Mon Oct 6

Can Sussan Ley avoid Brendan Nelson’s fate?

Written by: Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of Canberra

When you look at Sussan Ley’s predicament, you can’t help thinking of Brendan Nelson.

Nelson, a Liberal moderate and a former minister who was a competent but not outstanding performer, won the Liberal leadership after the 2007 defeat of the Howard government. He then never had a chance. Malcolm Turnbull was determined to bring him down (only himself to be ousted by Tony Abbott before the 2010 election, which the Coalition narrowly lost).

Ley came to the leadership in worse circumstances than Nelson. The Liberals, already in opposition, suffered such a devastating defeat in May that it would be near impossible for any leader to be competitive at the 2028 election.

The Liberals had three leaders between 2007 and 2010; Nelson lasted less than a year. Who knows how many they will churn through between now and 2031? The odds of Ley making it to the next election are not good; her chances of leading into the 2031 election must be near nil.

Ley is an interim leader and may, like Nelson, be a short term one.

Not that she isn’t doing a fair job. She is active; her office seems well-organised; she hasn’t made serious mistakes. Critics complain the Liberals don’t have policies. This leaves a void but it is also an unreasonable attack so soon after the election. Where Ley has failed is in managing the more difficult members of her team, notably Jacinta Nampijinpa Price and Andrew Hastie. Her defenders would say they have been unmanageable.

Ley has massive forces arrayed against her. Many of the conservatives in the party won’t accept a leader who wants to campaign in the political centre. In an era when right winger Nigel Farage in Britain is doing over the Tories, they insist the Liberals should go to the right, regardless of the fact that compulsory voting and other factors make Australia very different from the United Kingdom.

They are encouraged by Sky After Dark presenters who want to see the back of Ley.

The polls provide plenty of ammunition. The latest Newspoll, published at the weekend, showed Labor with a two-party lead of 57-43%. Ley’s net approval was down three points to a new low of minus 20.

Two ambitious right wingers, Angus Taylor and Hastie, are waiting to pounce when the opportunity comes (which won’t be this year). Taylor, defence spokesman, is (sensibly) biding his time and behaving himself. Hastie, who was home affairs spokesman, last week spat the dummy and quit the frontbench, complaining that Ley, in the portfolio instruction she sent him, had made it clear he wouldn’t have a role in developing the immigration policy.

This was curious. Was Hastie looking for an excuse, or Ley looking to control him? Even if immigration spokesman Paul Scarr formulated the policy, as a senior member of shadow cabinet, Hastie would have had a say. On the other hand, immigration comes broadly under home affairs, so its spokesman would usually be expected to have some part in putting together the policy.

Neither Hastie nor Price, sacked from the frontbench by Ley when she wouldn’t endorse Ley’s leadership, is a comfortable team player. This is odd in Hastie’s case, given he comes from the special forces, the elite part of the military that requires maximum team discipline.

In the wake of Hastie’s resignation, a story, damaging to him, was leaked to Nine media. It reported that former leader Peter Dutton had been “scathing” about Hastie’s performance as shadow defence minister in his arguments to the Liberal Party’s election review panel.

The Liberal defence policy, which should have been a strength, amounted to only a proposed number for spending, with no substance to back it up.

Dutton did not make a formal submission to the review, but was interviewed at length by panel members Nick Minchin and Pru Goward. Minchin said on Monday that Dutton “avoided criticising his shadows”. Whatever Dutton said or did not say, party sources said it was obvious there had been tension between Dutton and Hastie. For his part Hastie – who certainly was not a top performer for the opposition last term – is known to have been critical of the fact some policy work he prepared did not see the light of day.

Hastie’s retort to the Nine story was that “the old guard is lashing out because it is losing the fight on immigration and energy”.

Apart from being stalked by aspirants, Ley is dogged by the ideological division within the party.

It is now clear Ley has to get a decision – that could involve a patched-together compromise – on the Liberals’ stand on net zero by Christmas. But it will be awkward to do this without also announcing a wider policy on energy, which would take a good deal longer to craft.

It’s not easy for Ley to deal with the wider call from critics for policies. She knows the policy process has to be deeper than last term, with releases coming much earlier ahead of the election. But excessive rush would be risky.

One strategy is embarking on “headland” speeches to signal directions at least. Ley has already given one on fiscal issues and middle class welfare (which received less attention than it deserved), and there are more to come.

Most immediately, Ley has to have yet another minor reshuffle, to fill Hastie’s home affairs post. In the interim, finance spokesman senator James Paterson, who held the job last term, is acting.

Paterson has become important to Ley’s leadership. A senior conservative, he is not a natural to be in her camp. But at the moment he has her back.

He told the Conversation’s politics podcast ^[2] last week (a day before Hastie’s announcement):

My view is the overwhelming majority of the party room is behind Sussan as leader and want to give her the best chance to succeed. She won the ballot for the leadership fair and square. In the Liberal Party we respect the outcome of ballots and give leaders the opportunity to prove their worth.

Well, not all Liberals do.