EDITORIAL: Truth and trust at the heart of politics

There has been much reflection in Canberra in recent days about the way politics is conducted in this country.

The foundation for the pause in the usual mud-slinging on the national political stage has been the horrific attack on independent MP Helen Haines last week.

There have been many contributions across the political divide and calls to “turn the temperature down”, with blame being levelled at various times to areas such as social media, big tech, the mainstream media, and consideration of upgrading MPs’ security.

But the reflection has mostly stopped short of the contribution of the Albanese Government to the breakdown of standards which is eroding the democracy which has served us so well.

It took a contribution to the debate from outside Canberra to nail it.

Victoria’s Liberal Opposition Leader Jess Wilson, the frontrunner in that State’s looming election, put the focus on telling the truth and honouring promises.

Her views, published in a newspaper opinion piece, were centred on Victoria.

But they could well have been applied to the Albanese Government.

One of the key moments in the Federal Government’s slide in opinion polls was the last Budget, which broke promises that capital gains tax and negative gearing would not be touched.

That set the standard. At a new low. It torched the values upon which our system has long operated. Like trust, integrity, truth.

The premise that those who seek public office outline what they plan to do, and not do, if they win government — and that we should have faith in them to keep their word.

If that pact is lost, then the system is severely weakened. Perhaps irreparably so.

Ms Wilson wrote that “the greatest threat to public trust in our democracy is not the strength of our political disagreements, it is the growing belief that governments cannot be trusted to tell the truth”.

“People are increasingly frustrated by governments that promise one thing before an election and deliver another afterwards, that refuse to acknowledge mistakes and that treat legitimate questions as political attacks.

“Federal Labor’s broken promises on negative gearing and capital gains tax demonstrate how quickly trust can be squandered when governments abandon commitments made to voters.

“The answer is not another public relations campaign or a new set of political slogans. It is a fundamental change in the standards of government,” Ms Wilson wrote.

Good government meant “treating voters as adults, explaining difficult decisions and accepting responsibility when things go wrong”.

Voters were “entitled to expect honesty, integrity and a government that does what it says it will do”.

“Trust is not something politicians can demand. It is something governments must earn. It starts with telling the truth,” she wrote.

The message could not be clearer. The Albanese Government should take it to heart.

Its denials, spin and deflections are well past their use-by date.

Australians are awake to it all. The question is, does the Albanese Government still have the capacity to respond?

Or has it rusted itself on to what may otherwise be the seeds of its downfall.

Responsibility for this editorial comment is taken by Editor-in-Chief Christopher Dore