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 ANALYSIS |
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Politics
Who should win on November 24?
Mike Dobbie, October 22, 2007
Mike Dobbie looks at where the parties stand as the election campaign kicks off.
The phoney campaign is finally over. A six-week struggle has begun in earnest. Does the Howard Government deserve yet another term to take it beyond its 12th year in power? That’s what the electorate must consider when it goes to the polls on November 24.
Both major parties are stressing leadership. Prime Minister John Howard calls it “the right leadership”. “By common agreement Australia is enjoying a remarkable level of national prosperity at the present time... I believe very passionately that this country’s best years can lie ahead of us... This country does not need new leadership. It does not need old leadership. It needs the right leadership...
“The right leadership... has the experience to further expand the prosperity of the Australian economy and to ensure that everybody gets a fair share of it,” Howard said at his press conference shortly after he returned from Yarralumla. “Love me or loath me, the Australian people know where I stand on all the major issues of importance,” he said, blithely ignoring his back-flip on reconciliation just four days earlier. At the beginning of the week, the polls suggested that the electorate loathed Howard. The Labor mantra, describing him as a “clever and cunning politician” (code for “too smart and sneaky by half”) was clearly being reflected in the polls. (However, a week is a long time in politics - by the end of the first week of campaigning the Liberal Party appears to have halved Labor's lead).
By contrast, Kevin Rudd’s slogan is indeed “New Leadership”. He stresses how the Liberal Party just last month was considering ditching Howard as leader. Indeed, the Liberals blundered a year ago and several times since when they had the opportunity to replace Howard with a new leader better able to woo back disaffected conservative voters prior to the election. Worse still, the decision by John Howard to step-down mid-term as PM if re-elected has not gone across well – it signals a wishy-washy approach to leadership: “vote for me and I won’t stay the course”.
Over the past 18 months, the Coalition has also blundered badly with WorkChoices, an ideologically-driven policy unnecessary at a time of the economic prosperity the Government is boasting about. The removal of long-held rights, the need for a “fairness test” to rein in employer powers unleashed by the new laws, and the resulting confusion and fear facing many workers and their families, have triggered widespread concern about the carefully-wrought balance between employer and employee rights have been radically tipped in favour of business.
In other areas the Coalition has been tripping over itself. In his short-time in the role, Kevin Andrews has blundered through his portfolio as immigration minister. Tony Abbott too has been remarkably flustered in health, and Peter Costello’s on-again off-again prime ministerial aspirations have taken the gloss off his otherwise strong performance as Treasurer and the Government’s best gun in the House. Defence Minister Brendan Nelson’s demeanour has dwindled into a funereal monotone, just hours before Howard began the Liberal’s election campaign. And another leadership aspirant Malcolm Turnbull looks wounded over Gunns’ pulp mill on the Tamar River with his seat under threat.
In terms of economic management, the greatest long-term threat to the economy is drought and climate change. The Coalition has not kept pace with public opinion on those issues and remains doggedly stuck in the past. It has yet to fashion a cogent comprehensive response to the immense challenge being faced by rural and urban in terms of water use.
While unemployment, at least the way the Australian Bureau of Statistics currently measures it, has dropped to 4.2 per cent, there is a massive skills shortage, particularly in the burgeoning resources industry, with the Government slow to respond to the challenge of a massive lift in skills training and apprenticeships to meet demand.
The Iraq war, the ministerial ineptitude over the AWB scandal, Andrew’s mishandling of the Dr Haneef case and inflammatory remarks regarding African refugees will gnaw away at the Government. And after 11 and a half years in power, the Government is beginning to look tired, albeit not as lazy as the Keating Government was from 1993-96.
But Rudd is not a shoe-in for the Lodge. He is still an unknown with the electorate yet to determine just where he stands on many issues. Unlike Mark Latham, he has largely returned to the Kim Beazley tactic of maintaining a small target in recent months. Labor’s response to WorkChoices has been remarkably muted for a party that represents working families and which may cause traditional ALP voters to drift to the Greens. Indeed the Greens are well positioned to end up with the balance of power in the Senate next year.
It should not be forgotten that Howard is the master election tactician. Rudd is untested and has often displayed a “deer caught in headlights” attitude when caught out on detail, policies and even the sustained mud-slinging by the Coalition. There are reasonable questions about the different stances adopted by Rudd (softer) and his deputy Julia Gillard (boots-and-all) on several issues, not least industrial relations.
Finally, Rudd needs to win 16 seats. Labor may struggle in Western Australia and Queensland is hard to read. The battle in the marginal seats will be fierce indeed. A six-week campaign will be dirty and there are plenty of opportunities for Rudd to mis-step. But the real challenge confronts Howard – his appeal to the electorate as being the “right leadership” sounds more like trying to disguise an FJ Holden as a Porsche.
More articles from this week's CompareShares newsletter:
Analysis: Market crash signals
Markets: Local market to drop on memories of '87
Stock picks for the long haul: Mineral Resources (MIN) and The MAC Services Group (MSL)
Election: Who should win on November 24?
Smart Investing: Rewind 1987: the lessons 20 years on
Markets: US market plunges on crash anniversary
Resident Trader: How to profit from volatility - part 2
Trading: Learn from the Barings Bank rogue trader's mistakes
Stock of the week: Malachite Resources NL
Expert Panel: Trading international shares using CFDs
Commodities: Raging oil bull feeds euphoria
Superannuation: Buying your dream home in your DIY fund
Expert Panel: Why buy an instalment warrant instead of a share
Whatever your views, you can discuss this article - or any of Mike's articles - on our message board Your 2 Cents, in the Analysis section.
Mike Dobbie is business consultant. He is a former managing editor with Fairfax Business Magazines.
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