Since it was founded in the middle of the second world war, theLiberal partyhas been a leadership party. Its longest periods of government are the result of the skills of the men who led it, Robert Menzies and John Howard. And compared with the Labor party, it gives its leaders more power. They have a free hand in the choice of their ministry, and they are ultimately responsible for the development of party policy. There are consultative mechanisms in place, between the leader and the party room, and between the parliamentary party and the organisation. But the power ultimately lies with the parliamentary party, and within that with the leader. If the leader chooses not to consult, he cannot be made to do so; and if the party organisation is unhappy about a particular policy direction it can advise and warn, but it cannot veto.
The Liberal party’s two failed policy documents of last century, John Hewson’s Fightback! and John Howard’s Future Directions, were both produced out of the leader’s office. There was some use of outside consultancy firms, but almost no consultation with the parliamentary party or with the party organisation, including its joint standing committee on federal policy.
Following the 1993 election loss to Paul Keating who had subjected the nation to “the recession we had to have”, the organisational structures which allowed an unpopular tax to become the centre of an election campaign were reviewed. There was a renewed emphasis on the need for a policy partnership between the parliamentary party and the organisation, but nothing essentially changed. The party’s fortunes continue to be hostage to one man’s leadership abilities.
SoPeter Duttonwas right on Saturday night to take responsibility for the election loss. The policy ball was always in his court, but he barely noticed as he put his energy into sledging Labor. He would clean up Labor’s mess, Albanese was weak, only the Liberals had a plan. But it all lacked substance. Dutton told us he was a strong leader, tough and decisive, but when one looked more closely there was barely anything there – just claims and bluster, repeated by other leading Liberals. And it was massively over-egged.
Take the claim, made by both the shadow treasurer, Angus Taylor, and the campaign spokesperson, James Paterson, that under Labor Australia had suffered the greatest collapse in living standards in its history. Really? Compared with the early 1930s when a third of workers were unemployed, or in the 1890s when a speculative building bubble burst and the savings of thousands of people evaporated? How could intelligent, well-educated men spout such nonsense? Where did these campaign talking points come from – the leader’s office? To me, this was evidence of gross incompetence. Did no one know enough history to amend the claim to the greatest collapse of living standards in living memory, which is at least arguable? Or did they think that Australians knew so little history that no one would notice?
So where does this massive defeat leave the party? The answer is, in dire straits, perhaps as dire as the situation after the 1943 election when the major non-labour party, the United Australia party, was reduced to 13 seats and 18.33% percent of the vote. These were the ashes from which Menzies and others reconstructed the party into a viable party of government which went on to win the 1949 election and govern for 23 years.
Looking across the diminished ranks of Liberal parliamentarians, one sees no one of Menzies’ stature. The loss of Liberal moderates is a huge problem for any rejuvenation of the party. The competent, professional women who won old blue ribbon Liberal seats in 2022 have mostly held them. But the marginalisation of Liberal moderates has been going on since the 1980s as Howard and the dries defeated the so-called wets.
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This is nowhere better seen than in the relegation of Petro Georgiou, who died a few weeks ago, to the backbench. In 1994 Georgiou succeeded Andrew Peacock who had succeeded Menzies to the prized Melbourne seat of Kooyong, and he held it for 16 years before retiring. Georgiou was competent and intelligent, with lived understanding of the changes postwar migration was making to Australia, yet he never held a ministry. His successor, Josh Frydenberg, was treasurer, restoring Kooyong to its historic place in a Liberal government until he lost it to Monique Ryan in 2022. The Liberals preselected a candidate, Amelia Hamer, with a Liberal moderate pedigree, and lost again.
So where to from here? For my money, Dan Tehan is the most plausible. He is experienced, with no taint of scandal, and seems decent, though his doubling of the Hecs fees for humanities degrees when he was minister for education was a dreadful decision, showing that he too places little value on understanding our history. But the Liberals will need to think long and hard about their history if they are to find a way out of their current mess.
It has put its faith in the capacity of the leader to develop the policies which will win the confidence of the electorate.
Judith Brett is a political historian and biographer, and an emeritus professor of politics at La Trobe University. Her latest book is titled Fearless Beatrice Faust