Article: Labor in Queensland faces a make or break year

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Labor in Queensland faces a make or break year

Labor in Queensland faces a make or break year
Article from: The Courier-Mail

Paul Williams

December 28, 2009 11:00pm

A CHALLENGE, like beauty, is in the eye of the beholder. Some will see a crisis; others an opportunity.

The Government has had a poor year since its easy win at the state election. How, or if, Premier Anna Bligh recovers in 2010 will determine the party's fate in 2012.

The next 12 months for the LNP will be equally testing, and will determine if leader John-Paul Langbroek has what it takes to be premier, and if a single conservative party is even right for Queensland.

Let's look at Labor first.

Bligh's most pressing challenge will again be asset sales. How can she complete the plan without stirring the party's snoozing factional beast? With left-wing trade unions on the war path, and with community fears over job losses and declining services, even sharemarket floats and 99-year leases will do little to assuage the party faithful.

A second test will be Bligh's leadership. If the asset sales descend into debacle, and if the Premier's approval ratings sink with them, leadership whisperings will become deafening. But if the caucus wants a new leader, it will have to move quickly. Vacillation will only create a New South Wales-like paralysis.

Third, Labor will have no defence in 2012 if it doesn't address – both materially and rhetorically – what should be (if the LNP were doing its job) the Government's weakest Achilles heel: Budget deficits and massive debt. With last year's Budget forecasting a state debt more than $85 billion by 2012-13 (more than twice that of NSW), the political cost of the Government's $18 billion infrastructure program may yet prove too great.

The Premier, of course, has little option but to continue pump-priming, and the Government must avoid another spike in unemployment above the national average. What progress Bligh and Treasurer Andrew Fraser make on their 100,000 new jobs promised during the last election campaign will be particularly critical.

Who would have thought any recent Queensland government would need reminding of the dangers of a damaged integrity? But, two decades after Fitzgerald, scandals of murky lobbying again stole the headlines.

Voters tolerate a lot of things; but they won't wear incestuous government-business relations. The Government's response to any CMC findings in the Simon Tutt-Queensland Rugby Union affair will therefore be very interesting.

However, a blood-letting might come earlier still.

Scuttlebutt from senior public servants has it that several new ministers are way out of their depth. Look out for a Cabinet reshuffle before mid-year, with ministers Nolan, Reeves, Hinchliffe and Wallace at the top of any list.

But the LNP can forget about any easy ride. Any fillip in the opinion polls the LNP has enjoyed this year is owed more to the Government's own goals than any newfound love of the party, or its leader John-Paul Langbroek. The polls are soft, and if the Opposition wants to firm its lead it must do so on its own merits.

This means developing a comprehensive attack strategy that includes, first, constructing a narrative that reminds voters the LNP is the alternative government and not some sniping pressure group. A consistent assault and not just the occasional television sound bite on government debt is the place to start.

Second, its 2009 policy platform must be overhauled, and rolled out piecemeal to rid the LNP once and for all of the small-target tag. And third, a more professional parliamentary presence is needed where the Opposition ignores Labor's baits, and where well-researched inquiries can hit home at Question Time.

Langbroek's leadership will be a major test. First, too few voters are able to identify him, let alone extol his virtues. Second, how can the "small-l Liberal" Langbroek prevent his party being hijacked by the Right? To many, the new LNP looks more like the old Nationals with every passing day. And third, how can Langbroek diplomatically rein in deputy leader Lawrence Springborg who, many assume, still wants to be premier?

Experience would have it that 2010 – not being an election year – should be about as interesting as Hansard itself.

But we're at the slippery end of Labor's long grip on office, and the desperate can do almost anything.

Dr Paul Williams is a senior lecturer in the School of Humanities at Griffith University on the Gold Coast.

I don't think it is a matter of Ministers being out of their depth as such, as much as flawed bureaucratic advice and spin machines distant from reality ..