Opinion
National politics last week had a faint sense of raggedness to it. There are two and a half months until Christmas and what is usually – unless bushfires break out – the long political break. The problems should not be exaggerated – the government is very far from being in serious trouble. Still, unless Labor can find a way of seizing the initiative, it will be wishing those months away.
The most prominent example of this creeping quality of unkemptness was the government’s swift retreat on the ATO’s decision to stop accepting credit cards for the payment of tax. On Friday, Jim Chalmers announced the transition period would be extended until mid-next year.
The most generous interpretation of events is that Labor was responsive. Faced with the consequence of an earlier announcement by the Reserve Bank – banning credit card surcharges – the government listened to concerns and fixed the problem. These are just the usual minor bumps of governing. And, as Chalmers pointed out, this was part of a package of changes – businesses will also save money as banks are forced to cut the fees they charge for credit card usage.
All this is true. But there are two other interpretations worth mentioning. One is that the government should have seen this coming. Remember, too, that while the surcharge ban was technically a Reserve Bank decision, it was something the government argued for in late 2024 – a point the Liberals have been making – and boasted about after it happened. That means shouldering responsibility for the problems, too.
None of this is damning. Politically, Labor made the right call in the end. But you can see, too, in all this just how sensitive the government is right now. Labor obviously knew it could not afford a flare-up among small businesses.
And that is in part because it is heading towards what it must hope are the final stages of dealing with lingering budget legislation, with its trust changes likely to reach parliament this week.
This is another aspect of the raggedness. Again, it is not really unusual for budget matters to be drawn out – nobody should pretend this is something unique to this government. But as long as there is unfinished business, there are opportunities for oppositions.
Angus Taylor clearly senses this. In recent weeks, he has ramped up attacks on Chalmers. First, he dismissed the treasurer as only a “media adviser”, fond of spin. Then he began to ask where Chalmers was (this was unfair – Chalmers had been in Japan). Finally, he started calling for Chalmers to resign.
This last was an extreme overreach, a bad habit Taylor seems to be developing (he calls this government both “socialist” and the “worst” in Australia’s history), leaving him nowhere to go when genuinely significant things happen.
It may also have worked better had Taylor not been dealing with his own raggedness. Last week, he announced the Coalition’s migration policy. It seemed broadly unloved and quickly attracted critics. It also raised two significant political issues.
The first was: why, when the interest rate hike had just landed with a thud, did Taylor choose to return almost immediately to One Nation territory? There is an answer of sorts: as I wrote two weeks back, Taylor has been focusing on culture war issues, presumably with the hope of moving on to the economy. Arguably, migration was the last of these. But it still seemed odd: finally, the politics were moving in his direction – and he zigzagged away.
The second was that the policy angered business so much. This is not automatically a problem for the Liberals the way it might once have been. When Peter Dutton tried to position the Coalition as separate from, even opposed to, the interests of big business, it sounded halfway plausible. This holds true when Andrew Hastie says it. But Taylor’s avowed strategy is all about the economy – and his image is tied to his own business acumen. All politicians are constrained by how the public sees them. With last week’s announcement, Taylor risked cutting against one of his personal strengths.
Now, presuming he can segue back onto the economy, the test arrives for Taylor. Can he prosecute the economic arguments? The conditions are immensely favourable – so how long will the Liberals give him?
Liberal minds – including Hastie’s – may be focused by Josh Frydenberg’s reappearance on the political scene as he releases his memoir. Asked by Paul Kelly whether the Liberals could overcome One Nation, Frydenberg offered this sharp challenge: “The answer is yes – but not with the trajectory we are on. There needs to be massive change on multiple fronts and the turnaround will not happen overnight.”
The small silver lining of the Coalition’s troubles, for Taylor, is that its fortunes have fallen so low that a small recovery could seem larger than it deserves to. One Nation overtook the Coalition in January’s Newspoll and in March’s Resolve poll. If the Coalition managed to catch One Nation again, it might be seen as proof of its renewed viability. It would have more credibility in arguing that the Coalition is the only realistic path to stop Labor.
In Victoria, the pollster Kos Samaras has suggested that voters in the state election may, as the ballot approaches, turn away from One Nation to the Liberals. The reason is that voters desperately want change and will back the party that can guarantee Labor won’t win again.
This should be what Taylor hopes for, too. Right now, though, federal Labor is a very, very long way from that. Yes, the federal government has had some tough months, but it remains hard to point to anything disastrous. If anything, the fairly minor topics (besides inflation) around which public discontent often seems to cluster – the ATO issue, melons, Kylie, the golf club – are pointers to how rare hugely significant mistakes are.
But the risk with raggedness is that it comes from tiredness. The two can amplify each other – and mistakes can multiply. In four and a half years, Labor has never really fallen too deeply into such cycles. Over the next 10 weeks it will have to hold its nerve. In politics, that’s a long, long time.
Sean Kelly is a regular columnist. He was an adviser to former prime ministers Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd.
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