Democratic battlelines drawn for next three years

Peter Dutton and the Coalition’s new leadership team – Liberal deputy Sussan Ley, Nationals leader David Littleproud and his deputy, Perin Davey – will be eager to start rebuilding and take the fight up to the Albanese government. The last thing they should do, however, is go at their task like a bulldozer, as Scott Morrison said of himself during the election campaign. Over-reacting by moving to the left or the right, especially at this stage, would achieve nothing but more divisions.

There is important policy work ahead. And the internal review of the election loss being led by the Liberal Party’s former federal director, Brian Loughnane, and senator Jane Hume should provide important lessons about preselection campaigning and candidates’ profiles. Were any major parties’ rookie candidates as well known, even by their first names, as Allegra (Spender) or Kylea (Tink) for example? The findings of the review will need to be considered carefully and the most helpful recommendations taken on board.

The success of the teal candidates in nine once-safe Liberal seats in Sydney and Melbourne and one in Perth was a lesson for both major parties. It showed the headway well-funded, highly publicised smaller parties can make tapping into popular sentiment and dissatisfaction with major parties. Labor suffered the same fate at the hands of the Greens in Brisbane seats. Claims the Liberal Party should shift policy and philosophical ground to reclaim teal seats are simplistic. The compulsory preferential voting system helped the teals to victory in several Liberal seats, including Kooyong. Former treasurer Josh Frydenberg beat teal candidate Monique Ryan on the primary vote, 43.16 per cent to 41.24 per cent. Dr Ryan won on the preferences of Labor and the Greens, whose votes collapsed far more – 11 per cent (Labor) and 15 per cent (Greens) – than that of Mr Frydenberg (6 per cent).

Before his election as Opposition Leader, unopposed, Mr Dutton made a good point: “We aren’t the Moderate Party. We aren’t the Conservative Party. We believe in families, whatever their composition. Small and micro businesses. For aspirational hardworking ‘forgotten people’ across the cities, suburbs, regions and in the bush.” Mr Dutton, 51, a former policeman, knows the territory. His Dickson seat, in Brisbane’s northwestern outer suburbs, is not silvertail. He has won it eight times despite determined Labor challenges. His experience in big portfolios since 2004 – workforce participation, assistant treasurer, health, immigration and border protection, home affairs and most recently defence – will be valuable as he seeks to hold the Albanese team to account. Ms Ley, 60, also has broad experience as a minister and in real life. She represents the regional/rural NSW seat of Farrer and worked as an accountant, a commercial pilot, air traffic controller, shearer’s cook and farmer.

To some extent, the issue of how well the Coalition fares in 2025 will depend on the Albanese government’s management of challenging economic circumstances and national security, and how well it maintains unity and coherence. Mr Dutton can afford to watch, wait and produce alternative policies at the right time. Australians do not want to return to dysfunctional government and the revolving-door prime ministerships of 2007 to 2013 and 2013 to 2018, until Mr Morrison won the Coalition an additional three years. The lower house will be finely balanced. Labor has about 76 seats out of 151 and will be governing with less than a third of the primary vote. The Nationals held all of their seats but the Liberals lost at least 17 seats. It is not Armageddon but the Liberal Party has vast ground to recover, especially in the west. But it is the nation’s most successful political party, governing for 50 years since 1949. It is picking up the pieces after a hefty loss. That is part of the democratic process. With the Prime Minister finalising his ministry, battlelines and frontline players for the next three years are coming into focus.