By Bob McMullan

A version of this article was originally published by The West Australian.

I want to propose a new test that the Albanese government should apply to all its new policy proposals: the Hasluck test.

This test is based on the well-established, but often forgotten, concept that for reforms to have lasting impact the government needs to be sufficiently enduring to enable the reforms to become so embedded in the national psyche as to make them difficult to remove.

The test essentially says, what would the voters of Hasluck think about this proposal? Could we sell this proposal to those voters?

I have chosen the electorate of Hasluck in Western Australia because it has demography representative of the target group of voters I believe the government needs to give attention to. Also, its geographic location in the eastern suburbs of Perth would be a balancing focal point to the tendency for national policy to concentrate on the south-east corner and the inner-city suburbs.

The idea of the Hasluck test was generated following comments by the experienced and insightful member for MacArthur, Mike Freelander. Mike attributed the failure of the voice referendum at least in part to the failure to communicate the proposition to working people in electorates like his.

I was overseas for the last weeks of the referendum campaign and therefore can’t really comment on the merits of the campaign or Mike’s view about the referendum. However, his comments got me thinking about the implications of his statement for the next and subsequent elections.

We all find it too easy to live within a bubble of like-minded people. It is difficult but important to judge events and issues from a different mind-set. What decision makers need is a framework for considering the potential impact of policy proposals.

It is also true that all the major parties, Labor, Liberal, Nationals and the Greens, have a South East corner view of Australia, ignoring the different views in outer suburbs and in the West. The Liberals and Nationals have a sub-set of this with a peculiar dominance of Queensland in their parliamentary party and leadership. Historically, Labor has been Sydney focussed, with lesser focus on Melbourne and then the rest of NSW and Victoria and South Australia. The Greens are totally focussed on the inner -city seats and voters.

Despite PM Albanese’s consistent efforts to give attention to WA, this narrowing of focus to which all parties and governments are susceptible could become a point of political weakness over the next few years. In this term the uniquely unsuitable characteristics of Peter Dutton’s style of politics and expression will make a second term for the Prime Minister more likely. But it would be unwise to rely on this alone.

However, Anthony Albanese has always shown an admirable awareness of the need to plan beyond one term to achieve lasting change.

This is where the Hasluck test comes in.

Why do you need such a test? Good public policy stands on its own merits, which can be measured by cost-benefit analysis; social analysis; environmental consequences etc. But the political merits of public policy are important too if a government is to last a long time and achieve its long-term policy objectives,

Howard and Hawke both showed the benefit of an extended term of government. As a consequence, their reforms have become embedded and endured.

The demographic characteristics of Hasluck are very relevant to the type of voters Labor needs to focus on winning and retaining. Suburbs such as Midland are typical of the type of working-class areas which could become battleground regions at the next or subsequent elections.

Hasluck, on its current boundaries, has fewer professional workers than the national average and more trades workers.  It has fewer managers than the national average and more sales workers. It is not a poor district; family income is close to the average. The proportion of households with a mortgage is more than 50% compared to the WA average of about 40 and the national average of about 35% so it is very vulnerable to the impact of monetary policy.

No electorate can represent every target group at any election but demography and geography make Hasluck a good approximation of the sort of policy test-bed that the government needs.

I am aware that there will be a redistribution of boundaries in WA before the next election which may lead to significant changes to the boundaries of Hasluck.

This may change the details of the choice the government should apply. But it will not change the essential message.

The working people of the eastern suburbs of Perth should be the prism through which the political acceptability of policy proposals is tested.

Bob McMullan is a Visiting Fellow at the ANU Australian Studies Institute.