Wong’s take on China is orthodoxWong’s orthodox China take

Penny Wong thinks a Shorten Labor government will manage the China relationship better than the Coalition has done.

But she is realistic enough to know there is every chance there will still be real difficulties.

That’s because, as senior Labor people know, the problems between Beijing and Canberra emerge out of issues and decisions of substance, not the stylistics or nuance of speeches.

Nonetheless, Wong has half a fair point in suggesting the government has sometimes been clumsy in its language on China.

However, her own words are very balanced and fully anticipate troubles ahead. Labor, she told the Lowy Institute in an important speech this week, would bring “a more considered, disciplined and consistent approach to the management of Australia’s relationship with China” than the government had done.

Those modestly critical words are pretty much boilerplate for any opposition about any government.

Labor, Wong told Lowy, won’t “pre-emptively frame China only as a threat”. Of course, the government has not framed China “only as a threat” either. Wong also explicitly pointed out China is not a democracy and does not share Australia’s commitment to the rule of law and that such differences in systems and values will affect the nature of the relationship. China, she rightly says, is important to Australia and the region.

Wong’s approach strikes me as perfectly reasonable. Certainly, she is infinitely more prominent on the campaign trail than her counterpart, Foreign Minister Marise Payne, who is all but ­invisible.

The ignominious failure of the Coalition to make any use at all of the structural media opportunities inherent in the foreign affairs portfolio is just another of the countless incidents of self-harm it engaged in before and even during this campaign, notwithstanding Scott Morrison’s spirited solo ­effort.

In another section of her speech, Wong fully affirms Labor’s commitment to the US alliance.

This is important but not novel. All the senior Labor figures have done this repeatedly. Both sides of politics contain some minority pro-Beijing elements that would like to compromise key security interests — or, more fairly, don’t believe those interests are really key — in exchange for better ­relations with Beijing.

No one can predict exactly how a Labor government would perform on this score but it has given every indication it would continue to treat national security, and the advice of the relevant agencies, with the utmost seriousness.

Beijing’s key ambition will be for Labor to reverse the Coalition’s ban on Huawei participating in the 5G network. If Labor does that, it will be repudiating clear national security advice.

However, there is no reason to think Labor will do that. And if it doesn’t give Beijing what it wants on 5G, changes in rhetorical emphasis won’t count for anything.

There are some issues where Labor has been tougher on Beijing than the government has. The Turnbull government tried to ­ratify an extradition treaty with Beijing, which critics saw as an ­avenue of intimidation of the Chinese diaspora in Australia. Labor rejected the treaty.

The only dubious part of Wong’s speech was her claim that in preferencing Clive Palmer and dealing with Pauline Hanson, the government was holding hands with forces harking back to the White Australia policy and this would damage our standing in Asia.

This is just wrong. Palmer and Hanson are fringe players. Neither actually supports the White Australia policy. And no one of any consequence in Asia could care less what a fringe Australian senator might say in this area. All democratic nations have their fringe players.

So this part of Wong’s speech is ill-advised. But it is of no consequence. The truth is the government is, for reasons impossible to fathom, saying nothing about foreign policy in this campaign, and what Labor is saying is almost ­entirely bipartisan and orthodox.