Opinion
It is rare outside of a federal election for the fortunes of all political leaders, their parties and the non-aligned to be broken, restored or enhanced in the space of a few days.
Yet this next week – with the Farrer byelection on Saturday, the federal budget on Tuesday and the opposition leader’s budget-in-reply speech next Thursday – will be critical in determining which politicians, parties or movements will emerge in decent enough shape to make the distance.
At a time when the national mood has seldom been bleaker, the government is unveiling, one veil at a time, what is being framed as a blockbuster budget. Whether voters are mollified, infuriated or alienated will be determined not only by the contents of the document that Jim Chalmers will deliver, which has Anthony Albanese’s fingerprints all over it, but by how convincingly the government explains the broken promises, how responsible it is and how many concessions it will be forced to make after the grievance industries of the far right and far left mobilise.
Labor’s job, under the most difficult circumstances in decades, was not made easier by Reserve Bank governor Michele Bullock announcing the latest rate rise, despite getting an early outline of the budget. Bullock held true to her promise/threat to kill inflation even if it leads to recession. She insisted she was still fighting home-grown inflation pressures – which the latest CPI figures actually showed had subsided – not those caused by Donald Trump’s war. In the process she undermined the government’s arguments its budget was economically responsible.
Bullock effectively told all governments, federal and state, to stop diluting the intent of rate rises by putting more money in people’s pockets, while acknowledging that the consequences of Trump’s war could soon force everyone, including the RBA, into a complete U-turn. Which also sounded like a good reason to sit pat rather than put a chokehold on the economy.
The spectre of recession will only add to the anger, resentment and pessimism which is higher now than during COVID. Back then the government shovelled out billions, which sedated discontent and kept businesses alive. There was the prospect of a vaccine and medical experts appeared daily to explain what was happening and how and where people could stay safe.
Today there is no cure for an increasingly erratic Trump and no safe spaces. He has made whatever problems existed infinitely worse, and he shows no sign of stopping. People are right to be worried.
No one much cares if Trump is not happy with Australia. It is nothing compared to how millions of Australians feel about him and the misery he has unleashed. Even though they blame him for the war, they can’t do anything about him. Instead, they might have to settle for punishing the government for a faltering economy and the Coalition for being so hopeless.
In the first two months of his leadership, Angus Taylor studiously avoided saying anything remotely interesting. Then he released his immigration policy. The party which dismantled the White Australia Policy has plagiarised Trump and One Nation to embrace discrimination.
After Paul Keating accused him of racism, Taylor accused Keating of never standing up for Australian values. Asked to detail those values, he told one Brisbane radio interviewer that it was stuff like people adhering to the rule of law, “not Sharia law”.
Asked who should not be in the country, Taylor pointed to the Bondi Beach killers. The father was born in India, and the son was born here. Without in any way diminishing the despicable nature of that attack or the deep antisemitism which incited it, horrendous crimes are committed by people of every nationality, every faith or no faith, every colour and every class.
People with Anglo names – like the Hoddle Street or Port Arthur killers or sovereign citizen types like Dezi Freeman (born Desmond Christopher Filby), who cold-bloodedly murdered two police officers and wounded another, or Gareth Train, his wife Stacey Train, and his brother Nathaniel Train who also shot dead two police officers and their neighbour in Wieambilla, Queensland in 2022 – are seldom if ever referenced by Coalition and One Nation agitators.
Taylor argues there is a greater risk of bad people coming to Australia from bad countries, hence the need to discriminate against those who do not conform with Australian values.
So. Would a Coalition government welcome to Australia US Defence Secretary Pete Hegseth, who belongs to a religious sect which believes women should not be allowed to vote and that slavery not only benefited the US but cultivated “affection among the races”?
Would it welcome Trump, who cast aspersions on the bravery of allied soldiers in Afghanistan, sucked up to warmongers like Vladimir Putin, committed blasphemy, threatened to wipe out a civilisation, threatened to bomb Iran back to the Stone Age and in 2023 was ordered by a New York civil jury to pay millions in damages to a woman he allegedly sexually assaulted?
Just asking.
Saturday’s byelection will show how much life is left in the Coalition and if One Nation can be a viable threat despite a shambolic campaign with its gaffe-prone candidate, David Farley, who seems destined – if he wins – to clash with both Pauline Hanson and Barnaby Joyce, when they are not clashing with each other. If Farley wins thanks to Coalition preferences, which seems most likely, or independent Michelle Milthorpe manages to beat him, Taylor will be seriously wounded. Internal mutterings that he will struggle to make it to Christmas will intensify.
Senior Liberals defended preferencing Farley, arguing if they had not, their conservative membership and MPs would have gone nuclear.
Another reason was that if Milthorpe were to win, she would likely hold Farrer for as long as she wanted – as happened with Cathy McGowan and Helen Haines in Indi – whereas One Nation MPs tend to implode and quit. They hope Farley will oblige, and the signs so far are encouraging, making it possible for the Liberals to one day regain it.
To have any chance of making it to that point, Taylor has to deliver a budget reply overflowing with confidence and credible alternative policies. Otherwise, what is the point of a leader who says his party has to change or die, then follows in the footsteps of Peter Dutton on immigration and in condemning the booing of Indigenous welcomes to country by neo-Nazis at Anzac Day ceremonies one day, then the next saying there have to be fewer welcomes. How did that work out? Just asking.
Niki Savva is a regular columnist for The Age and The Sydney Morning Herald. Her most recent book, Earthquake, details the inside story of the 2025 election.
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Niki Savva is an award-winning political commentator and author. She was a staffer to former prime minister John Howard and former treasurer Peter Costello, and is a member of the board of Old Parliament House.