If I had been present at the shadow cabinet meeting I would have argued that we support the Government. I wasn’t there and, by coincidence or not, a decision on this issue was taken. I had no alternative to going along with it, even though I felt uncomfortable.
Politically, it turned out that Peacock’s judgement on this issue was absolutely correct. His opposition to the assets test was a major reason why the opposition performed much better in the premature 1984 election than many expected. He developed a fine line of rhetoric, and it resonated with many older voters. It was a very good example of successfully applying the politics of consolidating one’s base of support, albeit in a different manner from what I was endeavouring to do with small business.
On 19 June 1984, Phillip Lynch died at the very early age of 50. Some time before, he had been diagnosed with stomach cancer. Lynch had been a hardworking servant of the Liberal Party, and had carried much of the grinding work of building the case of economic mismanagement against the Whitlam Government throughout 1975. We had been close as colleagues, and I felt for his wife, Leah, and their three sons. I called to see him at his home on the Mornington Peninsula only a few weeks before his death. He knew his fate, but was sustained by his strong Catholic beliefs. I admired his fortitude. He did not seek pity; rather he remained deeply engaged about the challenges then facing the Liberal Party.
The opposition languished in the opinion polls all through 1984. Six days before the election was called, the Morgan Poll in the Bulletin showed Hawke at 73 per cent against Peacock’s 15 per cent on the preferred prime minister rating. This probably encouraged Bob Hawke to call an election for December that year, only 20 months after his win in March 1983. He was to get a rude shock. He entered the election campaign with supreme confidence, believing that the Labor Party would win seats from the Coalition, particularly in Victoria. As a measure of his hubris, he programmed a 55-day campaign, which was ridiculously long, especially as the election was being held so soon after the change of government.
Before the election there was speculation, both amongst some colleagues and in the press, that if the Coalition performed badly, and many expected this, then I would replace Peacock as Leader of the Opposition. My own stocks within the party had been bolstered unexpectedly by a very successful parliamentary speech on race issues in August 1984. I effectively attacked a speech by Hayden, the Foreign Minister, in which he had clumsily attempted to smear people in the opposition as racist. I drew attention to the Labor Party’s long historic support for the White Australia policy and managed to capture the moment. For immediate impact, it was probably as good a speech as any I delivered during my 33 years in parliament.
The campaign for the December 1984 election turned into something of a tour de force for Andrew Peacock. Undaunted by his poll deficit, he hammered away very effectively on two issues: the assets test on the aged pension, and altered taxation arrangements for lump-sum superannuation payments.
For the first time in Australian political history there was a televised debate between the Prime Minister and the Leader of the Opposition. Peacock won the debate quite convincingly. As Hawke and others were to learn, the expectations of these debates are such that, as there is an assumed ascendency for the incumbent, a reasonably good performance by the Leader of the Opposition exceeds expectations, and he often ends up ‘winning’ the debate. That is not to take anything away from Andrew Peacock’s extremely polished performance. He put in more than a reasonably good performance; he outclassed Hawke with an engaging, direct style of presentation. Such was the impact of this debate on Bob Hawke that at the next election, in 1987, he refused to debate me as Opposition leader. An overly compliant media allowed him to get away with this piece of dismissive arrogance. Leaders’ debates returned in 1990 when Peacock was again against Hawke and have been a permanent fixture ever since.
At the election the Labor Party was returned with a reduced majority of only 16 seats. Peacock and the Liberal Party had performed beyond all expectations. There was a wide feeling within the party, and elsewhere, that we would be back in government at the following election. This result put paid to any idea of a leadership change, and both Peacock and I were unanimously re-elected to our respective positions at the post-election party meeting.
At the news conference following the party meeting, I gave an answer to the question, ‘Will you rule out a leadership challenge to Mr Peacock during the term of this parliament?', which was to be the source of intense irritation to Andrew Peacock and his close supporters. My response was, ‘I think somebody who has had the track record of loyalty that I’ve had for the cause of the Liberal Party is not really required to answer that question.’1
I took the position that no person could ever be expected to rule out a leadership challenge.
Peacock’s leadership had been consolidated by his election performance, and it was my expectation that he would lead the party to the next election. However, politics is always unpredictable, and I saw no reason why I should not, in an upfront fashion, keep my options open. I understood why my response irritated Peacock. In return, he should have accepted that it was a perfectly legitimate stance for me to take.
One other incident concerning the leadership of the party in those months is worth recounting. Andrew Peacock, Malcolm Fraser and I, with our wives, attended a function staged by the Victorian division of the Liberal Party in October 1984, just before the election, to mark the 40th anniversary of the party’s foundation. After the function, Malcolm, his wife, Tamie, Janette and I, together with Tom Austin, deputy leader of the Victorian Liberals, and his wife, Judith, adjourned to Austin’s hotel room for a drink. In the course of discussion Malcolm lambasted Peacock’s leadership, asserting that he had no policies, and said that the party was headed for ruin at the next election and that I had an obligation ‘to put my hand up'. Both Janette and I were rather taken aback at this outburst, and afterwards confided to each other that maybe Malcolm had in mind two leaders being knocked off for the price of one election. There had, for some time, been low-level chatter that perhaps Fraser might be recalled to lead the Liberal Party. It should be remembered that he had left the prime ministership at a very young age, 52. Hawke, in fact, was six months older than Fraser when he defeated him for the top job.
Whatever may have been the former Prime Minister’s motives, he left me with the unmistakable impression that I should seek the leadership, and quickly do so. I had no intention of doing this and made that clear to him. The very next morning Janette and I ran into him at the airport. Robin Gray, the Premier of Tasmania, was also there and we chatted inconsequentially. As Malcolm left to get his plane, he raised his arm and repeated the words ‘Put your arm up.’ According to the media, when asked about the whole incident, Fraser denied that it had taken place.
Some months later, after the election, Malcolm Fraser rang me and said that in light of changed circumstances, I should ignore the advice he had given me back in October 1984.
The changed circumstances to which Fraser referred were not only the unexpectedly good election outcome, but also the extraordinary way in which Bob Hawke had handled a national security issue involving the US Alliance. There had been an understanding between the Australian and US governments, concluded under the Fraser Government, whereby Australian facilities would be available to help monitor splash-down trials of the MX missile, then under production in the United States. As the time of the trials approached, this became a sensitive issue within the Labor Party because the missile would be capable of carrying a nuclear warhead.
The 1984 election had seen a surge in support for the Nuclear Disarmament Party (NDP), and Palm Sunday peace rallies had attracted large crowds. Hawke’s natural instincts were to honour the agreement with the Americans but, remarkably, he caved in to the left wing. Keating, to his credit, had commented before Hawke’s capitulation that the Government should not take any notice of ‘fifth-graders'. If he is to be believed, Graham Richardson is the person who finally persuaded Hawke to give in to the left. By chance I ran into Richardson in the lobby of the Imperial Hotel in Tokyo just after the decision had been announced. He was quite happy to confide in me that, having canvassed opinion within the parliamentary party, he had offered Hawke the advice to compromise with those who were nervous about being too close to the Americans.