West's Rich Folk May Not Be Sick Of PM Yet

by Matt Price - The Australian

Remember as Mark Latham neared the apex of his popularity and John Howard was filmed crawling around a classroom floor reading to school kiddies.

The Prime Minister was mocked mercilessly for what struck many observers, me included, as an excruciatingly try-hard gesture. Latham had been getting plenty of mileage in his guise as narrator-in-chief, now here was the PM rather desperately following suit. Howard's clunky Dr Seuss routine occurred in Perth in February, 2004, at almost precisely this stage of the previous electoral cycle. As freshly installed Latham headed up the east coast on a heavily publicised bus tour, the PM flew west for a week.

Unsurprisingly, the new boy's campaign stole the headlines. Not long afterwards his approval rating peaked at 66 per cent and Latham lagged just a single percentage point behind Howard as preferred PM. It was at about this time I received a cautionary phone call a from West Australian Labor friend.

"Don't get overexcited about this Latham bloke," he counselled. "It mightn't have got much of a run over there, but you wouldn't believe the treatment Howard's been getting here in the west. Everywhere he goes they're hailing him like a hero."

I was moved to recall this sage advice as Howard flew west again, mischievously trailed by another young upstart. Kevin Rudd arrived in Perth as the preferred PM and departed with Howard tying himself in knots attempting not very convincingly to rationalise Tony Blair's withdrawal/retreat/reduction/whatever as something other than a political embarrassment.

During the corresponding week in 2004, Howard was also being pilloried for refusing to accept what was then obvious: there were no weapons of mass destruction to be found in Iraq. Latham was deriding Howard as being anchored in the past, mired in old politics and old ideas. Coalition MPs were reportedly nervous about the sudden and seismic shift in political fortunes and wondering whether the PM hadn't lost his touch. Sound familiar?

As Rudd's popularity balloons, the PM has been consoling colleagues (and himself) with the observation that while people may be taken with the new Opposition Leader, they're not viscerally turning against the Government. In the west, at least, this is patently true. Howard played to mainly handpicked audiences during his four day-trip - some of the evangelical chanting at a happy-clappy church was disconcerting - but the PM remains popular in Perth.

The overwhelmingly positive reaction proved an antidote to the cascade of ill tidings about sagging polls, prospective rate rises, fights with states over water, Iraq and the indignity of being stalked by Rudd.

"I don't want to get carried away with it," Howard said before departing. "I don't want to exaggerate it, but I have found the response on the ground here to be very positive."

Soon after his 2004 West Australian sojourn, Howard flew to Tasmania for another phony campaign jaunt. Latham was still flying, yet the PM received rock star attention in the Apple Isle. "They're not angry, they're not angry," he quipped to reporters tagging along. They weren't, either. At the subsequent election, Western Australia and Tasmania recorded the highest swings towards the Coalition, roughly double the national average.

The wealth explosion out west since 2004 is so palpable as to be frightening. Anybody owning a home is, on paper at least, several hundreds of thousands of dollars richer. Anybody without a job doesn't want to work. Porsche four-wheel-drives vie for parking spots around Cottesloe Beach and the Swan River is littered with hideously extravagant mini-ocean liners.

Small wonder Reserve Bank of Autralia Governor Glenn Stevens turned faintly feral this week when exposed to the Indian Ocean air. Were his authority restricted to the western third of the continent, Stevens wouldn't be merely cautioning about higher rates, he'd be jacking them up 4 or 5 per cent.

Beyond the fog of Newspoll euphoria, the mathematical challenge for Labor remains daunting. Rudd must win 16 seats; more if the ALP can't hold those it already owns.

That Rudd has vowed to fly west every six weeks has nothing to do with fondness for in-flight movies; two Labor seats, Cowan and Swan, hang on a few hundred votes.

Graham Edwards is the retiring member for Cowan: a legless, wheelchair-toting Vietnam veteran and the closest thing there is to a bullshit-free politician.

Only his high profile saved his electoral skin in 2004 and, with departure looming, Edwards sniffs hope for Labor.

"We're a long, long way out but I reckon some of the shine has come off Howard over here," he says. "It's one thing to be rich on paper, but the price of everything - groceries, education, petrol, child care - has skyrocketed since 2004. So many people don't feel wealthy, especially those who don't own a home, and they're starting to tire of Howard. Kevin's not very well known here, but he's made a good start and I don't think there's one bit of residual bad feeling about Kim Beazley's departure. We've got a good candidate - I was real worried last time but take it from me, we'll definitely hold Cowan."

David Johnston graduated to the Senate after a hellish apprenticeship running the Liberals' West Australian division. Johnston can't detect any anti-Howard backlash, thinks the Government could pick up seats in Perth and summed up Labor's challenge succinctly while introducing Howard at a campaign function. "It's only 12 or 15 years ago that parents wondered whether our children would be able to find work," Johnston said. "Now we're worried about them leaving school too early to head north for a high-paying job."

Last word to Geoff Gallop, who, as you can imagine, is rather chuffed to have left Brian Burke and his shonky operatives behind.

The former West Australian premier is in good health and presently living in non-booming Sydney; Gallop understands better than most both the nuances of the dual-paced economy and the challenge for Rudd.

"Kevin's made a very good start, and I reckon Labor can win federally," Gallop told me yesterday. "But gee, the economy is a hard nut to crack. Australians are very practical and conservative, just like Kevin. And I think with things like Iraq and industrial relations, Howard has begun to vacate the centre ground he owned, which gives Labor a chance.

"But then there's what I call the Sweaty Hands Syndrome. They might go off Howard on a whole lot of issues, but with the economy going so well, will people ultimately enter that polling booth and vote against him? That's the big challenge for Kevin."

Indeed it is, especially while voters remain relatively well off and not particularly angry.