Xeno-who?
BY ROGER HANNEY
South Australian federal Senator Nick Xenophon is an unknown quantity outside his home state but his profile has been greatly enhanced by his initial rejection of, then support for, Kevin Rudd’s $42B nation-building stimulus package.
Xenophon shares the balance of power in the Senate with five Greens and Family First’s Steve Fielding. As long as the Liberals and Nationals line up against the ALP, this block of seven votes is essential for passing legislation.
Like Fielding, Xenophon enjoys the odd attention-seeking political stunt ‘ such as announcing a ‘stick my neck out’ federal candidacy in front of the giraffe enclosure at Adelaide Zoo. Unlike Fielding, Xenophon was already a well-established and very popular state MP experienced in working the crossbenches before resigning to run for Federal Parliament.
Conversely, Fielding received only 920 primary votes in 2004 but was swept to power as part of the Labor Party’s ‘anybody but the Greens’ preferencing strategy. Such an outcome seems unlikely in 2010.
Elected on an anti-gambling/save the Murray-Darling platform, Xenophon has now distinguished himself as a smart politician. He has outsmarted Malcolm Turnbull and all senior Liberals by putting the Government over a barrel without appearing to do the same to ordinary Australians.
And he has, of course, outsmarted the Government by extracting $900 million of fast-tracked funds and up to $2 billion in additional medium-term support for the Murray-Darling Basin ‘ a river system that directly supports about 2 million appreciative citizens.
Xenophon has even, to a degree, outflanked the Greens. Voting down the Government’s package and the initial $400 million Murray-Darling sweetener was, ironically, a gamble. The outcome will arguably do more for the environment than cycleways and housing insulation can for at least the next decade.
He may also have created a climate where increasingly progressive and flexible policymaking displaces Kevin Rudd and Julia Gillard’s current adherence to established Labor ideology and the sway of powerbrokers.
