A clear paradox has emerged over recent Newspolls, including yesterday’s: the government is substantially less popular than the opposition, even though the Prime Minister comfortably out-rates the Opposition Leader.
While it was Malcolm Turnbull who set up a terrible KPI for himself when taking over from Tony Abbott — declaring that 30 consecutive Newspolls justified a challenge — changing leaders now because that yardstick is fast approaching would be folly. That’s because Turnbull is comfortably the preferred PM (42 to 31 per cent), and as the incumbent he leads Bill Shorten on the net satisfaction rating (minus 17 to minus 20).
Turnbull’s lead over Shorten has come about despite a relentless campaign to undermine the PM and issues distracting from what the government would prefer to talk about. Sticking with Turnbull will avoid a bad situation getting worse, and once distractions are put to bed it just might give it a chance of a recovery.
Phewy. What would change the political landscape would be a new leader plus new policies that united the party. It’s not going to be Tony Abbott. He’s wandered off into the coal woods.
But it could be another conservative leader. That leader need only commit to policies in the national interest to pull the party together:
- winding back immigration to lift pressure on living standards;
- committing to climate change mitigation with base load power provided by gas, plus
- culture wars can roll on against anyone not white and male.
That mix of policies is more than friendly to conservative voters and will also seriously wedge:
- One Nation on population recapturing that vote;
- The Greens on environment recapturing some of that vote;
- Labor on housing affordability without junking the tax rorts that Coalition voters love.
It would also make the Coalition the national security front-runner.
Even a semi-competent conservative leader could prosecute this agenda. S/he would probably still lose but they’d sure have a better chance. Do-nothing is doomed.
