Labor’s inability to appear to criticise a progressive cause for any reason, even a threat to public health and an economic rebound, is limiting its ability to deal cleanly with the COVID-19 crisis, undermining its credibility and damaging its political support.
A failure to condemn the Black Lives Matter mass gatherings last weekend, a lack of a clear call of “do not go” and an ambivalent attitude to more planned protests are putting Labor out of kilter with public views on handling the crisis.
Mixed and muted messages from state and federal Labor MPs and leaders are being met with disbelief as the public vents its pent-up frustration at double standards on social restrictions after months of anxiety and sacrifice.
Labor Premiers and territory leaders who could not or would not stop tens of thousands of people gathering continue petty rules on golf, fishing, funerals and weddings while keeping borders shut.
Federal Labor MPs are not saying “don’t go” but use health warnings as a guide or ask people to “look within themselves” when thinking about attending new rallies on the weekend.
Four Labor MPs attended the rallies in defiance of health warnings and needed to be nudged into coronavirus tests before the first confirmed infection at a mass rally appeared yesterday.
There is even a danger Labor will be pulled into the increasingly bizarre international campaigns originating in the riots of the US and Britain, ranging from trying to pull down statues of Captain Cook and ban Gone with the Wind to stopping police funding.
What’s worse for federal Labor and Anthony Albanese is that the lack of a crystal clear, unified view on rallies during the coronavirus pandemic is making it harder to put Scott Morrison under legitimate scrutiny over the bungled and illegal robodebt recovery scheme and descent into economic recession.
There is one big issue in the public mind — it’s COVID-19 — and Labor has to handle that story and position itself properly before it can address other issues with any political effect.
The Prime Minister, Health Minister Greg Hunt and Finance Minister Mathias Cormann are not suffering from the same ambivalence. They have all declared emphatically and categorically that mass rallies should not be held, protesters should not attend, there is a real health threat with a subsequent $2bn economic cost to a second wave of infections and the reckless behaviour is putting all Australians at risk.
Morrison, conscious of not criticising his national cabinet colleagues who he will be meeting on Friday with hope of getting some definite dates for opening borders and “getting planes in the air” has avoided accusations.
On Thursday, he simply said that people who went to rallies should be charged, they should not go to more rallies, good causes were being hijacked and there was a danger of breaching public trust.
“The price of liberty is exercising it responsibly and respecting fellow Australians,” he told parliament on Thursday. “People who would turn up to a rally this weekend would be showing great disrespect to their neighbours.
“Do not go to those rallies. You are putting the lives of others at risk. The issue you raise is important and is understood and acknowledged by all.’’
The Health Minister, confirming the first case of coronavirus among the protesters in Melbourne, said the health advice was clear: “There are no safe mass gatherings, please do not go. Please do not endanger your fellow Australians.”
The Finance Minister, warning against the economic cost of a second wave of infections, described the protesters at mass rallies as “reckless and self-indulgent” and was attacked by Labor.
Cormann was not sympathetic — (if you chose him from a chocolate box you would not expect a gooey caramel or a strawberry cream) — but he effectively summed up the public attitude.
The mass rallies have already delayed any early lifting of restrictions for at least a week, at a cost of $1bn.
What’s more, there is one confirmed coronavirus case, the threat of a second wave, a public backlash and premiers are under more pressure to lift restrictions, but still Labor puts its progressive heart ahead of its body politic.
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