Political raggedness: Why both Labor and Angus Taylor are stumbling toward Christmas

This last was an extreme overreach, a bad habit Taylor seems to be developing (he calls this government both “socialist” and the “worst” in Australia’s history), leaving him nowhere to go when genuinely significant things happen.

It may also have worked better had Taylor not been dealing with his own raggedness. Last week, he announced the Coalition’s migration policy. It seemed broadly unloved and quickly attracted critics. It also raised two significant political issues.

The first was: why, when the interest rate hike had just landed with a thud, did Taylor choose to return almost immediately to One Nation territory? There is an answer of sorts: as I wrote two weeks back, Taylor has been focusing on culture war issues, presumably with the hope of moving on to the economy. Arguably, migration was the last of these. But it still seemed odd: finally, the politics were moving in his direction – and he zigzagged away.

The second was that the policy angered business so much. This is not automatically a problem for the Liberals the way it might once have been. When Peter Dutton tried to position the Coalition as separate from, even opposed to, the interests of big business, it sounded halfway plausible. This holds true when Andrew Hastie says it. But Taylor’s avowed strategy is all about the economy – and his image is tied to his own business acumen. All politicians are constrained by how the public sees them. With last week’s announcement, Taylor risked cutting against one of his personal strengths.

Now, presuming he can segue back onto the economy, the test arrives for Taylor. Can he prosecute the economic arguments? The conditions are immensely favourable – so how long will the Liberals give him?