Grattan: Albanese could learn from Malinauskas’ masterclass in messaging

With social cohesion badly fraying, politicians desperately need to find the rhetoric to help glue our multiculturalism back together, writes Michelle Grattan.

With social cohesion badly fraying and One Nation’s surge reinforcing the threat it is under, politicians desperately need to find the rhetoric to help glue our multiculturalism back together.

Obviously it will take much more than words but, as is often said, words matter.

So does linking change with continuity, relating today’s Australia to the country of yesterday.

Also important is making the national symbols and values the instruments of unity, claiming them back from the culture warriors.

In his Saturday night victory speech, South Australian Premier Peter Malinauskas gave a masterclass in how to tackle the task. On Sunday, Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s comments on the subject were direct and blunt.

In a targeted response to One Nation, Malinauskas personalised diversity with a contemporary anecdote. He rooted the imperative for tolerance in the distant past by invoking an Australian literary icon. He brought a degree of subtlety that spoke to his ability as a communicator.

“I lined up today as I’ve done at each election, at the Woodville Gardens polling booth in my electorate. It’s home to one of the more diverse communities in our state,” the premier told the excited crowd at the Labor function.

“And I got chatting to the gentleman........

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