Like all decent and right-thinking people, I felt immense relief on Saturday evening when it became clear Labor would win government. The nightmare that began nine years ago is finally over. Democracy has returned.
The adults are in charge once more. This new government, unlike the one it replaced, is one based on kindness and tolerance.
Let the word go out that Australia is ready to resume its place in the world community. No longer are we a pariah nation.
Witness the many Australians declaring on social media “I am proud of my country once again”. It is gratifying to learn we are finally worthy of these moral luminaries, not that anyone asked them.
Let us join France’s outgoing foreign minister, Jean-Yves Le Drian, in celebrating the downfall of the Morrison government. “I can’t stop myself from saying that the defeat of Morrison suits me very well,” he smugly observed on the weekend. We can only sympathise and apologise for rebuffing your country, monsieur. If there is one people that have always come to the aid of Australians during a crisis, it’s the French.
The zeitgeist is positively Obamaesque, the moment when, to quote the former US president upon securing the Democratic nomination in 2008, “the rise of the oceans began to slow, and our planet began to heal”.
From Lismore to Mallacoota, the people celebrate. No more torrential floods, no more devastating bushfires. And when they do occur, what reasonable person would blame Prime Minister Anthony Albanese for an act of nature?
In every contest there must be a loser. It was too hard to pick who was the most miserable on Saturday night.
The best I could do was narrow it down to Tim Wilson, Dave Sharma, Josh Frydenberg, and Bill Shorten (not necessarily in that order). As for Kristina Keneally, what are the chances of her honouring her promise to live in Fowler even if she lost the election? I can imagine her response: “Try as hard as I did, I was unable to find a secluded millionaire island retreat within the electorate”.
Fifth wheel Teals
And what of the Teal ‘independents’? You know, the ones who were going to end the dominance of the two major parties by securing the balance of power in the lower house. Well, by targeting only Liberal-held seats all they have done is delivered majority government to Labor. Far from being a fifth columnist, they are now a fifth wheel.
They claimed not to be a party and cited gender equality as one of their core principles. But last week they refused to criticise the behaviour of their bankroller and Climate 200 co-founder Simon Holmes a Court.
He had confronted and stood over a clearly uncomfortable Jane Hume at a polling station despite the Liberal senator asking him repeatedly to leave her alone. We do not want to upset our patriarch and benefactor, do we ladies?
The Coalition’s defeat has been attributed to many reasons, including climate change, the vaccine rollout, and the desire for integrity in government. I do not deny they were factors, but none of them was the primary one.
My theory is that people who normally vote Liberal were understandably terrified that The Project co-host and author Lisa Wilkinson would write another of her excruciating open letters to Scott Morrison if his government were re-elected. That alone would be enough to make conservatives vote for anyone else, even the Greens, in desperation.
Foreign debut
In a press conference at Tokyo this week, Albanese was chutzpah personified. “What we shouldn’t do, when we speak about Australia’s national interest, is try to score cheap political domestic points by doing it,” he said.
This from the former opposition leader who has spent the last three years undermining the Morrison government over foreign policy, even implicitly siding with Beijing in 2020 when he accused the Coalition of having “presided over a complete breakdown” with China.
But aside from that, Albanese’s first international conference as prime minister seems to have gone well. Amazingly, in his opening statement to Quad leaders he resisted the urge to tell them he is the son of a single mother and grew up in public housing in Camperdown. He has also established a rapport with US President Joe Biden, which could be explained by the many things they have in common, particularly their difficulty in getting across briefs and answering press questions.
The other foreign policy priority is establishing a “First Nations foreign policy,” the brainchild of Foreign Affairs Minister Penny Wong. “It counters narratives from countries that seek advantage over us,” she explained earlier this month, saying it would deepen “long-held ties across countries of the Indo-Pacific”. This, I am certain, is a brilliant strategy that will convince Solomon Islands Prime Minister Manasseh Sogavare to tear up the security agreement with Beijing and forbid the construction of a Chinese military base in his country.
As for New Zealand Prime Minister Jacinda Ardern, she would be delighted that her Australian counterpart is also a socialist who moonlights as a DJ. We can expect her, however, to press Albanese to drop the practice of deporting Kiwis from Australia who have been sentenced to 12 months or more imprisonment, else risk a public haranguing at Kirribilli House.
Holding him to account
The domestic issues that Albanese has inherited are considerable, particularly standard of living. Home ownership, rising interest rates, inflation, crippling petrol and energy prices, burgeoning debt, and wage parity are just a few. He has promised to address them, and the media must hold him to account, as it did Morrison. Whether it will is another matter. For example, on Saturday evening an exuberant Patricia Karvelas tweeted a selfie of herself and Labor frontbencher Linda Burney.
This woman is a legend and looks like she will be the next Indigenous affairs minister #UluruStatementpic.twitter.com/l0UtPZUjLQ
— Patricia Karvelas (@PatsKarvelas) May 21, 2022
She was, said the host of ABC’s RN Breakfast, “a legend”.
Do not expect former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull to stop his meddling tweets soon, especially if Peter Dutton becomes Liberal leader as expected.
That rancour has not dwindled any.
Turnbull could play tag team with WA Premier Mark McGowan, who last week blasted Dutton for saying the presence of a Chinese warship near Perth was an “aggressive act”.
That statement was “highly dangerous” rhetoric, according to McGowan.
“It’s inflammatory and unnecessary and I just think he’s the biggest threat to the national security,” he said. This was the same premier who last year was praised by China’s foreign affairs spokesman and firebrand Zhao Lijian for criticising the Morrison government’s stance on China. On a completely unrelated note, does anyone know how to say ‘Sneakers’ in Mandarin?
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