Barnaby Joyce’s detractors are blinded by their disdain for the man

Barnaby Joyce speaks during an anti-abortion rally in Hyde Park, Sydney in 2019. Picture: File / AAP

The return of Barnaby Joyce will clearly shake things up this close to an election. Whether Scott Morrison goes to the polls later this year or early next, the return of the flamboyant (and controversial) Member for New England will have a profound impact on the way the Coalition campaigns.

Joyce will be an electoral asset and liability in equal measure. What will be lumpy is where and how that impact plays out.

Scott Morrison and Barnaby Joyce. Picture: Kym Smith

The Nationals are now led by a polarising figure. Joyce will see the Coalition’s vote take a hit with women. Inner-city electorates won’t react well to his return. Anyone interested in climate change action will be appalled by Joyce’s resurgence. A state like Victoria will probably lower the colours of the Coalition now, to some extent anyway. Nationals will be more likely to stand up to the Liberals under Joyce’s leadership than they were under Michael McCormack’s. That might cause public divisions which can be electoral poison.

To be sure, these are the negative consequences of Barnaby being back.

But there are definite upsides for the government too, and anyone who doesn’t recognise that reality is blinded by their disdain for the man.

For a start, a Nationals leader standing up to the Liberals can lift the Nationals vote.

Joyce will shore up the votes of LNP candidates under threat in North Queensland. He will help the Coalition’s chances of picking up seats in and around mining communities. The Hunter region in NSW will be especially interesting to watch in this respect. Joyce might even convince George Christensen to go around for another term. Some readers will see this as a possibility that should go in the negative impacts section, but Christensen’s seat of Dawson is in play if he retires, but it’s out of Labor’s reach if he does not. That makes Joyce’s influence on him a positive electorally.

While the votes of Liberal MPs in inner city areas might take a hit, few if any of these seats are marginal. But the outer metro and regional seats where voters might welcome Joyce’s comeback – seats being targeted by Coalition strategists – are marginal.

In short, Barnaby being back might damage the Coalition electorally on the macro level, but on the micro level he’s a seat-by-seat campaigning asset for the government.

Don’t forget, however much Malcolm Turnbull despises Joyce, it was Joyce as Nationals leader who saved Turnbull’s bacon at the 2016 election.

The Nationals didn’t lose a single seat at that election, winning the vital electorate of Capricornia to deliver the Coalition the narrowest of majorities. In contrast, Liberals under Turnbull’s leadership bled seats all over the country.

Malcolm Turnbull (centre) has Barnaby Joyce to thank for his 2016 federal election victory. Picture: AAP / File

If Turnbull didn’t have Joyce campaigning in tandem with him in 2016, the then PM would have lost the election and the Coalition would have been turfed out after just one term. All that after a coup Turnbull orchestrated against Tony Abbott – it would have been the height of embarrassment for Turnbull.

For all Morrison’s faults, he’s a good campaigner. Turnbull probably even by his own admission never was. The duality of Morrison and Joyce campaigning is therefore a powerful development during the final sitting week before the winter recess. Yes, it has its drawbacks. Mavericks taking centre stage always does. But there are upsides for the government as well.

Peter van Onselen is a professor of politics and public policy at the University of Western Australia and Griffith University.