Rex Jory: The problem of the seatwarmer politician

THEY can’t propose reasonable new polices. They can’t contribute to debate. As MPs, they don’t know what they’re doing. They’re seatwarmers — and we’re about get even more at the State Election, writes Rex Jory. But it’s partly the voters’ fault.

POLITICAL parties across Australia are struggling to find reasonable candidates to contest elections. The problem is surfacing again before the March 17 state election.

Many members who will be re-elected or enter State Parliament for the first time will not have the calibre or stature to make a major, worthwhile contribution to the political process. They will be seat warmers.

In the past 20 years there have been dozens of members who have served their time and taken their salary and pension without making a squeak of difference to the quality of debate or decision making. They have not sat in Cabinet or framed new policies. It’s a national problem which has serious implications for Australia. Put simply, poor candidates mean poor governments.

Even in Opposition, inadequate members are a liability. If the Opposition doesn’t perform with vigour and hold the government accountable, then the government becomes lazy, undisciplined, lethargic and careless. The result is poor economic management, slack control of finances and work practices and, ultimately, corruption.

The reasons political parties find difficulty in attracting good candidates are complex. Media and public scrutiny of candidates and members is far more intense than it was, say, 20 years ago. The media has diversified and expanded. Social media, driven by anonymous political activists, can be brutal and damaging.

Almost everyone today has a smartphone. Any indiscretion or presumed indiscretion by a member or candidate — or their family or friends — can be captured on film and spread on social media. Microphones and other recording devices — including mobile phones — can pick up private comments or asides and broadcast them to the world. The strict rules of political correctness are easily, if unintentionally, breached.

A harmless joke can suddenly become a major and offensive blunder. Anything written on texts or emails can — and often are — intercepted and put on social media. Even comments or actions made a decade or more ago can resurface. Computers provide ready access to historic indiscretions.

The political environment is so unpredictable that someone elected to parliament may be voted out at the next election — a maximum of three years federally and four years in the State Parliament.

There is no job security. Parliamentary superannuation has been eroded so that it is no longer an inducement to enter parliament. Politics is a unique occupation and people prepared to stand for public office deserve some additional protection. The incentives of job security or reasonable superannuation no longer exist.

For all these and other reasons the quality of candidates has fallen.

In Derek Reilly’s Wednesdays With Bob, former Prime Minister Bob Hawke lifts a corner on the problem. “Yeah. It’s become a popular game to sneer at and denigrate politicians. Some of it’s their own fault, or course. It’s a pity that we’re not getting the calibre of people into our parliaments that we should get. This is a problem particularly for the conservative side of politics.

“On our side (Labor), it’s more ideologically driven. You look at a businessman, successful businessman. He thinks about politics and he looks at the increasing intrusiveness of the media into his private life, not only of himself but of his family. I think a lot of them are saying: ‘Bugger it. It’s not worth it’.”

While it’s true Labor has less trouble finding candidates they are often party hacks, hangers-on who have left school or university, got a job with a union or as a ministerial adviser and then won factional backing to enter parliament.

They have never worked in private enterprise, never struggled to run a business. Their sole income has come from the public purse. In the main, fair average quality, at best. The dearth of genuine talent entering our parliaments is a serious and perhaps worsening problem.

French philosopher Joseph de Maistre said: “Every country has the government it deserves and in a democracy people get the leaders they deserve.” That may well be the case on March 17.