Foolish Daniel Andrews a tool of Beijing’s strategy

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews.

Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews has significantly damaged Australia’s national interest by his foolish decision to sign up to China’s Belt and Road Initiative.

Scott Morrison is right to criticise him over it.

The state Labor parties should stop trying to play smart politics with the China relationship. It’s too important. And the provincial Labor parties, without any of the national institutions that provide strategic assessment, geopolitical nuance, intelligence insights and the rest, are effortlessly outmanoeuvred by the Chinese and look foolish and ignorant while damaging Australia’s foreign policy.

Here is an introductory constitutional lesson: in Australia, foreign policy is the responsibility of the national government.

The BRI is considered by our national assessment agencies, the bodies with the relevant expertise and constitutional competence, to be a geopolitical play freighted with Chinese strategic ambition.

As a result, Canberra has taken a sensible and balanced approach. It welcomes Chinese investment in principle but assesses each proposal on its merits. Canberra does not run a campaign against BRI, does not discourage other nations from signing up. But Australia sees no need to formally join a BRI pledge.

In many nations, BRI projects have been part of Beijing’s debt-trap diplomacy and have sometimes resulted in building infrastructure in foreign nations that is obliged to give priority to Chinese users.

The Australian national position is the same as that adopted by all our Western allies. It is, critically, also the position adopted by federal Labor.

Beijing is delighted to pick away at Australian foreign policy and to use its financial power to divide and weaken Australia. Andrews has been an unwitting tool of Chinese policy directed against Australia. He has contradicted the national government on a key security matter of foreign policy. Regardless of which party is in government federally and which is in government in Melbourne, state governments are gravely ill- advised to set out to sabotage Australian foreign policy.

Andrews has no serious understanding of the strategic issues involved. State governments are not set up to have such understanding. Only foolish and irresponsible state governments overstep the mark in this way. It is not clear what, in substance, Andrews could offer BRI because any Chinese investment in Victoria will have to be approved by the federal Foreign Investment Review Board, and ultimately the federal government, anyway. A state government with even a soupcon of prudence and competence tries to work with Canberra in such matters, no matter the political complexion of the different levels of government.

Beijing was happy to use Victoria’s compliance to belt Australia, in an official press conference favourably contrasting Victoria’s naive obeisance to BRI with federal decisions it doesn’t like. State governments should not help foreign powers play divide and conquer this way.

Aspects of Andrews’ behaviour are particularly troubling. The federal government became aware in June that Victoria was talking about a BRI memorandum of understanding. The federal government was not kept informed of the detail of negotiations and knew nothing of the actual signing of the agreement until it was announced publicly on October 25.

The federal government did not get a copy of the agreement until November 2. It is still incomprehensible that the Andrews government kept the text of the agreement secret.

On the federal side, it is quite sloppy that Foreign Minister Marise Payne gave a neutral comment just hours before Morrison responded vigorously and critically. Payne was being diplomatic, trying not to imperil her visit to Beijing later this week.

But Morrison was right. Andrews has behaved poorly and without due regard for Australia’s national interest. It is extremely unlikely he will even get any marginal financial advantage for Victoria.