
Issue No 119		16 November 2001

LaborNET	Ask Neale	Tool of the Week

Politics

Wrong Way, Go Back

By Michael Gadiel and Peter Lewis

Labor's failure in the federal election is the result of more than bad luck. It is the result of a shift to populism that has left the Party bereft of core principles.


	Kim Beazley

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There is no doubt that John Howard's effective dealing of the race card was the decisive moment of the campaign. But it was Labor's response which dictated the outcome. It embodied all that was wrong with Labor in the post-Keating era.

The Beazley camp will argue that, faced with the Tampa crisis, it had no alternative but to neutralize the issue and attempt to keep the focus on its chosen battle ground of health, education and jobs. These were, after all, the issues its polling was telling it were of concern to voters. It was prepared to run dead on the Howard's covertly racist policy on refugees to give the people the message they wanted to hear.

Beazley's fatal mistake was in failing to differentiate his position on refugees from Howard's. By wholly adopting Howard's position, Beazley conceded the leadership in this area to the Government.

If Howard tapped Australia's xenophobic streak, then why could Beazley not have tapped the Nation's compassion? Who were the refugees running from and why? What risks had they undergone in reaching our shores? Isn't it a problem for the whole region, not just Australia?

Whilst accepting the need to regulate our borders and discourage illegal entrants, Labor could have argued the ridiculousness of the pacific island solution, challenged the government on its relationship with Indonesia, and put forward an alternative policy for streamlining the refugee assessments system and limiting appeals. What about re-funding English language classes for immigrants? The Coastguard proposal was the single positive contribution Labor brought to the debate.

The Labor strategy could only work if the refugee issue could be kept out of the headlines for the rest of the campaign - for Beazley to get a clear run on his message on health and education, but it was na�ve to think that that would be the case. With each new boatload, the refugees were back on the front pages throughout the five weeks of the campaign.

When a boatload of refugees sank - or when the video affair that blew up on the government in the final days, Beazley would have been able to take advantage of these events to turn the debate around -had he sought to differentiate his position from Howard. Instead these events worked against Labor - even though the Government was on the defensive - because the refugee issue was back on the agenda drowning out Labor's other messages.

The results on Saturday night show that Labor lost ground from both the left and the right: A strategy that sought to minimise the effect of this issue instead magnified it leaving many Party faithful disillusioned about Labor to the point of disengagement.

In doing so, it showed again its willingness to sacrifice principle for populism, in a bid to win power. This, more than Tampa, is the reason we have not elected a Beazley Government.

The race card has been played effectively and has exposed an enduring Achilles Heel for Labor. Whenever a conservative faces difficulties it can now play the card, knowing Labor is left blowing in the populist wind. The only viable strategy for Labor is to challenge the race question head on and take the card out of the pack.

In the inevitable rebuilding period it would be dangerous to blame Tampa and bad luck, Labor must re-evaluate the way it conducts politics, why it is in the game and what it wants power for.

The Problem with Populism

Beazley appeared weak because he has constantly allowed the opinion polls to shape his position.

Inconsistency is a luxury that oppositions enjoy and governments do not. Governments must develop policy that is workable and in the public interest or they will suffer the unpopularity of the effect of these policies in the future.

How would Beazley behave in government? Where is there an example of a policy where the Labor Party has held out against public opinion on the ground of principle? Can the average punter find this position believable? Are they just telling us what we want to hear...sucking up with the real intention of doing something else? These were the enduring questions about Labor.

Adherence to principle and consistency is vital for an Opposition because it is the only way the electorate can get a sense for how they will behave in government.

Labor was unable to gain the trust of the Australian electorate because they didn't know where they really stood. When the planes hit the Twin Towers, any chance of explaining these positions was probably obliterated.

By relying too heavily on polling to determine their position Labor is not acting strategically - they become as predictable as the mob and therefore Howard has been able to manipulate the landscape to his advantage.

To act strategically the party must work to shape public opinion as well as reflect it. This means that Labor needs to engage - a two-way, exchange of ideas leading to a genuine change of thinking on both sides. Without this educative roll the Party serves no purpose other than as a public opinion polling machine whose skills are built up around telling people what they want to hear and then being forced by circumstances to do the opposite.

It is time for the Labor Party to re-establish some realistic principles and then stick to them. Maybe it could start by listening to its constituency - talking to unions and working people that have been the base of this Party for 110 years.

They will find that- far from being the racist rednecks that Howard played to, Australians can be deeply thoughtful about the future and compassionate about their fellow humans. Aussies are caring and generous people, it was just that these emotions were never tapped in the refugee debate.

What Principle?

At what point should the Party draw a line and accept that it will not compromise certain principles to get elected?

Are there some principles upon which it is worth making a stand - or is everything negotiable and flexible in this post-modern world?

Labor has always been a party that sought power to achieve an agenda - to the benefit of its core constituency of working people. This is the one of the key distinctions between the Labor Party and the conservatives who see themselves as the natural ruling class and seek government for the sake of power alone.

Labor seeks power to achieve benefits for its constituents. Both Whitlam and Hawke were elected with a genuine case for change and with a real spirit of optimism that there was a better way.

That feeling was missing in this campaign - largely because of the international situation, but also because with major parties were pandering to isolationist, inward-looking feelings in the electorate.

Traditional Labor thinking is that none of the agenda can be implemented if power is not achieved, therefore it is necessary to compromise.

The question for Labor is what is the real objective: the pursuit of power or the pursuit of the objectives that it purports to stand for?.

This is not a black and white question, but involves a balance. Whitlam is rightly respected for making the party electable - reforming it in a Cold War climate to offer the electorate an alternate government rather than a revolution.

But is it possible though that we have now swung too far? That the principles that the Party purports to represent have been totally subjugated to the pursuit of power? Does the party now compete with the Liberals to be the 'natural' government.

The refugee issue is perhaps an issue that would be better served, in the long term, by Labor holding the line on this issue.

Regardless, the tendency to populism over principle hurt the Labor campaign before the Tampa issue exploded.

By taking short-term decisions in Opposition to support the Coalition's policies on private health and private education, Labor locked itself into conservative funding priorities.

Not only did this make it difficult to distinguish itself from its opponents, it meant that it could not draw on these substantial funds to finance its own agenda in the election campaign.

Re-Building

Labor has two possible responses to the weekend election defeat. The first is to treat it as an apparition - a lucky break for Howard. Under this scenario. The alternative is to look for a generational change in leadership and a reappraisal of the way the Party is operating.

While the elevation of Simon Crean to the leadership suggest Labor is taking the former course, it's what he does in the job that is ultimately important. What is clear is that Crean needs to remake Labor as much as he needs to remake himself.

Crean has already signaled a review of Labor's relations with the unions. A better place to start would be in his own backyard and the increasingly destructive role of factionalism. This would involves confronting the reality of the Party's failure to change with the times - that sees it still operating under the old cold war structure - dominated by the factional warlords of the Left and Right. The dominance of these groupings intersects with the problems we identify above - the primacy of attaining power over standing up for Labor principles. The people at the top have placed an ideological straight jacket on the Party in order to maintain their own power. But this approach has failed. Their obsession with power will be the reason why it is denied to them yet again.

The hallmark of Labor has always been about standing up for principles in the face of the populism of the conservatives. Labor must be realistic; making sure that it only adopts principles that it can adhere to in government. But it needs to enunciate these principles, rather than presenting a grab-bag of issues at election time as it did this time around.

Several emerging Labor figures have attempted to redefine these principles in the last few days. Lindsay Tanner speaks of building a bridge between the middle class and blue-collar Labor bases, a theme based on equality of opportunity. Kevin Rudd talks of the new radical centre - the aspirational voters and small businesses who are now the mass of the Australian popoulation. He would hone right in on these groups - with an agenda of equality and social justice. Neither of these perspectives are definitive, although Tanner's call for a story that bridges different groups in society seems a useful starting point.

Let's start the new era with an open debate on immigration and refugees - a full policy is required that deals with our collective fears while unlocking our compassion for a people who have been devastated by a conflict in which the old Cold War alliances have some responsibility.

To be electable, we must develop a broad set of Labor principles that articulate a firm world view: embracing the opportunities of change while protecting those who are victims, developing a new language for distributing the fruits of prosperity and about increasing the stake of people in system increasingly dominated by big corporations.

Education, jobs and health are all elements of this agenda, but they are tools to Labor objectives not ends in themselves. A package like the Knowledge Nation is also a component, but it too is tool for the broader Labor agenda.

If there is a positive to come out of the election defeat Labor must regain an appropriate balance between principle and populism and give the Party a sense of direction to rebuild and then regrow out of this unhappy chapter in its history.

Otherwise we will suffer a similar a fate to that experienced by the boatpeople - adrift, unwanted and with nowhere to call home.

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Issue 119 contents

Interview: Out of the Rubble
Michael Costa argues that Saturday's election result could have been much, much worse.

Unions: Sixty-Forty Are Good Odds!
John Robertson argues that while there may be many problems with the ALP, union power is not one of them.

Politics: Wrong Way, Go Back
Labor's failure in the federal election is the result of more than bad luck. It is the result of a shift to populism that has left the Party bereft of core principles.

Campaign Diary: Week Five: All Washed Up
If you can stand it, relive the fatefull final week of a most remarkable election campaign.

International: Trade Piracy Unmasked
As the trade barons met in Qatar to chart out their agenda, George Monbiot looks at the machinations behind the scenes.

Factions: The Party's Over
Chris Christodoulou renews his call for a breakdown of the factional system to bring new life into the ALP

History: The Fall-Out
Neale Towart looks back to Labor's reaction to its loss in the 1954 'Petrov election' and finds warnings for today's post mortem.

Media: Elite Defeat
Rowan Cahill looks at the intellectual paucity in the PM's ongoing attacks on 'elite opinion'.

Satire: Crean 'Listens To Australian People': Will Sink Refugee Boats
Simon Crean, the most likely candidate to replace Kim Beazley as Labor's leader, says he will take heed of the message sent to the ALP by Australian voters at the Federal Election.

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» Workers Unite Over Corporate Power

» Day Three: Telstra Privatisation Begins

» Primus Deal Marks New Era in Telcos

» Qantas Staff Cuts Condemned

» Bank Workers Seek Proxies for AGMs

» Blokes Stand Up For The Ladies

» Landmark Community Services Win

» Anger at Sartor's Power Grab

» Consumer Boycott Call for Sugar Co-op

» Apprentices Win Parity with Uni Students

» Competition for Nurses Hots Up

» CFMEU Launches Bunny Club

» ICFTU Reveals 250 Companies in Burma

» Activists Notebook

» STOP PRESS: No Democracy at Telstra AGM