Tasmanian election leaders’ debate: ‘Crossbench the winner’

Liberal leader Jeremy Rockliff, left, and Labor leader Dean Winter shake hands prior to the televised debate ahead of Saturday’s state election. Picture: Linda Higginson/The Mercury

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There was only one real winner from the leaders’ debate in the Tasmanian election on Wednesday – and it was neither of the men on the Sky News stage.

Labor’s Dean Winter and Liberal leader Jeremy Rockliff scored blows on each other but the only real victor was the prospective crossbench.

There was a unity ticket on the unpopular Hobart AFL stadium, and both leaders blamed each other for forcing Tasmanians back to the polls for a second time in 16 months.

None of which is likely to change the minds of the huge number of voters – 40 per cent on the latest published poll – who are favouring independents and minor party candidates.

Rockliff, who sometimes ­meanders with a painful lack of ­vibrancy through press conferences, started the debate with unusual vigour and oration.

Winter appeared shell-shocked initially, looking hopelessly to the moderator to rein in the rampant deposed premier.

However, the tables turned during the course of the contest as Winter, the younger man, dispensed with Marquess of Queensberry rules, in favour of bare knuckles.

The Labor leader, whose no confidence motion started the crisis that led to this unwanted election, called his opponent a liar and “gaslighter”, who was “recklessly bankrupting Tasmania”, promising he would “clean up this guy’s mess”.

Rockliff painted Winter as a game-playing, power-crazed wrecker, solely to blame for the snap election.

It’s a charge that ignores the genuine concern across the parliament – and the community – about a state budget that would saddle Tasmania with, on some measures, the nation’s highest debt levels.

It also ignores the fact that it was the parliamentary Liberal Party that ultimately forced the election. The no confidence targeted Rockliff, not the government, and a poll could have been avoided by electing a new leader.

But it’s a charge that appears to be resonating with voters, and which may ultimately deny Labor its best shot at governing since the Libs took over in 2014.

Huge anti-Dutton swings to Labor in Tasmania at the federal election – 17 per cent in Braddon, 14 per cent in Lyons – are not, it seems, translating to the state sphere.

No wonder Winter used the debate to try to paint Rockliff as a Duttonesque figure for matching Labor’s free doctor policy – “just like Dutton, pretending he cares about health”.

Nice try. But most likely, we are heading for a very similar hung parliament to the one the Liberals were unable to work with a few weeks ago.

Some of the crossbenchers who lack confidence in Rockliff are likely to be returned, which will make for fascinating post-election negotiations.

The Liberals will make merry with Winter’s concession he could govern with the passive support of the Greens.

But that’s exactly what they’ve been doing, with the help of three independents, before the Greens decided they’d had enough and backed the no confidence motion.

The only ways of breaking this state’s cycle of political chaos are either to dump the Hare Clark voting system – or for all parties to grow up and make a diverse parliament work.