Party Games: Huge strategic gap as politicians deliver final messages

OPINION: With less than 48 hours until the polls open, it’s full steam ahead for politicians in their final pitches to voters. In the case of the two major parties, they couldn’t be more different.

ACCORDING to the betting markets Chris Bowen has a tiny chance — about 8 per cent — of being the Australian Treasurer next week while the opinion polls put that chance at just under 50 per cent.

This discrepancy aside, Bowen, the Labor member for the safe Labor western Sydney seat of McMahon, this morning gave a shout out to those poor souls who don’t have any sleeps planned between now election day.

These are the phone canvassers, those people who do all sorts of essentially unskilled labour which has to be done so that the political parties can ensure their “ground game” on polling day is as efficient and as productive as possible.

For those of us who are not in this niche cohort of crazy people, there are two more sleeps and then another sleep to wake up and see just what happened.

Election junkies — and this columnist is one of those — regard the weekend as grand final time when all the season’s events come to a head.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull is at the National Press Club for the last big speech of the campaign — following up Labor’s Bill Shorten who delivered a very creditable speech on Tuesday but then ruined it all by making mashed potatoes of the Q & A session.

Turnbull’s final pitch — which is being cold called into radio stations from Launceston to Darwin as you read this — is for Australians to stay with party they know.

“Australians want the government they elect to get on with the job of ensuring we have a strong economy that can set us up for the future,” Turnbull told the Press Club.

“In uncertain times globally, they are looking for a greater sense of common purpose.”

Turnbull’s use of the phrase “uncertain times” reminds old hands of the last election when we heard those words.

It was 2001 when John Howard, against the backdrop of the twin towers terror attacks in New York and the United States invasion of Afghanistan, kept talking about “these uncertain times”.

It is a meta message that strong political parties — usually of the centre-right — use in times of economic or security uncertainty.

Stick with the safe, secure pair of political hands, they say.

Labor’s final pitch — emailed to journalists and candidates first thing today — was not about uncertainty and had nothing to do with the economy or security.

“This election is about Medicare,” said Labor, rather hopefully.

“If you want to Save Medicare, then you need to vote Labor.”

There is a huge strategic gap between those two messages.

Don’t miss Dennis Atkins and Malcolm Farr’s election podcast Two Grumpy Hacks, available for free on iTunes or Soundcloud.

Originally published as Party Games: Huge strategic gap as politicians deliver final messages