Barnaby Joyce will address his dramatic defection from the Nationals and his new political partnership with Pauline Hanson in an Australian Story episode airing on Monday night.
Over a political career spanning more than 20 years, Mr Joyce became one of the National Party’s most recognisable figures and led the party three times. That all ended late last year, when he took New Englanders on a rollercoaster of quitting the party, then announcing his intention to quit politics, then announcing he was joining One Nation, then that he would run for the Senate.
It was a shocking turn of events that was taken very hard by the ‘Barney Army’ who had just campaigned to re-elected, as well as many ordinary New Englanders who had voted for him.
In the episode, Mr Joyce explains why he abandoned the party that shaped his political career and discusses whether his new political partnership can last.
His wife, Vikki Campion, also appears in the program, telling some of her personal story of the journey to be with Barnaby and life on the farm at Woolbrook, alongside former colleagues, friends and critics.
New England Times publisher and political pollster Raphaella Kathryn Crosby, who was interviewed for the episode, said she hoped it would provide some answers for voters struggling to understand Mr Joyce’s decision.
“In the 20 years that I have been studying New England politics, I don’t think I have ever seen this level of undecided voters,” Dr Crosby said.
“Some of the polls we have done since Barnaby’s defection have had higher undecided numbers than the Nationals and One Nation vote combined.”
“There are a lot of National Party supporters who are still grieving, still feel betrayed, and are unlikely to be wooed by either the Nationals or One Nation.”
That sense of betrayal is given a voice in the program by former Nationals senator John “Wacka” Williams, who has labelled Mr Joyce a “king rat” for deserting the party.
“Without the National Party, he’d still be an accountant out in St George, and to think he just ratted on us and betrayed us after all we’d done for him, I think it’s unforgivable,” Mr Williams told the ABC.
Dr Crosby said the anger was deep and could have significant consequences in New England at the next federal election.
“On paper, that would make it an ideal time for an independent, but they’d want to declare soon,” she said.
“The level of hurt among the most politically engaged New Englanders, who will influence other voters, is so great that it will take a long time to build trust.
She said New England voters had traditionally decided who to vote for based on the individual person rather than the party, and that the Nationals’ dominance of the seat was largely due to the absence of serious opposition, not brand loyalty.
“The same goes for the Nationals. They need to extract a finger and find a really amazing candidate, nominate them and give them a full year to get around this massive electorate and make themselves known – they cannot rely on the party label to get them across the line.”
The episode marks the second time Mr Joyce has been featured by Australian Story, coming two decades after a 2006 episode when he was a maverick Queensland senator.
Australian Story airs Monday, August 24, at 8pm on ABC TV and ABC iview.
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