Learning from our Federal Election Failure
Gordon Moyes
Christian Democratic Party Media Release
November 28, 2007
We must learn from the failure of the CDP in the last two Federal elections. Despite faithful workers on the polling booths, energetic and faithful visitation to communities and churches by our candidates, outstanding diligent work by our state director Phil, and the expenditure of a great deal of money given by faithful Christian, we made no dint in the electors mind.
Why? We need to discuss this with experts. But here are some ideas:
1. We have left our church base behind.
We have moved too far to the right in conservative terms. We have become an extremist group. Read my editorial: “DJ’s and Myers and the Federal Election.” to understand what has happened to the CDP.
We are appealing to a fundamentalist group that no longer exists. Read my editorial “The Death of Fundamentalism” to understand the issue.
Of course there are individual fundamentalists left promoting eighty year old views on the end times, using the 1611 King James translation, but they are no longer of any significance in Australian Christianity as a whole.
2. We have taken the totally wrong approach to the Muslim issue.
Banning Muslims immigration and closing Muslim schools is not the way to go about solving a social problem. We appear to be obscurantist and unthinking people as well as being unchristian. Christian leaders have almost without exception rejected us. Our own membership is telling us the same. See “Your Say” the only place where responses by members of the CDP are published without selection or censorship. This is what our members really think. Next week I will go into an analysis of what our response should be.
3. We have not changed leadership to a fresher, younger and more dynamic leadership team.
There is much concern about this among our membership, and our Executive will be discussion CDP Governance and Leadership issues at an all day session just prior to Christmas. Our founder, Rev Fred Nile, is 75 and has outlived most of his strongest supporters. No political party anywhere still has a leader of that age. Where they have fought to continue as with Rev Ian Paisley in Northern Ireland, they have eventually been removed by their members. For many people, John Howard at 68 was regarded as too old. Peter Costello knew that even if he led the Opposition for the next six years, he would then be 56 and he considers that too old to start being Prime Minister. Many of our members are writing saying we need fresher, new leadership. I have written and said a dozen times I will not accept any leadership as at 69 I am too old. At a convenient time I will vacate my seat in Parliament to allow a younger person enough time to prepare and get known for the next State election. We need a generational change to new leaders in their forties and fifties now. We have them. They should be our Parliamentarians, Chairpersons and committee leaders.
4. We have disregarded the facts about climate change that worry so many people at our head in the sand denial approach.
See my editorial “God and Climate Change”
There are several generations of Christian voters who will not touch the CDP while some of our leaders deny the facts. This should have been to the forefront of our policies. Denials have driven these Christians into the fold of the Greens. Even John Howard changed his tack on this issue.
The man who was at the side of John Howard in each of his four successful elections, but who left because he did not think John Howard should remain as leader, Arthur Sinodinos said this week: “The Party must be ruthlessly honest about the reasons for its loss. This is not a witch-hunt but a plea to focus on how to re-establish its connection with the electorate. Promoting a broadly based party that is focused on reclaiming the great centre of Australian politics is a prerequisite. There must be a focus on listening to the concerns of electors rather than engagement in factional jockeying. It does not mean junking our values. The challenge is how we apply those values to meet the changing concerns of Australians.”
Read those words again. That is exactly what we have been saying about the Christian Democratic Party for all of this year. We must be ruthlessly honest about the reasons for our losses instead of banning post election analysis or covering it with spin and gloss. This is not a witch-hunt but a plea to focus on reconnecting with our potential Christian supporters. We need a broad based Christian party to recapture the centre of the Christian concerns. We must listen to the concerns of the Christians for Australia instead of pushing minor factions. It does not mean junking our values but applying those values to the changing concerns of Australians.
Rev The Hon. Dr Gordon Moyes, A.C., M.L.C.
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