The Liberal Party of Australia is at risk of becoming a shadow of its former self as it lurches to the right under Abbott and disenfranchises a large portion of its base, Daniel Carr explains.

IF ABC’s Q&A has taught us anything last year, it’s that our collective nostalgia for the leadership of Malcolm Turnbull shows no sign of abating. Since losing the Liberal Party leadership in 2009, Turnbull has been busy cultivating a public image as a principled and considered statesman.

This is without doubt a significant factor in his confessed “thousands of requests” to form a new party. The fact Turnbull is being asked to form a new party, rather than take back the reigns of Liberal Party, is telling. It appears Australians now see too great a gap between the ‘small l’ liberalism championed by Turnbull and the conservatism of his party.

The two political traditions cohabit in the Liberal Party as a result of Menzies’ fusion of the two to fight their common enemy, socialism, during the 1940s. Though this fusion was not seen in other Westminster system nations, it was highly effective in combatting socialism and saw the Liberal Party become the natural party of government in the latter part of the 20th century. Though with the Liberal Party campaigning to protect middle class welfare, scrap a carbon price (in favour of a government ‘pick-a-winner’ scheme), oppose gay marriage and having recently voted against wheat export deregulation, it has to be asked — are today’s liberals well served by this arrangement?



I recently took to OurSay, an online forum, to ask Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey what the Liberal Party offered to liberals as distinct from conservatives. Hockey’s answer, broadcast online and on Sky News in mid-December, was an indictment on what passes for liberalism in the Party. Hockey rightly acknowledged the Liberal opposition to the government’s internet filter and push for press regulation in his response — but liberalism is not an ideology concerned with free speech alone. It also contains a commitment to the freedom of the individual and equality of opportunity in society. One would be hard pressed to argue the Liberal Party is still true to these ideals.

In his answer, Hockey made much of the right to cross the floor on votes without being expelled from the Party. Though this is unabashedly liberal, with Sue Boyce, Mal Washer and Judi Moylan all set to retire, the majority of Liberal MPs that have wavered, abstained or voted against their party on the issues of gay marriage and asylum seeker policy will have left parliament by 2013. Given this, I am sceptical of how ‘small l’ liberal voters benefit from voting Liberal, if the increasingly conservative make-up of the party sees crossing the floor as now unacceptable.

The remainder of Hockey’s answer dwelt on the ‘compassion’ of the Liberal Party in seeking to “stop the boats” as evidence of a commitment to liberalism.

As the answer I received on the OurSay forum confirmed, there is little in the Liberal Party’s 2013 election pitch for a liberal to take solace in.

Tony Abbott’s vision boasts no ambition beyond locking in the economic and social status quo of John Howard’s prime ministership, despite the mining revenue that buoyed it evaporating and the social conservatism of the nation declining. Beyond addressing the non-issues of an immaterial surplus in 2013, ‘stopping the boats’ and a judicial inquiry into the Gillard AWU fiasco, the Liberal Party will be hard pressed to meet the real challenges Australia faces without the liberal values of internationalism, fiscal prudence, civil liberties and equal opportunity.

Turnbull should definitely make the move to labor

progressiveslol wrote on Jan 8^th, 2013 at 8:54am:


they certainly need a new leader. Maybe they could have Mr 16% instead of us?

cods wrote on Jan 8^th, 2013 at 8:33am:


Yep. the unbiased Independent by the er, wiseone?

It is a truth universally acknowledged, one might say, that contemporary Australian politics is uninspiring and unengaging. In an atmosphere of increasing cynicism about the political process, few of its practitioners appear able to connect with a largely disengaged electorate. Those politicians who do elicit trust and admiration, then, are particularly noticeable. One such figure is former Liberal Party leader Malcolm Turnbull, who famously lost out to Tony Abbott by only one vote in December 2009 and went on to cross the floor to vote for the Rudd government's doomed emissions trading scheme.

Turnbull inspires respect across party lines, and it is not difficult to see why. He makes speeches like this, tweets about literature and global politics as well as local concerns (and recently gave Rupert Murdoch a classy serve regarding Fox News' approach to gun policy in the US), and continues to emphasise the need to address climate change in the face of an awkward ambivalence on his party's part. Where Abbott chose the occasion of Margaret Whitlam's death to have a partisan dig at the 1972-1975 Labor administration, Turnbull spoke warmly of her optimism, generosity and compassion.

It is therefore understandable that Turnbull has become somewhat iconic among political junkies (he is for instance regularly voted 'sexiest male politician' in Crikey's annual poll). What is more mysterious is the habitual suggestion that he wandered into the wrong political party by mistake and ought to be a member of the ALP – or even its leader. In 2009, Turnbull was forced to deny that he had ever approached the ALP to seek a parliamentary seat, and stated instead that he had been 'courted' by prominent party members, including former PM Paul Keating, and had advised Keating that 'I wouldn't be comfortable in the Labor Party and it wouldn't be comfortable with me'.

Some voters appear to have found Turnbull's political allegiance difficult to accept, or entertaining to reject: 11% of respondents to an Essential poll from August 2011 supported Turnbull as Labor leader (Kevin Rudd garnered 37% support to Julia Gillard's 12%). Turnbull downplayed the poll, while maintaining that that popularity with the 'other side' was useful rather than detrimental, arguing: 'You don't win elections by persuading your most devoted supporters to cast a vote for you with even more enthusiasm than they did at the last election…You win elections by persuading people who didn't vote for you at the last election to vote for you. Elections are always won at the centre'.

This concept of the 'sensible centre' was evoked in the latest rush of blood to collective heads about Turnbull's place in Australian politics. A charming double-act between Turnbull and Rudd on Q&A late last year intensified a flurry of enthusiasm about both former party leaders; at the end of the program, an audience member asked:

You two have a lot in common. You both are moderate, wealthy, and not very popular in your own parties but very popular among people…Many Labor voters are very disillusioned with the influence of the factions and unions. Many Liberal voters are disappointed with the influence of big business and the far right wing. Why don't you two join and establish a new party that can open a new chapter in politics in Australia?