Fear of change: Negative politics wins Australia election

Australia's conservative government held on to power at national elections thanks to a highly effective negative campaign warning voters against the centre-left Labour Party's large policy reform agenda, analysts said Sunday.

Labour led every opinion poll in the two years prior to Saturday's election but fell well short of a parliamentary majority after the vote, in a surprise result for the ruling Liberal-National coalition.

Analysts said opposition leader Bill Shorten's unpopularity with voters and his struggle to explain the party's complex tax policies were used by Prime Minister Scott Morrison to devastating effect.

Labour's failure also reflected a broader trend across Western societies of voter cynicism towards bold policy platforms, said Australian National University senior fellow Mark Kenny.

"I think we're in an age where it is very difficult to communicate big ideas and to sell imagery," Kenny told AFP, adding that right-wing populists around the world had been successful in invoking nostalgia and anxiety over the future to win elections.

"It's quite hard to run a change or proposed change and to inspire the imaginations of voters and hold that against a very spirited and surgical scare campaign."
"The regions in Queensland are desperate for economic and employment opportunities and (voters believed) that the coalition was better placed to secure those opportunities."