One of the reasons her call has not been taken up by others who are equally – but privately – dismayed,according to Liberal strategists,is that a byelection in Morrison’s electorate of Cook,in Sydney’s southern suburbs,could prove embarrassing and cause extra problems for Perrottet’s government in the coming state election.
Howard,always cautious and protective of the Liberal Party’s interests,has been the leading advocate for Morrison remaining in parliament to prevent a byelection.
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Cook has long been considered a conservative and safe Liberal seat.
Morrison won it in May by a margin of 12.5 per cent. However,this was down from his previous 19 per cent margin,and the swing against him at the election was double the NSW swing against Liberals of 3.2 per cent.
Indeed,Morrison’s personal unpopularity has been blamed in large part for the Coalition’s loss at the federal election. Some of the Liberal Party’s most “blue-ribbon” seats were taken by “teal” independents who pointedly campaigned for meaningful action on climate change,an integrity commission and better treatment of women – all considered Morrison’s vulnerable flanks.
The negative publicity that would accompany any further reduction in the Liberal hold on such a seat as Cook in the case of a byelection would be the last thing the Liberal Party needs,particularly in the lead-up to an attempt to retain the last mainland state Coalition government.
Morrison,anyway,has declared he has no intention of resigning in the near future.
This guarantees continuing pain for Dutton’s Coalition when parliament resumes on September 5.
TheGreens will move to send Morrison to the powerful privileges committee to be examined for possible contempt of parliament for failing to disclose to the House of Representatives his secret powers.
Should that occur,Morrison would likely face a censure motion. Censures against backbenchers are exceedingly rare,but in effect amount to ritual humiliation.
Liberal MPs would find themselves in the position of having to publicly defend their former leader.
Morrison’s main explanation for his extraordinary behaviour is that he needed extraordinary “reserve” powers to face down the COVID-19 pandemic that was threatening Australian lives and society.
For his party to now publicly abandon him on the floor of parliament would be tantamount to disavowing their policies during the pandemic emergency.
“He’s put us in a terrible spot,” one Liberal MP says,speaking on the condition of anonymity.
Rather than take a backward step himself,Morrison spent adesperate hour on Wednesday trying to persuade the gathered media and anyone prepared to follow the TV feed of his press conference that no one but he could possibly comprehend the pressures that persuaded him to secretly have himself granted separate responsibility for other ministers’ portfolios during 2020 and 2021.
“You’re standing on the shore after the fact,” he told sceptical journalists. “I was steering the ship in the middle of the tempest.”
His pleas for understanding fell on unsympathetic ears. Media commentary was almost universally disparaging.
Much of it declared Morrison’s explanations were either confused,contradictory or raised more questions than they answered.
He was accused of displaying a lack of trust in his cabinet colleagues to exercise their ministerial responsibilities,though he argued he had only once used what he called his “reserve emergency powers” to overrule a minister. His use of ministerial power to override then-resources minister Keith Pitt andveto a gas-drilling proposal off Sydney’s coast had nothing to do with the pandemic,he stressed.
Among the most cutting commentary came in a column by Amanda Vanstone,who served as a minister for all 11 years of the Howard government.
“Scott Morrison’s suggestion that he had himself sworn into a number of ministries because we were in a crisis doesn’t pass either the front bar of the pub or the tuckshop test,” she wrote inThe Canberra Times. She pointed out that in a crisis,a junior minister or any other minister could be appointed expeditiously.
“If you think you alone can save the day,your brain is in a bad space,” Vanstone wrote. “Some would call it delusional.”
Morrison’s own explanation for keeping his most senior ministers in the dark even as he inhabited their portfolios appeared to convince no one. He didn’t want to cause them anxiety,he suggested.
“I was concerned that these issues could have been misconstrued and misunderstood and undermine the confidence of ministers in the performance of their duties at that time,and I did not consider that to be in the country’s interest,” Morrison said,to accusations from journalists that he simply didn’t have the courage to tell his colleagues.
Morrison did,however,confide his extraordinary arrangements to two journalists from the very start,which is how the issue eventually made its way into the public forum.
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The journalists,Simon Benson and Geoff Chambers,ofThe Australian,were let into the secret by Morrison two years ago,about the time he had the governor-general assign him power over the health and finance portfolios.
Benson and Chambers were writing a book,which has now been released asPlagued,Two Years of Hell,and presents itself as the inside story of the machinations at the highest levels of government during the first two years of the pandemic.
That the two journalists kept their scoop about secret ministerial arrangements to themselves until the book was published after the election has excited much comment among other political journalists.
But to Morrison,who has made a career of marketing himself as a man for all seasons,it was a matter of telling his side of the story before it could be misconstrued.
“I have no commercial interest in[the book] whatsoever,but I co-operated with interviews that were done contemporaneously – contemporaneously because a lot of political books are written and a lot of things are written after the event where people fit events to the narrative they want to tell,” he said.
“That book was written based on interviews that were conducted at the time,in the middle of the tempest.”
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Meanwhile,Hurley,facing questions about why he had not required the arrangements to grant Morrison power over numerous portfolios be made public,took the highly unusual step of issuing a statement washing his hands of responsibility.
“The governor-general had no reason to believe that appointments would not be communicated,” Hurley’s statement said.
This,however,did not explain why Hurley had not comprehended that appointments were being kept secret when he assigned Morrison new roles a year after the first had not been made public.
The intrigue over Morrison’s penchant for secrecy,and its ramifications for Australia’s constitutional conventions,the exercise of democracy and the ability of a single politician to use the rules to hoard power,remains far from settled.
The tempest,Morrison might consider,will rage for some time yet.
Cut through the noise of federal politics with news,views and expert analysis from Jacqueline Maley. Subscribers can sign up toour weekly Inside Politics newsletter here.