I’ve long been the archetypical swing voter. It’s now two decades since I first joined the queue at my local public school, nervously skirting the flyers thrust in my direction on the way in, checking whether I had enough coins in my purse for a sanga on the way out. I usually make up my mind before entering the booth, but on a couple of occasions I have been known to decide then and there, standing in front of the cardboard partition with pencil in hand.
Given the current state of Australian politics, figuring out who to vote for has never been harder.
My vote is usually a toss-up between a couple of candidates. Sometimes I like the local member but don’t like the direction their party is travelling. Sometimes my vote in a state election is influenced by the antics of federal counterparts. Sometimes I think the government has been there long enough and should be turfed out as a matter of principle.
I’m not an expert on voter behaviour, but I’d hazard a guess that such tendencies are pretty common in today’s Australia, where membership of political parties is at record lows and scorn for the political class is more widespread than ever. Voters like myself sit in the so-called “sensible centre” – all we want is decent leadership, good policies and the continuation of the quality of life that has delivered Australia decades of prosperity, but is now failing younger Australians. Sometimes this recipe can be found on the left and sometimes on the right, but it rarely strays far from the moderate centre ground.
Populist radicalisation at both ends of the political spectrum, driven by algorithmic polarisation and trends bleeding through from overseas, has left us moderate swing voters desperately trying to anchor ourselves onto a crumbling centre ground. That’s why the prospect of a new centrist party, potentially encompassing a loose coalition of teal independents and disaffected Liberal moderates, has me excited.
Much has been written about the success of the teals in cannibalising the centre-right vote in seats that used to be held by the Liberal Party. The reality is that teal independents have far more in common with Liberal moderates than either does with the conservative wing of the Liberal Party, which is now ascendent and – given the numbers – is likely to remain in charge for some time.
Former prime minister Malcolm Turnbull is rumoured to be behind the push, but has understandably not come out and said so, given the need for such a grouping to distinguish itself from the Liberal Party, of which he is still a member.
The resurgence of One Nation on the far right has arguably made the need for moderate political options more critical than ever. One Nation has already pulled the beleaguered Liberal and National parties into its orbit, dragging the Coalition further away from the centre-right policies that have previously won them many an election. I’m pessimistic that the valiant efforts of those moderates who are yet to abandon the party, like Tim Wilson, Keith Wolahan and new convenor of Hilma’s Network Erin Watson, will be able to dampen the allure of hard-right populism.
The Greens, once a party of principled environmentalism, is no longer the party to vote for on climate change – that mantle has been ceded to the teals. To the average voter, the Greens increasingly appear to be consumed by “luxury beliefs” more closely associated with whatever social justice cause is in vogue at the time. In this they resemble a left-wing version of One Nation. Both see value in stoking populist culture wars and garnering votes of protest and outrage. Neither has a sensible vision of how to actually govern the country.
So why not just vote Labor?
One reason Prime Minister Anthony Albanese has been so successful is that he has positioned Labor as the only credible party that can lay claim to this sensible centre, a winning strategy that saw him hoover up moderate votes like mine at the last election. I’m not a die-hard Labor supporter, however, and I have my concerns about the outsized influence of the union movement over the party. I’ve also been around long enough to know that good governance requires a strong opposition. There’s a genuine fear that the Coalition’s spiral into unelectable-boys’-club irrelevance may ultimately be the undoing of Labor, too. Just look at Victoria.
Nothing illustrates the plight of the swing voter more starkly than the upcoming Victorian state election. An uninspiring Liberal opposition has long prioritised personal ambition and factional infighting over the need to present itself as an alternative government. The Moira Deeming fiasco was just the latest scandal signalling to voters that this undisciplined rabble cannot be trusted to run a state. However, Labor, in power for more than 12 years, first under Dan Andrews and now his protege Jacinta Allan, is arguably long past its use-by date, saved only by the lack of a credible alternative.
The Age’s revelations of the staggering corruption and links to organised crime that plague Allan’s Big Build construction projects, fleecing taxpayers out of an estimated $15 billion, should ensure Labor is unelectable. Yet new Liberal leader Jess Wilson, who is fighting to impose her authority over a nest of scorpions while shaking off the toxic taint of the federal Liberal Party, is far from a shoo-in.
Bikies driving Ferraris effectively funded by taxpayers should have been Wilson’s slam-dunk moment, but the memory of the Victorian Liberals’ many past shenanigans is yet to fade in the minds of voters.
Who is there to vote for, when the choice is between the allegedly compromised and the self-absorbed? In Victorian politics there is no sensible centre option at all.
The politically homeless don’t want to be stuck voting Labor forever, and we can’t wait for the Liberal Party to get its act together either. A new centrist party wouldn’t have to do much to win my vote – recruiting people who aren’t in bed with big business or corrupt unions would be a good start.
Australians yearn for leaders with authenticity and personal integrity. A new party should elevate candidates who can draw on real-world experience and who speak from the heart, rather than rehashing talking points and slogans dreamed up by consultants, pollsters and focus groups.
Most Aussies are sensible people who are wary of political extremes. Should a new centrist party form, they will quickly find that votes like mine will be up for grabs.
Kylie Moore-Gilbert is a research fellow in Security Studies at Macquarie University and a regular columnist. She is the author of The Uncaged Sky: My 804 Days in an Iranian Prison.
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Kylie Moore-Gilbert is a research fellow in Security Studies at Macquarie University and a regular columnist for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. She is the author of The Uncaged Sky: My 804 Days in an Iranian Prison.