Turnbull crafted Triple-A disaster for himself, Liberal party and the country

ONE thing is absolutely clear: Malcolm Turnbull has crafted a Triple-A disaster — for himself, for the Liberal Party and most of all, for the country, writes Terry McCrann.

Malcolm & Lucy Turnbull. Picture: Sahlan Hayes

ONE thing is absolutely clear: Malcolm Turnbull has crafted a Triple-A disaster — for himself, for the Liberal Party and most of all, for the country.

Whatever the final outcome proves to be, we are now officially ungovernable.

The balance of power in the lower, the supposed house of government, will be on a knife edge. The balance of power in the Senate will be split between the Greens, the Nick Xenophon Party and Pauline Hanson senators, in both cases, plural.

One way or the other, Turnbull is going to suffer — the entirely well-deserved — humiliation of being prime minister for an even shorter period than both Julia Gillard and Kevin Rudd.

We are in for even worse political instability than in the Gillard hung parliament days. And our economy and our national finances are in much worse shape now than they were back in 2010.

Back then, the best years of the China boom were actually still ahead of us. We are now in the process of discovering just how much tougher life will actually be after the boom.

Then add on the uncertainty in the wake of the Brexit vote and serious instability in global financial markets from the policies of very low interest rates and central bank money-printing.

At best, the government might end up with a razor-thin majority, alternatively it will be another minority government.

We do know there will be zero chance of getting anything substantive or tough through the Senate — precisely when we need tough reform, increasingly not to build a prosperous future but to avoid economic and financial disaster.

Turnbull has to take full ownership of the completely bonehead tactic of calling a double dissolution election off the back of the Budget.

It made the election that much tougher to win, and guaranteed there would be even more crossbenchers in the Senate. In 2013, Tony Abbott won a decisive majority in the lower house but was unable to get anything substantive through the Senate.

Now the need is much greater and far more urgent and we face unending political gridlock — in both houses.

We’ve also had six more years of Budget deficits that have added more than $220 billion to our national debt. There are more deficits as far as the eye can see. They are likely to be even worse.

Even if the global economic environment was reasonable, we would be facing tough times. There is every prospect that the world could turn seriously dark.

The “lucky country” just used up the last of its luck.

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