Australia’s opposition grapples with Trump fallout after defeat
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Now the fractured Labour Party joins conservative movements in Canada and Britain in trying to devise a path back to government.
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CANBERRA – Australia’s main centre-right opposition party is reeling from a landslide election defeat and grappling with an issue that has perplexed conservative movements across the world since 2016 – whether to embrace or distance itself from US President Donald Trump.
Three former ministers in the Liberal party are fighting for its leadership following the defeat of opposition leader Peter Dutton
While the contest is expected to come to a head in the next week, there’s no consensus over how to rebuild numbers and challenge Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s ascendant Labor Party.
Less than 48 hours after the Liberal-National Coalition’s second consecutive election defeat, one of the worst in Australian history, moderate Liberal Senator Andrew Bragg urged his party to recapture the centre ground of politics.
“It’s important that we focus on economic issues and avoid culture wars at all costs,” Mr Bragg told Australian Broadcasting Corp radio while discussing the lessons of the election defeat.
Yet just hours earlier, one of his fellow Liberal senators called on the party to “Make Australia Great Again”, in a local version of Mr Trump’s Maga motto.
“No one should have any backlash about that, that’s a simple statement,” conservative Liberal Senator Alex Antic told Sky News. “Why are they getting stuck into this slogan?”
The opposition Liberal-National Coalition is expected to hold fewer than 50 seats in the 150-member Lower House of Parliament, its worst result since the Liberal party was founded in 1944.
Now the fractured group joins conservative movements in Canada and Britain in trying to devise a path back to government.
Three candidates are expected to stand for the leadership of the Liberals, the senior party in the centre-right Coalition. These are:
Deputy Liberal Party leader Sussan Ley, a centrist and former Cabinet minister who is the favourite of the party’s moderate wing but disliked by its conservative faction.
Shadow Treasurer Angus Taylor, a former energy minister and a conservative who is likely to have the most support in the party room. However, some lawmakers hold him responsible for the election debacle, citing his failure to develop a credible alternative economic programme.
Shadow Immigration Minister Dan Tehan, former education minister who is relatively unknown in the wider community, making him a potential consensus candidate.
Some former Liberal ministers attributed the heavy defeat to the party’s perceived closeness to Mr Trump, who is widely disliked in Australia.
This perception was fuelled, they say, by candidates using “Make Australia Great Again” during the campaign as well as Maga-like policies on immigration, work-from-home and social issues.
“Donald Trump is toxic in Australian politics,” former coalition attorney-general George Brandis told ABC TV on the night of May 5. “And he should be. Because he doesn’t represent our values.”
However, the Liberal party has lost more moderate-held inner-city seats in recent elections than conservative-held semi-rural districts, bolstering the latter’s influence.
In addition, the National Party, the junior partner in the Coalition, is generally more right-wing in its views than the Liberals.
Not only do some members of the Liberal party want to see a move toward more Maga-style politics, one of its largest donors does as well.
Billionaire mining magnate Gina Rinehart sent out a statement on May 5 blaming the media for “frightening many in the Liberal Party from anything Trump and away from any Trump-like policies”.
“Why are Americans getting it, and we aren’t?” she asked, in a statement distributed by her spokesperson. BLOOMBERG
