You have to admire the Liberal Party’s remarkable ability to swing the political conversation back to itself time and time again.
The world may be undergoing an historic financial crisis and Australia teetering on the edge of recession but for many Liberals at the moment it’s all about the Nationals.
Some of us may have been fooling ourselves that last week’s late night Senate shenanigans didn’t matter a great deal, that National senators crossing the floor on the last vote of the year at twenty to two in the morning wasn’t important in the scheme of things. Not too many voters would have known or cared, except perhaps Nationals voters, and if you can ‘t cross the floor a year into Opposition then when can you?
But the Liberals just can’t let it go.
Just as the dust was settling on the Shane Stone letter earlier this week, when we were all in danger of switching attention to looming holidays and Yuletide festivities, Tony Abbott appears to attack the Nationals.
“The Liberal Party respects conscientious dissent,” Abbott piously intones.
“Nationals senators’ considered decision to vote contrary to the shadow cabinet, though, was more serious… Nationals senators need to understand that it’s impossible to be part of a coalition only when it suits them.”
Presumably Abbott has shared those views with the two Liberal senators who crossed the floor as well last Friday.
Abbott has been doing this all year. He briefly went quiet after Malcolm Turnbull ascended to the leadership but lately he’s been at it again. He is plainly bored with his portfolio — he even complained he wanted out of it when Turnbull was considering his shadow ministry — and loves being the centre of media attention. He is the Opposition’s resident blabbermouth, Mr Rent-a-quote who’ll speak on anything, anytime, for anyone. We got Media Monitors to check Abbott’s press appearances for the last six months, divided between comment on his own portfolio — Families and Indigenous Services — and everything else.
| Press | Radio | Television | Total | |
| Tony Abbott (portfolio) | 625 | 6,238 | 3,547 | 10,410 |
| Tony Abbott (other) | 872 | 5,429 | 1,965 | 8,266 |
The split is nearly 50%, but in the press he talks far more about other matters than about the area he is supposed to be focussed on.
Abbott wasn’t alone, though. Alexander Downer’s replacement Jamie Briggs — a long-term Nats hater according to Coalition sources — decided to weigh in as well, declaring “Barnaby wants to make a decision over the Christmas period, does he want to be part of a team or does he want to be a renegade?”
While there’s no excuse for Abbott, at least Briggs is young and new to the game. But quite what either is thinking, or what good they believe they’re doing, is a mystery. We’re back to the absurd days of Brendan Nelson, when the Coalition couldn’t stop talking about themselves. The Nationals are astonished at the apparent inability of some Liberals to keep their mouths shut.
“It’s not doing us any harm at all,” one National source said. “And do they seriously think they can browbeat Barnaby into line? John Howard tried to do it and couldn’t.”
The Christmas break can’t come soon enough for the Liberals. Provided the likes of Abbott take a holiday from offering their views on internal Coalition matters.
Whoever coined the phrase re Abbott..’The Mad Monk’, got it 100% correct. He now even looks the part.
Ears flapping, what a partner for the Flying Nun !!!!.
Dave Liberts: couldn’t agree more. Except as the Bishop plagiarism case showed, the Liberals NEED five years to reinvent – Crean was one of the greatest post-Whitlam leaders; unfortunately, the job he had to do was not conducive to government. Turnbull shot his bolt – they needed an Abbott, or a Downer to rebuild, then give it to the young-guns. Even a Hockey (FFS!) would have done it. Shame for Mal, and he still might pull it off…
Obviously I’m preaching to the choir, but Bernard’s core message – the Libs need to stop talking about themselves and start opposing the government – is also supported by the evidence of how Labor got itself out of opposition and into government. Under Beazley, discussions about ‘daleks’ and other details of Labor’s machinations did the party a lot of damage. Under Crean, the party was so self-focussed that it was clearly unelectable (but in Crean’s defence, I think this was always the plan and I believe he left the party in better shape than he inherited it). Under Rudd, the factions have fallen into line very neatly. The Libs can either learn, change and get somewhere or they can keep the focus on their own navels and see how far it gets them. My bet is they spend the next five years or so doing the latter.
There’s no doubt Tony Abbott needs to pull his head in and it seems the Daily Telegraph has sent the same message after he blogged this morning on the Bill of Rights. I went back to retrieve another of his gob-smacking comments and half of it is missing – the long rant about our useless judiciary that can only interpret and not make laws. A few sentences I believed were libellous aren’t there. What is there is the inane “everyone who believes in the role of parliament should be against allowing judges to invent new rights. Bills of rights are left-wing tricks to allow judges to change society in ways a parliament would never dare”. If only someone could shed some light on Abbott’s full bottle blast on barristers and QC’s being a bunch of lame ducks.
I wish people would stop telling the coalition what to do. We had to endure them in government for twelve years so can’t we just enjoy watching them tear each other apart for a while? please!