This is slightly wrong. Just about everything the Government does has to pass both houses, so in a way minority government is the norm for Australia because its quite rare that a sitting government gets an outright majority in both houses.
In this cases it looks like its going to be the same, majority in lower house, minority in upper house.
The thing that undermines the bargaining power of a crossbench is when the two majors team up to pass legislation, which happens often enough. Afterall we don’t want an opposition that simply opposes everything because they’re the opposition.
So the crossbench, i think in this case the key players will be the Greens, have to have a strategy but be able to change their tactics as the Parliament progresses. Their failure to not get a deal from Labor last year on housing, and subsequent inability to find a path to back down for so long, and also the lib-lab team up on electoral and funding reform early this year, showws me they haven’t mastered parliamentary tactics yet.
Viewing it from the Party of Governments perspective, i think, is easier. Its not a cross-bench they’re dealing with, its two or more paths to passing legislation thpugh both houses.
Since Labor is in power, they have the option to attempt legislation with Liberal support, or Greens support. This is where the Greens need to step up, Labor will go with the Liberals if they’re the easier party to deal with on legislation, Greens should aim to be the Partner of choice for the Government this term, this can keep legislation primarily on the progressive side of the ledger.
prex@aussie.zone 21 hours ago
The optimist in me says that they have no excuses now: They have to perfom.
notgold@aussie.zone 19 hours ago
Agreed. Labor has been given the stage now, they better put on a performance.