From crossbench to DJ decks: former top national pollie hits Adelaide
One of the nation’s best-known former political party leaders is playing a DJ set in Adelaide before jetting back to Canberra’s Parliament House for gas tax talks.
Former federal Greens leader Adam Bandt will perform a guest DJ set at the Lime Cordiale-run festival in Adelaide this Saturday before returning to Canberra to lobby for a gas export tax.
Since leaving politics and taking a four-month social media hiatus, Bandt re-emerged in January as CEO of the Australian Conservation Foundation – a partner of the Lime Green Festival, organised by the similarly named pop-rock duo.
Australian Conservation Foundation – a registered charity and a bipartisan organisation, with no official link to the Greens – is one of the country’s oldest conservation campaign groups, with early wins including World Heritage Listing the Great Barrier Reef.
Bandt – who has a love for European dance music – made his DJ debut at Melbourne night-club Revolver during the 2025 federal election campaign and seized the opportunity to keep spinning in his new gig.
The former party leader, who was born in Adelaide and grew up on Hindmarsh Island, last year lost his previously safe seat of Melbourne after 16 years.
The festival, featuring performances by Lime Cordiale, The Dreggs and aleksiah at Adelaide University’s Cloisters, is designed to be entirely off-grid, and a slice of ticket proceeds goes towards algal bloom recovery.
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Bandt’s appearance is a part of his mandate to turn the 60-year-old climate organisation into a “movement so big it can’t be ignored” by policymakers.
“We won’t save the planet with doom and gloom – our plan is to have fun and dance alongside great Australian artists while working hard to hold government and big corporations to account for trashing our environment,” Bandt said.
“I can’t wait to warm up Lime Green Festival with a DJ set and meet lots of folks in the crowd to chat about meaningful ways to take climate action.”
Before getting behind the decks on Saturday, Bandt will appear at the Conservation Council’s Santos AGM rally outside the convention centre on Thursday morning.
After leaving Adelaide on the weekend, Bandt will make a short stop home in Melbourne before heading to Canberra to lobby for a 25 per cent gas export tax.
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Bandt will make his first appearance at Parliament House since losing his seat on Tuesday for a federal Senate inquiry into taxing gas resources.
The inquiry, led by Victorian Greens Senator Steph Hodgins-May, was established at the end of March to investigate how Australian oil and gas resources are taxed and the impacts of the Middle East conflict on Australia’s gas and oil prices.
The Australian Conservation Foundation recommended the existing Petroleum Resource Rent Tax Assessment Act be repealed and replaced with a gas-exports-focused royalty regime.
Bandt pointed to research from Victoria University that showed a 25 per cent tax would have redirected about $23 billion in additional revenue to government coffers in 2022.
“The federal government can provide relief for Australians being stung by high prices at the petrol station and the supermarket checkout by reining in the greed of the gas giants,” Bandt said.
A Wood Mackenzie report commissioned by Australian Energy Producers said a 25 per cent tax would make new projects “uninvestable”, drive investment offshore and put future energy supply at risk.
Santos CEO Kevin Gallagher, Woodside CEO Liz Westcott and Chevron CEO Balaki Krishnamurthy have been requested to give evidence to the inquiry, and could be made to attend under Senate rules.
When asked about possible changes to gas export settings this week, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese said the federal budget will be next month.
The Senate inquiry will hand down its report before the federal budget.
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