One Nation is heading towards the rock on which the Liberal Party shattered. The party is playing out an accelerated re-enactment of the catastrophe of purpose that crept up on the Coalition over years.
Since One Nation rocketed up the opinion polls following the Bondi massacre, it has been scrambling to consolidate its good fortune. Overnight a party that had an undisputed identity for 30 years gained a whole new following.
A study by Labor pollster John Utting in August has confirmed that the new supporters came for the anti-immigration policies. This is, after all, the established One Nation brand. But a single-issue party can’t move from protest vote to major force without expanding its policy suite into a plan to govern the country. The challenge for One Nation is to hold on to its lottery win.
The minor party is determined to make the leap into the big leagues. Despite currently only having two seats in the House of Representatives and four senators – including the party leader – the party has big ambitions. And some new supporters have big ambitions on its behalf. In a move that has sparked a great deal of attention, former Scott Morrison adviser and Australian Banking Association policy chief Chris Taylor took up the role of chief of staff to Pauline Hanson. He brought over Maxwell Pryor, a colleague from the banking association. Their most important role right now is turning the party into a genuine player.
The One Nation policymaking brains trust includes party leader Pauline Hanson, former Nationals leader Barnaby Joyce, longtime Hanson wrangler James Ashby, loyalist and senator Malcolm Roberts, and Taylor and Pryor. The range of views in the room, from Roberts’ conspiracy leanings to Taylor’s dry economics, already sets up an interesting dynamic. In addition, the party has high-profile donors – most famously, mining mogul Gina Rinehart – who undoubtedly have and share strong views on a range of issues. Since the beginning of the year, the party’s positions have been evolving rapidly.
Immigration policy has proven unexpectedly tricky for the longtime one-trick pony. After some back-and-forth, which included newly elected (and some would say precariously attached) Farrer MP David Farley declaring that immigration rates under One Nation would be “not too different” from those proposed by Labor or the Coalition, the party has now declared a policy of net-negative migration.
But the back-and-forth highlighted a coming challenge for the party as it looks to pick up rural and regional seats that are leaning towards the populist party. The general attitude to “mass migration” is at odds with the reliance in many of these electorates on migrant workers. It would be a short memory that forgot Barnaby Joyce’s intervention on behalf of Tamil asylum seekers.
The economy and trade are also difficult areas for the party to navigate. In February, One Nation supported a domestic gas reservation policy. At the time, Hanson said the reservation would “increase the supply of gas and lower the price of electricity directly”.
By June, the party had abandoned that idea. Instead, it now proposes a 30 per cent exploration tax break, in return for a 30 per cent public equity stake in resulting production licenses. The party now says it will give Australians “real ownership of their resource assets for the first time”. It will also provide “the predictability our trading partners need to continue their mutually beneficial relationship with Australia”.
Perhaps the most significant aspect of the policy shift is in that rhetoric. One Nation’s new-found concern for “predictability” and “mutually beneficial relationships” with overseas trading partners. The wording is revealing. This is a party moving from “splendid isolation” to a view of Australia as economically interconnected with the world.
The question is how the One Nation “base” – the loyal six or so per cent who have stuck with the party over the years – will respond as “their” party tries to change. And it has hardly started on the cultural issues that have traditionally fired up One Nation voters. So far, Hanson has shown herself willing to backtrack whenever an idea that would have been uncontroversial among her base causes issues. After her National Press Club address, she was forced to “clarify” that she supports paid parental leave. This week she retracted an episode in her Please Explain cartoon series mocking Jacqui Lambie’s prolapse condition, amid anger from women that their reproductive issues had been made a source of fun.
This sort of response makes a lot of sense for a party that enjoys equal support from men and women. But with many of Hanson’s base exercised about perceived unfairness to men in the Family Court, she may soon be forced to choose which voters are more or less important to her.
The same calculation is approaching on economic sovereignty versus trade. Lean too far towards big business, with its globalised interests and preference for free trade, and she’ll alienate voters wedded to a more protectionist Australia. Insist on a walled Australia-first approach and business people will be repelled.
The Liberal Party knows this pain. Over time, the party found it harder and harder to hold together supporters who had a range of life experiences and views. Wealthy voters who had once valued the party’s economically rationalist positions became more concerned about climate change and promoting subsidies for renewable investments.
Women, who once saw it as the party of the stable family unit, and voted Liberal in greater numbers than men, lost their family stability as divorce rates rose and gender dynamics changed. They gravitated to more socially interventionist parties. Young people were locked out, while older people clung to benefits originally intended for the war generation.
The one saving grace for the Liberal Party has been its coalition with the National Party. The relationship has delivered just enough constructive conflict for voters to see their representatives as standing up for them – balancing their local interests with an appreciation of the broader economic benefits of market-based policies.
Productive conflict among robust representatives of One Nation is not yet on the table. They are more at risk of defecting than disagreeing internally – a result the prime minister is actively encouraging. At this rate, the siren-song of major party status may prove the cause of One Nation’s premature demise. One Nation is speeding towards the same shoal as the Liberals. What happens when they splinter is anyone’s guess.
Parnell Palme McGuinness is an insights and advocacy strategist. She has done work for the Liberal Party and the German Greens and she is a senior fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies. She is also an advisory board member of Australians For Prosperity, which is part-funded by the coal industry.
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Parnell Palme McGuinnessis an insights and advocacy strategist. She has done work for the Liberal Party and the German Greens and is a senior fellow at the Centre for Independent Studies. She is also an advisory board member of Australians For Prosperity, which is part-funded by the coal industry.
