Seamless, practical transition bodes well for new team

Barnaby Joyce with Scott Morrison om 2018.

Well within an hour of the news breaking that Barnaby Joyce, for the second time, had become ­Nationals leader and would again be deputy prime minister, he was deep into a pragmatic and highly political discussion with Scott Morrison. It was a sign of two highly professional politicians prepared to work together, and it belied the sense of chaos and doom being projected by Labor and critics keen to adopt easy and superficial pre-existing positions.

There’s no doubt the Prime Minister was a friend of the outgoing Michael McCormack and preferred him as deputy PM. There is also no doubt Morrison, no stran­ger to leadership ballot machin­ations and a political animal of the first order, like Joyce, recognises the Coalition’s top priority is to ­defeat Labor at the next election.

Scott Morrison and Barnaby Joyce at the National Drought Summit in 2018. Picture: Kym Smith.

Morrison realises there is a great challenge for Joyce to live up to his promise and on Monday show that he has learned from his mistakes and will work with his Nationals colleagues without destroying the Coalition.

But Morrison also realises that there is a challenge for him as Prime Minister to manage the new leadership team, use Joyce’s strengths and minimise his faults, no matter what he may have wanted personally.

Warm as the friendship between Morrison and McCormack is, and tense as the relationship with Joyce may be, that virtual meeting through secure video link from parliament to The Lodge between the new Coalition leaders was all about politics and beating Labor.

Joyce came armed with the political positives for Morrison in the new partnership – seats that could be won or held on the basis of his higher profile in the electorates in the Hunter Valley in NSW and regional Queensland.

McCormack’s lack of appeal to Queensland voters and Joyce’s relative strength was at the core of the party’s move to change leader.

The argument that “women won’t vote” for the Coalition with the new leader has to be set against the number of people – men and women – who will support the “great communicator” Joyce in the regions.

The other issue Morrison and Joyce will be able to use positively is the speed, clinical efficiency and seamlessness of the transition.

McCormack’s performance as Deputy Prime Minister in the Prime Minister’s parliamentary chair during question time was a show of grace, courage, discipline and good humour. Other leaders have lost their jobs and lost the plot – not McCormack, nor any of the Nationals MPs.

As McCormack, Morrison and Joyce worked out the mechanics of parliament and the political realities, there were no public displays of revenge or outrage. At the end of question time, McCormack was treated to a standing ovation not just from Coalition MPs but also from Labor.

If Morrison and Joyce can get down to talking politics within an hour of a leadership change, if their colleagues provide a perfect platform for change, and Labor misreads the real impact of that change, then there could be a very different outcome from that being forecast by long-term critics.