Postmortem - Where to now for the Liberal Party?
In the wake of Australian Labor Party’s (ALP) victory in the 2007 Australian Federal Election, The Liberal Party (LP) has been left without office in any state or territory in Australia. Already, the recriminations have begun on what went wrong, and the direction of the LP post-Howard, without government and a foot to stand on, is under turmoil. There are so many questions that need to be answered. Here are some of them.
What went wrong?
Well, pretty much everything as soon as Kevin Rudd got the Labor leadership, although prior to this there were already signs that all was not well. We should start with Workchoices, the legislation that was more based on individual ideologies rather than genuine desire within the community. While many have claimed that this single piece of legislation has had a major impact on the voting choices of the Australian public, there is much to say that this legislation wasn’t the main reason that people changed their vote as some within the Union movement would love to claim. Yes, it was a horrendous piece of legislation that changed the complexion of the landscape of employer-employee relations in favour of employees. Yes, it predominated much of the news and became a massive bugbear for the government, so much so that it changed the name and introduced a fairness test to ameliorate concerns. But, one piece of legislation does not make an election. The problem is that, if anything, a lot of things went wrong for the government in the last 12 to 15 months. Beyond Workchoices, there were other questions that went poorly answered.
First question was one about the environment, or rather, the lack of innovation or leadership from the government on addressing the growing concerns raised by the public (locally and internationally) on global warming/climate change. As evidenced by the lengthening drought, the lack of genuine initiatives to combat the water crisis in the food bowl of Australia, the government did not proactively respond to these concerns. While the ALP did not provide a brilliant response, they did enough to differentiate themselves from the LP. Sign Kyoto, move on. The LP was left spluttering in their wake with the line of looking beyond Kyoto, not realizing that perceptions of actually doing something by signing Kyoto meant much more than the actual value of the treaty itself.
The second question was the one about the leadership of the party itself. This came to a head in 2006 when it was revealed that there had been a secret agreement between John Howard and Peter Costello about a leadership transition, which did not occur. What happened was similar to the Kiribilli agreement between Bob Hawke and Paul Keating of the early 1990s, only in this script, the treasurer didn’t challenge directly and walk off with the prize. This issue continued to haunt the LP all through 2007 in some way, shape or form, culminating with the unprepared announcement that Howard would be retiring “somewhere in his fifth term”. What followed was a poorly scripted and thought out campaign to present both Howard and Costello as part of a team, when it had been made very clear over the years that both couldn’t stand the other. This was made even more ridiculous with the sight of both of them appearing on Today Tonight, of all shows, as a happy brotherhood. While the hypocrisy was evident, the reality was that Peter Costello, beyond him being a good bloke, was not good leadership material come election time. If anything, this was played upon by the ALP throughout the campaign, especially once it became very clear that Howard was retiring. Also, if anything, the LP misread the people when it came to the “it’s time” factor. While Costello may not have been as popular as Howard in a head-to-head battle with Rudd, if there had been enough time for Costello to build a base and establish himself as his own man (say 12-18 months), on Saturday the election may have been a much more close-run thing.
The third question was the one about leadership, and whether or not the ALP or the LP presented a clear vision for the future, and this one also stems towards another problem of the campaigns themselves. Yes, the ALP vision was blurry and lacked a huge amount of developed substance at many levels, but the LP’s agenda was exactly the same. The difference was that the LP’s message was one that asked voters to look back and consider their track record, and say “if you like that, stick with us” while not spending more time developing a vision of the future. What the ALP did here was actually create some sort of blurred vision of where Australia was to be, and yes, it lacked any sort of real genuine innovations or developments, but it was a message that was forward thinking and looking towards 2010 and 2013, rather than one that was based on past performance. The reality was that the LP didn’t look as if they had a vision of the future, and again, perception is important to people. The LP and their senior members were the past, and the ALP presented themselves as the future.
The fourth question was the campaign itself and how the LP’s election campaign was poorly run in comparison to the ALP’s campaign. Beyond the first week, when the ALP was caught by the LP tax cut announcement, the ALP campaign remained completely on track and responsive to anything the LP threw at it. If anything, the LP looked more harried and under pressure as the weeks drew on, making more mistakes in their press conferences, off-camera comments, and other various smaller errors that spoke extensively of a lack of control by the party of the message that was being presented. This culminated on the week prior to the election of LP members being caught distributing fake flyers that were supposedly in support of the ALP’s stance on Bali. If anything, this controversy hurt the LP enormously and took the party off message for the remaining three days of the campaign. But, there were more of these moments during the entire month. The leak that Malcolm Turnbull had attempted to persuade the LP cabinet to ratify Kyoto was one. Another would have been that Howard raised the question of his leadership during the APEC summit prior to the election. These little mistakes translated into periods where the message was no longer under party control, and the LP had too many of these to deal with in comparison to the ALP.
Who is going to lead now?
This has to be the most complicated question to answer for the LP. There is a massive dearth of genuine talent within the parliamentary wing of the party after this election. John Howard has lost his seat. Peter Costello has announced that he will not put his hand up for the leadership. Mal Brough, who was touted as a potential leader, has lost his seat. A massively reduced majority of members has left only a small selection of potential people to lead the party to 2010.
If anything, they will be, as The Age put it on Sunday 25 November, drinking from a poisoned chalice. The party has been decimated by this loss, and now out of government across the entire country, they will face more problems than just a dearth of political talent (see below). The possibility of the LP, as it currently stands, of making a return to government in 2010 is very poor indeed, thus it is very understandable why Peter Costello has chosen not to lead the party in opposition. While he would make a formidable opposition leader, his association with the Howard government would be a massive burden to carry, especially in light of the strength of the change of mood within the electorate. He knows that 2010 may not be a possibility, and if he was not going to stand again in 2010, then there would be little point in warming a seat for the next parliamentary LP leader.
This leaves a very small, and unimpressive field to choose from. The following people have already declared their intentions: Malcolm Turnbull, Tony Abbott and Brendan Nelson. Other possibilities include Alexander Downer and Julie Bishop. Joe Hockey has already ruled himself out, and other such as Andrew Robb and Christopher Pyne have possibly put their hand up as deputy leader. Beyond that, there isn’t much to choose from in terms of individuals that could be nominated as leader. The one person that was being groomed for the potential position, Mal Brough, lost his seat during the election.
Each individual that have declared or are possibilities have their own incumbent problems. Malcolm Turnbull is smart and a new face within the LP, but his inexperience and polish as a politician really showed during this campaign. Furthermore, he is not a unifying force within the party at this point, he remains a divisive figure. The same could be said for Tony Abbott, although for different reasons. Abbott lacks any sort of genuine political charisma, but retains every part (if not more) of Howard’s conservatism. If anything, the LP under Abbott would become even more conservative than it is now, something that may annihilate the party. His performance during the election campaign was appalling. Brendan Nelson has the problem of having the historical ALP links count against him, but he also lacks charisma and has seen to mishandle the two portfolios that he was tasked with while in cabinet (Education and Defence). Because of this he was never seen during the campaign. Alexander Downer, while the most experienced in this group, would probably not run. He has been there already, and now he will not enjoy doing it again. There are also questions of his longevity in parliament, and he has hinted that he may not be around past 2010. There are also questions of his popularity in cabinet.
This leaves Julie Bishop, who probably would not be a bad choice if she chooses to run for opposition leader. She would make a good representation, but probably lacks experience as an opposition leader. Of course, we said the same thing about Kevin Rudd when he took the opposition leader job in December 2006. The other person, that is not running, is Joe Hockey, and his moderate position would have been a good rallying point for the LP to run to, despite his problematic association with Workchoices.
What has become clear is this. The person that will lead the Liberal Party to their next election victory may not yet be in parliament. The chances of the party returning to power in 2010 are slim, and it may be 2013 before they have a real chance of ending the ALP reign.
What direction to take?
This may seem a stupid question to ask, but it is not a simple as it seems. Now that they are out of government across the country, the LP’s ability to muster support and rebuild after this loss will be severely hampered. Paul Kelly on Insiders put it succinctly - they will have a very limited ability to raise funds and seek patronage. Furthermore, the massive factionalism that used to claim the ALP has already begun to surface in the LP, and this needs to be dealt with swiftly by the new leader. Beyond that, a serious bout of soul searching and rebuilding of the party needs to be undertaken. The problem is that if the recriminations within the party continue, there won’t be much of a party left to be a viable opposition to the ALP. Just because the LP has not been in opposition does not mean that they should automatically give up. They need to take this blow as part of the process, examine the causes, fix them, and move on. This will be tough, but, in a nutshell, that is what needs to happen. Even a complete re-examination of the basis of the party and its founding values needs to be considered and revisited. Whatever it takes to rebuild the party and forge it into something that could be considered a political force again. That’s as simple as it gets. But, sometimes simplicity is the key to success.
What went wrong?
Well, pretty much everything as soon as Kevin Rudd got the Labor leadership, although prior to this there were already signs that all was not well. We should start with Workchoices, the legislation that was more based on individual ideologies rather than genuine desire within the community. While many have claimed that this single piece of legislation has had a major impact on the voting choices of the Australian public, there is much to say that this legislation wasn’t the main reason that people changed their vote as some within the Union movement would love to claim. Yes, it was a horrendous piece of legislation that changed the complexion of the landscape of employer-employee relations in favour of employees. Yes, it predominated much of the news and became a massive bugbear for the government, so much so that it changed the name and introduced a fairness test to ameliorate concerns. But, one piece of legislation does not make an election. The problem is that, if anything, a lot of things went wrong for the government in the last 12 to 15 months. Beyond Workchoices, there were other questions that went poorly answered.
First question was one about the environment, or rather, the lack of innovation or leadership from the government on addressing the growing concerns raised by the public (locally and internationally) on global warming/climate change. As evidenced by the lengthening drought, the lack of genuine initiatives to combat the water crisis in the food bowl of Australia, the government did not proactively respond to these concerns. While the ALP did not provide a brilliant response, they did enough to differentiate themselves from the LP. Sign Kyoto, move on. The LP was left spluttering in their wake with the line of looking beyond Kyoto, not realizing that perceptions of actually doing something by signing Kyoto meant much more than the actual value of the treaty itself.
The second question was the one about the leadership of the party itself. This came to a head in 2006 when it was revealed that there had been a secret agreement between John Howard and Peter Costello about a leadership transition, which did not occur. What happened was similar to the Kiribilli agreement between Bob Hawke and Paul Keating of the early 1990s, only in this script, the treasurer didn’t challenge directly and walk off with the prize. This issue continued to haunt the LP all through 2007 in some way, shape or form, culminating with the unprepared announcement that Howard would be retiring “somewhere in his fifth term”. What followed was a poorly scripted and thought out campaign to present both Howard and Costello as part of a team, when it had been made very clear over the years that both couldn’t stand the other. This was made even more ridiculous with the sight of both of them appearing on Today Tonight, of all shows, as a happy brotherhood. While the hypocrisy was evident, the reality was that Peter Costello, beyond him being a good bloke, was not good leadership material come election time. If anything, this was played upon by the ALP throughout the campaign, especially once it became very clear that Howard was retiring. Also, if anything, the LP misread the people when it came to the “it’s time” factor. While Costello may not have been as popular as Howard in a head-to-head battle with Rudd, if there had been enough time for Costello to build a base and establish himself as his own man (say 12-18 months), on Saturday the election may have been a much more close-run thing.
The third question was the one about leadership, and whether or not the ALP or the LP presented a clear vision for the future, and this one also stems towards another problem of the campaigns themselves. Yes, the ALP vision was blurry and lacked a huge amount of developed substance at many levels, but the LP’s agenda was exactly the same. The difference was that the LP’s message was one that asked voters to look back and consider their track record, and say “if you like that, stick with us” while not spending more time developing a vision of the future. What the ALP did here was actually create some sort of blurred vision of where Australia was to be, and yes, it lacked any sort of real genuine innovations or developments, but it was a message that was forward thinking and looking towards 2010 and 2013, rather than one that was based on past performance. The reality was that the LP didn’t look as if they had a vision of the future, and again, perception is important to people. The LP and their senior members were the past, and the ALP presented themselves as the future.
The fourth question was the campaign itself and how the LP’s election campaign was poorly run in comparison to the ALP’s campaign. Beyond the first week, when the ALP was caught by the LP tax cut announcement, the ALP campaign remained completely on track and responsive to anything the LP threw at it. If anything, the LP looked more harried and under pressure as the weeks drew on, making more mistakes in their press conferences, off-camera comments, and other various smaller errors that spoke extensively of a lack of control by the party of the message that was being presented. This culminated on the week prior to the election of LP members being caught distributing fake flyers that were supposedly in support of the ALP’s stance on Bali. If anything, this controversy hurt the LP enormously and took the party off message for the remaining three days of the campaign. But, there were more of these moments during the entire month. The leak that Malcolm Turnbull had attempted to persuade the LP cabinet to ratify Kyoto was one. Another would have been that Howard raised the question of his leadership during the APEC summit prior to the election. These little mistakes translated into periods where the message was no longer under party control, and the LP had too many of these to deal with in comparison to the ALP.
Who is going to lead now?
This has to be the most complicated question to answer for the LP. There is a massive dearth of genuine talent within the parliamentary wing of the party after this election. John Howard has lost his seat. Peter Costello has announced that he will not put his hand up for the leadership. Mal Brough, who was touted as a potential leader, has lost his seat. A massively reduced majority of members has left only a small selection of potential people to lead the party to 2010.
If anything, they will be, as The Age put it on Sunday 25 November, drinking from a poisoned chalice. The party has been decimated by this loss, and now out of government across the entire country, they will face more problems than just a dearth of political talent (see below). The possibility of the LP, as it currently stands, of making a return to government in 2010 is very poor indeed, thus it is very understandable why Peter Costello has chosen not to lead the party in opposition. While he would make a formidable opposition leader, his association with the Howard government would be a massive burden to carry, especially in light of the strength of the change of mood within the electorate. He knows that 2010 may not be a possibility, and if he was not going to stand again in 2010, then there would be little point in warming a seat for the next parliamentary LP leader.
This leaves a very small, and unimpressive field to choose from. The following people have already declared their intentions: Malcolm Turnbull, Tony Abbott and Brendan Nelson. Other possibilities include Alexander Downer and Julie Bishop. Joe Hockey has already ruled himself out, and other such as Andrew Robb and Christopher Pyne have possibly put their hand up as deputy leader. Beyond that, there isn’t much to choose from in terms of individuals that could be nominated as leader. The one person that was being groomed for the potential position, Mal Brough, lost his seat during the election.
Each individual that have declared or are possibilities have their own incumbent problems. Malcolm Turnbull is smart and a new face within the LP, but his inexperience and polish as a politician really showed during this campaign. Furthermore, he is not a unifying force within the party at this point, he remains a divisive figure. The same could be said for Tony Abbott, although for different reasons. Abbott lacks any sort of genuine political charisma, but retains every part (if not more) of Howard’s conservatism. If anything, the LP under Abbott would become even more conservative than it is now, something that may annihilate the party. His performance during the election campaign was appalling. Brendan Nelson has the problem of having the historical ALP links count against him, but he also lacks charisma and has seen to mishandle the two portfolios that he was tasked with while in cabinet (Education and Defence). Because of this he was never seen during the campaign. Alexander Downer, while the most experienced in this group, would probably not run. He has been there already, and now he will not enjoy doing it again. There are also questions of his longevity in parliament, and he has hinted that he may not be around past 2010. There are also questions of his popularity in cabinet.
This leaves Julie Bishop, who probably would not be a bad choice if she chooses to run for opposition leader. She would make a good representation, but probably lacks experience as an opposition leader. Of course, we said the same thing about Kevin Rudd when he took the opposition leader job in December 2006. The other person, that is not running, is Joe Hockey, and his moderate position would have been a good rallying point for the LP to run to, despite his problematic association with Workchoices.
What has become clear is this. The person that will lead the Liberal Party to their next election victory may not yet be in parliament. The chances of the party returning to power in 2010 are slim, and it may be 2013 before they have a real chance of ending the ALP reign.
What direction to take?
This may seem a stupid question to ask, but it is not a simple as it seems. Now that they are out of government across the country, the LP’s ability to muster support and rebuild after this loss will be severely hampered. Paul Kelly on Insiders put it succinctly - they will have a very limited ability to raise funds and seek patronage. Furthermore, the massive factionalism that used to claim the ALP has already begun to surface in the LP, and this needs to be dealt with swiftly by the new leader. Beyond that, a serious bout of soul searching and rebuilding of the party needs to be undertaken. The problem is that if the recriminations within the party continue, there won’t be much of a party left to be a viable opposition to the ALP. Just because the LP has not been in opposition does not mean that they should automatically give up. They need to take this blow as part of the process, examine the causes, fix them, and move on. This will be tough, but, in a nutshell, that is what needs to happen. Even a complete re-examination of the basis of the party and its founding values needs to be considered and revisited. Whatever it takes to rebuild the party and forge it into something that could be considered a political force again. That’s as simple as it gets. But, sometimes simplicity is the key to success.