Politics
Government secrecy
Imagine if the Nürnberg trials after the 1939-45 war had never gone ahead, because Göring, Höss, Keitel, Streicher and other Nazis could have rebutted any possible proceedings with the defence “I had to follow the Führer’s orders”.
The primacy of official orders seems to dominate in the prosecution of David McBride, the army lawyer who leaked classified information to the ABC, revealing allegations of crimes committed by special forces in Afghanistan. In his trial he hoped to rely on the defence that a duty to protect the public interest coincides with a soldier’s duty to follow lawful orders, but that was unsuccessful. As Chris Wallace of the University of Canberra explains in a Saturday Paper contribution – David McBride’s whistleblower defence crashes – the judge struck down that defence because it has no foundation in Australia’s laws. He had no option but to plead guilty.
Rebecca Ananian-Walsh, of the University of Queensland, has a Conversation article describing details of the proceedings against McBride: David McBride is facing jailtime for helping reveal alleged war crimes. Will it end whistleblowing in Australia?. She notes that regarding allegations revealed by McBride, there have been 36 matters relating to 25 incidents concerning 19 individuals referred to the Federal Police for investigation, but that “so far, the only charges to have been laid as a result of these investigations are against McBride himself”. In fact the Commonwealth seems to have made a special effort to see McBride prosecuted. Ironically it invoked public interest – the defence McBride tried to use – in justifying its refusal to supply material to the court that may have helped his defence.
Wallace in her article refers to precedents and legal opinion suggesting that the Commonwealth may not have a watertight case, even within the constraints of existing law. But the general issue is about the rights of whistleblowers. A few days after McBride’s plea Attorney-General Mark Dreyfus issued a press release Reforms to Commonwealth secrecy offences, which opens with the statement “The Australian Government will significantly reduce the number of secrecy offences, ensure remaining secrecy offences are fit for purpose, and improve protections for press freedom”. As described in an accompanying policy paper, Review of secrecy provisions, the government intends to reduce the number of specific secrecy provisions and to develop “a new general secrecy offence … that will ensure Commonwealth officers and others with confidentiality obligations can be held to account for harm caused by breaching those obligations”.
That’s all promising, but from Dreyfus’ statement, and from the review paper, the government’s emphasis seems to be more about protecting journalists who publish material from whistleblowers, rather than protecting whistleblowers themselves.
Peter Greste, now Professor of Journalism at Macquarie University, has a Conversation article: Australia’s secrecy laws include 875 offences. Reforms are welcome, but don’t go far enough for press freedom. He draws attention to a recommendation in the policy paper that Commonwealth officers should be prohibited from disclosing anything that would be “prejudicial to the effective working of government”. Most whistleblowers’ revelations reveal things the government would prefer not to see on the front pages of daily papers: is causing political embarrassment “prejudicial to the effective working of government”?
Trust and social cohesion – warning signs about economic exclusion
Australia has become a less cohesive and less trusting society over the last 15 years.
That’s a clear message from the Scanlon Institute report Mapping social cohesion 2023: a tear in the fabric?. Using attitudinal surveys, researchers pull together indicators of people’s feelings towards others, trust in government and other collective institutions, connections with neighbours, and perceptions of inclusion and exclusion. Between 2007 when the surveys started and 2023, their composite index has trended downwards, but with some volatility around the pandemic.
There is some good news in the survey, however. We have become much more supportive of multiculturalism, of immigrant diversity, and of religious diversity. Responses indicate not simply tolerance, but actually an enthusiastic embrace of multiculturalism. And, lest anyone misinterpret the results of the Voice referendum, we see the relationship between first nations and other Australians as very important.
The fall in the index is explained by an increasing sense of economic division. The idea that Australia is a land of economic opportunity, underpinned by a shared commitment to a “fair go”, has been declining. To quote from the report:
Declines in national pride and belonging in recent years are related to declining trust in government and increasing concern for inequality. Declining trust in the Federal Government is estimated to have contributed to 17 per cent of the overall decline in the sense of national pride and belonging, while declining belief that hard work brings a better life contributes a further 27 per cent to the decline. This result supports the notion that trust in government and perceptions of economic fairness help to shape our sense of national pride and belonging.
Trust in government is at a low ebb. It rose somewhat during the pandemic, but has subsequently fallen back.
Anyone seeking to infer partisan messages from the survey data is looking too shallowly. Rather there is a growing lack of confidence in our system of government. As the report states “there are widely held doubts about the integrity of politicians and the electoral system”.
Don’t trust anyone very much
Trust in government seems to be directly related to our economic fortunes. The more economically secure we feel, the more are we likely to trust government. There are many plausible explanations for such a correlation: the well-off are also the better educated who understand how government operates; the poor and excluded have negative interactions with government (think Robodebt); the geographic distribution of government services is unfair (think country hospitals); and so on.
Whatever the reason, when those who feel excluded and left behind mistrust government, there is fertile ground for right-wing populists to exploit people’s resentment, and to vote for those who will make their situation worse. Politicians from social-democratic parties and associated movements become puzzled and upset when they see poor people voting against their economic self-interest, but they fail to understand that they themselves reinforce the idea that there is some conspiratorial deep state acting against people’s interests. Politicians’ use of political spin, a Canberra-based public service that is inaccessible to most citizens but which opens the door to lobbyists, a heavy cloak of secrecy around government documents, and the privatization of services that once reached into the community such as the Commonwealth Employment Service, all contribute to this sense of disconnection and reinforce the idea that there is a Canberra conspiratorial bubble.
The report is rich in data. If you want a brief overview, James O’Donnell of ANU, the principal author of the report, is interviewed on the ABC in a 9-minute session, with the alarming headline Australian social cohesion index at lowest on record (the record goes back only 15 years). A theme in the interview is the influence of forces driving a wedge into our community. Names are not mentioned, but partisan media come to mind, as do some members of parliament on the opposition benches.
The government is floundering – really?
The Albanese government is floundering.
That’s the media story about the government’s reactions to the High Court instruction, without reason, to immediately release immigration detainees, and to what looks like a deliberate sonar attack on Australian Navy divers by the Chinese Navy. There is also the developing narrative that the current government is somehow responsible for the supposed “cost of living crisis”.
The government did handle the High Court decision poorly, in that rather than taking a cautious approach as urged by legal experts, it yielded to the opposition’s pressure to rush legislation through Parliament. And its public relations on the matter gave the impression that it was clueless. (Covered in last week’s roundup.) As Laura Tingle says, the 12-hour rush to push through laws concerning the end of indefinite detention was alarming in its chaos.
By contrast the government handled the sonar incident in line with normal practice around events of this kind – initially at a ministerial level, and then with a strong statement from the prime minister. It’s crucial that any reaction occur only after the cause of the incident is known. Was it an accident, was it an aggressive action by a rogue naval commander, was it in line with Chinese government policy, was it actually directed as a signal to Australia? Any missteps in reacting to such incidents can have serious consequences. We don’t know if Albanese discussed the incident with Xi, but as Crispin Hull points out in his post – Rule of law rings in the ears – there is a strong case for a slow, cautious approach.
The impression we get from these incidents is that the opposition is driving the policy agenda – an impression that serves Dutton very well.
Now the opposition suggests that the government’s weakly inadequate proposals to give journalists more protection in publishing whistleblowers’ revelations is going too far, and it appears that Attorney-general Dreyfus might seek some bi-partisan agreement.
What’s up with the Albanese government? Is it still coming to grips with the frightening reality that it actually won the federal election last year?
Writing in the Saturday Paper – Dutton tracks the scent of victory – Paul Bongiorno points out that Dutton “is hell-bent on a mission to shape how the public sees Albanese”. He points out the hollowness of Dutton’s attacks: they are devoid of any policy proposals to deal with the problems facing government. But Albanese seems to be reacting to them by seeking to do “bipartisan” deals with the Coalition, as if there are only two political interests represented in Parliament.
Judging by the government’s acquiescence to Dutton one may imagine that the Coalition is a powerful force to be taken seriously, but Bongiorno draws attention to the Coalition’s weakness, exemplified by Russel Broadbent’s resignation from the Liberal Party (an event that commanded very little cover in the media.)
Broadbent is a politician who could never be classified as “left” or “right”, but who is highly principled. His worst heresies in recent times have been to support the government’s minor changes to taxation of income from large superannuation balances and to oppose the government’s plans to proceed with the stage 3 tax cuts. The Liberal Party in his Monash electorate (about 100 km east of Melbourne) has failed to re-endorse him however, even though he has held the seat through name changes and boundary changes since 2004, and even though his taxation and spending proposals would probably be of benefit to people in his semi-rural electorate.
Bongiorno points out that Broadbent’s resignation is the Coalition’s third loss since the election, coming after their loss of the seat of Aston to Labor, and Andrew Gee’s resignation from the National Party: the Coalition is now down to 55 seats in the 151 seat House of Representatives.
Even that overstates the Coalition’s strength, because 21 of those 55 seats are in Queensland, held by the LNP (3 in Brisbane, 18 in the rest of Queensland). In the rest of Australia – 5 states and 2 territories, with a total of 121 electorates, the Coalition holds only 34 seats. Only 25 of those seats are held by the Liberal Party while the other 9 are held by the National Party.
Another framing is to include the 10 Brisbane electorates with the rest of Australia. That means the Coalition holds 18 out of 20 non-metropolitan Queensland electorates – almost a clean sweep – and only 37 of the nation’s other 131 electorates. For most of Australia, other than the non-metropolitan part of Queensland, the Coalition is a minor force in Parliament.
These numbers reveal the awful position of the Coalition and the Liberal Party in particular. Policies likely to appeal to hard-right conservatives in non-metropolitan Queensland don’t necessarily appeal to the rest of Australia, including Brisbane. In the strange arrangements that govern the LNP Dutton sits in the Liberal Party room, but he is actually a member of the rural-based LNP, a party that is essentially the National Party in character.
A more in-depth analysis of the fortunes of the Coalition, particularly the way its base has become concentrated in rural Queensland, is in a 29-minute Rear Vision program The life and death of political parties, in which Frank Bongiorno, Paul Strangio, Marija Taflaga, and Kos Samaras, discuss the ways political parties in Australia have developed since (and even before) Federation. All four commentators have their own views: perhaps the party will split; perhaps it will fade away as its old, white, male constituency fades away; perhaps there is still a chance of reform. But there is a general consensus that the Coalition, in its present form, is unelectable.
The question then is why is the Albanese government being cowered by what has become essentially a regional party, barely representative of the main part of Australia, and why does it not realize that appeasing bullies only rewards their aggressive behaviour? If it feels it should seek some broad support for its policies, why does it not approach independent MPs, upon whom it could well be dependent to form a government after the next election?
What’s so funny about politics?
Federal politicians these days seem to have two speaking styles. One, characterized by the Albanese ministry, comes across as an AI-generated script – polite, factual, unexciting and with no concrete information. The other, characterized by Dutton and his colleagues, comes across as calm, cold and carefully-crafted – moderate language crafted to incite confusion, doubt, suspicion, fear and division. Then there are the shock jocks on right wing media, most assured of what they are most ignorant.
What has happened to humour and sarcasm? Who in 2023 can match Billy Hughes’ assessment of the parties that would later morph into the Coalition, when he was defeated in 1922:
There are three parties in this country, two of which are known to the people. The other is like a maid entering service for the first time, without a character. This Country Party has recently made an illegitimate compact with a party which was composed of the flotsam and jetsam of the city. These troglodytes have emerged after an almost interminable lapse of time from their political caves, where it had been hoped they would have remained for ever.
This description of the parties may still be apt, but the language has changed. Martyn Goddard, on his Policy Post, traces the decline and fall of the intelligent political insult.