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Surreal moments in a phoney election war

July 18, 2004
The Sun-Herald

On the eve of the Prime Minister's 65th birthday, Howard and Latham are battling it out on the hustings, Michelle Grattan writes.

John Howard is 65 on Monday week. He probably wishes he'd been born in January. He could do without a landmark birthday at this crucial point. The age of retirement for many Australians is for Howard the time at which he is seeking a renewed mandate.

At a rough guess, the birthday boy appears to have a 50-50 chance of celebrating at Kirribilli House turning 66 - which would give him the opportunity, before he turns 67, to hand over gracefully to Peter Costello. While partisans and commentators vary in predictions of whether Howard or Mark Latham will win this election, neither will go into the campaign as favourite and it's also quite possible that Howard's 66th birthday will be marked by a modest party at Wollstonecraft.

The Liberals are holding their collective breath as they watch their leader fight this epic struggle for the right to retire on his own terms.

Some moments on the road are unreal. At a Liberal dinner in Melbourne on Friday night, two men tussled in an extraordinary bidding match over a bottle of Grange Hermitage.

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The wine was worth only a few hundred dollars, even with John Howard's signature on the label. They were fighting over the right to donate to the Liberals. When the bidding slowed round $16,900, one leapt to $20,000. Then they jumped to $25,000. After bids of a few hundred more, an offer came of $30,000. In the end, the bottle was knocked down for $30,100.

Earlier in the night Karen Synon, a former senator who lost her position in bitter factional infighting between the Kroger-Costello and Kennett forces, gave an introduction to Howard the like of which hasn't been heard since Danna Vale (later rewarded with a ministry) declared in the 2001 campaign that Australia "needs a sound compass to steer by and a captain with the experience and the vision to chart the course of our nation".

Synon, who heads the Victorian Liberal women's organisation, gushed in introducing Howard: "You have singlehandedly transformed the Australian economy from an antiquated relic to a modern vibrant showpiece.

"Only you, sir, stand for continuing social progress and protect us from a return to the abyss. But being prime minister is not just about being competent and visionary . . . it's about providing a moral and values compass to our citizens.

"You, sir, provide that compass. In fact, you are our very own GPS [global positioning system]."

But, when it comes to navigation, what Howard and the Liberals need is a positioning system that predicts where Latham will land from week to week.

Snap: Latham, with his appointment of Kim Beazley as defence spokesman, defuses much of Labor's alliance problem. Snap, snap: he's there with the Labor premiers, promising that far from being scary - as Howard claims - wall-to-wall Labor governments would help solve problems in health and education.

The still-unofficial campaign, which saw both leaders in Melbourne for much of last week, is tactically faster than we've ever seen as they strive to match, outdo or counter each other's moves. One reason Howard's office is so secretive about his engagements is that if there's too much out there they fear Labor pre-emption.

Now that politicians and media are operating as if this is already the election campaign, Latham has acquired the advantage of being accorded as much media attention as Howard.

In the past week, each man has been developing his lines. Howard talked up a scare campaign around the risk of Labor governments coast to coast. Labor would "govern absolutely without let or hindrance . . . there would be no checks and balances". And in a flash we'd be right back to the bad old days of union domination of our industrial relations system, says Howard.

Latham didn't miss the opportunity, when Howard announced his mini reshuffle on Wednesday, to say that now Howard had clarified his ministers' future, what about his own? Labor was back to the theme that a vote for Howard was a vote for Costello. The Coalition expects a major onslaught on this theme in advertising.

The Liberals say Costello's doing better with the punters these days, that at last he's getting credit for running the economy well.

Costello himself has turned his religious bent to broader uses, and started preaching gospel (we should return to the Ten Commandments) as well as economics. It's his own brand of "values" politics.

He also claims to have learned the value of patience. "I guess as you get older you realise you can't do everything at once," he told an interviewer at the weekend.

"When you're young, you've got to do everything tomorrow. As you get older you realise you can do some things in a week's time, some things in a month's time, maybe some things in a year's time".

He's a clever man with words, that Costello, and the politics watchers won't miss the "maybe some things in a year's time".

Howard's critics say he looks old and that will count against him in the electorate. He's still fitter than many half his age, and he brings the stamina and concentration of the Olympic athlete to the political race.

At Friday's morning tea at Boronia, on Melbourne's outskirts, he worked the crowd methodically. All the surveys tell us politicians are unpopular, but out on the hustings, whether it be Howard or Latham, the faithful and people at community gatherings want to talk to them.

Latham's Beazley coup was a blow to Howard, but then the US Congress's "yes" to the Australia-US free trade agreement gave Howard a fresh card. The future of the agreement is now up to Labor in the Senate. Howard's Friday catch-cry became "call it for Australia, Mr Latham, and pass the US free trade agreement".

Assuming Howard does not announce the election before Parliament resumes, Latham is likely to "call it" for political safety and have Labor let the agreement through. Any other course would be foolhardy politics and short-sighted policy. It's true the party is deeply divided on the issue, but trade spokesman Stephen Conroy, foreign affairs spokesman Kevin Rudd and Beazley are all in favour of the FTA.

Howard's problem is that once the vote is taken and Labor supports it, the FTA issue loses most of the political value it had.

Meanwhile Costello, with his newfound patience, is waiting for the most crucial battle he will face in this campaign. Labor continues to hold back its tax policy, aware of both the opportunities and hazards that will present.

Costello will have the weight of the detailed demolition of that tax policy when it comes, and how well he does it will be crucial for both his and Howard's futures.