Journalism students at the University of Canberra are expected to follow the news, so we have current-affairs tests.
They are nothing too strenuous and we even have a fail safe against impossible questions in some classes, so that if no-one in a class gets a question right, the whole class gets a point for that question.
Well, this week, six months out from an ACT election, the Liberal Opposition launched a television advertising campaign. Though the party was hardly mentioned, the campaign was aimed at presenting its relatively new and youthful leader to the public.
So I thought, it would be perfectly reasonable to ask, Who is the Leader of the ACT Liberal Opposition? Only one student out of 54 (in three tutorial groups) got it right, and even then misspelt his name. Another wrote: “Zed someone or other”.
So Zed Seselja is not very well known, even among those who should know.
The Liberals have a big task ahead, and it is made more difficult than in the other state-level jurisdictions because of some of the unique characteristics of Canberra.
One of those characteristics is not, I hasten to add, that Canberra is a dyed-in-the-wool Labor town, so the Libs do not have a hope anyway.
In fact, Canberra voters are similar to other voters in that their material well-being is a strong factor in their voting patterns. It just so happens that this is a government town, and, rightly or wrongly, people believe that Federal Labor is big on federal administration which is the key industry of the town. The townsfolk, in Federal elections, do what other townsfolk do – vote for the party that will best support their most important industry.
At state level, the Labor tendency is weaker, and the hip pocket nerve – sensitive to rates and so on – is just a strong. This is evidenced by the fact that the Legislative Assembly and pre-self-government Assemblies only once had a Labor majority: the 2004-2008 Stanhope Government.
No, the Libs face other difficulties. Media is foremost. On the paid advertising side, the cost is not really the difficulty.
Indeed, Canberra media is relatively cheap, especially television. The TV stations take their feeds from the networks which had ad gaps designed for the huge Sydney and Melbourne markets. The local stations often struggle to fill the space.
Rather, the big problem in Canberra is the commercial TV stations have fewer eyes watching than elsewhere. The ABC is stronger here. And that is true in radio, too. Also, non-television-viewing is higher here because we are high consumers of cultural and community events. Further, pay TV is higher here because we have Transact and we have higher incomes which enable us to afford it.
In short, paid ads on free-to-air television will not do the trick.
The Libs will have to marshal free media time and space in the news space. They did it in the past with Kate Carnell. It takes a lot of hard work, imagination and personality. Tragically in Australia, these things are more important in politics than soundness of policy.
Worse for the Libs, these days it is much harder than in the mid-1990s, because ACT Labor has far stronger media skills now than it has ever had.
Labor is now easily corralling the dozen media outlets into one or two positive media events every day. Ministers take the good news announcements and senior bureaucrats are left to explain the bad news announcements. On bad-news days, air time is easily burned away with non-answers.
Worse for the Libs, Stanhope has not been accident or disaster-prone, even if some of his Ministers have. Stanhope has weathered the bushfire storm. And his government has not been touched by incompetence or lack of integrity in the way that, say, NSW or Tasmanian Labor has.
The Libs, as elsewhere, face policy fractures which have turned into factional and personality mayhem. Since losing to Stanhope, the Libs have spent far too much time and effort worrying about far-right social agenda items – gays and right-to-life and so on – and not enough time on economics.
The result has been a disenchanted and frustrated business community despairing of ever having effective opposition to Labor — so much so that many have withdrawn their chequebooks and diverted support to business independents.
Labor will laugh all the way to the poll.
The Libs are also up against voter apathy. Tragically, in Canberra, it is almost a badge of intellectual honour to deny any interest at all in local politics – and then bemoan anything that goes wrong, like poor water management, foolish one-lane freeways to Gungahlin and so on.
Also, the high proportion of public-sector employees, makes for fewer people in active politics. Ironically, activity in local politics is not a good career move in this town of politics. It makes it hard because Oppositions need people on the ground and solid party-organisation support to win.
Despite accepted wisdom, Governments do not lose elections; Oppositions have to win them.
The electoral system will help the Libs, up to a point. It will save them from the utter annihilation that a single-member system would otherwise deliver.
It is not that Labor is brilliant, to the contrary. It has two performers: the leader and deputy. And they are master carpenters. They are a veneer of talent that turns what would otherwise be a chipboard kitchen into something that can sit proudly and solidly in the equivalent of an electoral display home.
In October, aside from the Ministers, the average voter will be met with slates of instantly unrecognisable (SUBS: yes, unrecognisable) candidates, so they will flick their pencils down the Labor column.
Six months out may be a bit early, but people should not be asking whether Stanhope Labor might lose its majority because it has been in government a long time and some well-heeled business push can grab a seat or so in each electorate.
No, people should now be thinking that it is more likely that Stanhope Labor will increase its majority than lose it.
Unfortunately, there is little reliable polling the ACT. Further, the Hare-Clark system does not provide a readable pendulum. But the way both sides are going, three, three and four Labor MLAs in the three electorates (an increase of one) is quite on the cards.