Weatherill’s risky step to the Right
While Federal Liberals were busy trying in vain to spill blood on their partyroom floor, state Labor was slaughtering a few sacred cows of its own.
When Jay Weatherill spoke of unveiling “bold” policy solutions that would make people “gasp”, you didn’t have to be a nuclear physicist to glean that Labor’s historic opposition to the nuclear industry would likely come under review at some point.
The manner of the review is peculiar; royal commissions are usually a tool for high-level inquisitions to compel participants who may be otherwise disinclined to participate. Weatherill’s nuclear “debate” is rather an industry-wide forum which will not find itself short of participants eager to throw in their two cents.
One imagines the fact that the phrase itself – Royal Commission – is so emotive is what appeals to the populist in our Premier. In SA, it conjures events such as the State Bank collapse, Eugene McGee’s hit-run scandal and child protection failures. A Royal Commission conveys: this is a big deal.
But if the manner of the inquiry is largely symbolic, it is important symbolism for the Labor Party. There are few debates more wont to divide the ALP’s “broad church” than nuclear. Every step of reform, from ditching the redundant “three mines” cap on domestic uranium production to the sale of yellowcake to India, has been accompanied by public soul-searching and finger-pointing. Perhaps the pugnacious nature of a Royal Commission will sublimate Labor’s own internal turmoil.
You might like
So is it bold?
No, in the sense that it is another discussion about future policy direction, rather than a policy per se. Weatherill concedes the fruits of this inquiry, if indeed it bears fruit, will not blossom until well after his political lifetime; the state’s economic need, however, is somewhat more pressing.
This, though, is rooted in Weatherill’s conception of democracy: radical policy cannot be entered into lightly, and without a full and frank discussion about the implications. He suggested that if the commission made pro-nuclear recommendations, and if these recommendations were carried by a future Labor conference, he would then take them to an election before proceeding with legislation.
With no timeline placed on the commission’s findings though, we may never even get that far.
Stay informed, daily
But it is bold in the sense that Labor has taken a very significant step in shucking off its historic opposition to an industry from which South Australia is uniquely poised to benefit.
Last week, Weatherill threw out a discussion about timezones to get people talking – which, indeed, it did. The fact, however, that he seemed equally disposed towards a move towards western time as eastern suggested this was change for its own sake. In short, we feel we should shift our timezone – now, in which direction should it move?
A review of Hansard betrayed the long-held views of many on the Labor benches against any such change, but critics were quick to argue that a politician’s position on a subject five or even 10 years ago is immaterial.
I certainly don’t begrudge any politician changing their mind on an issue, but that doesn’t make their historic arguments irrelevant – particularly when they’re arguments as amusing as Tom Koutsantonis’s riposte that SA investors benefit from the stockmarket opening half an hour later than on the eastern seaboard.
The nuclear question, though, is no mere “time zone” debate: it goes to the core of many MP’s ideological beliefs. And I don’t even need to scour Hansard to tell you that if the Labor cabinet is now in favour of exploring a nuclear future, it means a great many of Weatherill’s ministers have retreated dramatically from positions they’ve previously held, in most cases strongly.
That is significant, and it is an ideological shift that perhaps only Weatherill – a left-winger governing with Right assent – could have orchestrated.
Both changing SA’s timezone and increasing its role in the nuclear fuel cycle are policy hobby-horses long ridden by Business SA, and it’s conspicuous that Weatherill is adopting so much of the lobby’s agenda. He firmly believes that Labor must reconnect with two interest groups — business and the regions, personified now in his cabinet by Martin Hamilton-Smith and Geoff Brock.
What he must remember, of course, is that he won the 2014 election (albeit narrowly) despite these groups voting against Labor in droves, and that no matter how fully he adopts their policy agenda, they remain the natural constituency of the Liberal Party.
In seeking to broaden Labor’s mandate, Weatherill’s challenge will be to retain those inner-suburban swinging voters that got him over the line in the first place. To sacrifice their support for a stake in the business vote would be a bold gambit indeed.
Want to see more stories from InDaily SA in your Google search results?
- Click here to set InDaily SA as a preferred source.
- Tick the box next to "InDaily SA". That's it.
