News Analysis
The recent federal election saw substantial swings to the centre-left Labor Party in electorates with major Chinese-Australian populations.
They include the Melbourne seats of Menzies, Aston, and Chisholm, Brisbane’s Moreton, as well as the Sydney seats of Bennelong, Reid, and Banks.
In the northern Sydney seat of Bennelong, which encompasses the suburbs of Chatswood and Eastwood—where 40 percent of residents are of Chinese heritage—Labor MP Jerome Laxale gained a 9.2 percent swing after preferences against Liberal Party candidate Scott Yung, who himself is of Chinese ancestry. About 90.9 percent of votes have been counted for that seat.
However, upon deeper examination, some candidates like the Liberal’s Keith Wolahan in Menzies actually saw their primary vote hold firm, which may be attributed to his strong Chinese social media presence.
Yet one conclusion propagated is that Chinese-Australian voters were concerned about the state of official ties between Canberra and Beijing, with the subtext that calling out the Chinese Communist Party (CCP) for its human rights abuses or military aggression could damage ties and as a result, cost votes.
It’s also a view shared by a 2022 Liberal Party internal review.
Liberals Stayed Quiet on Policies That Could Resonate With Chinese Voters
Some argue the results should be looked at more holistically.
“Many Chinese people—especially those who have already become citizens here—actually identify strongly with the values of Australia,” said Feng Chongyi, a China studies associate professor at the University of Technology Sydney, in an interview with The Epoch Times.
“But the [former] Liberal Party leader [Peter Dutton’s campaign] was too weak—he tried to please everyone, and didn’t actually offer a real alternative [to Labor].”
He said the Coalition’s entire election campaign was “very passive” and failed to champion a conservative agenda, such as freedom of speech and religion, smaller government, pro-business policies, pro-education, and opposing net zero.
Feng also pointed out that Dutton’s inability to discipline the party’s moderate faction damaged his campaign, meaning the Liberal Party did not promote the policies that normally resonate with Chinese-Asians.
In turn, this also allowed alternative messages to run free—on Chinese social media platforms like RedNote and WeChat—particularly when Liberal Senator Jane Hume’s comment about “Chinese spies“ handing out voting cards for Labor MPs took hold.
National Security Argument Not Prosecuted Hard Enough: Professor
The professor also said the Liberal Party did not emphasise the importance of Australia’s national security.
“The Liberal Party was supposed to show that if they came to power, they would prioritise national security and not profit from unjust means [through trading with the CCP],” said Feng.
“In fact, after so many years, the Australian public is already well aware of the Chinese communist regime’s malicious nature and the threat it poses to Australia.”
Feng was critical of the shift in tone from the opposition leader, who softened his hardline stance to appease Chinese-Australian voters
“The relationship with China will be much stronger than it is under the Albanese government,” Dutton said in January.
While both sides of politics used more restrained rhetoric when discussing China, the CCP had other ideas.
In March, three Chinese warships appeared with no prior notice along the east coast of Australia, conducted a weapons exercise in international waters between Australia and New Zealand, and circled much of Australia for two weeks, triggering national security concerns.
Others Say National Security May Not Have Been a Big Concern
Graham Young, executive director of the Australian Institute for Progress, said appeasement for the sake of votes had little value, noting that national security was not a major concern for voters this time.
“In this election, most voters were not attuned to the issue,” he told The Epoch Times in an email.
Rowan Callick, an expert associate at the National Security College of the Australian National University and an industry fellow at the Griffith Asia Institute, said there was not enough hard evidence to support the findings of a 2022 Liberal Party review that suggested Chinese voters did not like the former Morrison government’s tough stance on the CCP.
“Too much of this concern is anecdotal, and sometimes presumes that people of Chinese ethnicity are all or mostly from the PRC [People’s Republic of China],” he told The Epoch Times before the election.
Callick said that despite lacking empirical evidence, the party naturally connected the voting patterns in those electorates, with Australia-China ties, and had adopted a more “disciplined” approach to discussing the Chinese regime.
“One can understand, therefore, the current response. But this results in a distorted policy-making process on China relations.”
The Loyalty Factor
Chin Jin, a PhD in social sciences and the Australia-based global chair of the Federation for a Democratic China, believes old loyalties may have been a factor.
He said many older Chinese immigrants came after the 1989 Tiananmen Square Massacre and may have fled gratitude towards late Labor Prime Minister Bob Hawke, a similar dynamic plays out in Vietnamese communities.
Hawke approved 42,000 permanent residency visas for Chinese students in Australia at the time.
“I believe many within this group continue to be deeply appreciative of Bob Hawke and the Labor Party, and they certainly had an impact in this election,” Chin, a beneficiary of Hawke’s decision himself, told The Epoch Times.
Nothing to Fear With Standing Up to the CCP
Meanwhile, Feng referred to 2022 Lowy Institute research, which showed that the CCP’s trade war against Australia during COVID-19 failed.
Beijing imposed trade barriers across several Australian exports, including lobster and wine, in retaliation for what the CCP called Australia’s “misguided government policies”—including calling for an independent inquiry into the origins of COVID-19, and banning Huawei from its 5G network.
“The myth that Australia’s economy is dependent on the Chinese market has been debunked by facts. Australia’s exports as a whole rose during period of economic coercion by the CCP regime, partly because China depended on Australia for the supply of iron ore or metallurgical coal and partly because alternative markets could be found for Australia’s other goods,” Feng said.
“That’s why the Liberal absolutely should speak out and say: we don’t have to rely on the Chinese regime — they simply can’t be trusted. If you rely on them, they’ll use that dependence to blackmail you again.”
