Prime Minister rising – but not quite far enough
Quite by chance, the final poll in the series that Malcolm Turnbull set as a test of effective leadership is due to appear during the Commonwealth Games. The coincidence is fitting: politics in Australia is viewed often enough as another kind of sport, with a loser for every winner. Parties are cheered on by supporters as uncritically as fans cheer on their teams. Get too close and the din becomes deafening, blocking out perspective and common sense.
Mr Turnbull’s personal approval has made up ground since the last poll.
That certainly seems to have happened with the 30-polls test, which has become a simple pass or fail proposition. Politics, like real life, is rarely like that. In anticipation, however, Mr Turnbull can take some cheer from the latest Fairfax-Ipsos poll, which we publish today. He is not winning – Labor is still ahead 52 to 48 per cent in the two-party-preferred count – but the trend is running the government’s way.
Mr Turnbull’s personal approval has made up quite a lot of ground since the last poll in December – up 5 points and disapproval down 6, putting him in positive territory again with his best result for 22 months. His rating as preferred prime minister is up 4 points, to where more than half of those surveyed prefer him. One voter in two is even prepared to back the government’s controversial plan to cut the tax rate for large companies.
More importantly, 62 per cent of the sample believe he should stay Liberal leader and only 28 per cent say he should be replaced. Crucial here is the level of support he enjoys among Liberal voters – 74 per cent want him to stay in (21 per cent want a change). Would-be rivals within Liberal ranks who feel he is not conservative enough for the party’s support base would do well to ponder those figures.
Despite its improvement, however, the government is still not winning. It is not surprising Mr Turnbull will be blamed if the government is stuck. As leader his function is to set the direction and tone that will secure the victories. He has not been able to do that. More importantly, perhaps, although the Turnbull government has been no disaster, outsiders are hard pressed to say what it stands for or where it wants to go. Like the child who takes a great Dane for a walk, Mr Turnbull is the one being led by suspicious or recalcitrant members of his party. The few directions that have been set have been determined either by the recalcitrants, or in fear of their prejudices. It is the Turnbull government in name, not in fact.
John Howard, in an ABC interview, called on Liberal MPs to recognise their own responsibility in maintaining party unity. He is absolutely right, but it is telling that he had to raise the issue at all. He did so in a week when the party’s discontented rump did its best to make mischief for the leader they despise.
The Monash Forum called for the government, if necessary, to build a coal-fired power station. That members of a supposedly free-market party can seriously consider subsidies for the coal industry shows the incoherence of the internal opposition the Prime Minister faces. Yet though its ideas are ludicrous, the group maintains its zealous rage; it can cause the government trouble all the way to the election.
The Opposition Leader, meanwhile, labours under different problems. Bill Shorten is not the most charismatic of leaders and struggles in media appearances to make the case for Labor. Yet he has been self-aware in analysing the problems this causes and adroit in setting a strategy to counteract or compensate for them.
If he adopted the low-profile, trust-me tactic of some recent predecessors, he might sink without trace. But because he leads an able team, he has been able to put together coherent policies that are likely to appeal to groups whose support Labor is seeking. Its policies on negative gearing and changes to the imputation rules on company will undoubtedly offend some older voters. But the party appears to calculate that gains among the young should more than compensate. It deserves credit for presenting difficult but necessary policies and doing so early – even though this poll shows the public is yet to be convinced.
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