Australian Politics and Public Policy-Free-Samples for Students

Question: Australia has had five prime ministers in the last ten years. What factors have contributed to this and what impact does it have on contemporary Australian politics and public policy? Answer: Australian politics has been quite unstable for some time now, at least in terms of its election of prime ministers. The Australian general elections take place after every three years, which is shorter than general election than most of the other democracies around the world. This creates a situation where the politicians and the political parties in Australia have to start vying for the next election and its preparation within just one or one and half year after one election. This is one of the source of political over activeness in Australian scenario which sometimes gives rise to chaos and crisis which in turn produces instability (Primeministers.naa.gov.au 2018). The Australian people elect their Member of Parliaments who then selects the Prime Minister. Therefore, the system is adopted from the Westminster system. In Australia there are mainly two political camps that dominate the political scenario of Australia, the Coalition of the Liberal Party of Australia and the National Party of Australia on one side and the Australian Labor Party on the other side. From 2007 onwards the Australian political scenario has become more unpredictable, the voting pattern of the people have changed, and there is unpredictability about whom they may vote for, with more number of people voting for smaller parties or independent nominees. The incidents of political dumping or back stabbing has increased in Australia, when a Prime Minister is removed from the office due to political rivalry even before he or she can complete her term as Prime Minister and go to the next vote. During the economic recession Australia was one of the country that was more or less unaffected by the economic slowdown, leading many economists to term it as economic miracle. Till 2007 Australia had only 4 Prime Ministers but post that time there have been 5 Prime Ministers in the country which according to many political thinkers reflect the unstable nature of contemporary politics in Australia. Kevin Michael Rudd was selected as the Prime Minister from 2007 to 2010 for 3 years, completing his full term for probably the last time as of yet in Australian politics. He is a member of the Australian Labor Party. In 2007 Labor party won the election by great margins, and Rudd was elected the Prime Minister of the new government. After coming to power one of the first thing done by Rudd was to apologize to the native Australians for their lost generation. Although some important steps were taken by the Rudds government in bringing some much needed changes in the country, however by 2010 his popularity came down by massive margins among Australians for several reasons including the Resource Super Profit Tax delay of the Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme. Within the labor party itself the leader ship of Rudd was questioned and his own deputy Julia Gillard announced a challenge to his Prime Minister-ship. Rudd himself resigned following the crisis and Gillard was elected as the Prime minister without opposition. She became the Prime Minister even before the general elections were held because Rudd stepped down from the position. However, in the next 2010 general elections, for the first time since 1940 a hung parliament was seen in Australia and Gillard could hardly come back to power and maintain her Prime Minister-ship with the help of one Green MP and three independent MPs. The Prime Ministerial stint of Gillard could not go on for a long time, and soon she again lost her position. This time Rudd took the opportunity of grabbing away power back to himself after a leadership spill again in 2013. Like the elections at United States of America in Australia as well there are Presidential debates in big news channels. In 2013 clearly the popularity of the Labor party was at its lowest, and there were clear indications that there was going to be a change in the course of political scenario in Australia. Rudd had challenged Gillard post the formation of the minority government by her, and Gillard was defeated in the leadership vote. Gillard had given her resignation soon, and after that she also took retirement from politics. Tony Abbott became the Prime Minister in 2013 after the victory of the Coalition win in Australian general elections. Therefore, this was the third change of Prime Minister in 6 years (Liddy et al. 2015). The swearing in ceremony that happened after the victory in 2013 had been criticized by some quarters for including only one 1 women in the ministerial council. There were many important initiatives taken by him in the very beginning of his Prime Ministerial stint. He had repealed the Carbon Tax on the very first day, and taken action to halt all illegal maritime activities. Apart from that he also introduced legislation to establish Royal Commission into trade union governance and corruption. One of his important initiatives was the repeal day in which more than 10000 red tape regulations were repealed. In 2015 Malcolm Turnbull, the then communication minister in the government challenged the Liberal party leadership, in a leadership spill (Westcott 2016). These inner party processes witness one member of the same party getting defeated from another member and the voting takes place among the members of the party members themselves. Malcolm Turnbull won the leadership challenge and Abbott was defeated. Abbott in the final speech did not mention much about how he would go about in his political career, however he mentioned that he would continue to be a parliamentarian. Since 2015, Malcolm Turnbull is the Prime Minister of Australia, and he is the leader of the Liberal Party as well. During the Abbott Government it was seen in consecutive opinion polls and many other public opinion surveys that the popularity of the Government was lowering. In such situation, Turnbull decided to challenge Abbott in the leadership spill, because according to him "was not capable of providing the economic leadership we need". He defeated Abbott and was soon sworn in. The general election of 2016 was approaching and Turnbull had shifted his focus to the elections, however in the opinion polls a close competition was predicted. The result of the election was very close, and the Turnbull government could hold its position by just one single seat. Therefore, the factors that have contributed to such frequent changes in the Australian Prime Ministers office can be understood by the above discussions. The impact of such frequent changes in Australian administrative structure is that it makes the policies to change frequently. The repeated changes in the administrative structure also results in many changes in policies and decisions, many old policies are scrapped off and new policies and plans are implemented. This gives rise to uncertainty in administrative decision making. Apart from that the changes result in loss of days as the process of the whole new councils of ministers taking over the office and settling takes considerable time. The Australian policy makers may give proper thought to such frequent elections, and how to make the government more stable and productive. Most of the democracies in the world have 4 or 5 years to complete their term at office, Australia may contemplate on democratic structures around the world References Australianpolitics.com., 2018.2013 And The Years Of Three Prime Ministers | AustralianPolitics.com. [online] Australianpolitics.com. Available at: https://australianpolitics.com/2013/12/20/the-years-of-the-prime-ministers.html [Accessed 8 Apr. 2018]. Liddy, M., praggon, B., Fahey, L., Elvery, S. and Gourlay, C., 2015.Tony Abbott's toppling is the 66th leadership change in 13 years: see them all. [online] ABC News. Available at: https://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-02-10/australia-political-leadership-rollercoaster/6080126 [Accessed 8 Apr. 2018]. Primeministers.naa.gov.au., 2018.Timeline - Australia's Prime Ministers. [online] Primeministers.naa.gov.au. Available at: https://primeministers.naa.gov.au/timeline/results.aspx [Accessed 8 Apr. 2018]. Sandhu, S.., 2015.Why is it so easy to get rid of the Australian Prime Minister?. [online] The Independent. Available at: https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/australasia/tony-abbott-removed-australia-has-had-five-prime-ministers-in-five-years-10500229.html [Accessed 8 Apr. 2018]. Westcott, B., 2016.Could Australia have its 6th PM in 6 years?. [online] CNN. Available at: https://edition.cnn.com/2016/06/28/asia/australia-election-2016-explainer/index.html [Accessed 8 Apr. 2018].