This election was the revenge of Queenslanders. Their message on the weekend reminded me of a flood of letters, almost two decades ago, when I started writing in this newspaper. The directness, common sense, warmth and sense of humour from Queenslanders, with addresses overlooking the Brisbane river to those in Longreach and Townsville, taught me that Queensland is different to the rest of the country.
And long may that remain.
Queenslanders are evocative of traditional Australia. To someone in Cairns, a southerner is a bloke who lives in Brisbane. But even in Brisbane, as a good friend told me on Sunday, “we Queenslanders won’t be told what to do by a bunch of Victorians”. She is no arch-conservative.
My friend might have had in mind some Sydneysiders, too. But Victoria did confirm itself as the Massachusetts of Australia at their state election last year, brimming with well-heeled, well-educated sorts who think they can tell workers in Queensland that their jobs, their livelihoods, the welfare of their families, need to be sacrificed on the altar of green theology.
On Saturday, Queenslanders taught Labor not to mistake noise for numbers. Even though Victoria did not end up doing its usual Massachusetts thing, the battle over the future of the Adani coal mine became the parable of this election, a symbol of Queenslanders telling southern politicians with uncosted, job-killing green plans to butt out of their lives. The finely tuned bulldust detectors of Queenslanders picked Shorten’s disingenuous attempt to play both sides, the inner-city climate zealots and blue-collar workers. Why did he imagine they would fall for the ruse?
Queenslanders are to Australia what Texans are to the US.
The state’s decentralisation, with big regional communities from the far north to the outback to the southeast corner, makes Queensland voters more independent, less prone to groupthink than the rest of the country.
I noticed early on that people north of the NSW border are less uptight, less likely to be intellectual snobs, or to be seduced by them. And a Queenslander’s ability to spot, and laugh at, political correctness, and more recently, at the farce of identity politics, is a bracing antidote to the stifling side of modernity.
How will a new leader from Labor’s left faction, such as Anthony Albanese, play in Queensland? Probably as poorly as Malcolm Turnbull would have done on Saturday.
Voters in Queensland worked out Julie Gillard long before the rest of the country. The “real Julia” campaign tanked because Queenslanders spotted her cloying political calculation. Her national speech in Brisbane four days before the 2010 election, where she didn’t mention climate change for fear of spooking the locals, didn’t pass muster.
Four days later, Queenslanders swung behind Tony Abbott, presaging an Abbott government three year later. Maybe Queenslanders knew before the rest of us that there was little conviction behind Gillard’s claim there would be no carbon tax under a government she led.
In 1996, the Sunshine State backed John Howard with the largest swing in the country and more than 60 per cent of the two-party-preferred vote, the highest since 1975.
Notice, too, that state Labor has governed Queensland for 24 of the past 30 years because its premiers are a different breed from their federal and state counterparts.
From Wayne Goss to that knockabout bloke Peter Beattie who won four elections, to Anna Bligh, who now heads up the Australian Banking Association, and even Annastacia Palaszczuk, none are within cooee of a Daniel Andrews or a Don Dunstan. That’s why the radical left-wing deputy Labor leader Jackie Trad stands out like a sore left thumb.
The history of big voter swings in Queensland should have been a lesson for Labor.
With a primary vote in that state wallowing in the 20s, Labor has some serious soul-searching to do within, and lots of apologising to do to Queenslanders.
Speaking of apologies, it never ceases to amaze that a taxpayer-funded outfit the size and breadth of the ABC did not have a single commentator suggesting a path to victory for the Morrison government during the campaign coverage; no one curious enough to ask questions others did on Sky News, or in this newspaper.
By 6.20am on Monday, not even the ABC could ignore the revenge of the Queenslanders. Radio National offered what seemed like a mea culpa on Queensland. Craig Emerson told the ABC’s Cathy Van Extel that well beyond the state’s mining regions, “there is a consciousness in Queensland that if mining does not do well, then Queensland does not do well. So, the whole Adani issue catalysed this view that Labor’s not really on their side”.
Only a few days earlier, ABC economics correspondent Stephen Long talked about “secret” research by the Queensland Mining Council that claimed even supporters of mining think “mining wealth is strongly associated with self-interest, power and influence”, its profits benefiting a few at the cost of Australia’s future.
In a familiar ABC style, Long interviewed Julien Vincent, a bloke who campaigns for banks and super funds to divest from fossil fuel investments, and economist Richard Denniss from The Australia Institute, a left-wing outfit that opposes coal mines. This is a “good news story”, Denniss said, the data dispelling myths framing the upcoming federal election. “Coal-loving Queensland doesn’t really exist,” he said.
With curiosity like that, no wonder the ABC doesn’t understand the country it is paid to report on. A balanced and fair ABC would have included a voice representing Queensland voters who would, barely a few days later, reject this green dream nonsense.
And how to explain the post-election wrap on Sunday when Paul Bongiorno told ABC’s Sunday Extra that if Scott Morrison misreads the mood of the people on the need for action on climate change, he will be punished.
He must have been partying with Zali Steggall and missed the night’s news.
That said, being in an echo-chamber of like-minded folks is a problem for many of us. As The Wall Street Journal editorialised this week, the election “is another lesson that the politics of climate change isn’t as simple as Western cultural elites claim … Faced with lost jobs, higher taxes and a higher cost of living, voters in democracies have rejected climate change policies that wouldn’t in the end matter all that much to the climate. Joe Biden, take note.”
Shorten’s divisive class war campaign did not work in the least class-conscious Australian state either. Maybe Queenslanders, with BS detectors working overtime, winced as Shorten campaigned on the memories of former prime ministers, from Whitlam to Hawke to Keating, rather than being comfortable in his own leadership skin. While ScoMo was with voters in northern Tasmania on Saturday, Shorten laid flowers at the Opera House for Hawke, and then threw back a few beers with mates.
After Saturday’s drubbing, it is time we changed the whole nomenclature of Australian politics. This election was won, not by some far-right mob, but by Australia central.
Consider this a vote of thanks to those “quiet Australians”.
janeta@bigpond.net.au
Retail union fund owes a refund
A retail worker who admitted charging a customer for something they did not purchase, but only refunded the payment if asked, would not be in their job for long.
Hospitals ill-prepared to cope with terror attack
A mass casualty event would expose chronic shortcomings in our emergency response.