United by disappointment

THOUGH the votes have long been cast and the seemingly interminable election campaign has finally ended, there is no real sense of relief.

THOUGH the votes have long been cast and the seemingly interminable election campaign has finally ended, there is no real sense of relief.

Many voters filled in their papers unhappily, disappointed with the choice of leaders offered by the two principal parties and less than ­enthusiastic about the minors and new crop of independents. Grudgingly, they voted for what they believed to be the least worst option. In part this was a reflection of the international mood which saw discontented Britons vote for Brexit and disillusioned Americans give support to Donald Trump. But there was also a huge local factor. Australians have not warmed to either the Liberals’ Malcolm Turnbull or Labor’s Bill Shorten. According to Newspoll, they were the two least-favoured, least-preferred leaders going into an election for 40 years. When one considers how disliked have been some of the unpopular leaders who have strutted their stuff during that period, Julia Gillard, Kevin Rudd, Paul Keating and even the often reviled but now almost universally loved John Howard, the massive dissatisfaction with Turnbull and Shorten indicates that something is seriously wrong with the political system. The electorate didn’t think either of those leading the two parties were really deserving of their support. Turnbull was essentially self-anointed, having worked against his predecessor Tony Abbott since Abbott’s almost accidental elevation to the ­opposition leadership in ­December, 2009. Abbott didn’t realise what an enemy he had created but he also didn’t help himself with some of his own errors of judgment as prime minister — as inconsequential in the greater scheme of things as they were. It is a truism now but the Coalition’s “jobs and growth” strategy throughout the campaign did not curry as much favour from conservative supporters as the Coalition’s ­record for resolute border protection measures, dumping the carbon tax and mining taxes after Abbott led it to a thumping victory in 2013. Turnbull’s problem, apparent through the double dissolution campaign, was he wants to appear as such a centrist that he confuses voters about what he actually stands for. His support for homosexual marriage, surely a personal issue, was way over the top; his reluctance to deal with the gross manipulation of the Safe Schools program and his shambolic presentation of the superannuation policy ­offended many party supporters. He even sounded soft on ­illegal trade union obstruction to productivity. Only in the final 10 days did he find the voice with which to speak strongly on a couple of core issues, like people smuggling, much to the dismay of his non-Coalition sympathisers who thought that he would continue to echo the views he once espoused on his formerly favourite platform, the ABC’s Q&A. Shorten, on the other hand, was not self-anointed, he was the pick of the trade union movement and never dissocia-ted himself from rogue unions like the CFMEU or the union-backed Andrews Labor government in Victoria, which is still trying to kill off the state’s volunteer CFA brigades as a favour to the extreme Left leadership of the firefighters’ union. Listening to Shorten’s bleatings about his town hall meetings was just a reminder that he was never the choice of the Labor rank and file — that distinction went to his rival and Labor’s probable next leader Anthony Albanese. Shorten was beloved only of the heavyweights of the trade union movement, who appreciated his efforts to ensure that trade union bosses came first, and trade union members came second, in his negotiations with employers like Chiquita Mushrooms and CleanEvent. But the bottom line for many, including Labor supporters, was his outrageous mendacious scare campaign on Medicare. The dismal upshot of this election is the strong likelihood that both leaders will preside over fractious memberships. Turnbull has provided little to his party beside an election which saw a huge margin ­reduced. He showed himself to be a weak and indecisive leader with strong leanings toward the inane social policies ­beloved of the Left. The Liberals still have the unfinished business of cleaning out the squalid faction-ridden NSW division. Labor is riven by challenges on social issues, with more than 50 MPs having gone into the election at odds with the party’s equivocating policy on border protection, boat turnbacks and offshore detention. The mere fact the minority issue question of homosexual marriage occupied so much time at the expense of the economy or a vastly more damning social failure like the culture of violence and abuse toward women and children in Aboriginal communities is indicative of the degradation of meaningful goals by the elites. The record level of dissatisfaction with both party leaders would indicate the Liberal and Labor parties are collapsing ­inwardly in a terrible decline. Nevertheless, a win is a win but, as the history of the past nine years demonstrates, not necessarily enough to ensure stability of leadership. The public perception is that standards in politics are pretty abysmal and this election has just reinforced it. Strong leadership on real ­issues is needed to reunite the nation now.