Is Barnaby the new Pauline Hanson?

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It wasn't exactly a surprise, but certainly wasn't welcome news for an embattled coalition.

Nationals MP Barnaby Joyce has confirmed he won't recontest his New England seat and has left the door open for a future tilt to, yes, one nation.

But while the turbulence in the opposition continues, in fact, it feels like it's just getting more turbulent.

The Prime Minister has touched down in Washington, D.C.

and it seems the conditions for the much delayed meeting with Donald Trump are somewhat smoother, I think.

Welcome to politics now.

Hi, I'm Patricia Carvallis.

Back to the podcasting chair, and I am wrapped to be here.

Feels very good.

Jacob, you are the one I want to talk to.

Indeed, welcome back, PK.

I can't detect an actual Greek tan, but I believe you've been to the center of the universe where everything began, of course.

Okay, this is the right thing to say.

There is like the nod to my people there.

Very smart of you.

Yes, the birthplace of democracy, as we like to say.

But also, can I add, this sort of

diss that my tan isn't up to scratch as you.

I just think frankly, I'm doing a better job here.

I've got more of a tan.

And that's just from mowing the lawn.

So Jacob has a tan and he's loving himself sick with his tan.

He reckons my tan isn't very good.

Just want to fact check you.

It's a fantastic tan and it's not healthy to tan, but I did wear a lot of sunscreen.

Either way, I have missed this pod and talking to you, Jacob, and I've watched Australian politics from afar because I can't help myself.

And back to the sort of main show,

Brett Worthington did an excellent job.

Thank you for all the work you've done, Brett.

But what I notice is that I'm not going to use a rude word, although I want to, but the problems in the coalition have intensified since I left.

Like, I left as the Jacinta Price story was coming to a sort of maybe a close, not quite closed, but after she essentially lost her role on the front bench, resigning.

But it's got worse since, hasn't it?

Yeah, well,

I don't know.

Were you around for the whole Andrew Hasty...

Missed it, but watched it intensely.

That was a sort of soap opera for about a week and a half.

And now, as you say, we're on to the Dramedy Joyce

to be called of this particular Dramedy Joyce.

I've been working on that one all weekend, okay?

So good, isn't it?

So good.

The thing about the Dramedy Joyce, okay, I'm just going to throw this to you.

We're going to get to the Donald Trump meeting in a moment because I think that's really important.

And tomorrow on the Tuesday edition, we're going to deep dive into what that meant.

It's a big deal.

But let's get back to the Barnaby shenanigans.

Why has he done this?

What's going on?

I do love to psychoanalyse Barnaby Joyce.

It's sort of been my professional habit for 20 years.

What's happening?

Is Barnaby okay?

I think it's a useful way to actually think about Barnaby, his motivations and why he does these things.

There is a bit of psychology involved.

He's been talking to One Nation for quite some time.

maybe even as long as 18 months.

He's frustrated with David Littleproud.

He makes no bones about that.

He's frustrated that the party and the coalition more generally quote unquote isn't putting its best people on the field there's too many people on the bench that's where he's coming from he's basically got sick of of where they're at and he's lit a fire here that leads him maybe into one nation and maybe into the senate and maybe he becomes leader of one nation we can talk about that pauline is part of a general thing that's happened with that side of politics quite a lot of those people are starting to get long in the tooth and they're looking for ways for their movements to continue.

And Barnaby would be in many ways, not all, a natural vehicle for that.

He hasn't burned all his bridges though, has he, PK?

He's not actually left the National Party, but he can come back and vote.

Unless they expel him, which I don't know that they would, because they're all saying, Little Proud saying he must stay.

We want him to stay.

He could come back and vote in a future leadership ballot, couldn't he?

He absolutely could.

So he still hasn't resigned.

How I see it is, this is Barnaby Joyce messing with the heads of the National leadership, but it has massive implications, though, particularly if you look at the rise of Nigel Farage in the UK, the sort of galvanising of the far right in mainstream politics.

The context is important too.

Barnaby Joyce has said lots of critical things about Pauline Hanson, that movement in the past, when it suits him, when he's been a bit more mainstream, when he has occupied the deputy leadership role overall of the party, of the coalition rather, and he's been in senior roles.

So

he plays it differently according to his power base and who he's appealing to in my view.

He can be a bit of a chameleon.

He likes to think he's a conviction politician and he can be, but he can also be very transactional when it suits him.

I think the other part of this is the history for the Nationals is interesting.

If you look at people, and I'm just showing my age, but I'm leaning into it these days, people like Ron Boswell, who, you know, very senior Queensland National Senator,

who made his entire career about campaigning against sort of the far-right nature of One Nation.

For Barnaby Joyce as a past leader to even be talking about going into One Nation is a big deal.

I think a lot of it is because he feels alienated from his party.

David Littleproud has been an issue.

They clearly hate each other.

If it's, I think it's fair to say.

I don't think that's mincing words.

There's no love between those two whatsoever.

And he's trying to mess with everyone's heads.

But it comes at a time when there's a broader shift to the right.

At the margins, I don't think this is like mainstream yet in Australia, but it is happening.

And so he's trying to get in on that action, right?

And there are some synergies.

And I only say synergies because it's not the same story, but with Andrew Hastie also dancing with some ideas of the right.

That's what we're seeing here, isn't it?

Yeah, and it is quite staggering that a twice-elected former leader of the National Party, the party that made him the deputy prime minister twice, would now countenance going to someone like One Nation.

The interesting thing about it is that the National Party's job in the coalition has been to keep those votes for the coalition and not let them slip to One Nation.

That's always been their traditional role.

And depending on who the leader was, it was stronger

or maybe sometimes it also relied on the Liberal leader.

For instance, John Howard was very effective in that way.

Scott Morrison was very effective in 2019 in making sure that that right vote didn't drift to one nation, kept it in the coalition, or at least made sure that the preferences came back to the coalition.

That fell apart at the last election.

And the question I think Barnaby is putting on the table, you said he's messing with their minds, he's putting a challenge down to David Littleproud, which is, do you really think you're the person who can quarantine the coalition against One Nation?

Will you be the person with Susan Lee, ironically, both of them come from regional Australia, yet here we are questioning whether they will be the people and the personalities to retain that One Nation.

Let's not call it direct One Nation vote, but the one that dances between the coalition and one nation, that swing voter.

That's what we're talking about here.

That's what Barnaby's hanging this lantern on.

He's suggesting these two leaders, Susan Lee and David Littleproud, are not the ones who can do that, hold the thing together like has happened in the past.

So you've seen this now a few times.

You've seen the sort of One Nation threat come up, but they've never cracked

the Holy Grail.

They've never got people into that lower house.

At a time when independents have been coming in in great numbers,

one nation hasn't been able to land this.

And the question here, I think, that Barnaby's putting is, maybe at the next election, that's about to change.

I don't know about you, but there is a drift to the right.

The right is very fractured.

If someone can wave the magical political wand and bring them all together again, maybe you do get seats in the lower house.

Look, it's not impossible, but we do have compulsory voting in this country.

And even with the increase, according to News Poll and other polls, of the One Nation vote, I reckon we need to be, and I know you'll agree with me on this because it's just like the bleeding obvious, we need to be very, very careful about looking at polling right now for One Nation and seeing it as...

Yeah, I mean, that's within margin of error stuff, isn't it?

Margin of error, but also

this point of the political cycle, right?

Like, seriously, guys, we are a long way off.

You know, in Australian terms, we have them very frequently, actually, but long way off from an election.

People are putting themselves in grumpy piles.

And I think there is some frustration towards the coalition.

And the coalition is also...

very confusing about the messages that they're sending.

They're not cohesive.

All of that sort of trouble probably does bolster the sort of right.

You would expect that one nation vote to go up.

How could it not?

How could it not?

The coalition had an argument about whether to even be a coalition and for, I don't know, three days or something they weren't.

And then they're back and you've had very prominent defections, people as they go out the door complaining about everything that's wrong with the coalition.

So yeah, you would expect that to go somewhere.

The one thing I think hasn't been talked enough about today before we get into the other issues, but I just want to put on the table and get your views on, is

what happens to David Littleproud now.

I think that bit is being missed a bit.

So everyone's so obsessed with the carnival of Barnaby, which we always are.

Think about how many stories we've covered with this man.

He really is sort of sideshow,

you know, Barnaby.

Look, Barnaby's great talent.

Barnaby has a unique way of expressing things.

What did we say?

Used to say the best retail politician.

He's also about himself.

Barnaby is about himself.

And I did an interview with him in a previous role at the end of the 2020.

It was during the 2022 election when the teals were just starting to emerge.

And there were a few independents taking on National Party seats as well and they were getting nervous about them.

He contemptuously called them letter writers.

He said, it's all good and well to have your own special independent in your seat, but at the end of the day, they don't hold the levers of power.

They can write a letter of protest and publish it in the paper or send it to the Prime Minister.

That's as far as it goes.

That's now what he's doing.

That's where he's headed.

If this is the end point, leadership one nation,

he will be one of the primary letter writers.

And that's such a change from a man who was once deputy prime minister, who was able to go in to ERC meetings and argue for hundreds of billions of dollars worth of infrastructure projects, for instance, the dams and roads that he likes to talk about.

You are right.

So it's a big shift.

I think David Littleproud's leadership is, though, very much.

I think it's on shaky ground.

It has been for a while, but this makes it harder and harder.

If you can't keep your people in the tent, that's clearly a problem.

So three people have now left.

We should point that out, PK.

Three people have now left under his watch.

Not a good record.

G,

Jacinta Nampajimpa Price,

and now Barnaby Joyce.

Potentially.

Although he hasn't resigned.

Because can I say the other thing about Barnaby, last comment, really need to talk about Donald Trump, but Barnaby, is that...

Sort of a normal politician would do this in sort of one go, right?

I've resigned.

I'm doing this.

That's it.

Like, it's not a one-day story, but you know, it has sort of a confinement.

Not

this guy.

This is

like smoke and mirrors.

This is just a yarn that will absolutely do people's heads in for weeks as he dances.

You know what he's doing here.

Well, he's not going to be a quote-unquote salami sliced in or out

as he has.

He might be a television host on sunrise.

I mean, you know.

I don't know what that means, PK.

I'm concerned about that.

That he's got tickets on himself, that he thinks he's about to get one of the best jobs in australian television i mean come on all right let's talk about the hotly anticipated meeting taking place in the early hours of tuesday morning our time so we'll be able to record a good episode with uh the lovely rap epstein tomorrow to talk about it but Anthony Albanese, after months and months and months and months of pestering by us, it's our job.

He hates it though.

When is the meeting?

When is the meeting?

The meeting is now happening, Jacob.

So what's this is like a high-stakes thing.

What does he need to achieve to kind of tick some boxes, stabilise the relationship, deal with the constant inquiries from annoying people like us?

I don't think this is quite as scary as it's been made out to be

for the Prime Minister.

I think he's got a good measure on Donald Trump.

He understands his motivations.

And I've written and talked about this before.

He's actually got quite a lot in common with Donald Trump, much more than you would think at first glance.

Now, obviously, they see the world differently.

They have very different views on climate change, on Palestinian state recognition.

Their whole style is very different.

But there's a lot of common ground here.

I can just give you one.

Donald Trump likes a winner.

Anthony Albanese is a winner.

Donald Trump might not know the ins and outs of our political system, but he'll know that 94 seats mean something.

Oh, yeah.

And

that will be told to him.

And he wants to be associated with that person.

Both of these leaders will be around, all things being equal, and for the next three years, so they know they've got to work on a relationship.

And then things like China, there's even common ground.

Donald Trump does not want a war with China.

He said he does not want a war.

A war will not happen over Taiwan on his watch.

Well,

the Prime Minister, our Prime Minister, is exactly on the same page there.

And then there's the areas where they can work together on.

Critical minerals, there'll be a lot of discussion about that, I'm sure, tomorrow in your show.

There's areas like movement, you know, immigration,

they have similar policies.

Oh.

We don't run around with ICE people, but we've got pretty hardline immigration policies.

We pretty much don't need to because we have this island that we can protect through turning people into the world.

It's official prison.

That's what we do.

Donald Trump would love that.

He loves that.

He loves that.

Anyway, the problem has been that there hasn't been a meeting, and that's very unusual.

So,

and I think that's just because Donald Trump caused so many other balls to be thrown in the air when he came in that we were, frankly, not that important to him.

And now that some of that dust has settled, he's come around to it.

We've finally got this meeting.

Let's see how it happens.

It could go completely off the rails.

There might be something that irritates him, and he goes after Albanese for it.

I suspect not.

But we'll find out in about...

No, when's it?

It's roughly 12 hours from now.

Yeah, as we record.

So anyways,

whenever you're listening to this, a lot of people listen Monday afternoon, evening.

It'll be done Tuesday morning, and we'll spend the day talking about it because it matters.

Look, the other thing that has to happen, and I suspect they're quite well-developed on nailing down, is AUKUS and some commitment from Trump that he's really into it.

Now, it's a funny victory if they get that victory, and I suspect they're probably going to get something like that.

But it's a funny victory because it's like, it's already the deal.

It's like all they want is a confirmation of an existing deal.

It's not a new thing, but it's so key given we're investing so much money and

emotional and intellectual and architecture into this project.

They do need something.

And so they need some words, I think, from Donald Trump around that.

And I still think AUKUS is in the US's best interests in this region.

So you would suspect that's likely.

Can I say if for some reason that doesn't happen, that will be a story because

having some commitment from the President that he's committed to trying to see this through will be important, I think.

I really do.

And what about, PK, what about the trade element to this?

Does our Prime Minister need to get some kind of concession on the tariffs?

We've been hit with the sort of a pretty soft version of these tariffs that others have had.

It's interesting, isn't it?

When this first came up several months ago, the Australian position was, well, we've got all these important critical minerals.

We need you to work with us.

And that sort of got knocked away.

The White House rejected that as an argument for us getting an exemption.

Now, China has flexed its muscle on last week, you know, limiting shipment of all of these critical minerals that are vital to American industry.

And here we are now, our Prime Minister meeting, when we can offer quite quite a bit of that.

Does that change?

Does he really need, does he now have an ability, do you think, to get a deal that maybe softens the tariff blow?

If he could get one, that would be huge for him.

And what if he doesn't?

I don't think he will.

And if I'm wrong, oh well.

Like,

I just, I don't want to hold back on this podcast out of fear.

But Jacob, you correct me if you're hearing more than I am.

I've only been back in the country a couple of days, but I've spoken to enough people to know that I don't think that's really something they're talking up.

And usually expectations are...

Is that a problem for the Prime Minister?

Because the opposition will say, well, Kiostama got a discounted tariff, if there is such a thing.

Can you have a discounted tariff anyway?

Kiestama's doing so well.

Sorry.

He's got a lot of people.

He's doing so well.

Come on.

Look, the opposition will say it.

Yeah, sure.

Whatever.

They say lots of things.

They're at sixes and sevens right now, so I don't know if anyone's listening to them.

I think the Prime Minister behind the scenes, with his

5,000 people working on this project, Project Trump, would love to get something that resembles a deal on tariffs.

My read is that there's nothing coming.

And we do have the lowest tariffs compared to lots of other countries.

That is a fact.

Yeah, and I think in aggregate, if you added up all the tariffs that we have on us now as a result of the Trump administration, The overall impact is kind of semi-moderate, modest.

It's not great for the individual companies involved, but it's the flow-on for the rest of the global economy.

Future tariffs, future tariffs is a bit of an issue.

Pharmaceuticals is huge, of course.

CSL, the impact on jobs here, that's a big, big one.

I don't know if they're going to get into all of that nitty-gritty, but that's something clearly Team Australia, if I can call it that so parochial, but is working on broadly because that is huge and will matter and that's sort of looming in the future, right?

And just one other thing, too.

I wonder whether the big movement to recognise the Palestinian state that

our Prime Minister was part of, alongside other Prime Ministers from Canada, from the UK and other countries like France, whether Trump acknowledges any of that in his meeting with our Prime Minister, because there is an argument here from Anthony Albanese that that was part of the momentum that forced Netanyahu's hand, with Trump doing the forcing, of course, that resulted in the deal that we had a week or so ago.

How much was that other process a factor in moving the dial?

Jacob, I don't think our Prime Minister will have any interest in raising the Middle East with Donald Trump, and he would be silly to, right?

They are on different planets on that issue broadly.

If, however, I will say this because I really feel like this is a good hot take for me.

If, however, Donald Trump goes into that territory, I don't know why he would.

I don't think that's necessarily going to happen, but let's say it.

I suspect we will hear our Prime Minister heap praise on him for getting the ceasefire deal.

Because, you know, it's good that there's a ceasefire, even if it's rather fragile at the moment, but let's park that.

I think that is universally a good thing, right?

So that gives him an entry to at least say something nice to the president.

And we all know, you know, everyone's written this column maybe 7,000 times each.

Trump is an egomaniac that likes compliments.

I'm sure the Prime Minister is coming in armed with compliments because that's just the way you have to work with this man.

I want to pivot just finally to Susan Lee, who is the opposition leader and I imagine not having the best time ever in her opposition role with the way the party has been going.

But Susan Lee, who is giving a big and significant speech to the Centre for Independent Studies, where she's talking about IR.

tax cuts, all of the red meat, all of the red meat for a right-leaning party.

It's easy to talk about it, but to do it.

Yeah, you'd have to characterise this as the back-to-the-bread and butter.

Basics.

Basics.

You know,

this is the meat and tooth veg of

what you would call moderate Liberal Party politics.

It is centre-right, but

this is how Lee wants to reclaim what the Liberal Party is all about, what it means

as a vehicle for lower taxes, as a vehicle for small business to have fewer industrial relations, red tape around their necks.

It's the vehicle for how she thinks she can reconnect with what used to be the Liberal Party's heartland.

It's not your hasty Barnaby Joyce red meat, get rid of net zero,

shut the borders.

It's not that kind of politics.

This is quintessential, moderate, conservative,

stick to your knitting.

It's the one thing the Liberal Party probably has a natural claim to.

We can argue about whether it's justified or not, but budget management and lower taxes tends to be their brand.

That was trashed badly at the last election, frankly.

They actually had a policy of higher taxes.

And

the Labour Party was able to make hay with that.

So she's trying to repair that damage, get back to the basics.

I don't know if it'll work, do you?

Look, I don't know if she can achieve that.

One speech does not make a sort of manifesto, does it?

Speeches are one thing, but being able to deliver in a way that not only gives people a sense of winning, obviously lower taxes, individually we feel like we're winning, but answering the question around budgets, sustainability, cuts in other areas, that's the hard stuff.

And that's not the bit she's explaining today.

So yeah, I can't.

Yeah, but it's one of those markers, isn't it?

Like she's laid, she's done one of these before.

She did one two weeks ago.

This is now moving it a little bit more.

But it's it's ultimately about reminding people, in her mind, what the Liberal Party should be about as a bit of a contrast to all the other stuff that we were talking about earlier in the in the pod.

Oh, you're absolutely right.

Look, I'm so happy to be back on the pod again, thanks to Brett Worthington, who has just aced it while I've been,

you know, living my best life, enjoying the world that is very big, Jacob.

As you know, the world is a big place.

Great to have you back, PK.

And I'd also say, Brett did a great job.

Yeah, it's good to have you back, PK.

Yeah, absolutely.

We need lots of people being literate in talking about politics to try and cut through because it's a messy world out there.

Now, I just have to...

sort of let everyone know about something.

Politics now in the party room live is coming up.

Yes, we are doing a show.

It's me and the formidable Fran Kelly and special guests.

We're going to be chewing the fat about a year in politics.

And let's be frank, it's been pretty wild, Jacob.

Like it's, it's, I can't believe it, but this was, this is election year still.

Like, we're at the end of it, but this was election year.

Is the next one soon?

What's going on?

Why are they all so active?

On the opposition benches, at least.

I'll talk about what's going on for the government, too.

Lots of fun at the Canberra Theatre in my spiritual heartland on the 2nd of December.

If you want to come, tickets have just gone live and the link is on the show notes.

Jump on, get a ticket if you can.

I'm mainly happy to be hanging out with Fran, I've got to say, because we live in different states and try and catch up as much as we can.

So, this is an excellent hangout for us in front of lots of people.

Tomorrow, Raph Epstein will help us mob up the Trump meeting.

I'm so glad to be back.

See you, Jacob.

Take care.