How to fix a government that, no matter what it does, seems to come off badly. HG and Roy would have prescribed a spell in the room of mirrors – although perhaps not duds-down – to force its members to take a really good look at themselves.
Such introspection might reveal an uncomfortable truth: that by flexing their muscles and making themselves look strong, right-wingers in the Coalition party room are on a fool's errand that has made their prime minister look weak.
More News Videos
Tony Abbott lets loose
Little was off limits for the former PM who has been frank in his thoughts on the state of Australian politics, 18C, Malcolm Turnbull and his frontbench ambitions. Courtesy ABC.
Whether it be cracking the whip to demand superannuation changes, or niche ideological hobby horses such as the jihad against the "bad, bad, law" of section18C, and that "crook organisation" run by the "thought police" at the Human Rights Commission, conservative hardliners are merely hastening their own demise. If Turnbull fails, so do they.
Worse, they are ensuring that Bill Shorten becomes Australia's next prime minister.
![Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull: the arithmetic is running coldly against the Coalition.](/web/20161115040813im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/m/7/n/5/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsl9vo.png/1479075071981.jpg)
It really is that simple. As John Howard used to say, politics is governed by the iron laws of arithmetic.
Right now, that arithmetic is running coldly against the Coalition, which has slipped to 47-53 in the most recent Newspoll. It is the sixth such survey since the election and in not one of those has the Turnbull government led. The last four it has trailed.
Driving this fall is the poor standing of the Prime Minister – a once massively popular figure who, rightly or wrongly, was viewed as the antithesis of Tony Abbott. An optimistic, internet-savvy climate activist, pursuing economic advancement and social cohesion.
Yet as Turnbull's government has drifted from these orthodox preoccupations, reopening culture wars and waging noisy, pointless fights with statutory officers, so too have its fortunes. Ex-Ford workers are not grumbling to each other in the dole queues about 18C or the ABC.
![Bill Shorten: Australia's next prime minister, thanks to the Coalition.](/web/20161115040813im_/http://www.theage.com.au/content/dam/images/g/s/k/d/u/6/image.related.articleLeadwide.620x349.gsl9vo.png/1479075071981.jpg)
Turnbull's descent parallels a widespread feeling that his government is politically recidivist – that, despite its promises, its heart still yearns for Abbott-land.
Amazingly, this is no accident. Those on the conservative side of the party who opposed Turnbull's selection and remain hostile are pursuing a clear agenda to get him on their turf. Abbott, a humble backbencher who just happens to be the former prime minister, used a Radio National interview on Friday to praise the Turnbull government's steady return to "centre right" politics.
It's a resemblance that has not gone unnoticed by voters, which should be ringing alarm bells. But, in their righteous zeal, conservatives can see it no more clearly now than they could when the Abbott government indulged itself the first time around – spending weeks at a time fighting culture wars with individual ABC programs like Q&A;, where the comments of an audience member caused apoplexy.
The staggering win by the populist conservative Donald Trump last week threatens to push this project into overdrive, as like-minded populist conservatives here conclude that Trump's anti-PC courage and brash contempt for the educated consensus is a recipe for electoral victory here also. Or more accurately, perhaps, revenge.
This is bonfire of the vanities stuff, where the markers of bourgeois cultural hegemony – think marriage equality, feminism, climate change, multiculturalism, and now even free trade – are demonised so as to cleanse the corrupted body politic.
But Australia is not America, and nor is it Britain. Brexit happened before the Australian election and Trump after. Turnbull's skin-of-the-teeth win in July was not an electoral endorsement of Abbott-era policy so much as a line-ball vote of confidence in a PM who, despite worrying signs, was still believed in.
This is the lesson for conservatives. Had Turnbull called an election in November 2015 when his reputation preceded him and his approval rating was at record levels he would have stormed home.
Instead he waited, prevaricated, floated and then sunk ideas. Between the dithering, as one of his backbenchers called it, and the loss of Turnbull's distinct outline in the public mind, a massive poll advantage was whittled down to almost nothing.
Now it is gone, although whether it is gone forever depends on Turnbull asserting himself more, and on his colleagues accepting that they have to give him that space.
They should, because their own survival depends on it.
When Jay Weatherill became Premier of South Australia in 2011, his internal opponents, who had the numbers to block him, came to a mature and yet self-interested decision.
"They put him in the driver's seat, so it would have been crazy to deny him the keys," was how an insider to the deal explained it.
One result of this cool rationalism is that Weatherill, widely regarded as the pick of the state premiers, has overcome the deadly "it's time" factor to continue the ALP's long run in office in that state since 2002.
But Coalition recalcitrants and ideological warriors need not look even as far as SA for lessons. Right across the chamber, that "unelectable weakling", Bill Shorten, has demonstrated to devastating effect that the combination of party unity and focus can take you very close to the top in politics.
Room of mirrors time, for sure.
Mark Kenny is chief political correspondent.
69 comments
New User? Sign up