The Day Silent Australia Roared
It was always Labor’s election to lose.
National polling, for three consecutive years, gave them a solid lead. The Coalition Government had been divided, changing its leader mid-course, and seemed completely incapable of handling the intertwined issue of energy policy and climate policy. The Coalition was also reeling from the electoral thrashing they received at the Victorian State election, and in the Queensland seat of Longman.
Although many economic indicators favoured the Government, its narrative being that it had finally returned Australia to an oft-promised-but-ne’er-delivered budget surplus, and that jobs growth had been quite strong, they were still firmly on the back foot. The findings of the financial services royal commission, as well as the Fair Work Commission’s decision to cut penalty rates, fed into Labor’s ‘top end of town’ rhetoric of wage stagnation and worker exploitation. This paired nicely with Labor’s traditional policy focus on health, education and egalitarianism.
That being said, Labor was already starting to make strategic errors; they failed to make a clear and articulate case on the penalty rates issue; they never successfully cut-through with the message that the Commission findings were incompatible with Labor values and that that’s why they weren’t going to stand by them. Likewise, the mixed messaging over the Adani mine, a product of considerable tension between the anti-coal progressives and the pro-coal unions was a terrible faux pas, that I’m sure they’ll want to forget.
Both Labor and the Liberal-National Coalition made promises on tax cuts, spending programmes and the like. The only, seriously unconventional measure made in the campaign was by Labor, which committed itself to a number of taxation increases to underwrite their lavish spending programmes. The burden of the increases fell squarely on self-funded retirees. This single issue gave the Government considerable leverage on which to attack Labor.
Interestingly, the polling was so dismal for the Coalition, that it may have been their saviour; Labor had to campaign to maintain its lead. To this extent, Bill Shorten was almost campaigning with the disadvantages of incumbency. He was, I would argue, the better-known public leader, having been Opposition Leader for almost six years. Whereas, Scott Morrison, whilst admittedly being a prominent Government minister for some time, had only been Prime Minister for a few months. Moreover, Bill Shorten proved that he was not a popular figure.
While leadership popularity is far from the last word in winning elections, it was still a millstone for Labor’s fortunes; they had a leader that was simultaneously tried, tested, and tiresome.
To my astonishment, Scott Morrison’s evangelism proved to be a fillip for the Liberal Party: his dynamism, energy and apparent delight in campaigning starkly contrasted with Malcolm Turnbull’s approach at the 2016 election, but more importantly with Shorten’s comparatively dour demeanour.
However, this election was won not through the comparison of leaders, but based upon voters’ assessments of the Opposition and their policy agenda. A multitude of successive polls demonstrated that voters did not rate the Government very highly, however, Labor saw a similar fate. Crucially, Labor opted to adopt the proposition ‘that you cannot win if you’re a small target’. There is a certain truth to this, but it allowed the Coalition to run an attack campaign, especially on Labor’s franking credits policy, for which incumbent Governments don’t usually have the chance. This opening would ultimately prove to be a fatal move for the Labor Party.
The Coalition did very poorly in affluent inner-city areas, which have become havens for Green voters. In Sydney, former Prime Minister Tony Abbott, who once called climate change ‘crap’, was ousted from his formerly ultra-safe Northern Beaches seat by Independent Zali Steggall, who had correctly identified climate change as the key issue in her electorate, and campaigned heavily on cutting emissions. In Victoria, historically the most progressive state in Australia, there were significant swings against the Government in leafy blue-ribbon seats, including the ultra-wealthy Higgins — where Labor and the Greens combined primary vote was a mere 20 votes shy of the Liberal Party’s. However, despite withering majorities in some of these formerly-safe seats, they were ultimately still returned to the Coaltion.
Thus, in the end the election was won in Queensland, which is relatively rich in coal and marginal constituencies. Climate Change is the key reason as to Queensland’s worsening tropical weather, fires & droughts, which have devastated significant parts of the state, from the Great Barrier Reef to the Granite Belt, but Queensland’s state economy has largely relied upon exploiting natural resources. Urban Queenslanders are acutely aware of the risks of climate change, as are rural Queenslanders — yet, the messages propagated to both communities during the campaign were certainly at odds.
The Coalition, unlike the Labor Party, were successful in straddling a deep divide between the values of rural and urban Queensland. In the regions as in the city, the same set of issues did not appeal to all, nor did the same personalities. The art of the campaign in Queensland was to weave nuance and at times contradictory messages for the different constituencies.
The seemingly spectacular demise of Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party, a populist, reactionary, know-nothing far right party was not assumed, but was warmly welcomed. Labor was certain on wanting to set binding caps on carbon emissions. This would have meant that Australia would generate more electricity from renewable sources, rather than exploiting natural resources, which still fuel most of Australia’s power plants. Without a doubt, the Labor Party’s indecisiveness on whether to permit the development of the Carmichael coalmine by the Indian conglomerate, Adani — certainly did more electoral harm than good in regional areas, and possibly nationally as well.
One Nation had far less potency as a channel for protest votes at this election than it had in 2016 — in the past it took Liberal-Coalition votes, due to the moderate leanings of Malcolm Turnbull’s government. Although, it still managed to have a 3% swing towards it. Moreover, in many Queensland seats where there were large swings towards One Nation, there were also large swings against Labor. This was important as One Nation’s preferences largely went to the Coalition. With Scott Morrison as Prime Minister — touting his evangelicalism saw many social conservatives that would have voted for Hanson return to the Coalition. However, One Nation still maintained a considerable swing towards them by appealing to disgruntled social conservatives that once voted Labor, but disliked its high spending, high taxing, and overly progressive agenda.
Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party with his $60 million advertising blitz usurped One Nation and its Leader Pauline Hanson. Reaping the anti-major party vote and then subsequently recapturing it for a major party has proven to be very difficult. A strong vote for Palmer in the Senate and the House of Representatives proved to be to the Government’s advantage.
Moreover, Palmer’s aggressive campaigns towards Labor, helped the Government even more than his preferences did.
What the Labor Party failed to realise in the campaign was that you do not have to convince the entire population of your policy mandate. As former Liberal Richard Evans said, roughly 48% of people are rusted-on Liberals and roughly 48% of people are rusted-on Labor supporters, which leaves approximately 4% of voters who decide most elections. This swinging bloc is the key to winning any election because they’re the only people politicians must worry about. In this election, Scott Morrison and the Coalition certainly realised this fact, Bill Shorten and Labor seemingly did not. Morrison was able to influence the middle 4% of voters by attacking Labor’s lavish spending programmes and persuading them that Australia could not afford such increases in public expenditure.
For policy wonks, it’s a sad realisation that the 2019 election may well be the last time an opposition party tries to run an election based upon in-depth policies. In many respects the Coalition strategy was faultless, it fought firmly as the underdog, shifted the focus and scrutiny on to Labor during the campaign, whilst not shackling the party to any policy promises. Thus, Scott Morrison can now be more ambitious than his campaign suggested. This is especially true with the defeat of Tony Abbott, the leader of the conservative wing of the party, as the Prime Minister now can move the party back to the centre. Whether Morrison will, only time will tell. However, having saved the party from near disintegration and commanding an increased majority in his own right, without making many clear policy pledges — Morrison has considerable room to manoeuvre, something his predecessors could only have dreamt of.
This article was written in response to an article by Connor Harvey, which can be found here.
Brodie Fennell is Vice President (Social) of the PPE Society, and a self-confessed Liberal.
