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Hunter MP Dan ‘Repa’ Repacholi has today been overcome with the natural male phenomena of going quiet and being a bit surly, after learning that he’s not longer the biggest unit in his immediate circle.
This comes after Labor ran back their new political strategy of running enormous former athletes as candidates in regional electorates.
So far, this strategy has netted them a two from two success rate.
At the 2025 Federal Election, the people of Far North Queensland elected 45-year old Matt ‘Tiny’ Smith as the new Labor Member for Leichhardt. He is perhaps the only man in Australian politics that is bigger than Repacholi.
At 6 ft 8 inches and weighing in at a buck 20, Repacholi had spent the last Parliamentary term holding the indisputable title as the ‘Kahuna Of The House’
Unfortunately for the 42-year-old former coal miner, this all changed on Saturday night.
As a former professional basketball player for the Cairns Taipans, Matt Smith stands at 6 ft 11. An absolute behemoth.
While Repacholi has been more than open about his impressive weight loss journey, the fact of the matter is, there was a lot of pride attached to being man that cast shadows on every other Federal MP in Parliament House.
And despite being from the same political party, Repacholi can’t simply mask his sourness of being pipped by an even larger unit.
This toppling is been made worse by the fact that Matt Smith has more than doubled Repacholi’s margin with a 10.2% swing in his North Queensland electorate. However, the Member for The Hunter will argue that he was up against a One Nation candidate in a much rougher blue collar electorate – so these numbers are incomparable.
It is not yet known if Repacholi will continue with his standoffish and sulky manner, or if he will end up becoming best friends with Matt Smith, which is usually what usually happens to two highly competitive big units when they first get pissed together.
Prime Minister Albanese says that he hopes the two men can put the needless one-upmanship aside and work together in the new Parliament, but has flagged that Repacholi’s honest response to an indirect attack on his masculinity has only sured up his likelihood of being chosen as the first Minister for Men.
