Josh Frydenberg reaches for prized status of last man standing

A quirk of polling timing might save Scott Morrison from the ignominy of being dumped before the election. There’s no Newspoll this week — it’s been held off for the budget.

A disastrous Newspoll — bear in mind Morgan produced a staggering 58-42 result for Labor last week, despite the Canberra press gallery engaged in a campaign of lies over late senator Kimberley Kitching — would have both overshadowed the budget and set tongues wagging about the need to replace Morrison. The PM, even by the admission of News Corp stenographers, stinks with voters.

Indeed Morrison is so toxic he won’t be allowed near under-threat Sydney Liberal seats. That adds to the list of places Morrison can’t risk visiting, which include bushfire- and flood-affected communities. One doubts he’d fare particularly well in Adelaide either.

Luckily for him his most aggressive rival, Defence Minister Peter Dutton — who looks more and more like a parody of himself — is every bit as toxic with voters.

Morrison may not visit seats like North Sydney or Wentworth but there’ll be plenty of images of the toxic trio of him, Dutton and Barnaby Joyce on display in those seats, authorised by independents and Labor.

That leaves Treasurer Josh Frydenberg — who will be visiting at-risk Liberal seats — as the last man standing — and tomorrow night of course is his moment.

The only real fiscal and political question of the budget will be whether Frydenberg spends all the windfall revenue that has flowed to the government via higher commodity prices in the past six months, and thus preserve Australia’s trajectory towards a trillion-dollar debt, or whether he’ll actually offer some fiscal discipline — if only to enable at least a token effort at attacking Labor’s big-spending plans.

(That the Coalition, which has built on its long-term record as the big-spending party of Australian politics by becoming the biggest spending government since the days of Curtin, could even utter criticism of spending by Labor without being swept away by howls of laughter, is testimony to how ignorant and lazy the press gallery is.)

Most likely Frydenberg will bank a couple of billion in coal and gas revenue and throw the rest at voters in a desperate effort to reverse an 8-10 point polling gap, leading to only a trivial improvement in the forecast deficits.

A cut in the fuel excise (there are few certainties in politics, but one is a government that cuts fuel excise is both in serious trouble and seriously dumb), the pork-barrelling we cover elsewhere in Crikey today, more Defence spending, maybe some tax cuts. Why not? There’ll be no chance of Labor pulling a Rudd and wrongfooting the government with “this reckless spending must stop” The electorate is perfectly fine with spending, reckless or otherwise, thank you.

Frydenberg has the chance to set himself up as the natural heir apparent either in opposition or, if Morrison jags another miracle win, in the next term.

Despite his being a policy lightweight, there’s a Liberal constituency there waiting for Frydenberg: those deeply uncomfortable with, or even violently hostile to, Morrison’s big spending, along with whatever other aspects of the prime minister’s political personality they dislike. They know Morrison stands for nothing except the next press release, and hate him for it, and for the colossal debt Australia now wears. Frydenberg carries the true Liberal torch in a way Morrison now never can.

And if the government can turn things around in the remaining six weeks, or merely manages to save the furniture, it will have started with the budget. Josh’s budget. Frydenberg wins either way — if he can keep his seat. That Morgan poll? It has an 11% swing to Labor in Victoria. Frydenberg holds Kooyong by 6.4%.

No one seriously expects Frydenberg to lose Kooyong, or that Labor will do more than pick up one or maybe two seats in Victoria. But it’d be a terrible shame if it happened just when the path to the leadership opened up before him.