Quotes of the Day

The Australian Labor Party has less than a year to improve its general standing in the minds of voters. If he is to win office, leader Kim Beazley can't rely solely on the rises in home mortgage rates that would hurt borrowers and leave Prime Minister John Howard vulnerable. Nor should Beazley count on Australians giving Howard the kind of thump U.S. President George W. Bush received last week for his grim war in the Middle East. To fix its brand, as they say in the trade, Labor has to go beyond Iraq and I-rates. "We have spent too much time asking what's wrong with John Howard," says Lindsay Tanner, Labor's finance spokesman, of the party's lost decade. "Instead we should have been asking, What's wrong with Australia?—then building a sufficiently robust alternative."

Tanner is a central agent of Labor's policy renewal. But he's not as well known in the arena as those from the Molotov faction: incendiaries Kevin Rudd, Wayne Swan, Julia Gillard and Stephen Smith. Once described as the Shadow Minister for the Medium Term, Tanner likens himself to a ship's engineer: out of sight, always working, covered in grease. Part of his role in Labor's strategy group is to cost proposed election promises and find existing programs that can be cut. As well, Tanner and others have stripped out those parts of the a.l.p. platform that were closely identified with former leader Mark Latham (such as the deeply flawed funding model for schools and the health-care money pit known as Medicare Gold).

Labor has lacked spark and concord for most of the Howard years. Since Beazley regained the leadership last year, the parliamentary party has settled in behind him. Tanner says knocking off the incumbents will be difficult, particularly on the issue of economic management. "The bar is very high," he says of the obstacles. "We have to be seen as competent, coherent and unified—that we have a clear purpose." It's too early to tell how Labor will play the election, but Beazley and his colleagues have been road-testing their ripest ideas. In the hand-to-hand combat of daily news, and the endless campaign loop, Labor is gaining ground on industrial relations, climate change and volatile consumer issues (petrol prices). So far, Beazley has rolled out "blueprint" statements on issues such as early childhood, energy and skills; his colleagues have released a range of policy discussion papers. Like a burlesque performer, Beazley is trying to keep voters interested in the dance without revealing too much skin early in the show.

But if it hasn't yet been distilled into slogans, Labor's line of thought is out in the open. If you listen to Labor's leader, you might even start channeling him, so insistent are his claims. Does this sound familiar? Howard has lost touch with Middle Australia; he has squandered the nation's prosperity; after 10 long years, there's crumbling infrastructure, a skills crisis, the childcare shambles and extreme industrial relations laws. What does Beazley Labor stand for? Investing in the future; a fair reward for effort; building up the nation; a cleaner environment; regional security; Australian values. Howard would feel comfortable with that list—sometimes the two leaders stand behind the same white picket fence. Of course, it's the actual policies that have to pass muster, first with the professional scrutinizers and then with voters. The tighter the fit between the oratory and what Beazley puts on the table, the better chance Labor will have of securing its base and winning new voters in marginal seats.

Beazley makes a terrific 10-min. speech, whatever the occasion. But once he passes the 15-min. mark, it's even money that he'll flop. The more he warms to his subject, the less he seems aware of the audience; the old habits of a lecturer hobble him, especially on defense and military history. But there is a new side to the man. He's always been avuncular (which weakened him as a leader in some eyes). Now he's taking that image a step further by appearing more intimate and less self-conscious about addressing what politicians usually regard as softer issues. He's talking freely about family life, for example, about loneliness, stress, uncertainty and love. Beazley is having a Latham moment. One of the things Labor didn't scrub along with Latham is a determination to grapple with slippery "psych" terms like community and social relationships. This continuity has its roots in the writings and advocacy of Tanner, who shared many of Latham's insights and none of his deformities.

On Nov. 9, Beazley addressed the Brisbane Institute about the "time squeeze," which he declared was as stressful for families as paying the bills. "Coping with the collision between work and family time is one of the toughest parts of modern family life," he said. "Because a dollar lost can be recovered. But you can never get back a precious minute lost. It's gone forever." The "time famine"—a result of clogged roads, demanding employers, inadequate childcare services and slow Web connections—would "shape the politics of the future," he said. Not only did he have a plan to reduce these pressures, Beazley said, but when formulating policies, his Cabinet would consider their likely impact on families in terms of time as well as money. Opponents may call it a gimmick. But Labor says its evolving brand promises a fairer, safer, more caring future. Beazley may share Howard's nostalgia, but he'd like to convince Australians it's time to try the Labor version.

• Tom Dusevic
• Kim Beazley's kind, caring Labor Party