Labor begins election defeat postmortem with internal blame game | Australia news | The Guardian 19/5/19 11&17

Labor begins election defeat

postmortem with internal
blame game
Bill Shorten and key figures in the national secretariat
come under criticism as positioning starts for party
leadership

Australian election 2019 = live results

Queensland drives a stake through Labor’s hopes
Plibersek eyes Labor leadership as party reels from
defeat
Katharine Murphy and
Sarah Martin
Sun 19 May 2019 08.01 BST

Bill Shorten with wife Chloe the day after the election. His unpopularity and Labor’s
controversial tax agenda has been blamed for the defeat. Photograph: James
Ross/AAP

The knives are out internally after Labor’s weekend election defeat, with widespread
criticism of the performance of the party’s national secretary, Noah Carroll, including
allegations he ignored negative messages about Labor’s policy agenda emanating from focus
groups and wasn’t prepared to confront Bill Shorten to sharpen the campaign.

A number of Labor figures have told Guardian Australia they believe the combination of
Shorten’s unpopularity and the party’s controversial tax agenda was lethal for its electoral
prospects on Saturday night.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/19/labor-begins-election-defeat-postmortem-with-internal-blame-game Página 1 de 4
Labor begins election defeat postmortem with internal blame game | Australia news | The Guardian 19/5/19 11&17

Some are critical of the lack of punchy fightback on Coalition scare campaigns about
measures like dividend imputation, which was a significant problem for Labor in marginal
seats, and about the advertising campaign, which was dwarfed by the spend by the
controversial businessman Clive Palmer.

The Coalition determined at the start of the year it would use the budget to stabilise the
government’s political fortunes, and use the April statement to set up its core campaign
messaging on the economy and tax.

Liberal sources say the budget provided the conceptual starting point for the negative
arguments the Coalition campaign constructed about Labor needing to raise more taxes in
order to pay for big spending promises – a message Scott Morrison hammered both on the
hustings and through advertising.

Senior figures say there was a mood in the electorate for change – but not necessarily a
mood to change the government. Voters wanted a return to the more stable politics that
existed pre-2007, after which point federal politics entered a decade of leadership
instability.

With that nuance in mind, Morrison worked to paint Shorten and Labor as a risky rather
than productive change, and excised himself from colleagues in order to keep the Coalition’s
divisions largely out of public view.

With Labor figures shattered by the poor result, positioning for the party leadership under
way now that Shorten has made it known he will exit the field and finger-pointing in
advance of a campaign review, the ALP national president, Wayne Swan, issued a statement
warning his colleagues to remain calm.

“The result is deeply disappointing and our party has a responsibility to analyse the result
and to respond maturely,” Swan said on Sunday.

“Attributing blame or fault to any particular individual or policy is not the way ahead. Every
political party which suffers a defeat learns one lesson and that is to listen even more
carefully. In light of this result we need to examine our policy framework and our campaign
strategies.”

During a brief public appearance on Saturday, Shorten, who has agreed to be Labor’s interim
leader while the party makes a decision about the way forward, was asked what went
wrong. “We didn’t get enough votes,” he said.

Shorten said he would convene the party’s national executive to begin the postmortem and
the leadership ballot process.

Swan said Labor was “proud” of the role Shorten had played in “reuniting our party and
refreshing our policy agenda, and I am pleased he will continue to serve in the parliament”.

“The party has got to dust itself off, rethink and reorganise”.

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/19/labor-begins-election-defeat-postmortem-with-internal-blame-game Página 2 de 4
Labor begins election defeat postmortem with internal blame game | Australia news | The Guardian 19/5/19 11&17

As well as the criticism of Shorten and key figures in the national secretariat, internally there
is also backbiting about advice from veteran backroom operatives Peter Barron and Sharon
McCrohan.

Barron, a stalwart of the right faction in New South Wales, is known as a veteran “fixer” in
the party and was an adviser to both Bob Hawke and Neville Wran.

MPs in the wash-up on Sunday said the party had been over-ambitious in terms of a policy
agenda and had poorly targeted key marginal seats. Many reported that basic infrastructure,
such as signage and volunteers, were lacking from key pre-poll booths and across targeted
marginal seats.

The ACTU’s “change the rules” campaign has also come under fire, with the secretary, Sally
McManus, being compared unfavourably to former ACTU boss Greg Combet.

Some MPs also suggested that while decisions were made based on data, much of the
information gathered was flawed, largely because of voter fatigue with information
gathering by phone.

As many as 75,000 calls are estimated to have been made into key seats from both sides and
third parties in the final week of the campaign.

Since you’re here…

… we have a small favour to ask. More people are reading and supporting our independent,
investigative reporting than ever before. And unlike many news organisations, we have
chosen an approach that allows us to keep our journalism accessible to all, regardless of
where they live or what they can afford.

The Guardian is editorially independent, meaning we set our own agenda. Our journalism is
free from commercial bias and not influenced by billionaire owners, politicians or
shareholders. No one edits our editor. No one steers our opinion. This is important as it
enables us to give a voice to those less heard, challenge the powerful and hold them to
account. It’s what makes us different to so many others in the media, at a time when factual,
honest reporting is critical.

Every contribution we receive from readers like you, big or small, goes directly into funding
our journalism. This support enables us to keep working as we do – but we must maintain
and build on it for every year to come. Support The Guardian from as little as €1 – and it
only takes a minute. Thank you.

Support The Guardian

Topics

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/19/labor-begins-election-defeat-postmortem-with-internal-blame-game Página 3 de 4
Labor begins election defeat postmortem with internal blame game | Australia news | The Guardian 19/5/19 11&17

Australian election 2019

Labor party
Australian politics
news

https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/may/19/labor-begins-election-defeat-postmortem-with-internal-blame-game Página 4 de 4