Sussan Ley must fight to return the Liberal party to the broad church that embodies Australia's enduring values

The Guardian

a day ago

Reports of the death of the Liberal party are much exaggerated. There is a mountain to climb but should the incumbents stumble badly, the Coalition is the only viable governing option. In Australia, governments lose office rather than oppositions win.
The Coalition must regroup quickly, hold the government to account and commence serious policy development based on its enduring values. Sussan Ley must define herself before her opponents do. She can begin by going on the road and engaging with and listening to her fellow Australians.
The debacle over the work from home policy in the last election inevitably has revived calls for gender quotas, suggesting that would make the party more in touch. It's a great announceable, signalling a change in the party culture. There are strong arguments for and against given the more individualistic ethos of the Liberal party.
Delivering such a structural change is fraught with risk. It would require herding the cats of state divisions. The issue will probably become another front in the internal culture wars as it is already identified by detractors as a 'left' issue. It could spark a proxy leadership contest. Leaders must pick their fights and win. Is this the hill that Ley is prepared to die on?
It may be better to tackle this issue through the prism of party reform including more open membership and nomination processes. This is on the agenda in New South Wales and that's good as far as it goes. There is however a case for giving party directors more say in candidate identification and development, including testing candidate profiles in the electorate. The late secretary of the NSW Liberal party, Senator John Carrick, was a master at this.
Better candidate pathways also require that Liberal party factions and groupings be house trained. Formal power sharing to give everyone a voice at the table might help. Robust policy arguments between liberals and conservatives within the broad Liberal church are necessary and desirable but there can be no winner-take-all mentality. The party interest should trump factional interests.
The Coalition has to double down on its traditional strengths of economic management and national security, reflecting long-held values that elevate the national interest above sectional interests. Failure to control spending and taxation levels is a basic test of managerial competence.
If you cannot manage the budget, you cannot manage the country.
National defence is core government business. At present, more guns mean less butter, unless we radically improve our productivity. Governments need to take the public into their confidence about our rapidly changing strategic circumstances that require the most significant industrial mobilisation since the second world war. Economic reform and resilience are intimately connected to our capacity to maintain Aukus and other programs without shredding the national budget.
Social policies must be embedded in a Liberal vision of society. That means supporting the family unit, in all its contemporary manifestations, strengthening the sinews of civil society as a counter to big government, monopolistic businesses and powerful trade unions. An overriding regard for the rights of the individual as opposed to the collective. Liberals have long recognised the social benefit of high rates of home ownership.
Donald Trump's presidencies have energised the more conservative elements of the global right, promoting economic populism, 'traditional' values, nativism and a disdain for liberal elites that enforce drab conformism and cancel culture. In Australia this translates into a view that the centre is Labor-lite territory and there is a poultice of votes on the more conservative right, which represents a silent majority of voters, the 'real' people.
It's true that major parties can be Tweedledum and Tweedledee if they huddle too closely to each other. The risk for parties that go too far in one direction is to cede too much ground to their opponents. However, the centre also shifts depending on the salience of specific issues. If immigration appears out of control, for example, voters will give it a higher priority. The alchemy of politics lies in judging the Goldilocks moment, when policy is neither too right nor too left but just right.
Dutton misjudged the alchemy, allowing himself to be tagged with the Trump brush, not having defined himself over the last three years. Dutton did not need to agree with the government on everything. But politics is about arithmetic and building a big tent.
In 1996, John Howard improved the electability of the Coalition by taking the rough edges off many Fightback era policies, including embracing Medicare and putting a safety net under industrial relations reforms.
One pole of the big tent is addressing climate change in a pragmatic fashion. The weather is changing and nations that adapt quickly will gain a first mover advantage. Business and communities can see what is coming and are moving to address the issue, even if some governments want to turn back the clock. Most Australians will support sensible measures that provide affordable, abundant and clean energy with appropriate back up. The British Conservative party crossed this bridge some time ago. Failing to engage on the issue in a factual way makes it almost impossible to talk to those who regard this as a high priority, such as younger voters and Teal supporters.
Arthur Sinodinos is a former Australian ambassador to the US. He is the partner and chair of the Asia Group's Australia practice and was a former minister for industry, innovation and science