Is Labor a part of Team Australia vs China?

Paul Kelly was one of the last to join Team Australia versus China. But he’s on board now:

This is the one area of policy that the Morrison Government is showing real leadership and long-term thought.

Yet, Blind Freddy can see its troubles in many other areas have seriously damaged its re-election prospects. So much so that the base case is now for a new Albanese Government this time next year. State Newspolls make it abundantly clear that a landslide victory in the realm of a twenty seat majority is possible (notwithstanding that a year is a long time in politics).

So, the most important question to ask at this stage is is Labor a part of this Team Australia push? Here’s what it said in its recent National Platform statement about foreign affairs:

118. Labor will strengthen Australia’s ties with the countries of the world. Australia has a large immigrant population, global interests, and cultural ties to every part of the globe, and we have much to gain from improving our cultural and country-to-country relationships.
119. The United States remains our closest security ally, formalised through the ANZUS Treaty, and a vital global partner. Labor will maintain and strengthen Australia’s close relationship with the US, a relationship founded on our people’s common democratic values, our respect for the rule of law and our mutual commitment to international peace and security.
120. The US alliance is critical to Australia’s national security requirements in vitally important areas such as intelligence, cooperation on terrorism, defence equipment, and the US’ long-term role in underpinning broader stability in the region.
121. Labor supports active Australian participation in the Asian Infrastructure Investment Bank (AIIB) – an important multi-lateral economic institution which offers a unique opportunity to drive economic growth in our region and improve living standards.
122. Labor seeks to strengthen economic, social, cultural and educational ties with countries including Japan, Korea, India and Indonesia based on mutual respect and a sense of genuine partnership in our own Indo-Pacific region. Labor supports enhanced cooperation through rules-based institutions and opportunities for regional engagement including the PIF, ASEAN, the EAS and APEC. In particular a Labor government will commit resources and pursue closer relationships and cooperation with ASEAN and its members. Deepening of relationships and mutual trust may mean that, one day, ASEAN membership could be a natural step, desired by our neighbours and seen as logical by Australians.
123. The re-emergence of China as a great power and global economic giant is one of the most significant developments of the 21st century. Australia and China share an overarching interest in a peaceful, stable and prosperous region. Labor will build on our long tradition and work to deepen and extend Australia’s engagement with China.
124. As China grows, Labor will position Australia to benefit from this growth and preserve our core national interests.

So far, that seems reasonable, especially the commitment to ASEAN. Though there is clearly a tension between “deepening and extending” engagement with China and the preservation of “our core national interests” given Team Australia is now headed for a China divorce.

The problem for Labor is this:

FutureAsia

National Conference:

Believes that Australia’s future prosperity depends on improved capability at home and greater engagement and collaboration abroad and that central to achieving this is closer ties with our region;

 Recognises that this reflects a longstanding Labor view – from Prime Minister Whitlam through Hawke, Keating, Rudd and Gillard: spanning recognition of China, to the establishment of APEC, to a White Paper which recognised the need to shape domestic policy to meet the opportunity and challenges of the Asian century;
 Welcomes the FutureAsia strategy, a fundamental whole-of-government, nationwide strategy to deepen and broaden our engagement with Asia;
 Supports FutureAsia as a central focus of Labor’s foreign and domestic policy to achieve a step change in our relations with Asia; and
 Commends Labor’s FutureAsia, a comprehensive and confident plan for advancing Australia’s national interests and contributing to the prosperity, stability and security of the region.

FutureAsia is basically a renewed statement of Paul Keating’s Asian engagement doctrine. Labor holds very tightly to this agenda. It is a policy sacred cow. And just about every greybeard in the party is not only committed to it ideologically but financially dependent upon it.

Don’t get me wrong. This is in the national interest. But as things stand today, that doctrine excludes China. At least, it does if we value our democratic freedoms.

So the FutureAsia maxim throws up a range of questions that Labor is yet to address (for that matter so is the Morrison Government on many fronts). For instance:

• What is the Labor view of the 14 conditions placed by China upon any “deepening” relationship with it? We have already seen Labor fall silent on the Xinjiang genocide (along with the Morisson Government recently). What other topics will it muzzle itself on? Labor’s siding with China last year by blaming the Morrison Government for hamfisted diplomacy was very concerning.
• How will Asian engagement deal with the Chinese diaspora which Beijing is clearly aiming to coerce and bribe into a CCP-loyalist group, through no fault of its own? How will Labor deal with ongoing ethnic Chinese immigration when it is clear that Xi’s China fully intends to project power worldwide and especially within our region, in part by exploiting this group?
• Nowhere in the document does Labor mention Taiwan. What will it do in the event of conflict? What will it do when Australian iron ore is being used to shoot Taiwanese democrats? What will it do when the US demands we stop shipping it? Will the unions blockade the ports in a rerun of Pig Iron Bob? Or will they support the CCP against a decadent West?
• How will Labor handle Chinese-bought state premiers like Dan Andrews and Mark McGowan? The Morrison Government is clear on the former but not the latter.

Both political parties are easily bribed. See Gladys Liu, for instance. But Labor has a degree of Chinese influence within it that the Coalition does not. Labor has a cultural commitment to China, and corporate memory of success with it, that the Coalition does not. So these questions are more difficult for it to answer than the Coalition.

That is not to say that it is automatically less trustworthy on the issue. There are four major reassurances:

First, the Australian people have turned vehemently anti-CCP so the political imperative is for less engagement.

Second, Anthony Albanese is clearly a political centrist. He understands that radical policy loses elections and government.

Third, there is considerable inertia in the institutional structures of international relations. For all of China’s attempts to buy Australian loyalties, the strategic bedrock of the national political system is the liberal American empire and ANZUS. It would take a catastrophe to disrupt this.

Last, it is likely that a sinking Morrison Government will aim to wedge Labor on this over the next year and force it into an open acknowledgment of Team Australia versus China.

Clearly, in this area of Chinese policy, it is better “the devil you know” in a proven Coalition. But, the Morrison Government is a terrible failure on many other fronts in the struggle of freedom versus tyranny. It is anti-democratic in its rampant corruption, politics over policy, self-interest over national interest, retrograde social outlook and house price economic model.

Arguably, these failures matter more in the struggle of Team Australia versus China given they undermine local commitment to our own system, opening up avenues for soft invasion, division and conquest. Given Labor is better in all of these policy areas, that makes it an intrinsic member of Team Australia versus China in ways that the Coalition can’t match.

In sum, Labor’s cultural commitment to China remains a concern but its other strengths versus the Coalition make it an acceptable risk.

As one MB commenter recently noted, “live your principles, not your fears”.