Is politics about to tip?

Last Saturday’s election results in the ACT and in the NSW by-elections together with federal polling suggest that Australian politics is approaching a tipping point.

“The Tipping Point” is the title of a 2000 book by Malcolm Gladwell. It is replete with examples of how a few small things can cause a critical mass to build up with large consequences. He returned to the theme in a book this year called “Revenge of the Tipping Point”.

His underlying theme is that, given the right conditions, an idea, trend, or social behaviour will take hold, a bit like a pandemic. 

The tipping point we have been approaching for at least a decade is the permanent demise of the system under which one of other of the major parties gets a majority (or close enough to it) of seats in parliament that – election over – the parliament becomes an irrelevant rubber stamp.

The coming change is more profound than an occasional minority government where the ruling party can safely rely on a couple of needed MPs to obtain a majority. Rather it will come when both major parties are way short of a majority and need two or more groups of MPs to get legislation through or, indeed, to stay in power or to take power.

Saturday’s ACT and NSW results exemplify the trend from both ends of the spectrum. (The Queensland result this Saturday, however, is likely to fit the old mould for some time yet.)

In the ACT, Labor got 34.5 percent of the vote and 40 percent of the seats. Similarly, the Liberals got 33.1 percent of the vote and (likely) 40 percent of the seats. Others got 32.4 percent of the vote and 20 percent of the seats.

Labor will govern because all five of the seats going to others went to Greens or progressive independents. Labor, Liberals, and Greens all lost votes – mainly to independents. It follows the trend in the ACT last federal election when the three main parties lost to progressive independents, particularly to now Senator David Pocock.

So Labor is not just competing with the Greens for the progressive vote, but also with well-organised progressive independents. That change appears to have coincided with the Greens behaving more and more like an uncompromising major political party.

At the other end of the spectrum, in NSW, the Liberal Party comprehensively lost Pittwater – a safe urban seat – to an independent of the “teal” variety. Again, it follows a trend last federal election. 

Identity is important here. The vast majority of people (80 to 90 percent) used to identify or think themselves as either a Labor or Coalition voter. Not any more. In the US, of course, the vast majority of people still do – to the extent that party identity remains more important than the character or quality of a candidate.

Interestingly, Gladwell’s work shows that tipping points often arrive according to his one-third rule. He cites women on corporate boards, as an example. One or two are token. But three or more on a board of 10 or so makes a profound cultural difference. Then women board members are seen as board members with certain skills, not as women board members.

In the ACT the raw vote split three ways. Federally, it is almost there. The critical mass of independents is building and not likely to reverse.

We will know when (or if) the tipping point arrives in federal politics when, after an election, it is not possible for a party leader to stitch up a confidence-and-supply deal with a couple of independents or a small party and toddle off to Government House to be asked to form a government.

Instead, the new or continuing Prime Minister will only be known after the first vote in the Parliament after an election. Remember that in 2010, Bob Katter refused to say who he would support, but Julia Gillard did not need his vote because she got guarantees from two other independents to give her a majority.

Imagine if, after the next election, half a dozen MPs take a position similar to Katter’s. It is becoming increasingly likely as the vote splits more evenly three ways and the major parties lose more seats.

Politics would change dramatically. Parliament and debate in it would become more important. There might be a bit of instability and a bit of settling in, but there would be no going back after a tipping point. Like a pandemic, after the initial shock, there is accommodation and living with the new state of affairs.

That accommodation will include a much greater role for Parliament. For decades, the major parties have presided over the increasing centralisation of power. Party membership became irrelevant; the partyroom became irrelevant; the ministry became less relevant as did the cabinet. The Prime Minister’s office is now the centre and almost sole source of policy and power.

Outside the centre of power new ideas and approaches are not welcome. Moreover, that tiny centre of power is easily suborned by well-placed and well-heeled interests, invariably acting against the interests of the broad mass of voters.

The disparity between voters’ wishes (as polled) and government policy forever grows with big-ticket items like tax, housing, and health to smaller matters like gambling advertising. 

Thus, to a large extent, the major parties will be the architects of their own loss of power.

Monocultures, such as our major political parties have become, are not very resilient. As in nature an organism needs a bit of genetic variation to survive.

The two major parties do not like changing their ways to becoming more receptive to open adult debate about new ideas and less driven by child-like fear of trivial media gotcha moments or being “wedged” by the other side. 

The way things are going, voters look like forcing some change upon them – if last Saturday’s vote is any guide.

Crispin Hull

This article first appeared in The Canberra Times and other Australian media on 22 October 2024.