Richardson: SA Libs follow their head… and their heart
It was an event of high intrigue and thwarted ambition that seemed to capture the rapt attention of a nation, as allegiances dramatically shifted in a way that few saw coming.
Yes, last night’s finale of The Bachelor was all of that and more (or at least, that’s what I’m told… I didn’t watch it, honest!)
But there was another event this week that also briefly diverted the nation’s attention, as we had our annual round of Prime Ministerial Musical Chairs in Canberra.
Leadership coups are so dime a dozen in Australia these days you could set your watch by them – unless of course you were watching the coup unfold on a channel with a half hour delay on its “live” coverage emanating from the eastern seaboard (yep, cheers, Jay Weatherill!).
And in the end, just as that toothy lunk Sam Wood sent the ladies of Australia’s hearts a-flutter when he chose Snezana Markoski to be his official squeeze (no, I don’t know either, I think it rhymes with Parmigiana?), the Liberal Party won widespread poll plaudits by giving its proverbial rose to Malcolm Turnbull.
Leaving poor old shell-shocked Abbott to pick up the pieces of his shattered heart.
You can almost imagine the party-room ballot concluding with an appearance by the misty-eyed man formerly known as Andrew G, to dolefully declare: “Tony… you did not receive a majority. I’m sorry.”
Abbott quickly retreated from public view, initially too distraught to front the cameras, much like spurned Bachelor runner-up Lana Jeavons-Fellows (I swear, I didn’t watch it – this is all from Google! Really!)
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But just when it looked like the Liberals would all live happily ever after, the spiteful leaks recommenced in earnest and Steven “The Intruder” Marshall quickly jetted out to press the political case for SA.
When Jeavons-Fellows “intruded” on the Bachelor mansion (so I’m told), she reflected that “once the reality kind of sunk in that I was going to walk in there with ‘X’ amount of beautiful girls all trying to date the same guy it was a little bit daunting”.
Similarly, Marshall pushed to the front of a conga-line of state emissaries who were all angling for the same largesse.
The state Libs, for the most part, were cock-a-hoop about Abbott’s demise and Turnbull’s ascension. Well, of course they were.
Like Sam Wood, Turnbull looks great on paper: he’s smooth, assured and a self-made success.
But moreover, even Abbott’s supporters in SA readily concede he was a likely liability here.
“I think it’s fair to say that the whole time of Tony’s leadership he was never particularly popular in South Australia,” frontbencher and member for Mayo Jamie Briggs told ABC891 this week, nonetheless pointing to the reasonable local Liberal result at the 2013 federal poll as proof Abbott could still win votes “in spite of not ever being popular”.
The thing is, though, it was the decisions Abbott’s Government took after 2013 that really put it on the nose here in SA: pulling funding from the auto industry before pouring scorn on Holden for good measure; walking away (or trying to) from a promise to give a multi-billion dollar contract for 12 submarines to ASC, then pouring scorn on ASC for good measure. You might see a trend emerging here? It wasn’t enough to take contentious decisions; they had to be accompanied by intemperate – even bullying – rhetoric.
And it was done with no evident heed to the political fortunes of Marshall and his state colleagues.
Senior Coalition figures went on the Holden offensive three months before a state election the Liberals were widely expected to win. They didn’t.
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They argue the auto maker would have left regardless, and they’re probably right. So why go out of your way to look like you’re trying to hound them from the country?
Then-defence minister David “Canoe” Johnston’s foot-in-mouth moment on ASC came just days before a crucial by-election in Fisher. The Liberals lost by a mere nine votes.
So if Marshall looked like a kid in a candy store as he boarded the first flight out of Adelaide on Tuesday to join the Liberal swoon-fest – enthusing that Turnbull with his blinding smile and small-L liberal bent would be “very good for SA” – you can kinda understand why.
Of Abbott, he diplomatically lamented the demise of a “hard-working guy who made some difficult decisions”. Difficult for Steven Marshall, specifically.
Which, as far as calculating kiss-offs go, was the political equivalent of Sam telling Lana: “I know you’re the perfect girl, I just don’t know if you’re the perfect girl for me.”
Turnbull’s initial pitch for the Prime Ministership epitomizes where Abbott went astray, particularly in SA where he seemed to have no empathy for the mindset of a state watching its historic industries crumble as its unemployment soared.
“We need a style of leadership that explains those challenges and opportunities…a style of leadership that respects the people’s intelligence, that explains these complex issues and then sets out the course of action we believe we should take and makes a case for it,” Turnbull said as he announced his intention to stand for the Liberal leadership.
Consult and decide. Not announce and defend.
The new dynamics of the Federal Government will have its most overt reflection on the Federal Labor Opposition, but they will impact just as surely on the political landscape here in SA. Marshall was canny to align himself closely with Turnbull from the outset. As a moderate protégé of the Christopher Pyne faction, which now holds sway both in the state parliamentary party and among the SA federal contingent, he has followed his political heart. But he has also followed his head; Abbott was electoral poison in SA.
Marshall has thrown himself into Turnbull’s electoral embrace with the fervor of a new marriage. And, just like The Bachelor (which, just to reiterate, I have never, ever watched), they’re sure to live happily ever after.
That’s the way these things work… right?
Tom Richardson is a senior journalist at InDaily. His political column is published on Fridays.
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