Tony Abbott’s proposed people’s vote on the carbon tax is either a shallow stunt, a cunning manoeuvre, or both.
The fact that he equivocated when asked if he too would observe the people’s verdict, as he is demanding of the PM, suggests it is firmly in the former camp. Which BTW, makes it a giant waste of money as well as being an exercise in unattenuated hypocrisy.
What else is there to conclude from his promise, restated yesterday, to rescind the carbon tax in office even if the people have backed it in?
Regardless, the stunt has already worked at its primary level and marks a new and dangerous phase in his escalating siege of Julia Gillard. Dangerous for her, but possibly for him as well.
Clearly the Opposition now gauges the government’s political embattlements to be so compromised that an escalation of artillery fire may bring them down. But a careful examination of the language coming from the Abbott forces tells another story too.
Strategically, Tony Abbott is already looking beyond the immediate to the medium term - to what happens if the current prime minister is replaced, because that too carries risks especially this far out from an election.
To illustrate this point, let me take you back about 13 or 14 months. Kevin Rudd was prime minister. It was an election year. He had been in a dominant poll position for a long time and although experiencing a post-Copenhagen existential crisis, was still a reasonable chance to win the election to be called at his discretion.
But Tony Abbott was unquestionably in the ascendency. His bedraggled forces had pulled in tight behind him in precisely the way they had refused to do for Malcolm Turnbull. Newly united, they were for the first time, daring to believe.
Yet behind their hardline dismissal of the prime minister as all press release, no program, senior Coalition figures were quietly worried about being too successful in their hatchet job on Rudd. They wanted him wounded but they also wanted him to lead Labor to the election.
Behind the scenes, some canvassed the big variable as they saw it: a late switch to Julia Gillard - at the time, the Parliament’s most competent and formidable performer. It might seem strange now, but this was their horror scenario.
The concern was that if Labor switched, the new PM would get a honeymoon, and she would have the licence afforded a new leader to axe the mining tax and pull the government into line.
As more evidence mounted, through public polling and their own private research, they increasingly believed they had Rudd’s measure and had watched with glee as he walked away from emissions trading, mangled his messages, and led his pathetically compliant team into the absurdity of the Resources Super Profits Tax.
The fact is, few pundits, this one included, took the likelihood of a change-over that late in the term seriously - a complacency that was not contested by the fact that the suggestion had emanated from the Liberal Party: they would say that wouldn’t they, and besides, what would Liberals know about the internal views the Labor Caucus? Nothing, right?
The answer to that was yes. And No.
Their fears, as it turned out, were well placed. Pundits didn’t pick it, but other politicians did.
Perhaps this is because Liberals did not need to possess a detailed knowledge of the ALP so much as to understand a more universal truth: how dynamic forces like power and ambition and survival determine behaviour within political parties.
In short, they knew the Gillard switch was a strong possibility because, as inconceivable as it seemed outwardly, it was precisely what they would have considered doing in similar circumstances.
Why is this relevant now? Because Liberals, from Tony Abbott down, are again considering the possibility of a Labor leadership switch.
The evidence is everywhere. Senior Coalition figures are already broadening their attack lines to spray the Government rather than the PM specifically. As one very senior MP told me yesterday, “we have stopped worrying about Julia and started campaigning against the Labor brand just in case someone else takes over’‘.
Others have openly said on the record that it would make no difference who was running the Government, the policies are at fault - which is code for, it might actually make a difference who they put in and we’re dead worried about it.
While again, it seems inconceivable that Labor could axe another sitting PM, and equally inconceivable that Labor MPs would return to Rudd after the previous disaster, it is telling that Liberals are again muttering about it as their chief fear.
While another change of PM would almost certainly backfire on Labor, resulting in the independents walking away, voters branding them a rabble, or even a Labor MP or two quitting if it re-installed Kevin Rudd, it is telling that the Liberals regard it is a live possibility.
And some fear it might even work if it was seen by voters as righting a wrong they had never understood or supported in the first place.
As remote or fanciful as it is, it is a risk Tony Abbott has thought about and would no doubt like to avoid.
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