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“Have you seen Hasty’s page? It’s mental.”
The line moved quickly on Tuesday afternoon. As the first text. Then in the corridors of Parliament House as a know-it-all. Then face to face, over wine, said quietly, recognizing something with the air of people they don’t name.
Social media pile-on of Liberal Party MP and future leader of the Liberal Party Andrew Hastie was not curious. It was a warning flare – sparked by Labour’s decision to vote down hate crime and hate speech laws.
The reaction was immediate and unforgiving. Hastie’s Facebook and Instagram feeds are filled with thousands of fraud allegations, claims that he abandoned conservative voters, and reneged on promises to transfer their votes to One Nation. For many critics, the substance of the legislation barely mattered.
What mattered to them was that a Liberal, considered the last great hope, had followed their leader and many in the opposition sided with Labor on a bill and spent days branding it dangerous and impenetrable.
The political firestorm involving the coalition isn’t just about hate crime laws. Nor is it about citizens leaving the front bench en masse. Or even about Susan Lee’s authority, though it’s clearly under siege now. It’s about a coalition that no longer agrees on who it’s trying to represent – and is increasingly nervous about the votes it’s losing.
Online trolls can’t all be dismissed as false voices crying out in the void. They were coalition voters – or at least the MPs most fear losing now. It’s this crowd that thinks the political center is dead, that parties have spent the last few months courting, strengthening and suffering, especially online. But now they are angry, agitated and deeply suspicious of compromise.
Hastie’s response was swift and unforgettable. Politics, replied Hastie, is “like war”. His critics, he sniffed, were “emotionally frivolous”.
“Purity is for keyboard warriors and compensating influencers,” he wrote.
He openly argued that supporting Labour’s bill was the least worst option, warning that refusing to deal would lead to far worse outcomes than those sought by the Greens. In doing so, he emphasized a form of leadership that is in short supply.
It was a spray that revealed more than irritation. It showed just how badly the right wing of the coalition has been pushed – and the party’s leadership crisis is now being fought out as deeply online as in the party room.
Sympathy with Hastie from colleagues was thin, especially given the view that he had actively engaged with this audience. But he did something else this week: He fought them. Others took the opposite route. Among civilians, in particular, the instinct was comforting rather than challenging.
But controlling every calculation was Pauline Hansen.
The decision of the entire civic front bench to resign over their concerns over hate laws was hailed as a stand on freedom of expression and principle. It was also an act of political self-preservation. Faced with a restless base and growing support for a nation, citizens chose to validate the anger rather than confront it. It was safer to walk away than to explain a compromise.
Within the coalition, there will be no shortage of accusations: Lee, for supporting the laws that once made him invincible; Little Froud, to escalate a conflict into a full blown one. Anthony Albany, accused in the aftermath of the Bondi massacre for daring to oppose and fracturing complex legislation through Parliament. Everyone has a responsibility.
When the Solution Political Monitor poll puts One Nation at 18 percent nationally (the News poll has the party at 22 percent, even ahead of the Coalition at 21) the fear starts with Trump’s strategy. Two-party preference numbers lose meaning when the conservative vote spills over. At the last election, 35 seats ended up as contests that were not Labor versus the Coalition. At these numbers, it becomes the norm rather than the exception.
The threat is greatest where one nation is strongest: regional and outer suburban Australia. These are the remaining strongholds of the Alliance and the heartland of the citizens. In some seats, Queensland MPs believe Hanson’s party is now within striking distance of topping the primary vote. Once this happens, preference falls out of the bargain and labor becomes a rare arbiter of conservative survival.
That’s why Coalition MPs believe figures such as Queensland Citizens Senator Matt Canavan pushed the fight for independence so hard this week. But this was not a theater of culture war. It was an election scare.
For redbridge/accent polling Australian Financial Review Late last year made this very clear. In this survey, support for One Nation rises to 26 percent among male Gen X voters and 22 percent among baby boomers.
Translated into blunt political reality: If you’re male, over 50 and struggling with the cost of living, there’s a one in four chance you’ll vote for Pauline Hanson today. That voter is central to the citizenry base and increasingly important to liberals outside the capitals.
Hasty, boldly and imperfectly, chose to refuse after voting the Labor laws. Some of his colleagues among the citizens chose comfort.
The unity split isn’t really about any one bill. It might cost him his job, but it’s not really about that either. Too many liberals and citizens are paralyzed by fear — regardless of whether their voters lead them, fight them or simply follow them when they leave.
Rob Harris is the national representative Sydney Morning Herald And age Based in Canberra.
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Rob Harris is the Sydney Morning Herald and Omar’s national correspondent based in Canberra. He is a former representative of Europe.Connect via email.
