ANALYSIS
Katter backs Turnbull government
Crossbench MP Bob Katter announces he will give confidence and supply to a returned Coalition government. Vision courtesy ABC News 24.
PT1M21S 620 349Technically it remains unclear whether the contested premiership of Malcolm Bligh Turnbull will continue into a second term. Practically however, it is now virtually inevitable.
Officially, this declaration awaits the glacial count in half a dozen seats, all of which appear to be leaning towards sitting Coalition candidates. Unfortunately, that's the way it is folks: we might live in the era of email and digital immediacy, but this election has gone postal. Literally.
While Malcolm Turnbull is likely to be returned as Prime Minister, he faces a triple-threat to his leadership. Photo: Robert Shakespeare
If the Coalition picks up all six, it would make for a 79-seat haul and a governing majority of three. By no means a big buffer but a safe-enough win nonetheless. Seventy-seven is more likely because Hindmarsh in South Australia and Cowan in WA are likely Labor gains.
Even if the Coalition misses out on another two, it picked up the support of Bob Katter on Thursday - announced with all his mercurial flair - making a second term a pretty solid bet. Fellow independents such as Cathy McGowan, Andrew Wilkie, and Rebakah Sharkie might also guarantee supply and confidence in the interests of stability, so a second Coalition term can confidently be forecast.
This will make for uncomfortable reading for those who cannot separate forecasting from barracking, or prediction from wish. Indeed, election 2016, is notable for the self-appointed media experts who, in an ironic example of premature conclusion drawing - their key complaint about professional pundits - have loudly condemned the "MSM" for accurately reporting public surveys, and for suggesting a Turnbull win was the more likely result. It turned out it was.
Fairfax Media's depiction of an election on a knife-edge, or "cliffhanger" as it was headlined the day before, derived exclusively from these surveys, which by-the-way, were bang on.
To be sure the party spinners had different interpretations and promulgated these furtively in the final weeks and Turnbull himself said publicly he would win.
And there were senior voices even in the Labor camp who thought their side would fall 10 seats short, despite the prevailing view that it would be closer than the general commentary depicted.
The attention now will quickly turn to the complexity of the political equation facing Turnbull after his under achieving on the campaign trail.
Turnbull now faces a triple-threat to his leadership: diminished authority in a fracturing party room; reduced numerical command in the Parliament including a potentially unmanageable Senate; and feeding both of these, the diminished protection of popularity.
And just to add to that, the nation's triple-A credit rating has been put on negative outlook; tax cuts for big business face blockage; so-called retrospective superannuation changes from budget will be subject of an internal revolt; and Katter has warned his support would evaporate at the first hint of union bashing, making Turnbull's pursuit of the supposedly central trigger bills on union control, untenable.
This is not a government, it's a Rubik's Cube.
58 comments
More comments
Comments are now closed