Politics with Michelle Grattan: South Australian election special

South Australians are heading to the ballot box on March 21. If polls are correct, Peter Malinauskas’s Labor government will win in a landslide.

Polling also indicates One Nation has pulled ahead of the Liberal Party in the state, making it the first test of whether One Nation’s recent surge in national polls can translate into votes – and seats.

To talk about how the campaign is going so far and to explain some distinct features of the South Australian system, we speak to four locals:

• Flinders University’s Associate Professor of Politics and Public Policy, Rob Manwaring
• former federal minister and incoming national Labor president, Kate Ellis
• Opposition Leader Ashton Hurn
• former Liberal Senator turned One Nation’s lead upper house candidate, Cory Bernardi.

A ‘once-in-a-generation premier’: Manwaring

Flinders University’s Rob Manwaring says Labor is not taking the election win for granted and was still “trying to pinch strategic moments”, like poaching the MotoGP from Victoria. Manwaring says the premier’s personal popularity has been a key to Labor’s success.

I just wouldn’t underestimate just the charisma and the political leadership of Peter Malinauskas. He has been described by others as a sort of once-in-a-generation style politician.

[…] Largely he’s been sort of quite untouchable [… although] the debacle over, for example, Adelaide Writers Week and the disinvitation to a particular writer and the fallout from that, that actually proved perhaps there was some overreach by the premier […] But politically, there’s no damage.

As for One Nation, Manwaring predicts the party could win one or two seats in the lower house and “at least two spots” in the upper house, based on current polling. But he says seats alone are not the only way to measure One Nation’s success at this election.

I think that One Nation nationally will be looking at South Australia as a test bed to say they are riding high nationally […] I think they will be looking at the South Australian campaign to see what’s working and what’s not. And it’s a striking development too, because One Nation has had so little […] history in South Australia.

Voters ‘flirting’ with One Nation should think again: Hurn

Ashton Hurn, who took over as Liberal leader with only around 100 days before the election, says she and her team “are working to ensure that everyone knows what we stand for”.

You just have to be focused on speaking with as many people as you possibly can. Something that I’m always mindful of is Winston Churchill. He said that a politician complaining about the media is like a sailor complaining about the sea, or thereabouts. And so I just try and focus on what I can control and that’s my movements on the ground, getting to businesses, getting to every corner of the state as much as I possibly can.

The opposition leader says that while “the polls are pointing in a certain direction […] it’s not over until it’s over”.

I’m focused on […] getting the important things right, like affordability in SA, the healthcare system, which, of course, was such a dominant issue at the last election that the premier went to the election urging people to vote like their life depends on it and now he barely mentions the ramping word. So just getting back to the basics, I feel that’s what people are wanting.

As for the challenge from the Liberals’ right flank from One Nation, Hurn says:

We’re dealing with One Nation in the same way that we would deal with all minor parties. And I say that not because I’m ignorant to what I see in the polls. But it’s one thing to be sending a message to the major parties. It’s another thing to vote for minor parties come election day.

So we’re really clear about what we stand for. We’re the only party that is interested in defeating the ALP. And I just encourage anyone who’s flirting with the idea of voting One Nation to give the Liberals another look.

Aiming for ‘a couple’ of upper house seats: Bernardi

Cory Bernardi, One Nation’s lead upper house candidate, says he and his team are “running to give a voice to a great many South Australians who think the major parties have left them behind”.

They think the Liberal and Labor parties are basically the same, they care more about themselves than they care about outcomes for the electorate, and we’re giving them a strong voice. But we’ve also got a solid policy backing behind us. We know what we want to do, we know what we want to influence.

Bernardi says One Nation’s priorities include opposing “all race-based legislation”, including repealing South Australia’s Voice to Parliament; abandoning “net zero”; and lowering the cost of living, such as by removing state government stamp duty from general insurance contracts.

Bernardi also defends recent comments One Nation leader Pauline Hanson made about no “good” Muslims. He says “I’m 100% supportive about her comments in respect to the cultural integration and immigration mix in this country”.

Bernardi says while “predictions are fraught with error”, he won’t be surprised if a likely Labor government can get their legislation through the next parliament. But he says “I’d like to think we might be able to get a couple [of seats] in the upper house”.

With so many in the race, expect complicated results: Ellis

Incoming national Labor president Kate Ellis says “a huge split in the right and a number of independents and a fracturing of the vote […] makes this a little more unpredictable than other elections”.

Asked about the SA premier’s pro-immigration stance, Ellis says Malinauskas hasn’t been “kowtowing to One Nation”, despite the party’s surging support in the polls.

He’s actually leading an intelligent conversation about the fact that we need immigration, our economy needs immigration. But also everyday families need immigration across a whole range of employment areas, where otherwise we just wouldn’t find the workers.

[…] The rise of One Nation here is really interesting, in that I’m seeing it in metropolitan areas where I see people that were once locked-in Liberal voters wearing One Nation t-shirts and caps when they’re at the local farmers market. Like it’s quite noticeable and quite new and different.

I think the thing we don’t know is we’ve seen the polls, but we also know that it’s going to be really complex here in terms of results. We have a huge number of candidates, I think it’s a record high, the number of candidates running in seats across the state. But we also have a number of independents and some quite strong independents. So we know that disillusioned voters may be looking elsewhere. But I don’t know where those votes are going to land in the end.