天堂.受难记

Valley of the polls

By Laurie Oakes, Nine Political Editor

Turning from the international stage of APEC to the local drama of the election, John Howard has no interest in political suicide.

In 1941, Prime Minister Robert Menzies returned to Australia after attending Winston Churchill's War Cabinet in London for 10 weeks and delivering speeches in New York, Washington and Chicago. He had, he said, a sick feeling in his heart that he "must now come back to my own country and play politics". John Howard emerged from APEC with more than an inkling of how his idol felt. After strutting the international stage (sort of) and being treated as an equal (almost) by George W. Bush, Hu Jintao and Vladimir Putin, he found himself forced to come down to earth and get back to domestic politics. 

And it was no fun at all. Awaiting him was yet another awful opinion poll, confirming Labor's enormous lead and showing Kevin Rudd's approval rating ahead of Bob Hawke's before the 1983 election. Worse, near panic had broken out in sections of the Liberal Party, and there were discussions about how to avoid an electoral train wreck. The idea getting currency - embarrassingly, while APEC was still in progress - was to persuade Howard to emulate Captain Lawrence Oates, the brave soul who sacrificed himself in a bid to give other members of Scott of the Antarctic's ill-fated polar expedition a chance of survival. But Howard was not greatly attracted to the suggestion that he leave the tent at the height of a blizzard with the announcement that "I am just going outside and may be some time".

Self-sacrifice was not likely to come naturally to the prime minister. One of the most striking things about the latest criticism of the PM as APEC wound up was the allegation that he had repeatedly put himself ahead of the party and was doing it again. Even some Liberals who'd been strong Howard supporters until things went pear-shaped with the advent of Rudd were asserting that his decision to stay on as leader in the middle of last year was selfish. They did not say so at the time, of course - or even believe it then - but they make no bones about it now. Referring to the Liberal Party's accumulated woes, one formerly rusted-on Howardite commented: "A lot of it is driven by his own rapacious self-interest." Ouch!

It was no surprise that Howard's reaction to the suggestion he emulate Oates was to tell the closing APEC news conference: "I do intend to contest [the election]. I intend to contest it as leader." That was not necessarily the wrong response, of course. Oates' sacrifice was in vain - the rest of Scott's expedition perished anyway - and plenty of Liberals agreed there was no guarantee a switch to Peter Costello would save the Coalition from the electoral blizzard at this late stage. For every Liberal who believed a new leader would change the political dynamic in the Coalition's favour there was another arguing that a Costello accession would not only alienate voters but smack of utter desperation and make matters worse. It would be, as one Liberal strategist put it, "a real high-wire act". Even so, the Liberal Party conversation turned to the subject of a "tap". How would the PM react if a minister or ministers tapped him on the shoulder and suggested it was time he packed his bags and hit the road? Not well, was the judgment. Several of Howard's friendships had already become strained because of hints that he should think about his position. Howard took the view that the die was cast.

In any case, he had reason to feel confident that no minister would really push hard for a leadership change with the election starting gun about to be fired. None of his colleagues had shown much spine in the past. At a cabinet meeting a few months ago, Howard provided an opportunity for ministers who thought he was a major part of the government's electoral problem to speak up. None did. Later several ministers admitted to fellow Liberals that their courage had failed them and they had let the side down. More recently, a minister claimed privately to others in the party that he had twice told Howard he should consider standing aside. No one believed it.

The leadership issue aside, the government's most urgent need was to resume normal business as quickly as possible. APEC, after all, far from boosting Howard in the eyes of voters, turned out to be a showcase for Rudd. The former diplomat had looked confident and at ease in the company of Bush and Hu and addressing the Putin lunch. "The Howard machine is not what it used to be," commented a member of Rudd's inner circle. "In the old days he would not have given the opposition leader a look-in."

APEC was a distraction for Howard and senior ministers, diverting them from the task of trying to deal with the Labor threat and preparing for the election campaign. If it is to have any chance in the election - under any leader - the Coalition has to ignore the polls and move quickly to get its strategy and direction clear. Polling for the Liberals by Crosby Textor suggests there are deep hesitations in the electorate about voting Labor, but the government has to be on top of its game to exploit this. "There is a clear opportunity for us, even now," says a senior party figure. "But that is predicated on us getting our act together." This was the task Howard turned to after his brief moment rubbing shoulders with world leaders - trying to ignore, in the leadership muttering, a dangerous new distraction.