SA Liberal Opposition leader Steven Marshall must decide what to do about the surprise state bank tax

SATURDAY’S poll results will be the first order of business as Opposition Leader Steven Marshall and his partyroom sit down on Monday and decide what to do about the surprise state bank tax.

Blocking the bank tax would go against Steven Marshall’s wish to lead a reformist Liberal government.

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SATURDAY’S poll results will be the first order of business as Opposition Leader Steven Marshall and his partyroom sit down on Monday and decide what to do about the surprise state bank tax.

It is a stunning result that confounds conventional wisdom and completely up-ends expectations that banks have become so unpopular that bashing them must bring a big political windfall.

All science in the wake of the federal banking tax found that it was a popular move. A Coalition government that is ultimately on the hook if push comes to shove and banks need a bailout, was backed by the Labor Party with little complaint other than from a few aggrieved bankers.

Yesterday’s Advertiser-Galaxy poll shows a complete reversal. While Liberal voters are most against the tax, a third of Labor supporters also have reservations, and an overall majority oppose it.

There are a few possible explanations, specific to both the unique political and economic situations in SA, that make some sense of this otherwise head-scratching turnaround.

The first is that this is a “go it alone” tax for a state often distinguished for the wrong reasons.

When Treasurer Tom Koutsantonis dropped his $370 million bombshell last week, he placed SA at contrast with the rest of the country. A state that already has the highest unemployment and worst reputation in the land slapped a tax on investment, perhaps the one thing it needs most.

It immediately raised fears locally that the rest of Australia would look at SA differently from other states, raise an eyebrow and sneer while deciding instead to back development elsewhere.

This has been followed with a strong, rapid-response campaign from industry that has moved to shoot down Premier Jay Weatherill’s claim that this is a costless tax that will only hurt fat cats as mum and dads get away without injury.

A broad coalition of business and employer groups have made an argument, which it seems many people are buying, that the costs will have to be passed on one way or the other in higher charges or lower super or fewer jobs. People might be willing to have banks pay more, but can see a direct line from the tax to their own pockets.

The other possibility is that the tax’s salesman is the problem, not what they’re selling.

Labor’s primary vote has been languishing at historic lows for the last few years. Most recent published polls put it in the high 20s, a level below the State Bank election wipeout of 1993.

Labor’s two-party vote has been propped up by a similar decline in active Liberal support, as a disillusioned public scatters to the Nick Xenophon Team and other third or minor parties.

Labor remains in the hunt to keep government after March, but that doesn’t mean it’s popular.

The public doesn’t seem to have bought Premier Jay Weatherill’s claim that the tax will only hurt fat cats.

The common refrain of the commentariat is that Labor is bad at government, but excellent at politics. Premier Jay Weatherill is routinely painted as a kind of evil genius who can’t keep the lights on or create a single job but knows exactly which buttons to push at the ballot box.

It is very possible that this view is more widely held than many of the state’s self-appointed pundits, this author included, have appreciated. The casual voter in SA is clearly extremely jaded. It stands to reason that they have greeted this new tax, one announced in the shadow of an election, with the scepticism it deserves and assumed that Labor holds an ulterior motive.

They may just think the party of “can you trust Habib”, “put your family first”, privatisations not taken to elections and closed ICAC hearings is just too mean and tricky to ever believe any more.

The question for the Liberals now becomes what to do about it. They will oppose the tax, but there is a world of difference between moving to block it or just promising a rollback.

Blocking the tax would make a major statement that would reverberate for years.

The gentlemen of the SA Parliament (and they are still mostly men) still play by the Queensbury rules. The Canberra disease of oppositions and crossbenchers picking and choosing what they want to back in a Budget has not yet taken hold in Adelaide.

By agreement, governments are left to govern and held to account every four years. Blocking the bank tax would complete a drift that began when the Liberals stopped the carpark levy in 2014. The convention would be shattered into a thousand pieces, and a Labor opposition would have permission to behave like pirates.

Mr Marshall claims to want to lead a reformist Liberal government in the mould of former New Zealand prime minister John Key. Blocking the bank tax will put handcuffs on that plan.

It would also clearly be read as him having been rolled by the partyroom. On the night of the Budget, Mr Marshall said the tax would pass. A reversal would be very hard to coherently explain.

Promising a rollback also has its drawbacks. Labor will say it means the Liberals must find $370 million in cuts, and revive scare campaigns about wrecking balls through the public service.

But one tactical advantage for the Liberals is that it keeps the banks and business in the game for the next nine months, backing a policy of Mr Marshall’s all the way until the March election.

If the tax is dead on arrival in Parliament this month, the banks and industry have no incentive to crack open the multi-million dollar war chest they’ve assembled for a lengthy campaign.

If a policy shift hinges on Mr Marshall becoming the Premier in March, there’s real reason for SA’s usually self-censoring business community to activate and push for regime change.

But all eyes are on the Liberals this weekend. A state clearly disillusioned with its collective leadership is waiting intently to see what the new guy has got, and how he will sell it.