Federal elections were held in Australia on September 7, 2013. All 150 seats in the House of Representatives, the lower house of the Australian Parliament, and 40 of the 76 seats in the Senate, the upper house, were up for reelection.
Australia’s political and electoral system
Australia has a bicameral Parliament made up of the House of Representatives, whose members represent single-member constituencies (known in Australia as ‘divisions’ or ‘electorates’), and the (directly-elected) Senate, whose members represents the states and the two territories. Australia’s political and electoral system differs quite markedly from that of Canada and the United Kingdom, two other major Commonwealth realms. For starters, Australia’s bicameralism – with a nearly as powerful upper house – is unlike either British or Canadian contemporary bicameralism where the directly-elected lower house predominates over the appointed upper house.
The House of Representatives is made up of 150 members elected in as many single-member electorates, serving a term no longer than three years. Like in many other bicameral federal countries, apportionment in the lower house reflects population. According to the Australian Constitution, the House should have – “as nearly as practicable”, twice the number of Senators. Additionally, the Constitution guarantees all original states in the federation at least five seats, a clause which overrepresents Tasmania, Australia’s least populous state which has five seats with about 71,000-73,000 voters (in contrast, most divisions in New South Wales have about 90,000 to 105,000 voters). The Parliament also guarantees that Australia’s two territories – the Australian Capital Territory (ACT) and the Northern Territory (NT) have at least one member each; both territories currently have two seats in the House, with the ACT underrepresented (both members represent about 130,000 voters) and the NT overrepresented (about 64,000 voters per seat). The baseline quota for the number of voters in an electorate is determined by the number of voters in the state (rather than the whole country), with a maximum 10% deviation allowed.
Another Australian political particularity is that most electorates are named after historical figures, rather than geographic features or urban areas included in the seat. Only a handful of seats are named after geographic features.
Members of the House of Representatives are elected by preferential voting (also known as IRV or AV). On their ballot, voters must rank (number) all candidates in order of their preference. In federal elections, unlike in certain states (NSW, Queensland etc), full preferencing is mandatory – voters must rank all candidates, or their vote will not be counted (deemed as an ‘informal vote’), although their vote is counted if they leave one box blank – it is assumed that candidate would be their last preference. In polls, first preference votes are called the ‘primary votes’.
A candidate needs win an absolute majority of the total first preference voters. If no candidate has won an absolute majority, the candidate polling the fewest votes is excluded and his/her votes are transferred to the remaining candidates on the basis of his/her voters’ second preferences. This process of exclusion and transfers continues until one candidate has more than half of the total votes.
However, even in seats where a candidate has already been allocated, a full distribution of preferences takes place (until two candidates are left standing), to calculate a two-candidate preferred (2CP) and two-party preferred result (2PP). Australia basically a two-party system, with the centre-left Australian Labor Party (ALP) and the centre-right Coalition made up of the Liberal Party and the National Party. Therefore, in almost every single of the 150 electorates, the 2CP result is also the 2PP result. Only eight electorates in the last election, in 2010, had a ‘non-classic’ result where the 2CP was different from the 2PP – where one of the top two candidates was from neither major party (they were Greens or independents). In seats where the 2CP and 2PP are different, the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) notionally distributes preferences to the two major parties to determine a 2PP, which is purely informative.
The Senate is made up of 76 senators, 72 of which serve fixed six-year terms while the four remaining senators (the two senators representing each of the two territories) serve a term which runs concurrently to that of the House of Representatives. Similar to the United States Senate, Australian senators represent states – with each states, regardless of population, electing 12 senators (and the territories, as aforementioned, electing two each). Except in cases of a double dissolution election, the Senate is renewed by halves every three years (a half-Senate election). Therefore, in this election, each state elected six senators and the two territories both elected their two senators.
The Australian Senate, unlike the Canadian Senate or the House of Lords, has roughly equal powers to that of the lower house. It must pass all legislation, but the Senate cannot introduce or amend money bills (supply) – that prerogative is reserved to the House of Representatives. However, the Senate has the power to block supply, a power which led to a major constitutional crisis in 1975 when the government, which had the confidence of the lower house to govern, was denied supply by the opposition in the Senate – eventually leading to the Governor General controversially dismissing the sitting Labor Prime Minister.
If the Senate twice in a three-month period refuses to pass a bill approved by the lower house, the Prime Minister may use this bill (and any other bills which suffered similar fates) as ‘triggers’ and ask the Governor General for a double dissolution – in which the entirety of the Senate is up for reelection alongside the House. There have been five double dissolution elections since federation: 1914, 1951, 1974, 1975, 1983 and 1987.
The state senators serve fixed six-year terms. An election to renew half the Senate may only be called within twelve months of the term’s expiration. Therefore, if there is an early House election outside the twelve-month window in which Senate elections may occur, the synchronization of the election is disrupted and there may be elections in which only half the Senate is up for election. However, the House and Senate elections have been synchronized since 1974.
The Senate is elected by single transferable vote (STV). On the Senate ballot paper, voters may choose to either vote ‘above the line’ (or ‘group voting ticket’) or ‘below the line’. The vast majority of voters choose the former, which consists of simply placing a ’1′ in the box next to their party or group of preference. The party or group they vote determines the order of their preference. The ABC’s website lists group voting tickets and how each parties chose to distribute Senate preferences in this election here. For example, a voter who voted ‘above the line’ for the Labor group voting ticket in South Australia would have his vote distributed to the three Labor candidates, then to the Greens, then to Family First and so forth. Some voters – usually more ‘sophisticated’ voters who know more about each candidate – vote ‘below the line’ where they individually rank every candidate. Full preferencing is mandatory. Voting ‘below the line’ allows a voter to distribute his/her top preferences between the candidates of the various parties as he/she pleases.
Counting for the Senate can take several weeks until it is fully finalized. To be elected, a candidate needs to gain a certain quota of votes (calculated using the normal valid votes divided by the number of seats +1). Candidates who reach the quota on the first count are automatically elected, and their surplus is then transferred to other candidates before the lowest-placing candidates are excluded. Only after other candidates are elected with other candidate’s surplus and their own resulting surplus is further transferred are the lowest-placed candidates progressively excluded and their votes distributed to the remaining candidates. This process continues until all seats have been filled. The sixth and final Senate seat in many states often takes days (if not weeks) to determine, being won by intricate vote transfers from minor candidates or surplus votes.
It is very rare for a government to win an absolute majority in the Senate; the Coalition’s Senate majority between 2004 and 2007 was the exception rather than the rule, and it is something which governments will find very hard to replicate in the future. As a result, the government may be held ‘hostage’ by the opposition in the Senate (as happened to Gough Whitlam’s Labor government in the 1970s) or they are reliant on the swing votes of the ‘crossbench’ – minor parties and independents holding the balance of power (as the two Labor governments since 2007 have been).
Context: Australian parties and leaders
I won’t run through an endless summary of Australia’s political history since 1901; if you’re interested, I wrote a rather dry and chronological summary of that back in 2010.
Australia has been governed since the 2007 federal election by the Australian Labor Party (ALP). The ALP is a centre-left party, although like numerous other social democratic parties in the west, it has shifted towards the political centre since the 1980s/1990s – Bob Hawke and later Paul Keating’s Labor governments (1983-1996) radically transformed the Australian economy through dismantling protectionist policies, privatizing industries, floating the Australian dollar and extensive deregulation of the financial and banking sectors.
Australia has a two-party/coalition system, albeit one in which some third parties have been able to poll particularly well and influence government policies through their presence in the Senate. The main opposition to Labor is the right-leaning Coalition, a quasi-permanent electoral and governing coalition (since 1922, with few interruptions) made up of the centre-right Liberal Party and the conservative agrarian National Party, with the former as the dominant actor. The Liberal Party, founded in 1945, is the latest incarnation of a string of anti-Labor right-wing parties beginning with the Commonwealth Liberal Party in 1909, and later the Nationalist Party and the United Australia Party.
The Coalition dominated Australia’s post-war politics, governing the country between 1949 and 1972. Under Prime Minister Robert Menzies (1949-1966), the Liberals/Coalition represented conservative conformism: solid and visceral anti-communism, protectionist tariff policies, a free enterprise economy at home (albeit one with substantial government intervention), social conservatism, sentimental affection for Britain and the construction of Australia’s close military alliance with the United States – Australia sent troops to Korea and Vietnam. After Malcolm Fraser’s Coalition government lost the 1983 election, the Liberals progressively shifted towards ‘New Right’ conservatism in vogue in the west around that time. Under Prime Minister John Howard (1996-2007), the Coalition continued Labor’s neoliberal economic policies – notably with initial spending cuts, the introduction of a GST, a strong commitment to low interest rates and a controversial deregulation of industrial relations laws (WorkChoices). Howard’s government was also marked by strong support for Washington’s post-9/11 counter-terrorism and foreign policies (the government sent troops to Afghanistan and Iraq), a tough stance on asylum seekers (the ‘Pacific Solution’) and a controversial decision not to ratify the Kyoto Protocol.
The National Party, founded in 1920 as the Country Party, is an agrarian party which claims to represent rural areas (‘regional Australia’), traditionally through lobbying in favour of policies favourable to farmers, producers and rural areas in general. The party’s heyday was in the 1950s and 1960s, when they exerted significant pressure on the Liberals in favour of high tariff policies for their rural base. However, outside Queensland, the Nationals have always remained the weaker of the two parties in the Coalition. Rural depopulation, demographic changes in rural areas and strong challenges from the Liberals or third parties/independents in their rural strongholds have led to a marked decline in the Nationals’ electoral fortunes and political influence. In recent years, observers have put into question the continued relevance of the party, given the general absence of major policy differences with the Liberals and the Liberal Party’s ever-stronger hegemony within the Coalition.
The Queensland branches of the Liberal and National parties merged in 2008 to create the Liberal National Party (LNP), the first and, to date, only merger of the Liberal and National parties in any state. In the Northern Territory, however, the Country and Liberal parties merged as early as 1974 to form the Country Liberal Party (CLP), which remains the right-wing Coalition party in the NT.
The Western Australian and South Australian Nationals (although only the former are of any relevance today) are independent from the Coalition and they may run candidates against Liberal candidates in state and/or federal elections. The WA Nationals held the balance of power in the WA state legislature after the 2008 election; they chose to form a coalition with the Liberals, although the party remains outside the federal Coalition. In effect, the Nationals continue to exist within the Coalition framework only in NSW and Victoria.
Of particular relevance to this election is that the ALP is a very factionalized party. Internal politics in the ALP are dominated by a complex web of factions, backroom ‘factional bosses’ who wield considerable power within the party and rival trade unions aligned with the ALP. Although each state branch of the ALP has its own factions, the national factions of the ALP often boil down to a conflict between the ALP Right and the ALP Left (although it’s often much more complicated that it appears).
Australia has a fairly unique leadership culture; certainly one which is quite different from that of the United Kingdom and even Canada. To begin with, the parliamentary leaders of both the ALP and the Coalition are elected by their respective parliamentary caucuses rather than party members and activists at a national convention. Party leadership in Australia is a cutthroat business marked by incessant intrigues, backstabbing, knife sharpening by ostensible ‘allies’ and ‘colleagues’ and conspiracies. To be sure, the ALP isn’t the only party with such a cutthroat leadership culture – although because of its organized faction system and the influence of ‘backroom’ union and faction bosses in the ALP’s leadership, it probably is a bit more cutthroat than the Liberals.
Factional bosses within the ALP have the power to create and destroy party leaders. Kevin Rudd, a Queensland MP, won the Labor Party’s leadership in December 2006 following a ‘leadership spill’ (the Australian for a leadership challenge or a snap leadership ballot) staged by the Right against hapless ALP leader Kim Beazley. Kevin Rudd went on to win the November 2007 election, handily defeating Prime Minister John Howard’s right-wing Coalition government, which had held power for eleven years. Rudd enjoyed a long honeymoon, which basically extended until early 2010. A mix of unpopular or fumbled government policies (a Home Insulation Program scandal, a delay in Rudd’s landmark Emissions Trading Scheme and a proposed ‘super tax’ on mining profits) and Rudd’s leadership style weakened his popularity throughout the spring and summer of 2010, with an election looming later that year. Sensing that Rudd was turning into a liability for the ALP, the factional bosses who had installed Rudd in 2006 turned against him and played up his Deputy Leader, Julia Gillard, a Victoria MP associated with the Left faction. Within the party, Rudd’s two cardinal sins had been his weak ties to either of the main factions and his leadership style – his colleagues came to see him as a chaotic manager, a control freak and a narcissist. In June 2010, the NSW and Victorian Right’s main power-brokers, later joined by the Australian Workers’ Union (AWU) – a union aligned with the Right – turned against Rudd. They informed Gillard that they had gathered sufficient caucus support for her to win the leadership. His back against the wall, Rudd called a leadership spill for June 24. Initially, Rudd had said he would contest the leadership, but with insufficient support, he withdrew before the vote and Gillard was installed unopposed.
Julia Gillard quickly went to the people to seek her own mandate. Although the ALP was confident that it would have little trouble defeating the Coalition’s polarizing and very conservative leader, Tony Abbott (who had himself won the Liberal leadership in 2009 following a coup against previous leader Malcolm Turnbull); a poor campaign, lingering bad blood between the Gillard and Rudd camps and the weight of unpopular Labor state governments (especially in NSW and Queensland) meant that the 2010 election ended in deadlock. For the first time since 1940, neither party won an absolute majority in the House – in fact, with 72 seats apiece, the ALP and Coalition ended up tied, both short of the 75 seats required for a majority. Gillard was only able to hang on after signing a confidence and supply deal with the Greens (who had elected their first MP and held the balance of power in the Senate) and three out of four independent MPs returned (two of them former Nationals). One of these independents, Andrew Wilkie (Tasmania), withdrew his support in January 2012 claiming that Gillard hadn’t kept her word on poker-machine reform. The Greens ended their agreement with Labor, while continuing to guarantee confidence and supply, in February 2013.
Julia Gillard was never a popular Prime Minister. Although she had been one of the most popular member of Rudd’s cabinet as Deputy Prime Minister – hence the reason why the ALP Right chose her when they dumped Rudd; as Prime Minister, she was never remarkably popular and failed to catch on with the Australian electorate. One of the reasons why Gillard never caught on with voters was the way in which she became Prime Minister in June 2010. Although Rudd was unpopular within the ALP caucus because of his arrogant, overconfident and narcissistic behaviour, he was far more popular with voters who came to see him, after he left office, as a betrayed man, unfairly and wrongly stabbed in the back by Gillard and his own caucus. Many voters saw Gillard as opportunistic and disloyal, and sided with Rudd over Gillard. Gillard never took the time to explain ‘her side’ of the June 2010 coup: the official version was that it was a ‘good government which had lost its way’, until 2012, the stories of Rudd’s domineering command of his cabinet and his chaotic management style were the preserve of political circles in Canberra and savvy followers of Australian politics.
To make matters worse, however, Rudd did not retire from Parliament after losing the Labor leadership. He was reelected in his Brisbane electorate in 2010 and became Foreign Minister in Gillard’s cabinet. Quickly thereafter, Gillard’s leadership was undermined by persistent speculation that Rudd was planning his revenge. Leadership speculation and internal divisions ran wild in February 2012, with both sides conspiring behind the scenes to undermine the other. Senior Labor MP and cabinet minister Simon Crean accused Rudd of disloyalty, comments which led Rudd to resign as Foreign Minister and later announce his intention to challenge Gillard for the Labor leadership. Gillard called a leadership spill for February 27.
Tensions flared between both sides. Gillard’s supporters, led by Deputy Leader/PM and Treasurer Wayne Swan, attacked Rudd as dysfunctional, chaotic and a poor team player because of his temperament. Rudd criticized some of Gillard’s policy decisions and her behaviour in the 2010 coup. However, Rudd still lacked strong enough support within the caucus to defeat Gillard, who won with 71 votes to 31.
In March 2013, with a heavy defeat looming for the party in the September 14 federal election, leadership speculation propped up again. On March 21, Simon Crean – the very man who had called Rudd disloyal a year prior – called for a leadership spill and announced that he would support Rudd. Gillard, in a show of strength, sacked Crean and called for a leadership spill that same day. Rudd, citing insufficient support within caucus (he had said he would only return if an ‘overwhelming majority’ of the caucus requested him to do so), did not contest and Gillard was reelected unopposed.
The March 2013 spill, Gillard’s show of strength and the Rudd team’s removal/resignation from cabinet did not fix matters for Labor, which was still badly trailing Tony Abbott’s Coalition in polls. On June 26, after an alleged caucus petition by Rudd supporters, Gillard called another leadership spill to end speculation. This time, Rudd announced that he would challenge Gillard. Prominent Labor leaders, including some who had toppled Rudd in 2010, sided with Rudd. Gillard had become a liability for the ALP, and Rudd was judged as the party’s only hope of winning – or at least not losing too badly – the September election. Victorian Right leader Bill Shorten, who had backed Gillard in the 2010 spill, came out in support of Rudd, alongside other leading cabinet ministers. Wayne Swan, however, remained firmly behind Gillard. Rudd won the spill 57 votes to 45. Gillard resigned as Prime Minister and announced, keeping with her pre-ballot pledge, that she would not seek reelection as MP. Kevin Rudd was sworn in as Prime Minister, and announced, on August 4, that the election would be held on September 7 (instead of September 14, as first called by Gillard on January 30).
Major issues
Climate change has been a major issue in Australian politics since at least the 2007 federal election, when tough action on climate change with the introduction of an emissions trading scheme (ETS) became a cornerstone of Kevin Rudd’s ALP platform. Rudd’s ambitious ETS/Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme (CPRS) quickly became bogged down in Parliament. The Greens found the CPRS’ target limits on GHG emissions to be inadequate, forcing Rudd to negotiate with Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull, who supported an ETS over the opposition of several right-wingers and climate change skeptics in his caucus. Turnbull’s decision to support the government’s policy and engage in negotiations angered many Liberal backbenchers and prominent right-wingers within the caucus, notably Senator Nick Minchin and former Howard cabinet minister Tony Abbott. Turnbull called a leadership spill for December 1, which was contested by Turnbull, Tony Abbott (as the leading right-wing/anti-ETS candidate) and Joe Hockey (a moderate who supported the ETS). Surprisingly, Abbott placed first with 35 votes to Turnbull’s 26 and Hockey’s 23 on the first ballot. He defeated Turnbull by a single vote, 42-41, on the second ballot. Two days later, the Senate rejected Rudd’s CPRS. Rudd chose not to use the trigger to call a double dissolution election and in April 2010 he announced that the CPRS implementation would be delayed.
In the 2010 election, Gillard’s Labor pledged that no carbon tax would be introduced (although she supported carbon pricing). However, as part of the deal with the Greens after the election, she was eventually forced to agree to a carbon tax in February 2011. The carbon tax (Clean Energy Bill) passed in October and November 2011 created a carbon tax, which would be in place for 3-5 years before an ETS is implemented. The carbon tax applies to facilities emitting more than 25,000 tons per year (except for agriculture and transport), with the price for an emission permit set at AU$23 per tonne of emitted CO2 in 2012-2013, set to increase to $25.4 in 2014-2015. To help households offset the impact of the carbon tax, the government increased the tax-free threshold from $6,000 to $18,200 and reduced personal income tax for all households earning less than $80,000. As a result of the carbon tax, household energy prices and house construction costs have increased.
The Coalition immediately called the carbon tax a ‘broken promise’ and Tony Abbott made repealing the carbon tax the cornerstone of its platform by 2011. Although the Coalition now opposes a carbon tax and fought against Rudd’s earlier ETS, it was Howard’s government which first came up with the idea of a carbon trading scheme back in 2007.
Labor’s cooperation with the Greens on this and other issues created some unease, even within the Labor caucus. Some Labor backbenchers felt that the government was too close to the Greens or giving in too much to the Greens, a view shared by many Australians – especially those on the right.
Given that the carbon tax increased the cost of living for most Australians, through higher energy and construction costs, the Coalition’s crusade against the carbon tax proved politically beneficial. However, while public support for the carbon tax remains lower than public opposition, the numbers in favour of the tax have been steadily increasing since it was introduced. The carbon tax did not turn out to be the economic disaster the Coalition had predicted it would be; most companies have adapted themselves to the new dispensation. Furthermore, a deal signed with the European Union on emissions trading (the EU already has an ETS) seems to further entrench the carbon tax.
Although the Coalition shares the ALP’s commitment to a 5-25% reduction in GHG emissions on 2000 level by 2020, its alternative plan is so-called ‘Direct Action’ – public subsidies as incentives for energy producers to reduce their emissions. Opponents of Abbott’s alternative plan say it does not provide any disincentive to pollution, and that the public – rather than polluters – would be the ones paying for it. The Coalition also said that it would abolish two new public entities, the Climate Change Authority and the Climate Commission, as well as a new ‘clean energy bank’ which provides investments in clean energy projects. Unsurprisingly, environmental groups have been extremely hostile to the Coalition’s environmental agenda.
Under Rudd, in July 2013, the ALP announced that it would bring forward the implementation of the ETS by a year (the price of carbon will be set by the market), to July 2014, a move which would cost $4 billion but also save families some $380. The Greens opposed bringing forward the ETS, given that Rudd’s decision effectively meant ‘terminating’ the carbon tax a year ahead of schedule. The Greens also support much stricter GHG emission targets, aiming at a 25-40% reduction on 1990 levels by 2020 and net-zero emissions by 2050.
Most voters, obviously, cited the economy as their top issue in this election. The economy and Australia’s economic performance has been a matter of hot and acrimonious debate between Labor and the Coalition – the former saying they’ve kept Australia’s economy remarkably strong despite the financial crisis while the Coalition styles the government as one of the worst in years, citing a growing debt and fiscal irresponsibility.
Australia, unlike the United States and most EU countries, has not gone through recession since the global financial crisis began. Even in 2009, the Australian economy grew by 1.4%. It grew by 3.6% in 2012 and is scheduled to keep growing by around 3% through 2018. Many have cited the Hawke-Keating and Howard governments’ economic reforms in the 1990s/2000s as reasons for Australia’s robust economic performance since 1991. In recent years, growth has largely been fueled by a strong mining sector, returning large profits and contributing to economic growth because of high demand for minerals by China and other Asian economies. Australia has only 5% unemployment.
Although the Coalition says that the rise in debt over the ALP’s first four budgets has been bigger as a share of GDP than any other four-year period since 1990, Australia’s debt levels and credit ratings are something which most other western economies would only dream of having at this point. Although the debt has increased from 9.7% in 2007 to 27.6% in 2013, it is set to fall back to 17% of GDP by 2018 and Australia is one of the few remaining countries with an AAA credit rating from the three ratings agencies.
However, Australia has had a budget deficit since 2008-2009, reversing a string of Coalition surplus budgets since 2002-2003. Gillard ‘assured’ voters in 2010 that her government would post a surplus in 2013, and it stuck to that pledge until December 2012 – a long time after nearly everybody had said that it would not be able to meet its promise, or that doing so would entail excessive costs on the economy (austerity). The last budget had a $18 billion deficit. Labor’s campaign promised a return to surplus in 2016-2017.
The Coalition said that Australia was facing a “budget emergency”, but it did not really campaign on a platform of austerity. The Coalition has said that sound economic management is in its DNA and that returning to a surplus was a priority, but Abbott fell short of putting numbers or timelines on that and did not say if it would happen under his first term in office. The Coalition promised to start paying off the debt, lower taxes, reduce spending cut red tape costs and eliminate 12,000 public sector jobs but create one million jobs in five years. Abbott also promised significant investments in infrastructure. The Coalition was criticized for not releasing its detailed platform costings until two days before the election. The main victim of cuts under a Coalition budget would be foreign aid, while the Coalition expects to garner revenue by reducing the number of asylum seekers and by repealing the carbon tax.
Labor ran on its record, but also a ‘scare campaign’ warning of austerity and massive cuts under a Coalition government. Late in the campaign, Rudd, flanked by Treasurer Chris Bowen and Finance Minister Penny Wong, claimed that there was a $10 billion hole in the Coalition’s platform. The announcement backfired quite epically after the heads of Treasury and Finance distanced themselves from Rudd’s remarks, and Liberal Shadow Treasurer Joe Hockey called Rudd a ‘liar’ afterwards.
In the last months of the first Rudd government, Kevin Rudd and Wayne Swan proposed a Resource Super Profit Tax (RSPT), which would have been a 40% tax levied on all extractive industries. The RSPT was met with an avalanche of opposition from Coalition and, more importantly, the mining companies. Between May and June 2010, the mining companies and the federal government engaged in a costly ‘ad war’ – with the mining giants running ads against the RSPT, and the federal government spending millions on an ad campaign in support of the RSPT. The handling of the RSPT by the Rudd government was one of the reasons Labor’s powerbrokers toppled him in 2010 and replaced him with Gillard. Upon taking office, Gillard buried the hatchet and cancelled the ad campaign (the mining companies followed suit). Her government renegotiated the mining tax with the mining companies and the Greens, passing the Minerals Resource Rent Tax (MRRT) in 2011. The MRRT is a 22.5% tax on the profits of iron ore and coal projects but only applies to profits over $75 million. The government also expanded the 40% Petroleum Resource Rent Tax to cover all onshore and offshore oil and gas projects.
The intake of the MRRT was rather disappointing for the government, which had projected $2-3 billion revenue from the tax in 2013; it only raised $200 million. The lower than expected revenue forced Labor to shelve part of its “benefits of the boom” plan to use the MRRT’s revenue, which was originally supposed to cover a $1.8 billion boost to family tax benefits (dropped), a 1% reduction in the company tax rate and an increase in compulsory superannuation from 9% to 12%. Despite the relative failure of the MRRT, Labor is committed to keeping the tax as is.
In contrast, the Coalition promised to repeal the MRRT, arguing that the best way to make companies pay is through state royalties. The Coalition also wants to hand over environmental approvals for all resource projects to state governments.
The Greens, who supported the MRRT, want to amend the tax to increase the rate to 40% and expand coverage to all minerals. Unlike Labor and the Coalition, the Greens also oppose most new mining, coal seam gas and shale gas projects.
One of the more ironic parts of the campaign might be that, on childcare and family policies, it was the right-wing Coalition which promised the most generous and expensive childcare/parental leave policy, with the centre-left Labor attacking the Coalition’s plan for being too costly. One of Tony Abbott’s signature policy proposals was a 26-month paid parental leave for mothers, at their actual wage (up to $150,000) or the national minimum wage (whichever is greater). Labor’s current paid parental leave plan covers 18 weeks, paid at the minimum wage and not including superannuation. The Greens’ proposal is somewhere in between both parties’ plans, proposing a 26 month paid leave but full replacement salary only up to $100,000.
One of the reasons why Tony Abbott came out with such an ambitious and generous paid parental leave plan was an effort to fix his image as being sexist or misogynist. Abbott, a socially conservative Catholic who opposes abortion and same-sex marriage, made controversial comments about women in the past, which led many of his detractors to call him sexist or misogynist. In a much-heralded and publicized speech in the House in 2012, Gillard called out Abbott for his past statements and branded him as a ‘sexist’ and ‘misogynist’. Obviously, Abbott dismissed such labels, but his landmark parental leave policy was a major effort by the Coalition to give him a more pro-women image.
The Coalition supports the Labor government’s new DisabilityCare (formerly National Disability Insurance Scheme), which passed into law in March 2013. The program, to which the budget committed $14.3 billion, will provide 460,000 Australians with disabilities with funding to cater directly to their needs. Another major Labor policy which the Coalition more or less supports is Labor’s landmark National Broadband Network, a huge project to provide 93% of homes with fibre-to-home broadband internet. The Coalition opposed Labor’s NBN policy in 2010, but given how popular of a policy it has turned out to be, Abbott’s policy involves a cheaper (and slower) network. The Coalition proposes fibre-to-node (existing copper cables would connect nodes to homes) technology, which would cost $17 billion less than Labor’s plan and would be completed sooner (2019 instead of 2021) – but the internet would be slower than with Labor’s NBN. The Greens support Labor’s policy.
One issue which has raised passions and divided Australians for decades now is the question of asylum seekers. In 1992, Paul Keating’s Labor government introduced mandatory detention policies – detention (in immigration detention centres) of all persons entering the country without a valid visa while authorities assess the legitimacy of their reasons for entering the country and carry out security/health checks. After 2001, the Howard government took a tough stance on asylum seekers with the Pacific Solution, an offshore processing system under which asylum seekers were sent to Pacific island nations (Manus Island in Papua New Guinea and Nauru). Authorities also tried, when possible, to stop boats – mostly coming from Indonesia – carrying illegal migrants, most migrants being from Afghanistan, Iraq, Iran, Sri Lanka, China, Myanmar or Vietnam. The Pacific Solution was very successful in nearly stopping illegal boat arrivals: from over 5,500 in 2001 to only one in 2002. Critics argue that a good part of that is due to the fall of the Taliban in Afghanistan. The Pacific Solution, however, was very controversial and was heavily criticized by the Greens or human rights groups. NGOs said that Australia was not meeting its international obligations and expressed concerns about the poor condition of the offshore detention facilities.
In 2007, the Rudd government dismantled key aspects of the Pacific Solution and adopted a more ‘compassionate’ approach. However, the number of boat arrivals increased dramatically, from 161 in 2008 to over 2,700 in 2009 – and that number has increased to over 17,200 in 2012. Although a vocal minority mostly on the left are critical of the Pacific Solution and similar hardline policies on asylum seekers, most voters are rather supportive of tough stances like that taken by the Coalition under Howard.
Feeling that the immigration situation was dragging down the government and playing to the Coalition’s advantage, Gillard quickly backtracked on Rudd’s initial asylum seeker policies and began negotiations, first with East Timor and later with Malaysia, for a return to offshore processing. Negotiations to open a detention centre in East Timor failed, but in May 2011 she announced a deal with Malaysia whereby Australia would exchange asylum seekers (to be sent to and detained in Malaysia) with Malaysian refugees. The High Court, however, ruled the agreement invalid in August 2011. With boat arrivals continuing and a number of tragic boat sinkings which claimed the lives of asylum seekers, the issue remained at the fore of debate in 2012. In August 2012, Gillard announced that her government would reopen the offshore detention centres on Manus Island (PNG) and Nauru, marking a return to the Coalition’s Pacific Policy. This new policy, however, didn’t do anything to stem the tide of boats.
Certainly the most important event in Rudd’s short second government between regaining the Labor leadership in late June 2013 was his new policy on asylum seekers – adopting an even tougher stance than Howard had taken with the Pacific Solution. Following a deal with the Prime Minister of Papua New Guinea, Rudd announced that all asylum seekers arriving by boat would be sent to PNG for processing and resettlement. Rudd declared no asylum seeker who comes by boat would ever be resettled in Australia. If they are found to be refugees, will be resettled in PNG, Nauru or other countries in the region. Rudd also finalized a similar agreement with Nauru.
In May 2013, Labor – with the Coalition’s support – passed legislation which excised the entire mainland from Australia’s migration zone, meaning that asylum seekers who reach the mainland are no longer able to even apply for a visa to enter Australia.
The Coalition under Tony Abbott has made ‘stop the boats’ one of its main policy planks in 2010. Rudd’s new policy was intended to challenge the Coalition on an issue where voters have traditionally sided with the Coalition rather than Labor. Both parties have fairly similar hardline asylum seeker policies now, both of them supporting offshore processing and mandatory detention. Abbott’s ‘stop the boats’ plan, however, also involves the Australian military. Under the Coalition’s policy, the government would create a military-led and chaired task-force made up of the 12 border security agencies and authorize the Navy to ‘turn back’ the boats ‘where it is safe to do so’ (the Howard government had a similar policy of turning back the boats, if possible, to Indonesia). It would also reintroduce temporary protection visas (allowing refugees to be released into the community for three years, but without work rights) and extend them, meaning no one who came to Australia by boat would ever get permanent resettlement; they would have to reapply for protection periodically and return to their home country once it was safe. It would make its temporary protection visas retrospective, meaning no asylum seeker who has already arrived in Australia would ever have permanent settlement. The Coalition also opposed Labor’s decision to increase the humanitarian refugee intake from 13,750 to 20,000 and would reverse it.
Rudd’s policy was met by waves of criticism from the left and human rights groups – but also former Liberal Prime Minister Malcolm Fraser, who has become quite left-wing in retirement. The Greens strongly opposed Rudd’s new policy as ‘cruel’ and offer a much different platform on immigration: increasing humanitarian intake to 30,000, ending offshore processing and abolishing mandatory detention.
Same-sex marriage was not a top issue in the campaign, but it has become a hot topic in Australian politics, especially as other Western nations such as New Zealand, France and England/Wales all legalized same-sex marriage in 2013. In 2008, Labor passed legislation which recognized same-sex couples in federal law, granting them the same rights as heterosexual unions. However, private members bills introduced by the Greens or a Labor backbencher to legalize same-sex marriage have all failed. Julia Gillard opposed same-sex marriage, as did Kevin Rudd until this year.
However, in May, before reclaiming his old job, Kevin Rudd announced a change of heart and endorsed same-sex marriage, and became the first Australian Prime Minister to support same-sex marriage. When challenged by a Christian pastor on the issue on a Q&A programme near the end of the campaign, Rudd answered with a passionate argument in favour of same-sex marriage which became a small YouTube hit and won international acclaim from supporters of same-sex marriage. Labor’s platform promised to introduce legislation to legalize same-sex marriage if it won reelection, but it would still allow its MPs a free vote (like in 2012). The Greens have long supported same-sex marriage and has even suggested that Labor MPs should be whipped to vote in favour.
The Coalition, although voting in favour of the Rudd government’s 2008 legislation to extend benefits to same-sex couples, opposes same-sex marriage and Tony Abbott has not allowed his MPs a free vote on the issue (but only a tiny minority of Liberal MPs seem to favour same-sex marriage, including former leader Malcolm Turnbull). Tony Abbott was even challenged on the issue by American pop singer Katy Perry on an Australian radio show.
You can read more about policies on The Age, the ABC or The Guardian.
The Labor government since 2010 faced two major scandals. NSW Labor MP Craig Thomson was the subject of an investigation regarding misuse of union funds while he was leader of the Health Services Union. Gillard was hesitant to take a tough stand on the Thomson/HSU affair because a by-election in his electorate could mean that Labor would lose its majority in Parliament. He was suspended from the party in April 2012 and in October 2012, Fair Work Australia, the federal workplace relations tribunal, launched civil proceedings against him. He was arrested in January 2013.
In November 2011, the government installed Queensland LNP MP Peter Slipper as Speaker of the House, a move criticized by the Coalition, of which Slipper was a member (until he resigned from it shortly after becoming Speaker). In April 2012, he faced allegations of accused of sexually harassing a member of his staff. While Slipper temporarily stepped down from his duties, the Labor government continued to support him and argued that Slipper’s staffer did not have a case – even after lewd text messages sent by Slipper were released.
It was in this context that Gillard gave her viral misogyny speech in which she attacked Abbott as a sexist and misogynist. While it was met with widespread acclaim abroad, the domestic reaction was more subdued – she gave the speech in response to Abbott calling on Slipper to resign, and her government continued to support Slipper despite the text messages.
Preliminary results
The nature of Australia’s electoral system means that vote counting can take quite a while. Results remain preliminary, especially for the Senate. But as of today, more and more results are being set in stone. Results come from the AEC.
House of Representatives (primary votes, preliminary)
Coalition 45.66% (+2.04%) winning 90 seats (+17)
-Liberal 31.92% (+1.46%) winning 58 seats (+14)
-Liberal National Party 8.96% (-0.16%) winning 22 seats (+1)
-The Nationals 4.44% (+0.71%) winning 9 seats (+2)
-Country Liberals 0.34% (+0.03%) winning 1 seat (nc)
Labor 33.63% (-4.36%) winning 55 seats (-17)
Greens 8.35% (-3.41%) winning 1 seat (nc)
Palmer United Party 5.52% (+5.52%) winning 1 seat (+1)
Family First 1.37% (-0.88%) winning 0 seats (nc)
Independents 1.4% (-0.81%) winning 2 seats (-1)
Katter’s Australian Party 1.03% (+0.72%) winning 1 seat (nc)
Others 3.06% (+1.2%) winning 0 seats
House of Representatives (2PP, 140/150 divisions)
Coalition 53.38% (+3.58%) winning 90 seats (+17)
Labor 46.62% (-3.58%) winning 55 seats (-17)
Senate
Coalition 37.54% (-1.09%) winning 18 seats (nc) for 34 total seats (nc)
-Liberal/National (NSW, VIC) 21.71% (+0.29%)
-Liberal National Party (QLD) 7.54% (-0.44%)
-Liberal (WA, SA, TAS, ACT) 7.64% (-0.95%)
-The Nationals (WA, SA) 0.40% (+0.07%)
-Country Liberals 0.36% (+0.05%)
Labor 30.34% (-4.79%) winning 12 seats (-6) for 25 total seats (-6)
Greens 8.56% (-4.55%) winning 4 seats (+1) for 10 total seats (+1)
Palmer United Party 4.97% (+4.97%) winning 1 seat (+1) for 1 total seat (+1)
Liberal Democrats (LDP) 3.84% (+2.03%) winning 1 seat (+1) for 1 total seat (+1)
Nick Xenophon Group 2.1% (+2.1%) winning 1 seat (nc) for 1 total seat (nc)
Sex Party 1.35% (-0.69%) winning 0 seats (nc)
Family First 1.11% (-0.99%) winning 1 seat (+1) for 1 total seat (+1)
Shooters and Fishers 0.93% (-0.75%) winning 0 seats (nc)
Katter’s Australian Party 0.84% (+0.84%) winning 0 seats (nc)
Democratic Labour Party 0.84% (-0.22%) winning 0 seats (nc) for 1 total seat (nc)
Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party 0.49% (+0.49%) winning 1 seat (+1) for 1 total seat (+1)
Australian Sports Party 0.02% winning 1 seat (+1) for 1 total seat (+1)
Others 6.96% (+2.51%) winning 0 seats (nc)
Note: the map shows the % majority on 2CP – ‘majority’ defined as in Britain (winning candidate’s % – runner-up candidate’s %). Australia calculates ‘margin’ as winning candidate’s % – 50.00%.
As polls had predicted, Tony Abbott’s Coalition won a decisive victory – not quite a landslide (certainly not comparable to the Lib/Nat’s landslides in the QLD or NSW state elections in 2012 and 2011 respectively) but certainly a very comfortable win similar to John Howard’s inaugural 1996 victory or his fourth reelection in 2004.
In the next post covering the Norwegian election on September 9, we’ll see that Norwegian governments have rarely won third terms in office in the post-war era. In contrast, Australian governments often tend to win more than two three-year terms. But after only two terms and six years in office, Labor was thrown out – making it the first government since Gough Whitlam to not win at least a third term.
When one considers the relatively solid state of Australia’s economy – it hasn’t been in recession since 1991, 5% unemployment is no more than a wet dream for many of Australia’s G20 partners, low interest rates and a comparatively healthy debt/deficit – the defeat of a sitting government by such a wide margin may be quite surprising. A good economy does not mean that a government will inevitably win reelection – plenty of governments around the world have lost reelection despite a strong economy. However, many of those governments lost because of voter fatigue after 10+ years in office. Labor has been in office for ‘only’ six years.
Voter fatigue, however, played a key role in Labor’s defeat this year. This voter fatigue was in large part the result of Labor’s crippling internal instability and turbulent governments. Internal instability and civil wars always reflect badly on any party. And this was more than just the usual internal rumblings from malcontents about a mediocre leader: it was a series of constant factional wars, decided by shadowy figures in smoke-filled rooms, with a toppled Prime Minister conspiring from the day he lost his job to reclaim it from his one-time ally, and that sitting Prime Minister eager to hang on to her job and keep her ally-turned-bitter rival out of office. Labor might have done a good job in office, in terms of governance and policy (a subjective view, naturally, but a good case could be made that the government’s record was quite good), but it was often overshadowed by the constant factional warfare, backstabbing and backroom conspiracies. Labor gave the image that it was unable to govern itself.
The Coalition understood that voters were fed up with turbulent politics and instability under Labor and they ran on a platform which basically promised stability. A somewhat hypocritical promise, given that the Liberals are only slightly less prone than Labor to leadership chaos – for example, the CLP Chief Minister of the NT was recently toppled in a leadership spill.
Other factors played in the government’s defeat. Several unpopular policies or government decisions became strong rallying points for the conservative opposition.
There was the carbon tax, whose immediate repeal has been at the heart of the Coalition’s platform ever since it was first approved in 2011. Abbott, back in 2011, said that 2013 would be a ‘referendum on the carbon tax’. It is hard to say to what role the carbon tax played in voters’ minds in 2013 given that public acceptance of the carbon tax has been slowly edging upwards and the initial anger has petered out a bit. The election probably wasn’t a ’referendum on the carbon tax’ as the Coalition said it would be, especially as Rudd was campaigning on terminating the carbon tax a year ahead of schedule. It may, however, have mobilized conservative opinion against Labor.
The Coalition’s old ‘stop the boats’ pledge was popular with voters, hence why Rudd adopted such a tough stance on asylum seekers with the ‘PNG Solution’. Given Rudd’s new policy and the general proximity of both main parties on the issue, opposition to illegal boat arrivals was probably not a factor in Labor’s defeat, although it certainly dragged down the government between 2008 and 2013 – and some voters might have remembered that when they voted.
As in the 2010 election, Labor was unsuccessful at getting its message across and defending its record. For example, the Coalition was able to steamroll the government on economic issues. Labor’s failure to get its message across brings us to another major factor in this campaign: Kevin Rudd.
Kevin Rudd was ‘brought in’ at the end of June in a calculated attempt by Labor powerbrokers (those who had him kicked out three years prior) to win the election or, at the very least, save the most furniture possible. At the start of the year, with some polls showing Labor clawing upwards and eating into the Coalition’s massive lead on the primary vote and 2PP, some had thought that Julia Gillard – with a reputation as a fighter – would be able to turn things around, get Labor on the offensive and turn the tables on Abbott. However, by the summer, only weeks before the election itself, Labor was still trailing the Coalition by over 10 points on 2PP (up to 57-43) and it was crystal clear that Gillard would not be able to win the election. Rudd, who was much more popular than Gillard at that point, was a last-ditch attempt to win, or, more likely, salvage what could be salvaged.
Despite losing, was Kevin Rudd a net positive for Labor? Labor certainly lost by a substantial margin, but with about 54 seats (at least) it is in a better position to begin rebuilding than, say, the NSW and QLD Labor parties. In short, a major defeat but not a crippling one. Labor should be able to rebuild and fix itself up a bit before the 2016 federal election. Would Julia Gillard have done a better or worse job than Rudd in the election? Narratives have already been built for both views – the former holds that Rudd is too chaotic and egocentric of a politician to run a good campaign, and Gillard as a fighter could have run a better and less disorganized campaign; the latter holds that Gillard was far too unpopular with voters to be able to win, and that Rudd helped the party – notably by managing to hold all but two/three of Labor’s seats in his home state of Queensland (but Labor’s result in Queensland in 2010 was quite bad to begin with).
Rudd’s return to Prime Ministership came with the usual (short-lived) honeymoon: Labor took the lead on 2PP for the first time since 2010/2011 probably; but the poll bounce died off, and Labor fell back behind the Coalition and what had been clear for over a year – that Abbott would win – became clear again after a brief moment of doubt when Rudd returned. What seems to have gone wrong for Labor between the day Rudd returned and September 7 was a poorly run campaign, widely described as being disorganized and chaotic – in good part due to Rudd himself.
This post-election article describes how Rudd’s campaign imploded, going into lengthy details about a disconnect between central headquarters in Melbourne and Rudd’s personal campaign. Rudd has a long-standing reputation as a chaotic, thought-bubble and micro-managing type of guy; it was one of the reasons why the Labor caucus toppled him in 2010. During the campaign, there were several moments where frustrated Labor strategists felt that Rudd was making up policies on his own as he went along. The most infamous, cited in the article, is when Rudd floated the idea of a differential tax rate for Northern Territory businesses in a campaign stop in Darwin.
Rudd and the campaign’s messages weren’t working – nothing was sticking, nothing was breaking through with voters. Labor’s bump on asylum seekers didn’t last long. Rudd’s attacks on the Coalition – saying Abbott would raise the GST and/or “cut, cut, cut” – didn’t work. A successful second debate performance was ruined by a Facebook post from the woman who had put makeup on both leaders, which said that while Abbott was ‘lovely’, Rudd had been mean. An incident which brought back the old stories about Rudd’s unpredictable rudeness and egocentric behaviour. Rudd’s announcement that he would move a main Navy base from Sydney to Brisbane resulted in him being ‘ambushed’ on the stump by the Liberal Premier of NSW. Finally, as aforementioned, was the disastrous Rudd-Bowen-Wong announcement of the ‘black hole’ in the Coalition’s costings and the subsequent reprimand from the mandarins at Treasury and Finance.
It is also quite a performance from Tony Abbott, who was, not all that long ago, brushed off as an unelectable leader. Labor was certainly overconfident (in 2009) that Abbott’s reputation as a ‘social reactionary’ and his propensity for making controversial or insensitive comments (notably about women, hence the sexist/misogynist accusations) would mean that he would not be a serious threat. Besides, Abbott seems to be fairly gaffe-prone (although he doesn’t have foot-in-mouth disease); during the campaign he commented on a Liberal female candidate having ‘sex appeal’ and said ‘suppository’ instead of ‘repository’.
Abbott’s personal approval numbers (satisfied vs. dissatisfied) were quite low throughout the last Parliament’s term – he had a dissatisfied rating in the 50-60% range for most of 2011 and 2012, and only improved slightly during the campaign (but even the last polls had him with a negative satisfaction rating). It is pretty clear that the Coalition didn’t win because Abbott was a Obama-2008 like “transformational figure” who excited the electorate on his own merits; the Coalition won because Gillard/Rudd’s ratings as Prime Ministers were even lower and voters were fed up with the chaos and instability of Labor governments.
Nevertheless, Abbott cleaned up his image considerably over the course of the campaign. He tempered off his traditional “attack dog” image he had had since the last election as leader of the opposition, and ran a well-organized and disciplined campaign with a clear focus: stop the boats, clean up the debt and repeal the carbon tax. Abbott also softened his personal image, which up to that point had been that of a strict Catholic social conservative lacking a ‘soft touch’. During the campaign, he often appeared alongside his two daughters, aged 20 and 22 respectively. His generous parental leave policy was also an aspect of this calculated strategy to soften his previously ‘harsh’ image. Nevertheless, his seemingly natural propensity for awkward or insensitive comments came back: in a pitch to contestants of the Big Brother TV show, Abbott said he was “the guy with the not bad looking daughters.”
The Greens won 8.3%, a poor showing after their record-high 11% result in the 2010 election. In 2010, the Greens benefited from a high left-leaning protest vote in their favour, which seems to have evaporated somewhat in this election. However, while the Greens have reason to be disappointed at their poor showing and the substantial swings against them in most electorates, they can be pleased with two results: holding, against very tough odds, their only seat in the House of Representatives, and increasing their representation in the Senate by at least one seat to reach a record of 10 senators.
The election was shaken up by millionaire mining magnate Clive Palmer, who created his own party – the Palmer United Party (PUP) – earlier this year and managed to run 150 candidates, including Clive Palmer in the LNP-held seat of Fairfax on Queensland’s Sunshine Coast (north of Brisbane). Clive Palmer is a famous Australian millionaire – Forbes estimated his wealth at US$795 million – who owns the mining company Mineralogy. Besides creating his own party, the eccentric and bizarre millionaire made two other announcements this year: that he was building the Titanic II, a replica of the ill-fated RMS Titanic and opening an amusement park with animatronic dinosaurs.
Clive Palmer has been active in politics, as a member of the Queensland National Party (and later LNP) since 1974. He was the Nats’ campaign director in the 1983 QLD state election and was supporter of famous Queensland Premier Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen’s disastrous ‘Joh for Canberra’ bid for the Prime Ministership in the 1987 federal election. Palmer announced in 2012 that he would contest the LNP preselection (nomination) for the seat of Lilley, currently held by Julia Gillard ally and former Treasurer Wayne Swan. Such plans were scrapped in November 2012 when he resigned his life membership in the LNP, a party which he had also been a generous donor to.
The PUP is a classic populist party, feeding on voters’ anti-establishment feelings. His platform seems to have consisted of a mis-mash of policies, such as reducing inequalities between Aboriginals and the rest of the population, major investments in health and education, increasing pensions, creating mineral wealth and repealing the carbon tax. All in all, a classic populist party, with the added flair of typical Queensland populism – not far removed from Sir Joh. The PUP’s Senate candidates included former athletes: a former Australian rules football player, a boxer and former rugby player (Glenn Lazarus, the PUP’s senatorial candidate in QLD).
During the campaign, Clive Palmer again demonstrated his penchant for eccentricity and oddities by channeling Miley Cyrus and twerking on a radio show.
The incumbent MP for Kennedy, Bob Katter (a ex-Nat independent) created his own party, Katter’s Australian Party (KAP) in 2011. T