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AUSTRALIA

The PM's taste for old blood

  • 30 January 2015

Governments in trouble often reshuffle their ministry to introduce renewal and new blood. Sometimes they fall short and Tony Abbott’s reshuffle to begin 2015 is a case in point with one exception.

Sussan Ley, the new Health minister, is trying to cope with the shemozzle that she inherited from the Prime Minister and her predecessor, Peter Dutton. She cancelled the immediate implementation of the cut to the Medicare rebate and promised more consultation, while sticking to the general company line on reining in health costs.

Her performance has been nothing marvellous so far but her style is fresh and engaging; just what this federal government lacks.  It boasts a stack of experienced but boring ministers.

Ley, the member for Farrer, based in Albury, and formerly an air-traffic controller, farmer and public servant, may turn out to be one of the bright spots for the government this year. She is genuine new blood at the higher level and might even bring about some renewal in the government, at least in image.

This distinction between reshuffle, renewal and new blood is important.  Ley occupies her new position because of the Cabinet reshuffle in December, which also elevated Josh Frydenberg to Assistant Treasurer, replacing Arthur Sinodinos, tainted by political scandal at ICAC. Ley was Assistant Education Minister. The music stopped at Health for her because Scott Morrison moved to Social Services to replace Kevin Andrews who moved to Defence to replace David Johnston who was dropped from the ministry altogether. Dutton moved to Immigration.

It was not a serious effort at renewal. Abbott shuffled the existing deck of cards but didn’t introduce many new ones at the senior level. Even at the junior level there wasn’t much movement. Senator Simon Birmingham replaced Ley as the Assistant Education Minister. Brett Mason was dropped as a Parliamentary Secretary, apparently because of internal Queensland Liberal National Party politics rather than ability, leaving poor Johnston as the single casualty because of alleged poor performance. Clearly it was not a ministerial performance review or a serious effort to inject new blood into the Cabinet and the ministry.

This reshuffle moved some senior ministers from the portfolios they had spent fifteen months administering and getting to know. Most of them had also been shadow ministers in these portfolios while in Opposition. Andrews, for instance, had spent years getting to know the sector and thinking through what his approach to Social Services was going to be
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