David Penberthy: Does David Speirs even want to be SA premier?

The question isn’t why does David Speirs bother. The question is whether David Speirs is bothering at all, writes David Penberthy.

At the lowest ebb of his political career John Howard found himself on the receiving end of one of the toughest front pages the Australian media ever produced.

In the late 1980s Howard faced three insurmountable challenges – leaking and sniping from the Andrew Peacock camp, the chaotic left-field threat of the Joh for PM campaign led by former Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Petersen, and an ascendant and charismatic opponent in Prime Minister Bob Hawke.

When Howard polled one of the lowest approval ratings ever recorded in Australian history, The Bulletin magazine asked cruelly but validly on its front page: “Mr 18 per cent – Why does this man bother?” The cleverly designed page featured a diminutive image of Howard, dwarfed by a towering number 18.

The same question is now being asked in SA of Opposition Leader David Speirs. Actually, not quite the same question.

The question isn’t why does David Speirs bother. The question is whether David Speirs is bothering at all. And the real problem David Speirs has isn’t that the question is being asked in any widespread fashion in the community. The real problem is that it is being asked within the Liberal Party itself.

Andrew Hough broke the story this week of internal Liberal consternation over Mr Speirs’ plans to take yet another overseas holiday.

I say yet another because there have already been two which raised some eyebrows in Liberal circles and gave a cheap pile of ammo to Labor figures, none more so than ALP rabble rouser Tom Koutsantonis who takes great delight in comically documenting Mr Speirs’ travel plans on Twitter.

There was a bit of background chatter last year when Mr Speirs disappeared for a holiday, believed to be in the United States where his brother is a professional golfer. That trip did not result in any media coverage.

The one which did was a trip he took in June to attend a cousin’s wedding in his birthplace in Scotland.

Now, the revelation that Mr Speirs was planning to return to Scotland for a second time to attend another cousin’s wedding has sparked the internal drama Andrew Hough revealed, with Liberal Party figures in disbelief that the Opposition Leader was hoping to head off again, forcing the cancellation of the trip.

SA Liberal Party Leader David Speirs at a press conference. Picture: NCA NewsWire / Morgan Sette

Why does any of this matter? He’s paying his own way. Everyone deserves a holiday, right?

Indeed they do. In fact Premier Peter Malinauskas has also taken breaks, lining them up with school holidays so that he and his wife can have some down time with their four young kids.

The problem Mr Speirs has is twofold. The first problem is that all the consternation over his travel is coming from within the Liberal Party itself. Nobody else knows anything about whether the guy is going to be showing up for work or not. It is an internal matter for him and his parliamentary colleagues, which has only ever become an external one because people are both unimpressed about it and talking about it.

The second bigger problem is one of timing. The first Scottish trip coincided with the State Budget brought down in June. This is the key political moment on the state parliamentary calendar, all the outlays and initiatives of the State Government are revealed to be probed and queried by a dutiful Opposition. This budget was especially vulnerable given the contentious decision of Treasurer Steven Mullighan to plunge SA further into debt to fund infrastructure on the never-never. It was a big political opportunity for the Liberals to lay a solid hit on Labor – and on the day it was brought down, that opportunity went begging because David Speirs was on the other side of the world.

The same issue was at play with wedding number two, which explains why some Liberals have been so keen to put the kybosh on the holiday, and also to make sure that the enterprising Mr Hough knew about it so he could write about it.

The timing of this second wedding would have meant Mr Speirs would have missed the first sitting week of the spring session of Parliament.

“Find someone who loves you like David Speirs loves missing Parliament for a Scottish wedding,” Tom Koutsantonis tweeted on Wednesday.

Labor might be laughing about it but the Liberals aren’t laughing at all.

The reason for their lack of mirth – it makes the party look like it knows it is doomed.

When you have a leader who looks like they don’t have their heart in it, it’s hard for the team to maintain morale. It’s hard for them to tell voters they’re serious about holding the government account, and are working hard to ensure that they become South Australia’s next government.

One of the few modest hits the Libs have laid on Labor of late has been their prosecution of Child Protection Minister Katrine Hildyard over her inordinate focus on the sport portfolio and her recent holiday amid documented failures with children in care.

But this attack is undone by Speirs’ own absences, and the growing perception that he knows he is just keeping the leader’s seat warm and is behaving accordingly.

I mean, it’s hard to attack a minister for being overseas when you’re doing it between wedding reception number one in Glasgow and wedding reception number two in Edinburgh, while also holding yourself out as South Australia’s alternative premier.

The Liberal ambivalence about the state of things was underscored this week with a chat we had on the radio with Opposition transport spokesman Vincent Tarzia. As a potential leadership aspirant, Tarzia may well have his own reasons for sounding ambivalent. But when we asked Tarzia whether he thought David Speirs was doing a good job, his reply that the job of Opposition is “never easy” didn’t sound like a ringing endorsement. It certainly wasn’t an emphatic declaration that he was doing a good job. But in fairness, it’s probably hard to do that good a job as the South Australian Opposition Leader when you’re not actually in South Australia.