media saying that: "I love politics. This is not an easy decision to make ... when something like that happens and when one of your children, quite frankly, has a near-death experience, it does make you reassess your life and your priorities". His son, Oliver was seriously injured in a boat accident while training with the Australian Defence Force Academy in February 2010. After politics On 14 February 2014 Minchin was appointed to the role of Australian Consul-General in New York, which he held until May 2017. His appointment followed the controversial termination of the Labor-appointed nominee to the position, Steve Bracks (the former Premier of Victoria), by the incoming Abbott Government in September 2013. In 2018 Minchin was appointed to a five-year term on the Foreign Investment Review Board. Policy positions Minchin has been a strong proponent of privatisation and wholesale labour market deregulation. He has defended the full privatisation of Telstra, and argued that the Commonwealth should sell its Telstra shares to buy a portfolio of other income-earning investments rather than spend the profits on national infrastructure. In March 2006, Minchin received extensive media coverage when he highlighted the dilemma his government faced in the field of industrial relations and aired his views about future policy proposals. Speaking at a conference of the H. R. Nicholls Society where he told the audience that the coalition "knew its reform to WorkChoices were not popular but the process of change must continue", and that "there is still a long way to go... awards, the IR commission, all the rest of it...", he went on to say "The fact is the great majority of the Australian people do not support what we are doing on industrial relations. They violently disagree." Tobacco In 1995 Minchin submitted a dissenting Senate report on the tobacco industry and the costs of tobacco-related illness that disputed the committee's statements that it believes cigarettes are addictive and that passive smoking is harmful. Minchin claimed the tobacco industry was over-regulated. He also disagreed with the conclusions about the addictiveness of nicotine and the harmfulness of passive smoking: A 2009 article in The Australian drew parallels between his stance on tobacco and his stance as a global warming denial. In 2007, Minchin admitted to smoking cannabis at high school and university. Climate change In a March 2007 letter to the founder of Clean Up Australia, Ian Kiernan, Minchin expressed