As is generally the case during election campaigns in Australia, it would be rather generous to call this polished, well-managed, and tediously dull media event a 'debate' in any real sense of the word. In order for it to be truly persuasive, a debate requires engagement and a clash of ideas; it needs a sense of spontaneity, rather than carefully rehearsed speeches; it should provide a compelling vision of the future and an imperative for change; finally, it requires bold, innovative arguments, and analysis that moves beyond shallow, focus-group tested slogans and unsubstantiated assertions. For the most part, these were all lacking in Sunday's debate.
In the end, Julia Gillard emerged the winner of this debate, although the margin between the two leaders was narrow - perhaps narrower than many would have expected.
The first point to note is that this was not a debate won solely on manner; however, there were quite distinct differences. Both Gillard and Abbott have the capacity to be highly-effective speakers, yet neither politician really lived up to their potential in this instance. Both had moments of seemingly sincere warmth and engagement with the audience, whilst at other times, seemed able to do little more than mindlessly rattle-off meaningless buzzwords.
The difference in manner between the speakers became more obvious as the debate progressed - whilst Abbott's opening speech was quite effective, he has an unfortunate tendency to become overly defensive when faced with criticism, and at many times appeared rather visibly agitated, particularly when responding to attacks. Gillard, on the other hand, was able to remain calm and composed, and her rebuttal was generally clear, direct, and personable, if not always particularly responsive. Both speakers frequently avoided directly answering questions from the panel, choosing to instead repeat well-worn campaign messages.
Generally in a debate, one would expect an opening speech to outline a positive vision future for the future, to provide a strong imperative for change (or for the status quo - whatever the case may be), and to delineate the major areas of clash between the speaker and their opposition. Sadly, neither leader really offered any of these things.
Ms Gillard's opening speech was a shopping list of vague slogans and promises (a prosperous Australia, budget surplus by 2013, education, broadband, sustainability, renewable technology, people smugglers, etc.) with no elaboration on why the Government is able to achieve any of these things.
Mr. Abbott's speech was more effective, outlining favourable (i.e. non-controversial) policies he had worked on as a minister, and suggesting several areas of policy failure over the past three years that could be improved upon. Whilst his frequent description of the Government as 'hopeless' at times seemed overly negative and unjustified, his linking of that to the unceremonious removal of Rudd had resonance.
The opening speeches also reflected a broader problem with the debate as a whole: there was simply too little clash between the two speakers. One must ask the question: when the tow leaders appear to virtually agree on everything - from Afghanistan, to immigration, to workplace relations (even when their policies differ, the proposed outcomes seem to be the same) - what on earth can they actually debate?
When it came to the substantive arguments of the debate, both speakers were fairly effective (if still frustratingly vague and nonspecific) on certain issues, whilst appearing distinctly uncomfortable discussing others. Ms Gillard was unconvincing when explaining her policy for asylum seekers - a policy that she is unlikely to personally agree with (although her attempt to frame the policy in terms of compassion at least tried to provide a differentiation between herself and the Opposition) - and her proposal to seek citizen consensus for climate change is a painfully weak solution for what she herself admits is a potentially catastrophic problem.
On the other hand, whilst Mr. Abbott was able to compellingly sell his paid parental leave policy as a demonstration of his qualities as a leader, Gillard was able to fairly successfully to push him towards a discussion on Workchoices - an issue on which he still appears unable to speak unambiguously or convincingly.
In the end, Julia Gillard was able to establish the Government's economic credentials by linking them back to their handling of the recession, and demonstrate to some degree how the Opposition could not be trusted during this period of economic uncertainty. Her arguments relating to taxes and Workchoices were effective in undermining Abbott's trustworthiness on the economy, and even though her justification for the leadership challenge against Rudd seemed a little far-fetched for this cynical observer (was it really a 'service to the Australian people'?), it was probably the most effective way of handling an inevitably divisive issue.
Although Tony Abbott's opening speech attempted to paint an optimistic view of the future, his message gradually skewed heavily negative, with too much of his substantive material spent either criticising the Government, or lauding the achievements of the Howard years, whilst lacking the specificity that would have allowed him to effectively explain why an Abbott government could do better. When one considers the reasonably effective job Ms Gillard did of defending her government against these attacks, it becomes clear that the debate fell narrowly to her side.
Sadly, I think what this debate has shown us, more than anything else, is that for a country that has televised these debates for almost 30 years, we certainly have not yet mastered the format. One only needs to look at this year's debates between Brown, Cameron, and Clegg in the United Kingdom to see just how lacking ours are in relevance, vitality, and most importantly, entertainment. Let's face it, not only was the Masterchef grand final infinitely more engaging than this debate… I probably learnt more from it too.
Tom Sutherland,
Melbourne University Debating Society