ALP review: ‘I got it wrong’, Bill Shorten was a vote loser, says Michelle Rowland

Labor frontbencher Michelle Rowland says her pre-election claims that Bill Shorten’s unpopularity was not a liability were wrong.

Labor MP Michelle Rowland. Picture: AAP

Labor frontbencher Michelle Rowland says her pre-election claims that Bill Shorten’s unpopularity was not an electoral liability were wrong.

The opposition communi­cations spokeswoman, from the powerful NSW Right faction, said “truthfulness” was needed in ­analysing the defeat, despite the campaign review’s “brutally honest” assessment of Mr Shorten.

The review report, made public on Thursday, identified Mr Shorten’s unpopularity as one of the three key reasons Labor lost the election.

“With six months lapsed (since the election), we do need truthfulness. And that was borne out by the opinion polls at the time as well,” Ms Rowland told Sky News.

“I will be the first to admit, ­people asked me about Bill’s unpopularity and I would say, ‘That is clearly not coming through in the rest of the polls we have got; his ­unpopularity isn’t a drag on Labor being able to be successful in ­government.’ Clearly that was not the case.”

Labor deputy Senate leader Kristina Keneally — who travelled with Mr Shorten for parts of the campaign — said on Friday the review made the point that “the unpopularity of Bill Shorten was something that, one, was fuelled in part by a never-seen-before advertising campaign privately funded by Clive Palmer”.

“There were things that the party could have done around it to address that, and they failed to do,” she told the ABC.

“They weren’t agile enough in addressing that ­attack. Whatever was going on in relation to the ­attacks on Bill Shorten personally, Labor should still have been able to win the ­election.”

Ms Rowland played down speculation that Mr Shorten held ambitions to return as Labor ­leader, despite his vow to remain in federal parliament for another 20 years. “I think he has made it clear he doesn’t aspire to that. If he wants to serve in that capacity for 20 more years, good luck to him,” she said.

Opposition trade spokes­woman Madeleine King said the assessment that Mr Shorten was unpopular was “clearly correct”.

“In the electorate, what the ­review found is clearly correct: he was unpopular,” Ms King said.

Opposition resources spokesman Joel Fitzgibbon said the ­report was an “honest document”.

“It’s a comprehensive report and I think a robust one,” he said. “A take-no-prisoners sort of ­approach, and that’s a good thing.”

Mr Shorten and his allies were furious the former leader was pinpointed in the report.

“The fact they refused to look at the impact of unpopular policies on Shorten’s popularity is absurd,” a Labor insider said on Thursday.

“He was the bloke standing up every day — of course it was going to have an impact. His popularity and unpopular policies don’t exist in parallel universes.”

Deputy Labor leader Richard Marles said Mr Shorten “could have won the election”, saying the bigger problem was the policy agenda.