Emeritus Professor James (Jim) A. Walter, Political Science, School of Social Science, Monash University- The thrive and fail of Australia PM and Political leadership. What has been wrong with Australian politics and disunity due to the Liberal Party’s leadership spill?
Prof James Walter: “Liberal Party has two groups within it; one of them is the conservative which against many policies that the more moderate Liberal Party wants to pursue for instance there has been a big dispute about energy policy but it is also about climate changes. The conservative, well they remain skeptical about climate change, and the policies, the Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull who has just been defeated was perusing was partly trying to bring down emission from energy generation, and the conservative is very much oppose it, because they believe will but Australian to disadvantages and put extra cost, they don’t believe that renewable energy, solar, wind power will serve our purposes and so on. There has been other issues, same sex marriage with a fierce debate in Australia, the moderate and the Liberal party supported it, the population supported, having a majority vote in the country, however, the conservative felt that it should never been has raised and that Turnbull could have prevented from being raised. Those are the sort of issues that has been disputed within the party and they have tried to do leadership spill, Peter Dutton but don’t have the number, however Turnbull somehow set up a meeting that benefits Scott Morrison. To the public it seems like a big fight for nothing, because the conservative doesn’t win in any case, and that is the really the difficulties the party is fragmented from within and it is very hard for its leader to harness them together.”
Listen to Emeritus Professor James Walter's full interview here: https://www.sbs.com.au/yourlanguage/services/embeds/audioplayer/4285560e-5aae-4576-ab5a-a9dd194dfb8a
Both Greens and ALP said that the Liberal cannot get its house in order, is that the case?
Prof James Walter: “ Yes, Yes, I think that’s true. And it’s been true really ever since. Turnbull became Prime Minister, you needed to remember that he for his part challenges a conservative leader Tony Abbott, and said that he would bring the policies of the countries wanted, that partly was true that is to say public opinion was much more in support on the things that he proposed than they were the things that Tony Abbott is doing. That happened but then he was caught in the end getting enough votes to defeat Tony Abbott. He’s done various deal with the conservatives that he wouldn’t push too hard on this and that. The issues was that they voted for him because they thought he would be popular, because of his small policies, but that certainty trying to act on what he promised to the people. The blocked him, ended up having to compromise and kept compromising and off-course that method is electoral popularity start to decline. And that open another attack from the conservatives because they say, there you are, he is not going to win the election. It is a very difficult position, Morrison will face the same difficulties. There is a wide gap between what the public say and response to polling that they want and what the conservatives members of the Liberal Party are prepared to agree to. And so Morrison too, will have a great deal with trouble time to meet public expectation but also keep the support of the conservatives within his party.”
According to Financial Review, BBC even said that chopping and changing Prime Minister is almost a sport, a blood sports, if they see that their pm is not doing well in election, they cull their PM so the PM cycle is cutting short. The New York Times also said that “Australians joke that leadership challenges are a national sport, and gambling websites were giving odds and accepting bets. As each candidate entered the field, the odds on bookmaking sites fluctuated.” Financial Times called Australian leadership spills as “Games of thrones and an Italian Political instability, The Times of London said, “it is the gravest political crisis in decades”, Both CNN and The New York Times examined why climate change seems to equal political suicide in Australia, with the Times asking bluntly, "what on earth is going on?"
Mr. Turnbull, he himself said that “Politicians tend to focus to much on themselves and not much about the people, Australians wants us to govern, and to serve and provide services to Australians and deal their problem not self-indulgent or cause inflict in between parties or between politicians”. Is that the case that Australian politicians tend to ignore Australian public rather than focus on themselves and don’t really serve the people who elected them as voting is compulsory but it seems that votes doesn’t really matter at all according to one American comedian?
Prof James Walter: Well it matter to the extent that because enough of them fear that they will lose government that is they will lose public supports. They are making a desperate attempt to staying a government by getting rid of their leader. So Turnbull looks like a good bet because he has high level of public popularity. But the contradiction is that once they put him there, it wasn’t the sort of majority it was some faction within the Liberal Party that keep chipping away at him saying this is not what our base wants. Now the base is not the public it is just some of the Liberal members who are again most survey showed a bit distance from what the majority of the public wants. So there is always contradiction between the politicians are trying to keep their jobs by going for someone who looks popular but then saying this is not what our base wants. Our base are being a pretty small proportion of the population. So it is true when it comes down to it, they recently have been very much preoccupied with their own concerns which is staying in government, rather than a sensible policy. But we should remember that this happened too in the Labor party, it is also important to recognise that this fragmentation within the old party is going on on both sides. And just that the Labor Party has shown more discipline over the past 6 years, but they started this process of getting rid of leader because in the short term they thought that they will be unpopular as they are facing challenges from the Greens the National Party as well as One Nation, One nation is very conservative whereas the Greens is leaning toward the left with the Labor, so all of them are trying to somehow containing this inflicting tendency,”
So what should be changed in order to maintain political harmony within their political parties and focusing on Australians rather than their parties or their governments?
Prof James Walter: “ I think it is the party themselves were reformed. But that is a big issue, it is quite hard to do. The other things is that would probably change and this in Australia is quite hard is to change the voting system in a way that New Zealand did some ten or fifteen years ago (mixed-member proportional). Or there would be a system where proportional representation which would means that these group will get a vote but it has to enter into a sensible compromises with other real coalition. For example it is possible that the Liberal Part if they lose upcoming election for the next few years, it is possible that it will fragmented that conservatives will go off with Corey Burnaby to set up a separated conservative party. If we have a different voting system, that would not be necessary be a bad thing. Because they will be then force in an election to reach and negotiate compromise with a bigger party, and that would mean that they will be locked-in, in a way that they are not now. That would be one way to do, the other is problem we have and this is becoming too often that we see in the W mixed-member proportional western democracy is that politics used to be what we call mass party, and now they are very much about leader, the philosophy that keep the party together has been evaporated and now voting respond to leaders. It is very leader centric, which is why this sort of churn leader happened. It is because the party seems to be not getting support then it is all seen as leader’s problems and they think if we change the leader will fix the problem, as we’ve seen that doesn’t work. There as to be a agenda, a policy program for the country. And the biggest thing any Prime Minister has to maintain is disciplines in the party. The biggest change would be and there are six of these will be, if they are committed to a policy plug out that people understood and are attracted to, and where the centre could have the argument within the party, but once position was agreed with the policy, agenda was agree and they will be bound to comply. Now the Labor party does that to some extent, they have an understanding that you can have whatever argument you like within the party, but once the position was agreed, everybody had to follow what was decided, the Liberal Party and the National party don’t do that, and the result is that in extreme they can have this sort of complete chaos where we have seen in the last few weeks where the centre are free to publicly saying that they don’t agree with the leader, they don’t agree with the majority and the will challenge on that bases. That is a recipe for disaster.”
Do you think that democracy in western countries has been broken due to leadership spill?
Prof James Walter: I wouldn't go as far as broken but it certainly I do the biggest thing for both parties to look seriously about party reform. And a reform that would lead to politics where agree on policies competition, and people could respond to that rather than this sort of turn table of leaders coming and going. “
Do you reckon political party or government policies should resonate people of Australia rather than their own political party?
Prof James Walter: Yeah, Yap, and that has been always the case yes, you gonna keep your own party supported on that unless you can produce something that resonated with the broader public and you lost the plot. So you know people are concerning about climate change, yes they want cheaper energy prices, but there are plenty of bright people who can tell them they can do both, and time and again that issue has been inquiry, has been report, all of them putting forwards technically sensible solutions to this, on ideological ground rather than practical ground , people at least in the Liberal party has opposed them, despite the fact that increasingly the people, the population has showing through survey that that is what they want. “
Can you really predict what Scott Morrison as the leader will do or how is his leadership style will be?
Prof James Walter: I think it is almost inevitable that they will lose the next election whether it is soon or whether next year, which is at latest it can be. I think also that he will be unable, he like not that he is the same as Turnbull but the fact that he will be equally unable to unify those desperate group, the conservative. Mike realized that this is feeding an electoral defeat. There might be a little less strident and destructionists, but I think the damage has been done in a situation they have been already behind the poll for almost continuously for ever since the 2016 election. It is very hard to see how they can pull back now. When that happened, if it is happened, that is my prediction after they defeated, they there will be or there have to be solve the Schengen way can only hope that they set about some sort of sensible party reform.”
Emeritus Professor James Water, a political science, School of Social Science, from Monash University would like to conclude that:
“while it has been so startling of the past few weeks, to observe this circus, it is not only a problem that confine to the Liberal Party, the Labor Party has different set of division but they do have division nonetheless. They have shown more discipline to contain but the party model consistency from the twenty century is badly in needed of reconsideration. And eventually they too have to come to term that John Fawkner, the Labor senators for many years spent a lot of time trying to bring about reform in the Labor Party, and sadly it didn’t succeed. But I think it is too much to assume that it is just the Liberal Party that is having this set of problem even though it’s much more extreme at the moment in the Liberal Party. And all of the major parties are going to think about retailing changes circumstances we face now, in the new century.”
So in short, political party should reform to fit with the 21st century and suit the public’s needs.#
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