Leadership transitions are revealing. Not so much about the characters of the vanquished and victor — although the vast differences between Tony Abbott and Malcolm Turnbull are obvious — but about what hasn't changed.
Whether 2015 is seen in the long run as the end of the instability that has characterised Australian politics since Julia Gillard challenged Kevin Rudd, or just another episode of Canberra's soap opera, it is clear neither Abbott or Turnbull are fully masters of their own destiny.
Yes, Abbott's captain's calls hurt him. Turnbull's relatively steady hand has helped him. But both men have really just been pushed around by economic winds, geopolitical squalls, and wherever the permanent bureaucracy wants the ship of state to travel. George W. Bush once remarked that the biggest surprise he had during his presidency was how little power the leader of the free world really had.
Consider Abbott's attempt to shape the narrative of the spill as a conservative icon cut down by the forces of the Liberal left. It has been both disingenuous and revealing.
For example, last weekend he warned the Turnbull government not to pursue tax reform for tax reform's sake, arguing that the only good tax reform was that which cut taxes. Yet in potentially raising the GST to 15 per cent, the Turnbull government is merely following the process set in train by Joe Hockey. A higher GST is obviously the Treasury line.
For that matter, Abbott's love of lower taxes is hard to reconcile with the deficit levy that the 2014 budget imposed on high-income earners. There's an interesting little detail in the book Battleground by Peter van Onselen and Wayne Errington that Turnbull opposed the deficit levy in cabinet.
Even the debate about whether the government should focus political attention on the dangers of Islamism rings hollow. This is a "debate" Abbott could have launched as prime minister, but didn't. Presumably he was following the same advice Turnbull is receiving now from our security agencies. It's sadly ironic to see Abbott once again presenting himself as defender of free speech.
And no one should doubt that putting Australian boots on the ground in Iraq and Syria to fight Islamic State is almost entirely dependent on whether the Americans ask for our help, regardless of who the prime minister is.
The continuities between the two governments are even starker, and more worrying, when we turn to economic management. Every treasurer faces a steep learning curve, and Scott Morrison deserves his chance to grow in his role. But early signs show a great deal of similarity between Morrison and Hockey. Where Hockey had poor communications skills, Morrison has brought way too much over from his performance as immigration minister. The Treasury portfolio demands detail, explanation and argument, not stonewalling.
More importantly, Morrison hasn't yet shown much dexterity navigating the highly complex and controversial issues which the treasurer has to master. The last thing Australia needs is another treasurer who acts as a figurehead for his department. Morrison's claim last week that government spending can't be seriously cut because it would harm the economy is exactly what Hockey was saying this time last year, and is as questionable now as it was then. Another obvious Treasury line.
And yet while there is remarkable policy continuity, it is undeniable that the government is very different after the spill. The Coalition polled terribly last year, it polls brilliantly now. This poll reversal is a rudimentary but interesting confirmation of the argument that voters are less interested in policy specifics than what the individual parties seem to symbolise. Voters know their votes don't count, in any literal sense — no single vote is going to swing an election. So when they vote they tend to vote as an expression of their values.
Where Abbott looked back to the Labor years, a perpetual opposition underdog looking for something bigger to fight, Turnbull seems to look forwards. Same policies, different tone. And tone matters.
This is the big lesson of the spill, and indeed, the big lesson of politics in 2015. Governments need positivity. They need to offer the public a sense that things are going to get better. Negativity works in opposition. But what successful national leader has been a negative national leader? Even Abbott's hero, Winston Churchill, offered a sense of hope during the worst days of World War II.
In December Turnbull released the innovation policy package which he had been building up since the spill, and which was to serve as a statement of his priorities as leader. Policy for policy it was a damp squib, a collection of the standard wasteful spending and ineffective tax credits that have been the mainstay of innovation policy for decades. But so what? It sounded great. Agile. Innovation. Technology. The future. Isn't it wonderful to be alive. And sounding great is a big part of politics.
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