For a government whose reputation rests increasingly on building infrastructure – even as questions mount over billions cut from funding forhealth andeducation – it is difficult to imagine a more disruptive event than the war on Iran,which has seen that country close the shipping lane through which a significant chunk of the world’s oil and gas flows.
Predicting when the Iran conflict and its effects might end is a fool’s errand. But talk of “scallywags” aside,Allan and those considering a challenge to her leadership know that should rising prices for fuel and fertilisers result in majormark-ups on supermarket staples and even a change to the state’s already weak AA credit rating,the opposition’s message that Labor financial mismanagement is to blame will be amplified.
“Food production is heavily reliant on diesel,” dairy farmer Mark Billing told our regional editor,Benjamin Preiss. “Farmers and farm businesses can’t keep absorbing these costs without passing them on to consumers.”
In the past,questions over Allan’s position and pollinghave been muted by the absence of a functioning opposition. But she remains personally identified with many tainted portfolios,from theSuburban Rail Loop to theCommonwealth Games. Would her deputy Ben Carroll,from Labor’s Right faction,or current Transport Infrastructure Minister Gabrielle Williams,from the dominant Left,be able to gain some separation from those debates and credibly promise a reformed approach to the state’s finances?
These are the questions that Labor MPs in marginal seats across the state will be asking as the days to November count down. All of them know that “the show” is larger than any individual political leader.
David Hayward,RMIT emeritus professor of public policy,likened the current budget volatility to Victoria’s financial crisis of the early 1990s,with the state again facing high debt while interest rates rise to combat global inflation.
In those days,Joan Kirner succeeded John Cain after his three election victories. Then,as now,there was controversy over thepublic transport ticketing system. Could history be about to repeat itself?
It seems unlikely,not least because the major parties no longer enjoy a duopoly when it comes to voting intentions.
The pandemic created a disengagement from conventional politics,the effects of which are still being reckoned with. That new reality will be highly apparent at thisweekend’s poll in South Australia.
If Allan wants to keep her show on the road she will need to drastically improve her steering,and the conditions are only getting harder.
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