Playing up sectarian divisions has never gone well in Australian politics — especially not for Labor. This is probably why, since the days of the Labor split, Catholic voters abandoned the party in droves over its embrace of communism. The split condemned Labor to decades in the wilderness.
Half a century later, Anthony Albanese no doubt thinks he’s being very clever in skewering Scott Morrison over the Religious Freedom Bill. But Albo might find his tactics blowing back on him very, very hard indeed.
No one has emerged a winner from the shambolic parliamentary end to four years of political promises, a woke confusion of priorities, entrenched beliefs and needs, political opportunism and grandstanding at one minute to midnight.
Scott Morrison has failed to deliver on a promise based on a Malcolm Turnbull undertaking made four years ago under the duress of wanting to get support for the same-sex plebiscite.
Anthony Albanese has failed to address those pledges after the last election to people of faith and religious schools that Labor “got it wrong”.
The four soaking-wet Liberal “moderates” who crossed the floor to defeat Morrison’s bill may be feted by their bourgeois blue-green pals in the chic cafes. Anthony Albanese may win the praise of the ABC and the upper-middle-class, ageing queens who read Crikey. But there is a whole Australia “out there” who may think very differently.
Religion may be on the decline in Australia as in the rest of the West, but 70% of Australians still identify as religious. These are people who assented in good faith to same-sex marriage, believing as they were told that, “It’s just about gay marriage: there’s no slippery slope”. Six years later, they find themselves in a very different reality.
Even at the time of the plebiscite, the anti-religious intolerance of the “alphabet people” was so palpable that then-PM Malcolm Turnbull had to promise a religious freedom bill to sweeten the deal. What was ultimately offered — and defeated by the left — was a dog’s breakfast of a bill that would plainly have left most religious groups unable to publicly adhere to core tenets of their faiths.
For the Prime Minister it is the defeat of the Coalition on the floor of the House of Representatives reminding people it is indeed a minority government, and failure to fulfil a pledge that there would be laws protecting religious freedom passed in this term […] Morrison is the big loser because he’s failed to deliver on a promise of enormous import to his conservative base, he’s been ratted out by at least five colleagues who have ignored his plea to unite or lose the election, and the chaos of parliament continues.
But Albanese is no clear winner.
The Australian
Scott Morrison unexpectedly won the last election on a massive swing in Queensland and WA against Labor’s anti-mining bias. Western Queensland also happens to host a fair number of Australia’s Christian conservatives.
But it is Western Sydney where Albanese risks throwing a match in a religious tinderbox.
Western Sydney is Labor’s heartland. Densely populated and tribally Labor, it has often either delivered government to the party, or at least saved it from annihilation. But Western Sydney is also Sydney’s Muslim heartland. While it is Christian leaders who have so far got the most airtime in the media (mostly as punching bags), Muslim leaders have made it clear that they are not at all happy about the abortive progress of the religious freedom promise.
Meanwhile, rumours are flying that would make the Coalition’s conservative base very happy, if true.
Peter Dutton has slammed five Liberal MPs who crossed the floor over the religious discrimination bill.
The Defence Minister said the government was “misled” by Trent Zimmerman, Dave Sharma, Fiona Martin, Bridget Archer and Katie Allen after they joined Labor and crossbenchers in backing changes to the Sex Discrimination Act which removed some exemptions for religious schools.
Mr Dutton told RN Breakfast that certain MPs reneged on their undertakings on their vote on the bill.
The Australian
Rumours — many of them admittedly spread by Labor troublemakers stirring the pot — abound that Dutton will use the humiliating defeat to challenge Scott Morrison for the Prime Ministership.
Dutton has furiously denied the rumours, but the past decade or so has taught us exactly how much professions of loyalty by ambitious deputies are really worth.
This would be an enormously risky move for the Coalition. On the one hand, Australians have got used to a modicum of leadership stability after a decade of the revolving door at the PM’s office. Ditching a sitting PM again will almost certainly rub many voters the wrong way. Dutton is also hated by the left-elite, especially the media. But then, what Coalition leader isn’t? The Libs thought that putting Malcolm Turnbull in the top job would placate the media — they were sadly mistaken, of course.
So, why not go with Peter Dutton? Dutton narrowly lost the leadership challenge that was ultimately gazumped by Morrison. Dutton is also hugely popular with the Coalition’s conservative base. As Defence minister, Dutton, along with Foreign Minister Marise Payne, has been instrumental in the Morrison’s only real policy triumphs.
The Coalition may well decide that dumping Scotty from Marketing and going to a snap election to make the most of a new leader’s honeymoon is the only path to victory.
