Whether in government (Western Australia) or in Opposition (Queensland), the Coalition is being punished. It faces the prospect of One Nation splintering the liberal-conservative vote in such a way that it will not only lose the next federal election, but be kept out of power for a long period.
If this happens, it will have no-one but itself to blame. It will be the just reward for its sustained incompetence at cultural politics.
In Queensland, One Nation made it appear that the only plausible majority Government was the ALP. So, in the Queensland tradition, swinging voters voted for stability. Conservative voters voted to punish Opposition Parties for not sticking up for them effectively.
The One Nation persistence is not primarily about people being worse off. The best data on income distribution we have shows that, under economic reform, incomes have increased across the spectrum, with those at the bottom having the highest rates of increase. It was not simply about globalisation or about national competition policy or about failing to spend money on the bush.
Pauline Hanson herself did not gain prominence by talking about economic issues, but about cultural ones, about issues of national identity. Issues such as crime, immigration, indigenous issues. The issues where the gap between media opinion and public opinion is widest.
And this is where the Coalition is reaping the rewards of its sustained incompetence in cultural politics. Over the years, it has made no serious attempt to build up its intellectual resources in these areas. When in power, it has no serious network of people to appoint to cultural institutions. Consequently, it has, with few exceptions, no strategy for dealing with cultural issues apart from pallid acquiescence in the fads and fashions of the progressivist ascendancy.
It is not that the Coalition has to have a single view. On the contrary, a broad church approach is precisely what is required. But it had to be willing and able to effectively articulate the range of concerns of its social base. By treating large areas of cultural and social policy as effectively "no-go" areas it left them open for someone to come in and articulate concerns that were not being addressed. Which is what Hanson did.
The Coalition's federal margin is so narrow (a 0.8 per cent swing would see it lose office) that the smallest swing experienced by any Federal Government since 1966 (0.9%) would be sufficient to tip it out. But its margin is so narrow because of the cultural revolt on its own turf in 1998 where One Nation got one million votes.
The vote for One Nation represents a scream for attention by people who feel they are not being listened to. Yet the approved response (refusing to swap preferences with One Nation candidates) effectively says that these preferences are unclean and will not be accepted -- thereby shouting at these that they will not be listened to. Ostracism is not a basis for dialogue.
The demand by people who would never listen to anything John Howard says that he should have shouted Hanson down is really an attempt to maintain the legitimacy of shouting people down -- and shutting out of public debate lots of people including those who think like, well, Howard.
The real nightmare for the Coalition is that a mutually reinforcing situation will be set up. The progressivist intelligentsia screams at Pauline and One Nation, raising the sneering at the concerns of those who think differently to a new pitch, aiding the One Nation vote. This puts the Labor in power, and Labor then uses its resources, and those of the State, to reinforce the progressivist ascendancy to keep the cycle going.
The National Party may be in terminal difficulty (with the possible exception of Queensland). From the 1920s to the mid 1980s it had about 15 per cent of the seats in the House of Representatives, but now has about 10 per cent.
The Country-cum-National Party was created and lived as a protest against economic exclusion and exploitation by urban interests. Perhaps it can be re-born as a protest against cultural exclusion and exploitation by urban interests. After all, the major moral vanity issues of environment and indigenous affairs operate on the basis of urban posturing imposing costs on rural Australia. The urban greenies and reconciliation posturers get the moral vanity, the bush gets the devastated industries.
The National Party should not campaign against economic reform -- unless I was prepared to campaign against the welfare state. It should start advocating such things as capital punishment, pride in Australia, the same set of rules for all (in particular, no Treaty), welfare reform, firm crime policy, compensation for compromised property rights. It should denounce urban posturers who make country Australia pay for their preening indulgences.
The other big mistake the Coalition parties have made is that they have become high-tax parties. Under Howard, Australians pay more taxes per head than they have before. The net effect of bigger government is to tax the social base of the Coalition Parties to pay funds to the social and activist base of the Labor Party. It is stupid of the Coalition to play this game. It should be attempting to reverse it -- by smaller government.
Part of the problem for the Coalition is that its cultural opponents are shameless liars. Today's shameless untruths include: that there was a "stolen children" genocide, that poverty is increasing, that income distribution is (after taxes and transfers) becoming more unequal, that most people are worse off, that government is shrinking, that the welfare state is shrinking, that opposing Native Title or special programs for indigenous Australians is a mark of racism, that opposition to multiculturalism or immigration is proof of racism.
The Coalition gets swamped in such shameless untruth because it fails miserably to develop its own intellectual and cultural resources. Their opponents get away with such lies because public debate is so dominated by the self-serving moral vanity of the progressivist ascendancy. Yet, after five years in office federally, the Coalition has done nothing to seriously contest the dominance of cultural institutions by its opponents.
Mainstream liberal-conservative politicians have responded to the unreal moral vanity of the media rather than the values, concerns and experience of its own social base. What have Coalition Governments actually delivered since 1992 except fiscal rectitude? When Queensland National Party leader Rob Borbidge says that voters are not listening to the major conservative parties, the real question is, why should they? Those parties have become part of the problem.
The Coalition is in serious trouble, trouble which started at the height of a long economic boom. And it is all its own fault. It's the culture stupid.
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