Shannon Deery: What the push for motion of no-confidence against Premier Daniel Andrews means
Daniel Andrews is set to face an attempt to oust him as Premier, as his iron grip loosens and anger mounts over Jenny Mikakos’ sensational resignation. But even if a motion of no confidence got up, it wouldn’t exactly be curtains for the government, writes Shannon Deery.
Opinion
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When parliament resumes this week, Daniel Andrews will face a serious attempt to oust him as Premier.
Well, it’s an attempt, yes.
But describing it as serious might be over-egging the custard a little.
Opposition Leader Michael O’Brien will move a motion of no-confidence against Andrews, citing government “failures, cover-ups and lies” during the COVID-19 pandemic.
With Labor holding a commanding 11-seat majority in the house, the motion will almost definitely be voted down.
The tide may be turning on Andrews internally — party sources say he is fast losing his iron grip.
And there is growing anger about how he’s handled things lately, which wasn’t helped by the sensational resignation of Jenny Mikakos.
But it hasn’t turned enough that he would be publicly shamed by his own party in this way.
Votes of no-confidence aren’t exactly common inside the Victorian parliament.
But they’re not entirely unheard of either.
Indeed, they have been used on numerous occasions to force a swift change of government.
In 1893 the government fell to a successful no-confidence motion, ushering in James Patterson to succeeded William Shiels as premier.
Thomas Bent lost the top job after he failed to survive a no-confidence motion in 1908.
Then opposition leader Henry Bolte used a no-confidence motion to end John Cain’s government in 1955, and went on to win the subsequent election.
The most recent no-confidence motion against the government came in the months leading up to the last election in 2018.
The motion was moved by then opposition leader Matthew Guy over the misuse of taxpayer money in Labor’s rorts-for-votes scandal. It was defeated 49 to 33.
This week’s motion will be the one shot the Opposition gets to use this political tool this parliamentary term.
And with two years to go until the next scheduled election, the opposition is playing the card early.
But it’s doing so to send a message.
If, by chance, the motion got up, it wouldn’t exactly be curtains for the government.
The Legislative Assembly would have eight days to pass a motion of confidence before the house was dissolved, triggering an election.
Of course if it’s defeated, which is the likely scenario, life continues as normal.
Whatever happens it will be another blow, with potentially politically fatal consequences, for a Premier who has had to deflect more attacks this year than in his decade-long leadership of Labor.
There have been plenty of other scandals, but none as personally damaging to Andrews or his legacy.
Nothing has highlighted that more than the final submissions filed to the hotel quarantine inquiry on behalf of Jenny Mikakos.
With the former health minister’s political career now over, following her bombshell resignation, she no longer fears political paybacks or retribution.
And so it is with much venom she can reach out from the pit of the ministerial graveyard to strike.
Her submissions highlight the way in which the government operates, with all power centred around Andrews and his office.
In particular, she is damning of his subversion of ordinary cabinet process to set up the quarantine program.
And scathing of a culture in which she feared payback had she dared to cross examine either ministers or department secretaries at the inquiry.
The way in which power is centred around the Premier’s office has long aggrieved many inside Labor, sources say.
But it has taken until fallout of the bungled quarantine program for its potential for devastating consequences to be realised.
Mikakos urged the inquiry to treat key aspects of Andrew’s evidence “with caution”.
In essence, Mikakos wants the quarantine inquiry to brand the Premier a liar.
The public mood around Andrews has shifted over the past month.
He has long enjoyed popular support, even throughout the crisis — in the middle of June an Essential Report poll found 75 per cent of Victorians approved of his government’s pandemic response.
Last week, that rating dropped to 45 per cent according to the same poll.
His social media pages, long time places of almost universal adoration for fervent #IStandWithDan groupies, are now being invaded by hecklers.
Among the general electorate there has been a shift in patience. It’s run out.
And so the Opposition’s motion of no-confidence — brushed off as “cheap politics” by the Premier — might be set to fail.
He will almost certainly retain the confidence of parliament.
But if the hotel quarantine inquiry adopts in its final report the submissions of Jenny Mikakos, will the Premier and his government retain the confidence of the Victorian people?
Or the party room?
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— Shannon Deery is Herald Sun state politics editor