Senate hostility a bit less annoying

28 July 2019

 

The Liberal-National Coalition can’t afford to be complacent after its unexpected win in the recent Federal election.  It didn’t win the election by much, although so surprising was the win in many people’s minds that it seemed huge.

Everyone seems to forget that the Coalition only has a tiny majority in the House of Representatives, and doesn’t have a majority in the Senate, so it still requires some negotiation to get legislation passed.  It’ll only take three Coalition people in the House of Reps to vote differently for something to fail to pass there, while the Coalition requires four crossbenchers to get anything through the Senate.

Before becoming Prime Minister about twelve months ago, Scott Morrison had been a minister in the Coalition Government which took power in 2013.  While the Coalition struggled to deal with Senate crossbenchers in particular, Morrison was considered one of the Coalition’s better negotiators.  This doesn’t mean that he lost his ability to negotiate when he became PM – there just haven’t been that many instances so far of his skill in negotiation making a difference since then.

Generally, the Labor Party can be expected to vote against Morrison on various policies.  And usually the Greens, who have the most seats among minor players in both the House of Reps and the Senate, will be on Labor’s side when voting.

The recent election saw some Senate crossbenchers defeated, and the Coalition won the largest number of Senate seats, though not enough to obtain a Senate major.  But because of a shrunken crossbench in the Senate, the Coalition only needs to persuade four crossbench Senators to support its legislation.

The Senate crossbench includes nine Greens, six of whom had to face the voters at the election and managed to hold their seats.  With the Greens likely to oppose the Coalition on virtually every issue, the Coalition probably has to ignore them.

So what other options exist for the Coalition if the Greens are ignored?  Several Senate crossbenchers are likely to side with the Coalition a lot, but others might be harder to read as such.

There are six Senate crossbenchers if we discount the Greens.  The controversial Pauline Hanson and her party have two seats, with Malcolm Roberts alongside her.  A party called the Centre Alliance, which emerged from the mob of former Senator Nick Xenophon, has two seats.  The other two crossbenchers are Jacqui Lambie and Cory Bernardi.  Lambie was originally elected as a candidate from the mob of mining tycoon Clive Palmer before breaking away to lead her own mob, while Bernardi was with the Coalition until quitting to form his own party.

In terms of geography, both Hanson and Roberts come from Queensland, while Lambie comes from Tasmania and the other three come from South Australia, which means that special deals for those places might be possible.

I suspect that Bernardi might vote with the Coalition on most issues.  The Centre Alliance Senators, Rex Patrick and Stirling Griff, might be supportive on some issues, though not on everything.  Hanson and Roberts might also be supportive, but with Hanson attracting to so much vitriol and condemnation for her stands regarding many things, the Coalition might be uneasy about dealing with both her and Roberts.  Lambie will be hard to read, given that she speaks her mind freely and could go either way.

Despite this apparent unpredictability among Senate crossbenchers, Morrison and most Coalition people might well see the Senate hostility, which arguably goes back a number of years, as a bit less annoying than before.  But the Senate crossbenchers can’t be taken for granted.  Mind you, the Coalition has already enjoyed support from Labor on passing tax cuts, albeit not before Labor went through some internal torture over whether to oppose or support.

Morrison and his ministers could still be kept on their toes in relation to dealing with the Senate crossbenchers.  Their recent election win might generate hubris, unless they respect how narrow it was, and that might make the crossbenchers more hostile to them.  The wheeling and dealing, dressed up as respect, might well get interesting over coming months.

 

Barilaro scorching over Grylls

14 July 2019

 

The job of Deputy Premier should be prestigious for any State politician, at least at first glance.  But one wonders if the person currently holding the post in New South Wales, John Barilaro, considers it a poisoned chalice.

Barilaro became Deputy Premier at the same time that he became leader of the Nationals in NSW, in late 2016.  It was at a bad time for the Nationals, who lost one of their safest seats, Orange, in a by-election.  The loss was to a minor party proclaiming to represent shooters and fishers and farmers.  That party took another two seats from the Nationals, Barwon and Murray, at a general election earlier this year.

Because of a perception that people in regional NSW aren’t getting much out of massive investment and economic improvement within the state, Barilaro has been making some noises about whether he might give up the job of Deputy Premier, assuming that it lets him and the Nationals take a stronger stand for the bush.

Barilaro actually seems to be seeking to emulate Brendan Grylls, who used to lead the Nationals in Western Australia, in what might seem like an unusual arrangement when you look at the Australian political landscape.

Just over ten years ago, the Liberal Party took power in WA after a close election result, while the Labor Party lost office after seven years there.  But the Liberals didn’t obtain power like their counterparts elsewhere would’ve taken it.

You’d know about the Liberal-National Coalition which recently won a Federal election, and has governed in NSW for eight years.  But the Coalition hasn’t existed in WA since early 2001.  When the Liberals took power in WA in 2008, it was only through an alliance with the Nationals – rather than what we see at Federal level and in NSW.

Normally, the Coalition “splits” when it loses office in elections.  The Liberals, with more seats, hold the jobs of both Opposition Leader and Deputy Opposition Leader, and the Nationals act separately in that sense.  They still work together where possible, becoming the Coalition again if they win office at elections, and the leader of the Nationals takes the deputy leadership in power.

But in WA in 2008, with neither the Liberals nor Labor winning enough seats to govern alone, the Nationals had decided that they’d support the party willing to increase funds for regional WA in terms of economic growth and investment.  This idea was described as “royalties for regions”.  The Nationals had been prepared to support Labor if Labor had been willing to implement this policy.  In the end, however, the Nationals gave their support to the Liberals, led by Colin Barnett, who duly implemented the policy.

Grylls was then leading the Nationals, but because he and Barnett and their parties were only in an alliance, although he and several Nationals became ministers in the Barnett Government, the job of Deputy Premier went to the Liberals.

The next election in WA, in 2013, saw the Liberals win a parliamentary majority.  Despite this advantage, the Liberals maintained their alliance with the Nationals, meaning that Grylls and several colleagues stayed in the ministry.

Barnett did a pretty job as Premier, but he lost office at an election in 2017, while Grylls ended up losing his own seat.

Moreover, the notion of the Nationals being less than wholly supportive of the Liberals isn’t exactly new.  Back in 2004, there was a National in the South Australian Parliament, who became a minister in the Rann Labor Government, which didn’t have a majority there.  Although Labor later obtained a majority at an election, the National was retained as a minister until being defeated at a later election.

Barilaro, in his recent noises about having being more “independent” in his leadership regarding the Nationals, mightn’t have mentioned Grylls – assuming that he even knew about what Grylls did.  But I can’t help thinking that he’d like to do what Grylls managed to do.  I could suggest that, amid his discomfort at the loss of support for the Nationals lately, perhaps he’s burning or scorching over Grylls – if you’ll pardon the pun.

I also can’t help thinking that Barnaby Joyce, who was Deputy Prime Minister and leader of the Nationals in Federal Parliament until last year, might’ve sought to be what Grylls was.  After all, everybody knows Joyce to be a maverick willing to speak his mind, even though it puts him offside with the Liberals.  But upon joining the Coalition frontbench, and later becoming leader of the Nationals, he virtually ceased to be his true self.  Since resigning the leadership last year, he’s arguably become his true self again.

The troubles afflicting the Nationals might’ve unsettled Barilaro to the point of implying that he’d give up the job of Deputy Premier in NSW.  I’m not convinced that he’ll actually do that.  There’s no election due in NSW until 2023, so there’s time to clear up whatever messes happen before then.  But Barilaro and the Nationals must be jittery to consider developing more of an independent streak, regardless of what the Liberals think.