After Australia’s poll

Press, 16 July 1987, Page 20

After Australia’s poll

Factions within the Labour Party are rowing as the Australian Prime Minister, Mr Hawke, forms his Cabinet. Members of Parliament from the Left, Centre and Right are trying to increase their influence within the new Government. And Mr Hawke is responding to these pressures. He has increased the number of Ministers and reorganised the number of Ministries, partly in the cause of balancing the factions. But the factional manoeuvring is unlikely to alter the policies already in place in Canberra, and neither is it likely to lead to serious long-lasting divisions within the third Hawke administration. The‘ same moderate expectation cannot be held about the row within the Liberal and Country parties. Within the Liberal Party there is a sharp ideological split. Mr Howard, its present leader, favours smaller government, lower taxation, and tough monetary measures. In advocating these views he has taken the Liberal Party outside the mainstream of Australian politics. The challenge that Mr Peacock, a former leader of the Liberal Party, will mount to Mr Howard will be based on the moderate traditions of the party and be an attempt to return the Liberals to the mainstream and challenge Labour for the middle ground.

Mr Howard and Mr Peacock have demonstrated that they are unable to work together, so the Liberals will not allow one to be the leader and the other to be the deputy leader. It was to overcome that problem that Mr Neil Brown was elected deputy. However, the president of the Liberal Party, Mr John Valder, has suggested Senator Fred Chaney as deputy (much to the indignation of Mr Brown). Several others are candidates for the deputy leadership. As the Liberal Party has

had both Mr Howard and Mr Peacock as leaders and as neither has been an outstanding success, there is an outside chance that the Liberals will choose Senator Chaney, a man of easy manner, on the Left of the party, and with some personal popularity, to be leader. He would have to leave the Senate and win a seat in the House of Representatives, something he has already unsuccessfully attempted in his home state of Western Australia. He has said he will try again. Senator Chaney is becoming recognised as one of the most able people in the Liberal Party but his time might not yet have arrived. He would be a strong and loyal deputy to either Mr Howard or Mr Peacock and would be unlikely, in the immediate future, to seek the leadership on his own initiative; but strong support within the caucus and party would presumably tempt him to run for the top spot. Both the federal National Party and the Queensland National Party are similarly arguing about leadership. The Premier of Queensland and leader of that state’s National Party, Sir Joh Bjelke-Petersen, is widely blamed for causing the loss by the coalition parties. Australian voters certainly turned against the, National Party in Queensland. Sir Joh appears a spent force in Australian politics now, but there could be one more eruption left in him. However, time is catching up on Sir Joh. There is dissatisfaction within the Queensland National Party and he is too old to consider standing again as Premier of the state. The chances are strong that the sharpest reminder of Sir Joh’s venture into federal politics will be an election spoiled. But he shows no sign of going quietly.