Lose any of the by-elections and Bill Shorten becomes Disposa-Bill

Leader of the Opposition Bill Shorten during Question Time in the House of Representatives at Parliament House yesterday.

Labor MPs love sly references to Malcolm Turnbull’s wealth, derived partly from his merchant banking years. All Labor’s questions casting him as arrogant and out of touch are designed to show, to pinch a phrase used by frontbencher Jim Chalmers recently, that he’s not like “the rest of us”.

Chalmers has performed well as opposition finance spokesman. He is destined to go a long way if he stays the course. But as a shadow minister whose salary is more than $250,000 a year, it was a bit rich for him to accuse the Prime Minister of running two tax systems: one for the very wealthy and another “for the rest of us”.

However, the person who looked most like a merchant banker last week, and not much like the rest of us, was Bill Shorten after Turnbull got the bird from a young man in a pub who later wrongly accused the Prime Minister of pushing in to get a beer. Yes, a pub. How out of touch can you get?

Shorten, who pledged (again) in January to make politics better and to restore faith in parliament, yet whose dissembling on citizenship helped undermine its integrity, pompously advised: “Best probably not to serve alcohol, Malcolm, during political events.”

It was an invitation to the TV news to run footage of Shorten, beer in hand, schmoozing drinkers. Maybe Shorten’s response to Turnbull’s minor embarrassment was meant in jest. If so, it fell as flat as yesterday’s XXXX. Once again, it highlighted the problem with Shorten. Short on gags, almost five years into the job he’s a very well known quantity and not necessarily in a good way.

Shorten works hard, he is disciplined, he has kept Labor united. He often sets the agenda and wins the political arguments, most spectacularly by spooking a panicked Pauline Hanson into rendering the company tax cuts dead, although not yet buried.

He has fashioned a new narrative for 21st-century Labor with policies far removed from the ones he espoused a few years ago, now aligned to match the politics of envy rather than aspiration. He has spurned the small-target strategy, choosing to run as a King Kong-sized target, with gorilla-sized tax increases, personal tax cuts to match, billions more on education and health, and not one cent of welfare cut, all made saleable by bashing banks and the top end of town.

His message is popular. Balancing that is his King Kong-sized problem: he is not. Thanks to five upcoming by-elections, we will know soon enough how much that matters, or whether the reasons for his unpopularity, the reservations about his sincerity and his credibility matter more. There are those in the government keen for Shorten to survive because they believe he is their best asset.

The harder heads are agnostic, holding firm to a strategy that you deal with the leader in front of you, then the next one and the one after that, each with their imperfections.

The advantage for the government is Shorten’s imperfections are now well known. Troy Bramston has written of Labor’s research that shows many neither like nor trust him.

Liberal research is similar, and devastating for Shorten in three critical areas. First, in NSW, Queensland and his home state of Victoria, Shorten’s favourability ratings have roared into the negative mid-30s. Second, it shows the greatest hesitation factor among voters considering voting Labor is Shorten; there are suspicions about his character and motivations. In short, not credi-Bill, not likea-Bill. Third, a major concern is that Labor is too influenced by minority interests — cue John Setka and the CFMMEU.

The links are clear; they have been condemned by former leaders Bob Hawke, Kevin Rudd and Peter Beattie, two of whom know a bit about winning elections, and they cause unease inside his own caucus. Shorten’s indebtedness to the CFMMEU sustains him in the opposition leadership but it does not help voters see him as an alternative prime minister.

Even more, they worry what it may mean to the economy and therefore their jobs.

The Liberals were persuaded Shorten was a drag on his party during the Bennelong by-election. Its carefully worded research noted: “Bill Shorten continues to show an inhibiting force on Labor vote.”

Scott Morrison has nicknamed Shorten unbelieva-Bill, prompted partly by a Barbie movie watched by his daughters. He scrawled it down late one night as he was about to drop off to sleep so he wouldn’t forget it, and has remained devoted to it ever since. Is it any wonder based on both sides’ research?

Shorten easily could become disposa-Bill if Labor loses any of the five by-elections, although few in the government seriously believe it will pick up seats, maybe not even Mayo.

Unpopular leaders can win elections, although it’s usually after voters have decided it’s time for the government to be booted out. That is not the case. Yet. Voters are not sitting on their verandas, baseball bats ready to wreak revenge on Turnbull, as Queensland’s Wayne Goss warned Paul Keating in a memorable phrase coined by his then adviser, Dennis Atkins.

That doesn’t mean the Turnbull government is complacent. It can’t be. The indiscipline has become compulsive and seemingly compulsory: from Sussan Ley’s bill to ban live sheep exports to Andrew Hastie’s intervention on Chinese influence. However well intentioned, their actions are damaging and poorly timed. Hastie may have helped the media, but he has not helped the government get relations with China back on track, and he enabled Shorten to show Turnbull can’t control his MPs, even on highly sensitive matters.

Shorten recovered from his disappointing result in Bennelong, because everyone disappeared for the summer and by the time they returned, Barnaby Joyce and his pregnant girlfriend ensured weeks of damaging headlines. Shorten then did well in the Batman by-election. Ged Kearney was a good candidate, the Greens fell apart and he was able to narrowcast his message.

Many factors will play out in these by-elections, including whether the government can unite behind a message, which side has the better tax plan, who can run a better campaign, and whether One Nation and the Greens are flaming out. Right up there will be Shorten’s shortcomings. The results will help decide who or what survives.