Simon Birmingham: Liberals’ laid-back operator has seen enough

Penny Wong congratulates Simon Birmingham after his valedictory speech in the Senate. Picture: Martin Ollman/NewsWire

As the consummate political downplayer, not even Simon Birmingham could minimise the negative conclusions which will be drawn from his sudden decision to walk away from politics on the eve of the federal election and halfway through his Senate term.

It suggests scepticism at the chances of a Dutton victory. It suggests disbelief at the prospect of Birmingham’s moderates regaining ground in Teal-held middle class Australia.

It suggests despondency on the part of a man who for years has been the Liberals’ most persuasively laid-back operator, the master of sangfroid who would enthusiastically deploy himself to tell the world that all was well after leadership upheavals and electoral defeats.

Birmingham has seen far too much of that in his home state in the past two years. It looks like he has now seen enough, and has had enough of offering his glass half-full stylings on situations and events others are labelling disasters.

In his valedictory speech Birmingham almost admitted that he’s sick of being a sensible centrist in an increasingly polarised political age.

“The global rise of populism and divisive tribalism peddled by ideological extremes troubles me,” he said.

As the nation’s most senior Liberal moderate – a man who shares good friend Christopher Pyne’s politics, but none of his pugnacity – “Birmo” as he is affectionately known always managed to traverse both sides of the Liberal aisle.

But he has seen any sense of party camaraderie erode badly and rapidly in South Australia and appears to be at the point where feels he is banging his head on a brick wall.

In the past two years Birmingham has seen the defeat of his friend Steven Marshall’s one-term government in SA in 2002, for which he had a unique front row seat given his wife Courtney Morcombe served as Marshall’s chief of staff.

He has seen that dismal result followed by a poor showing in SA at the 2022 federal poll, the loss of Boothby leaving the Liberals with just one suburban SA seat.

He has been targeted in the party’s internal identity crisis, with conservatives led by Alex Antic saying the once moderate-dominated party sowed the seeds of its demise by going “Labor lite”.

He has been dismayed by aspects of the now-ascendant Right’s conduct, none bigger than Antic’s brutal and successful bid to roll Senator Anne Ruston for the number one SA Senate spot. He fears the party is becoming bogged down in culture war issues such as its recent brawl over abortion, which came days before the party’s second historic by-election loss this year to Peter Malinauskas.

Birmingham has just turned 50, has two daughters, and has already served at very senior levels in the Morrison and Turnbull governments. He performed with distinction and without error in multiple portfolios. He is the safest pair of hands the Coalition has. His departure robs the Dutton team of depth and experience.

Crucially it also robs Dutton of some of the momentum he has been gaining during a shambolic month for the Labor government where Anthony Albanese has lurched from one disaster to the next. Indeed it was Birmingham who played the powerful lead role in questioning Albanese’s judgment in appointing Rudd as US Ambassador despite the former PM’s long history of bilious tweeting at the President-elect.

There has been a giddy sense within the Liberals this past month along the lines of “Could we?”, where party figures have been excitedly speculating about the shock prospect of gaining an absolute majority. It looks like one of the wisest heads in Liberal ranks does not share that upbeat assessment, based on his reading of the numbers in Teal-coloured Australia, reinforced by his fatigue at hailing from a state branch which has perfected the art of self-harm.