Dead man walking? Aston disaster for Peter Dutton

Cartoonists love to portray federal Opposition Leader Peter Dutton as a zombie; cold as ice, a man stuck in the past, with a tendency towards authoritarianism. Last weekend the dead man walking analogy acquired new meaning with the loss of the once-safe Liberal seat of Aston, in outer Melbourne.

It marks the first time in 100 years that a government has snatched a seat from the opposition in a by-election. Mr Dutton was so sure things would go the other way that he made the election a referendum on himself and Prime Minister Anthony Albanese, declaring that the result would be ‘a verdict on the leaders, no doubt about that’.

With an extraordinary six per cent swing, the winner in Aston, Labor’s Mary Doyle, a breast cancer survivor and former unionist, replaces Scott Morrison’s old mate Alan Tudge (one of the architects of Robodebt), who quit in February. As Ms Doyle said on election night, ‘We were the underdog, but boy, have we shown that we have a big bite.’

The Aston contest was made stranger by the fact that the seat is deep in mortgage-belt territory, with interest rates climbing steadily since the election of federal Labor, as well as the price of pretty much everything else.

But the voters appear to have had their minds on other things. The Liberal party (described by Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews as a ‘nasty, bigoted outfit’) now holds just seven of Victoria’s 39 seats.

Interestingly, the Victorian seat of Aston was named for Matilda Aston, a blind activist and teacher who died in 1947. Despite facing a less than perfect Albanese government, the Liberals now appear to be walking blindly into oblivion, and irrelevance.

Having lost his moderate faction to the teals, Peter Dutton seems condemned to remain on the fringe unless he can do something positive to regain the centre. But does the former policeman have what it takes?

In normal times, a result like this would mean curtains for the federal leader, but it appears there is simply no better option available than Mr Dutton. For how long can a dead man keep walking before he and his party topple over?

The Liberals must be praying that Scott Morrison does not bring on another by-election by leaving Cook early.

No, yes and maybe

The Liberals’ decision to formally oppose the Voice to Parliament this week has further entrenched them as the party of ‘no’. It worked for Tony Abbott, until it didn’t. When the other team are fractured it can achieve short term political success, but otherwise it might be just a short cut to irrelevancy.

The other opposition in Canberra, The Greens, perhaps empowered by their recent modifications to Labor’s carbon abatement scheme, have been very vocal this week about the shortcomings of Labor’s $10 billion housing plan, which essentially involves gambling a large amount of money on the stock market, via the Future Fund, and spending the proceeds, if any, on housing, rather than using the principal for more immediate outcomes.

With $368 billion being proposed for submarines into the future, it doesn’t seem unreasonable to prioritise a much smaller amount to deal with what is now a national crisis.

As the Liberals fracture, and continue being pushed further away from popular support by their coalition with the extremists in the National Party, Anthony Albanese appears to have an increasingly clear run to achieving whatever he wants in the near future.

Hopefully he will raise his ambition, and achieve something meaningful, before this moment passes.

Originally from Canberra, David Lowe is an award-winning film-maker, writer and photographer with particular interests in the environment and politics. He’s known for his campaigning work with Cloudcatcher Media.

Long ago, he did work experience in Parliament House with Mungo MacCallum.