Marshall’s plan for your vision

Liberal leader Steven Marshall has eschewed the idea of his potential future government orchestrating the development of the state and the city with grand visions.

While he has long-range plans – articulated in his 2036 document – he has explicitly rejected the concept of providing a chapter-and-verse future vision for the state’s economy, cultural life and built form.

At the first of three InDaily leaders’ forums last night, Marshall was asked how he’d like to see these three strands develop in the state’s future.

He wouldn’t provide specific answers, instead using the opportunity to highlight philosophical differences between his party and Jay Weatherill’s Labor.

“Can I start by saying as Liberals we don’t tend to want to social engineer,” he responded. “So we are quite different from Jay Weatherill and the Labor Party where they think that it’s the Government’s responsibility to drive every single development for a city and for a state. We think it’s the people’s responsibility to do that.

“We want to be an enabling Government but we don’t want to be a Government that says that we know what is right for you. And I think that this is a fundamental difference between the two political philosophies.”

At the same time, Marshall said that his party has managed to stay united largely due to 2036 – a document written by the entire party room which articulates Liberal values, identifies areas that good government should focus on and, at the same, those areas that government should stay clear of.

The document even uses the “vision” word – but it’s painted with a broad brush of aspiration. It says the state’s bicentenary year is “a destination of hope and prosperity for South Australians, where we can have the life we want in the State we love”.

He said the document hadn’t been particularly well received by the media, but it had been crucial for the party.

“Has the media been captivated by what we’ve done? Look, no…. a lot of media is really interested in that daily media cycle of, you know, slip-ups and scandal and scoops rather than reporting long-range vision of what a party’s doing.”

When 2036 was released, he said, most of the media analysis of it was “pretty terrible” – but it had kept the party together and provided the framework for policy development ever since.

“It did actually simultaneously identify a whole pile of areas we think that good government shouldn’t be involved in,” he said. “I mean the current State Government has 58 portfolios and I would argue that because there’s so much spread they don’t do very much very well at all.”

You can listen to a snapshot of Marshall’s comments in the latest episode of our Unwinnable Election podcast.

We’ll be running similar podcasts after our forums with Nick Xenophon and Jay Weatherill over the coming week.

[The “vision thing” is a phrase coined by former US president George Bush senior, who was criticised for a lack of it.]

Red-baiting enters day five

The party that’s spent millions courting Chinese business over the past four years continues to bash away at a possibly non-existent donation to the state Liberal Party from a Chinese businesswoman.

Labor, whose leader Jay Weatherill once scolded federal parliament for its “hysteria” over a free-trade agreement with China, has flicked the switch to red-baiting during this campaign after Ausgold boss Sally Zou tweeted an image of a cheque for $1.2 million made out to the Liberal Party.

With all the panache of a hippopotamus let loose on an ice-skating rink, Labor has been blustering about the questions that need to be answered by Liberal leader Steven Marshall, who says the party hasn’t received a cheque in the past week from Zou and that he hasn’t received any personal gifts that need to be declared.

Pressed again today by journalists, Marshall said he had checked the records on gifts received from Zou.

“We’ve gone back and looked at it – there was things like a box of tea, there was… chocolate,” he told reporters.

The Government has been pursuing a China strategy specifically aimed at getting close to Chinese governments and business leaders.

The process of getting close involves the exchange of gifts, some of which are listed on the Premier’s department website.

This list shows then bureaucrat, former Weatherill adviser and now Labor candidate for Florey, Rik Morris, who had responsibility for Chinese engagement for part of his public service career, enjoyed the hospitality of the Chinese Consul-General at two dinners in 2016, at an estimated combined cost of $160.

The department’s executive director of government relations, Adam Kilvert, was gifted by the Consul-General a $100 “green and white Chinese tea set” and two bottles of  Kweichow-Moutai Chinese liquor worth a total of $557. (InDaily understands gifts of such value are generally not kept by individual bureaucrats.)

None of this is sinister or mysterious – it indicates a government attempting to build a relationship with another – but it does highlight, again, the political nature of Labor’s current focus on Sally Zou.

If Labor wanted to end to political donations altogether, then it could possibly take the high ground. But it doesn’t.

If Labor had produced evidence the Liberals were shaping policy to suit Zou, then it could take the high ground. But it hasn’t.

Not helping

Federal education minister Simon Birmingham did his state Liberal colleagues few favours this morning, declaring that he didn’t care where the Liberals found their funding.

When asked about the debate on ABC Radio Adelaide today, he said: “Please support the Liberal Party with your funding if you can, certainly with your vote, with your volunteering because we want to win this state election… I don’t care who wants to give money to the Liberal Party; I want to see a change of government here and that is the most important factor.”

Xenophon First for Tom the junior

Tom Playford Junior, son of South Australia’s longest-serving premier, has endorsed Nick Xenophon’s SA Best.

In a new commercial released generally today (after a friendly “exclusive” for the Murdoch press), Playford says Xenophon will get his vote because he believes his Dad, Liberal legend Tom Playford, would have opposed any party that accepts donations from the pokies lobby – which rules out Labor and the Liberals.

He doesn’t mention Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives, which is curious given Playford last entered the state political fray as a candidate for Family First – now merged into Bernardi’s party.

Playford, who lives in Lobethal, first stood for the Hills seat of Kavel in 2002 as an independent, coming second to the Liberals. In 2006, he represented Family First, coming third on primary votes behind the Liberals and Labor.

You can watch the ad below. Don’t worry – there’s no singing, dancing or rapping.