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As psephologists gradually realise that a clairvoyant has more chance of predicting the Victorian election, there’s one direct benefit to the political uncertainty: the much mocked, disliked, analysed and confusing beast that is One Nation has improved the contest and given democracy a boost.
With all its faults, One Nation has challenged the complacency and arrogance that have defined modern politics, forcing the major parties to think beyond their massaged focus groups and actually listen to the electorate.
That’s healthy. The question now is whether Ben Carroll and Jess Wilson read the room, show the strength to defy what has become convention, attempt to engage with voters properly, and understand that authenticity is not political poison.
Over decades the major players have seen One Nation supporters as thick-headed bogans who want to deport all immigrants and whip graffiti vandals. That no longer stands up. Look at the polls and interstate results. This is a popular and growing movement, and there aren’t that many rednecks in the country.
The party has given genuine and decent disengaged voters hope that at last someone is listening. It may be false hope, but it’s working, and the major parties are starting to understand why.
One Nation can’t be entirely driving its own success. It lacks much. Pauline Hanson has been around for decades and achieved little. She is inarticulate and seems bereft of the depth and focus required for high office.
The party looks dysfunctional and any serious role in a minority government in Victoria would likely end in tears. If it holds the balance of power in the upper house, as seems probable, whoever is in government will be herding cats.
The party leader in Victoria, who says he is running for premier, is Warren Pickering. To date, a serious political role seems beyond him.
That’s without factoring in some nasty but long-past behaviour to which he has now admitted: drug use, drink-driving. (His sexual experimentation is another thing and has nothing to do with anybody else.)
However, his handling of that drama: “I’m not a politician, I’m a real person,” may yet skew positive. It snugly fits the One Nation narrative.
Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell, the party’s only member in the Victorian parliament, is a contrast. She seems decent and engaging, with friends on both sides. Animal rights activist Georgie Purcell is a mate. She trusts her enough to use her as a babysitter.
Apart from personnel challenges, the party has few detailed policies and gets routinely bad press as media fights to expose what some seem to think is an illegitimate threat to their political bubble. But with all these problems the party’s support has surged. Labor and Liberal in Victoria have for months been frightened by it. Now they are terrified.
That fear has led to a flurry of people-focused policies like a tougher approach to law and order, improving public transport, and various little bribes to ease cost-of-living pressure.
The opposition will try anything, that’s what oppositions do. But it’s unlikely the scales would have so dramatically fallen from the premier’s eyes if One Nation were not a threat on exactly these issues.
Now, in the weeks ahead, will the majors respond with more of the same contrived, artificial, empty politicking. Or do they get real?
Ben Carroll is a decent man, respected across politics. That rarely comes through. He speaks in artificial, four-word sentences, think actor Michael Caine.
Jess Wilson can be warm, engaging and even funny, with an impish look in her eye. But on duty she mostly seems robotic, earnest and cold.
Neither presents their real self to the voters – instead, the electorate mostly sees the pre-packaged, minder-driven “vote for me” strategy that has failed Victorians for years, alienated voters, and driven them to the One Nation “answer” because the party talks directly to them and sounds real.
That’s one reason the comments by magnificently disgruntled comedian Dave Hughes have become so powerful. Unlike the leaders, he’s authentic. People understand what he’s saying. And he nails the frustration.
The government was slow to act on crime, bail laws, cost-of-living pressures and corruption. But there’s stark evidence of the orange fear factor and its impact on one more simple issue: potholes.
I raised the issue of our crumbling roads more than four years ago, and the radio audience jumped on it. It’s a radio cliche to say callers “jammed the talkback lines”, but they did. They were angry. It touched real people.
The campaign was mocked as trivial, although former roads minister Luke Donnellan warned roads were the biggest issue facing the re-elected government. Rikkie-Lee Tyrrell raised potholes 50 times as a new MP.
Still, there were only rare bursts of action. Until now.
In July, the opposition pledged to fix one million potholes and boost the road maintenance budget.
Then, the premier announced last week that he would spend an extra $352 million fixing 500,000 potholes next year.
It’s a start but window dressing. An auditor-general’s report last week found the Department of Transport told the government it needs $3 billion every year to fix and maintain roads. Even with the new funding, Carroll is promising about half that.
And this is the problem as nailed by the auditor: “The overall condition of Victoria’s state roads is deteriorating. In 2024, around 48 per cent of the network was in poor or very poor condition, compared to 39 per cent in 2021.”
All these years, all these warnings and when the government finally reacts, it produces spin and soft figures.
How much pain and money could have been saved, how much danger and frustration avoided, if the government had acted properly four years ago?
The inaction on such a basic safety and economic issue was a failure of democracy: the media, politicians, the opposition all took too long to understand the significance of the potholes. The public did not.
Finally, the government heard the clamour, delivering too little too late.
But part of the reason the political machine eventually reacted was One Nation and its underlying threat: there is no longer any such thing as a safe seat.
Neil Mitchell hosts the podcast Mitchell Unlimited.
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Neil Mitchell is the former host of Mornings on 3AW and host of the podcast Mitchell Unlimited.From our partners
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