Daniel Wills: Liberals ready for a second revolt as Premier Steven Marshall faces battle with his own political base on land tax change
Liberals are splitting ... again. This time it’s over a hike to land tax. The Advertiser has spoken with the dissidents, who reveal the fight that Premier Steven Marshall has to confront.
A strong foundation is essential, whatever you’re building.
New cracks are now emerging in the Liberal Party, this time over land tax changes which strike a key part of its base and could make the whole structure wobble.
There’s a famous anecdote about a US official trying to make small talk with a Chinese leader and asking what they thought about the French Revolution. The response, as folklore records, was that it was far too early to tell.
State Budgets can be similar.
Often what seems like the biggest issue on the day can soon sink into obscurity and something that seemed relatively benign, like a crack down on ‘tax dodgers’ that will only affect people who always end up voting Liberal anyway, can in time become the biggest headache.
The Advertiser this week took the temperature of the Liberal Party as a whole, including influential partyroom members, as an industry-led campaign takes off against Treasurer Rob Lucas’ plans for a $40 million per year clawback of land tax by making it harder for people to avoid through using complex legal and ownership structures.
The strength of the feeling against the move, on both principled and hard political grounds, is striking.
Without delicate management, there is a real chance that arguments which are currently constrained to the partyroom and private discussions could spill over on the floor of State Parliament.
While the significant number of land tax rebels share a desire to have the changes killed, their reasons are varied.
The first is a philosophical rejection of higher taxes. Many Liberals toiled long and hard through the 16 years of exile in opposition, grinding their teeth at Labor decisions to hike taxes on households and business which, in their view, condemned SA to slow growth and worsened an exodus of bright people to opportunities in the eastern states.
Many made solemn personal commitments that they would put a stop to such moves if given the chance.
They also fear that the tax changes feed into a growing sense that the State Government can’t be relied on to keep its promises, despite Premier Steven Marshall’s single-minded focus for the first year of his administration on building a new brand of trustworthiness.
Labor’s campaigns on privatisation and fees and charges have had impacts in their own rights, but are also beginning to affect the bigger and more significant narrative about credibility.
Some Liberals fear there could be an acute backlash in key seats that were essential to them breaking the drought of election wins in March last year.
The Liberals won the wealthy CDB and surrounds seat of Adelaide, held by Child Protection Minister Rachel Sanderson, by a whisker.
There are also significant communities of property investors in the northeastern suburbs around Tea Tree Gully and Campbelltown, often aspirational mortgage belt and retiree types that are important swing demographics, who fear they will be affected by complex tax changes that are still not well understood.
This has the most skittish Liberals concerned they will be “punished for a betrayal” in the bellwether seat of Newland and Speaker Vincent Tarzia’s electorate of Hartley, even if Labor doesn’t promise any real shift on the tax policy.
Many are also fearful that supporters who could never bring themselves to cross the Liberals at the ballot box, will lose enthusiasm. The concern is that those true believers will be less likely to turn out to volunteer, and an segment of donors will decide there’s better places for their hard earned cash.
Perhaps the more insidious problem is a growing gulf between the Cabinet and key players on the backbench.
Mr Marshall’s executive team has been remarkably stable in the nearly year and a half since they’ve controlled the biggest table.
It’s quite uncommon for a rookie government to go this long without losing a minister and, despite a few hiccups along the way, none look vulnerable enough that they’re likely to fall and make way anytime soon.
As one Liberal MP put it, there’s no “carrot” to stop the frustrated from acting out. Often, hanging a future ministry in front of a disgruntled MP as the reward for discretion and discipline can be enough to keep them quiet.
When advancement seems unlikely, there’s nothing to lose.
More than that, many on the backbench feel that those on the inside of the Cabinet room have gotten carried away with themselves since the March election win, and are riding roughshod over the rest.
Division need not be death for a party, despite what the maxim claims.
Take the very recent example of new mining legislation, where four Liberals backbenchers broke away from the peck to vote against their government.
Cabinet got what it wanted, as Mr Marshall and ministers kept good relations with a mining industry which is essential to achieving the campaign goal of ‘more jobs’. The four horseman went back to their communities as heroes, having martyred themselves in defence of the hardworking farmer.
The caravan moved on. No one seriously suggested that a principled disagreement reflected badly on the leader. But another bout of floor crossing, which is still far from certain, would form a pattern, and feed a much bigger story about the Liberal house divided.