Joyce affair: tribal ties prove more important than principles and morals

The Barnaby Joyce scandal may prove to be a pivotal moment in the degeneration of Australian political culture.

Barnaby Joyce cannot remain as Deputy Prime Minister. Picture: Gary Ramage

The Barnaby Joyce scandal may prove to be a pivotal moment in the degeneration of Australian political culture, for it could mark the definitive Donald Trumpific­ation of Australian conservative politics.

Joyce’s absurd belief that he can remain Deputy Prime Minister, and the astonishing lack of support for Malcolm Turnbull’s new ministerial standard banning sex between ministers and their staff, indicate the growing pervasiveness of the worst elements of Trump-style politics.

By this I don’t mean anything to do with Trump’s policies — which so far have been pretty good — but rather the truthless, personalised, polarising, tribalist and unaccountable nature of American politics in the era of Trump and Hillary Clinton.

Arguments for Joyce remaining Deputy Prime Minister are Trump-style arguments. They are: other people, especially on the other side of politics, behaved as badly and didn’t suffer a big penalty; technically (because of all the logic-chopping classifications of when Joyce and his staffer were “partners”) there has been no formal breach of ministerial guidelines; Joyce is a good bloke; and finally Joyce is part of the Nationals, and the larger conservative tribe, and the tribe should stick ­together.

The Joyce explanation for his initial failure to disclose rent-free accommodation from a politically active businessman who does business with his own department — that mates don’t tell about what other mates are doing for them — is a perfect bush adaptation of the basic Trump contention: the spirit of the rules don’t apply to me ­because I’m a good bloke.

Malcolm Turnbull and Barnaby Joyce in parliament last week. Picture: Kym Smith

If Joyce persists in his astonishingly selfish determination to ­remain Deputy PM, and the Nats don’t sack him, they are saying that in fact they are guilty of everything of which they accuse the left.

A similar primitive tribalism, which once it becomes dominant will grievously damage Australian politics, seems evident in the ­response of conservatives to Turnbull’s new ministerial standard forbidding ministers having sex with their staff.

Here is the assertion of one, single, solitary but important normative standard of behaviour — which surely conservatives, feminists and almost anyone of commonsense could agree upon.

The heart of the conservative critique of contemporary culture is that no one commits to, celebrates, affirms or abides by any standards.

But because Turnbull is seen as not being a tribal conservative, when he proposes something that represents one element of the very heart of conservative wisdom and insight, it is automatically ­opposed.

As Scott Morrison says, the standard is preventive. From the modern workplace point of view, it goes a tiny step towards equalising a power relationship in which it is always the junior female staffer who has to move and suffer a penalty, never the invariably male minister.

Many other occupations have such requirements, not least, as Jim Molan points out, the military.

I have read genuinely eloquent and powerful arguments over the years by Kevin Andrews about the need to buttress marriage with ­institutional protections, yet, disappointingly, Andrews leapt to condemn Turnbull’s proposed standard on the flimsiest possible grounds.

The conservative position now seems to be that two gay people committing to a lifetime of monogamous fidelity is a mortal threat to marriage, but they will defend to the death the right of ministers to have sexual relationships with their staff, unless it is a card-carrying conservative who proposes otherwise.

Conservatives, like the left in this country, appear to be heading into a bitter swamp of mindless division in which principles matter infinitely less than tribal identity.