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Richardson: Liberals’ future in Marshall’s hands

Jun 13, 2014
Steven Marshall leads the first meeting of his new Shadow Cabinet. Photo: Bension Siebert/InDaily

Steven Marshall leads the first meeting of his new Shadow Cabinet. Photo: Bension Siebert/InDaily

Despite almost retaining Government after a brief stint as Premier and serving a full four year term as Opposition Leader, Rob Kerin’s best-remembered legacy to the Liberal Party is likely to be quitting his seat mid-term and prompting the by-election that ultimately handed Frome to an independent, who ultimately handed power to Labor.

It would be a sad irony if Iain Evans’ legacy after more than two decades in parliament runs a similar course.

The Evans family is synonymous with the seat of Davenport. But then, it was once synonymous with the seat of Fisher, and that is now comfortably held by an independent.

Labor has already loudly proclaimed it is up for the fight, and will put all its heft behind a credible non-party candidate if the party believes (to borrow Margaret Thatcher’s phrase) they are someone with whom they can do business.

By-elections are strange beasts. With fixed-term state polls policy decisions are almost always engineered around the most propitious time to maximize political benefit; infrastructure projects are announced in the lead-up to polling day to give affected voters an impetus to back a certain party, and invariably a ribbon-cutting will follow almost four years later to the day, to remind them that the party has made good on its pledge.

But the timing of by-elections is whimsical, capricious. They become, in effect, a snapshot of a political moment in time, mid-term. There is invariably plenty of sound and fury, but it often symbolizes nothing.

Remember the cacophony that accompanied Kim Beazley’s Labor seizing the nominal Liberal Brisbane seat of Ryan in a 2001 by-election? It was supposed to be the beginning of the end for John Howard. Of course, when he was comfortably returned eight months later, it was a mere footnote that Ryan quietly returned to the Liberal fold.

A by-election, then, is a chance for constituents in a seat that is generally overlooked to make democracy work for them. To highlight local unresolved local concerns. And, invariably, to protest their dissatisfaction with the performance of one side or other.

And there’s the rub: will a by-election in Davenport become a protest against the illegitimate Weatherill Government or the flailing Marshall Opposition?

The recent rise and decline of the SA Libs has been quite phenomenal; little more than a year ago they were a basket case, yet just three months ago they looked a formidable unit on the cusp of Government; and now they look like a shell-shocked rabble.

They have lost two former leaders in as many weeks, Hamilton-Smith off to chase his political fortune and Evans folding his cards after one losing hand too many. He candidly admitted he was tired of Opposition.

“Iain Evans went into the election thinking we’d form Government – I think we all thought that,” a typically forthright Marshall conceded on Monday. And why not? All his political confidantes told him to do as they said and he’d be Premier. He did, but he’s not. A helpful, if harsh, political lesson.

In the immediate aftermath of the lost election, the Lib strategy was to brush it off as a psephological anomaly.

The shadow cabinet was unveiled looking exactly as it had before; this was, after all, the frontbench the majority of South Australians had voted for.

“We’re ready to govern,” Marshall insisted, firmly believing he could get the chance to do so if Bob Such was forced to retire and Geoff Brock could be convinced of the error of his ways.

Hamilton-Smith’s defection ended that fantasy.

Unveiling a very different-looking shadow cabinet yesterday, Marshall was forced to acknowledge what the rest of the state already knew: that the Liberals were a long, long way from governing.

It may take some time, but ultimately the SA Liberals need to be seen to represent something (and preferably something more than merely a branch office of the SA Chamber of Commerce), and to stand for something.

Far from being on stand-by, the Liberals are very much learning the ropes, not just of their individual portfolios but of politics itself. Having castigated Koutsantonis and Mullighan as L-platers, Marshall admits around half of his frontbench are essentially on probation (“We’ll see how they go!”).

Only one, the predictably-lampooned appointment of Rob Lucas as Shadow Treasurer, has any ministerial experience.

But here’s the rub: in this, at least, Hamilton-Smith may have done his former colleagues a favour. The lofty assumption that they were the Government-in-waiting was a deeply flawed strategy. It was the same way the Libs first fell into Opposition under Kerin, believing Peter Lewis had taken away their rightful hold on power and dismissing Rann’s cobbled-together majority as illegitimate.

Twelve years later, they’re still waiting for their chance to govern again.

Hamilton-Smith’s defection has, for the first time, clarified the truth of the Liberals’ plight. Avoiding a concerted regeneration is no longer feasible. Evans was probably right to concede he’d had his turn. The former leader and deputy team, Isobel Redmond and Mitch Williams, should probably follow his example, given they appear (through choice or edict) unlikely to ever grace the Liberal frontbench again.

Marshall must now emerge as the leader he should have been, on his own terms. That may take time, but he has one advantage: there is no acceptable candidate to succeed him. Put simply, he’s all they’ve got.

And he has to make something of a team that suddenly looks a lot less formidable.

Returning Vickie Chapman to the justice portfolio is significant; the former barrister and solicitor has been there before and it was the period she appeared most comfortable in a shadow ministry. Many of the other shadows won’t come to much, but some will, and that’s something; after all, in any given state parliament anywhere in the country there are only a handful of genuine A-graders (if you’re lucky) that prop up the rest.

With the addition of some first-termers alongside MH-S and Brock, Labor’s parliamentary benches suddenly look far more imposing. It occurred to me they’d look more redoubtable still if they had a Don Farrell up the back somewhere, until it was pointed out to me that if they did, they’d probably be sitting on the other side of the chamber!

But more importantly, Weatherill has a philosophy for this, his first full term as Premier. He sees the inclusion of a rural conservative and an Independent Liberal as greater than simply shoring up his required majority; rather, as reflecting the voting demographics in the state election. In other words, they are helping to legitimize his “illegitimate” Government. That may be a stretch, but at least it is a model for Government that can dictate the policy and ideological direction of his administration.

Marshall needs to similarly clarify, at least internally, his purpose and intent in his first full term as Opposition Leader (and no, simply “winning the 2018 election” ain’t gonna cut it).

It may take some time, but ultimately the SA Liberals need to be seen to represent something (and preferably something more than merely a branch office of the SA Chamber of Commerce), and to stand for something.

Labor’s bluster about taking up the fight in Davenport may be mere shit-stirring, but there’s no doubt it will be the first real test of the electoral mood after the March debacle.

The Libs will need to do more than simply pick a top-shelf candidate and run a concerted and well-drilled campaign.

They must do those things, but they must also forge a narrative to share with a jaded electorate, evidence that they have learned the lessons of a generation in the wilderness.

Because a repeat of Frome could be enough to condemn the Liberals to a successive generation in electoral purgatory.

Tom Richardson is InDaily’s political commentator and Channel Nine’s state political reporter.

 

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