Opposition Leader Kim Beazley and the Labor Party were being reactive and minimalist in his frontbench shuffle. They did the minimum necessary to deal with several matters. They had to fill the position created by the resignation of Aboriginal affairs spokesman Daryl Melham. That was a rare frontbench resignation on a question of principle. Small wonder the Labor Party was taken by surprise and so not in a position to do a full-scale shuffle. Mr Melham resigned from the frontbench after his party voted in the Senate to approve Queensland’s native title legislation which he thought would reduce Aboriginal rights. Next the Labor Party had to get Carmen Lawrence back to the frontbench after an absence of three years. Mr Beazley said a year ago that Dr Lawrence should be back on the frontbench as soon as possible. That was immediately after Dr Lawrence was cleared by a jury in Western Australia of having perjured herself at the Royal Commission set up by the Western Australian Liberal Government into the Eason affair. In that 12 months Mr Beazley did nothing to restore Dr Lawrence. He did not want to increase his frontbench by one nor replace someone on it. Both of those possibilities would upset the delicate factional balance in the party and the former would be viewed unfavourably in the electorate which views any extra position (even if unpaid) as an unnecessary perk.
Initially, Mr Beazley seemed very fortunate that he could, albeit belatedly, restore Dr Lawrence to the frontbench fairly painlessly. Mr Melham’s unexpected resignation was an ideal opportunity. It created the space. Moreover, Mr Melham was from the left faction, the same faction as Dr Lawrence, so there would be no need for one of those elaborate Labor Party factional deals whereby some advantage now for one faction would be repaid with some concession later. Dr Lawrence could take Mr Melham’s place. It was too easy. Something had to go wrong, and it did. The left made a lot of noise, anonymously, that their nominee for the frontbench, Dr Lawrence, should not have to take the poisoned chalice of Aboriginal affairs. An anonymous Labor frontbencher was reported as saying that Aboriginal affairs was like being the toilet cleaner on the Titanic.
In their jockeying for the “”best” job, the left of the Labor Party painted the task of helping Australia’s most disadvantaged group as something to be avoided, as a career-wrecking task. They put career and advancement of one of their own before the national interest.
Mr Beazley had to react. First, he gave in to (two words) the left by not giving Dr Lawrence the Aboriginal affairs portfolio. Secondly, he counteracted the impression created by the left that Labor thinks Aboriginal affairs is a ghastly task, by elevating the portfolio to Cabinet level where it will remain if Labor wins government.
But this minimalist, reactive response is gives rise to a couple of questions. If a shuffle of a couple of portfolios was possible, why not go the whole way. The shuffle was the minimum possible to give Dr Lawrence a “”knowledge” portfolio. The industry portfolio was the only one not locked in. That it resulted in an ACT MP, Bob McMullan, getting Aboriginal affairs shows its weakness. The ACT is the jurisdiction with the least Aboriginal health, education and infrastructure difficulties. Mr McMullan has been given the sop of a cabinet-level job.
Mr Beazley should have taken the opportunity to re-ignite his team with more widespread changes. Given the failure of his roll-back the GST idea, Labor needs a spark.