Although recently Tony Abbott appears
to have ‘toned down’ or ‘moderated’ many of his opinions, historically he is a
politician who has not been afraid of voicing his quite conservative attitudes
on various social issues (http://bit.ly/13DfISg). I think that in light of
these kinds of comments many people believe that it would impossible for a government
led by Tony Abbott to do something like legalise gay marriage, which is so
counter to the ‘conservative agenda’. However, I would like to suggest that the
idea that an Abbott-led Government could legalise gay marriage is not as
unlikely as it might first appear.
My argument rests on two points.
Firstly, I would like to suggest that if Abbott is forced to make a decision
between his values and his power (like Malcolm Turnbull was forced to over the
ETS); he is likely to choose power. Secondly, I propose that as a result of the
current (and projected) community and parliamentary opinion on this issue,
Abbott will be forced to make just such a decision.
My suggestion that if Tony is
forced to choose between his values and power, then he will choose power is
heavily influenced by the writings of the journalist David Marr. Marr wrote an
essay last year (and has recently released a book), which look at Tony Abbott’s
history (both political and personal) and provides some insight into what
‘makes the man tick’. One of the themes of Marr’s depiction of this history was
that whenever Abbott was faced with a choice where he was asked to choose
between his (conservative) values and his career (power), he tended to go with
his career. I don’t have time to do into too much of the examples here, but if
you want more evidence of this ‘trend’ I would encourage you to read Marr’s
essay, or book (http://bit.ly/ZPeWS2, http://bit.ly/ZPf18c). Having said that, one
prime example of this behaviour that I would like to pick out, is Abbott’s
behaviour in regards to the ‘WorkChoices’ policy which was pursued by the
Howard government. It has been suggested that Abbott argued strongly against
this policy in that party room, as it would appear that this policy went
against certain values which he held dear (http://bit.ly/ZPj9Ff). However, despite
Abbott appearing to disagree with the policy on principle, once the Howard
government adopted it as policy, Abbott put those values aside and staunchly
defended it (against those who he essentially ‘agreed’) (http://bit.ly/ZPjpEv).
I think that this (along with other examples of similar behaviour) shows that
when placed in this kind of position, Abbott will ‘abandon’ his values in
favour of attaining (or retaining) political power. Therefore, on this basis I
would like to suggest that if Abbott was forced into a position where he felt
that his political power would take a significant hit, by continuing his current
strong stance against gay marriage, then he would be willing to revise his
position. I’m not suggesting that Abbott would become a rainbow warrior, just
that he might move to allow his party a conscience vote on the issue (as the
party has done on similar issues in the past).
Having hopefully convinced you
that given the right circumstances Abbott would change his current stance on
this issue, I would now like to argue that Abbott is likely to be placed in just
such a set of circumstances in the ‘near’ future. As I mentioned earlier, I
feel that the push to legalise gay marriage has gained a lot of momentum
(nationally and internationally) recently. I think this movement has been made
particularly salient in Australia by the recent decision in New Zealand to move
over to the more colourful side of the divide. Some people in Australia (and
perhaps also in New Zealand) may have been quite surprised by this result, due
to that fact that it is a ‘conservative’ government in-power over there at the
moment. However, I think that in order to understand how this came to pass, it
is important to remember that ‘conservative’ political parties (like many political
parties) are quite a ‘broad church’ including people who hold a variety of
different ideologies (with some of them being quite ‘non-conservative’). In the
case of the Australian Liberal party, in regards to social issues much of the party
is in the conservative/traditional ideology camp, however, there is a
significant portion that would be more accurately identified as having a
‘libertarian’ ideology on these kinds of social issues. Those who are in the
conservative camp would obviously be against the legalising of gay marriage. On
the other hand, the libertarian ideology would encourage quite a different
conclusion, due to the emphasis it places on encouraging individual freedoms (http://bit.ly/ZPgT0W).
A natural result of this ideological split in
the party is that when it comes to an issue like gay marriage, it would be expected
that there would be a significant level of disagreement within the party over
how they should vote. And this analysis does appear to be supported by the fact
that a number of high profile (moderate/libertarian) Liberal Party MPs like
Malcolm Turnbull (http://bit.ly/ZPhkZ9) and
Barry O’ Farrell (http://bit.ly/ZPhrnl) have
‘come out’ in support of gay marriage. Historically, the Liberal party has
dealt with these kinds of ideological divides by invoking a ‘conscience vote’,
which allows its members to vote in the direction they want (rather than ‘toeing
the party line’). Abbott has so far resisted calls to allow a conscience vote
on this issue. This resistance is presumably motivated by his conservative
values, and a belief that if MPs are allowed to vote according to their
consciences, such a bill has a reasonable chance of success. Now, Abbott may
currently be able to justify the party’s stance by suggesting that they need to
hold to the position they presented at the last election (http://bit.ly/ZPi8gD).
However, if over the next couple of years the current trend continues and
support for legalising gay marriage continues to gain support in the community
and the parliament, then I think it likely that Abbott will find himself at a
familiar cross-road of having to choose between his values, and his political
power.
And I’m hoping that Abbott’s
unwillingness to commit to extending the party’s current position beyond the
next election (http://bit.ly/ZPi8gD), is a sign that old habits die hard.
