Ex-Labor premier David Bartlett adamant minority Tasmanian government can work if cool heads prevail

Australia Broadcast Center

13 hours ago

Tasmania is in a holding pattern as politicians wait to see the final makeup of the next parliament.
The ABC has called 14 seats for the Liberals and nine for Labor.
The Greens have won five seats, independents four, leaving three seats yet to be determined.
Those three seats could be crucial to whoever forms the next government. And until they become clear, party leaders can do very little.
Both Premier Jeremy Rockliff and Labor leader Dean Winter have been reaching out to confirmed and potential crossbenchers.
The two leaders know voters expect them to make the next parliament work and ideally for four years, but they will have to navigate a very diverse set of views.
David Bartlett, who as Labor premier came to a minority government agreement with the Greens in 2010, had some advice for both parties.
He told ABC Radio Hobart that when dealing with the crossbench, Mr Winter and Mr Rockliff should not start by trading on policy.
"Stop doing these individual deals that trade off policy because it's not credible for Kristie [Johnston], who's an incredibly great politician, in my view, to suddenly drop a policy or not fight for the policy she went to an election on," he said.
Mr Bartlett said that was how he and then-Greens leader Nick McKim approached things back in 2010.
"The one thing Nick McKim and I did immediately when we first talked, which was after [he] offered me supply and confidence, we said to each other we are not going to negotiate away policy right now at the start," he said.
"What we're going to do is create trust and a protocol through which we could negotiate on policy and could transparently and openly discuss policy.
Mr Bartlett said the arrangement worked because there was trust, particularly between himself and the Green ministers.
"I met with them every week. We had a protocol for dealing with issues. We then also had a formal exchange of letters," he said.
Senator Jonathon Duniam told ABC Radio Hobart there would need to be some form of understanding, but given the differences, it may be difficult to appease them all.
"Each of those, what, four, five independents we might have, plus the Greens, all have very disparate views on a range of things, and I'm not 100 per cent sure how you're going to be able to cobble together a coherent pathway forward if you appease all of them on the way through," he said.
He said independents and minor parties also have a responsibility to make this new parliament work.
"We've just been through an early election and we can talk about Dean and Jeremy all we like, but at the end of the day, you know, Peter George is absolutely clear in what he stands for," Senator Duniam said.
"But, he's going to have to give on some of the things he's talking about."
"There's going to be a lot of case-by-case assessment of legislation on the part of the crossbenchers and again, this is where a sensible, cool head is required.