Labor set to ban power sharing

THE Tasmanian ALP is expected to ban future Labor leaders from inviting Greens into state cabinet.

THE Tasmanian ALP is expected to ban future Labor leaders from inviting Greens — or any other minor party’s MPs — into state cabinet.

A motion to enshrine the ban in party rules will be moved at Labor’s state conference in July and is expected to win wide support from the rank and file.

It is a reaction to the party’s disastrous state election loss in March, after four years of sharing power with the Greens, who held two cabinet posts in return for backing Labor to govern in a hung parliament.

Labor’s review of the March election campaign, released yesterday, found a “widely held view” within the party that its slide in support began in 2010 with the ­decision of then premier David Bartlett to form government with the Greens.

While the decision kept Labor in office for a further four years, it saw the party’s level of electorate support slide to just 27 per cent at the March election, it’s lowest ever.

“The decision after the 2010 election to govern in minority with two Greens in cabinet was not supported by the majority of the party membership or by the broader community and cost Labor its traditional support base,” the review concludes.

The inquiry recommends the party adopt “a framework that ­ensures any decision to govern (in minority/with other parties) is made in conjunction with the broader party”.

However, the report does not say what such a framework would look like or how it would work in the fast-moving aftermath of the election of a hung parliament.

It does not appear practical for the party leader in such a scenario to call a party conference to ­approve an alliance or minority government because decisions need to be made quickly.

Instead, it appears more likely Labor’s state conference will simply outlaw power-sharing cabinets, with a motion already drafted to that effect and expected to win overwhelming support.

It would prevent a Labor leader forming a power-sharing cabinet. However, the leader would remain free to otherwise negotiate with a minority party to secure confidence and supply on the floor of the House of Assembly.

The election post-mortem was also critical of the party’s failure to “market” the state’s forest peace deal, concluding it “poisoned the Labor brand” in timber communities. This finding comes as caucus wrestles with its position on legislation — to be introduced to state parliament this week — to rescind 400,000ha of future forest res­erves underpinning the deal ­between green and timber groups.