Dear Mr Turnbull and Mr Shorten

Dear Messrs Turnbull and Shorten,

As much as you repeatedly say you are hearing the message the electorate is sending you, nothing changes.

We continue to see voters flock to minor parties and independent candidates.

To many of us, there is nothing about One Nation and The Greens that we find appealing. We are actually voting against the Liberal/National Parties and Labor and not for the others.

It would also be wrong to believe Labour is bleeding votes to The Greens and Liberal/National to One Nation.

In last weekends Queensland election, I know of many traditional LNP voters who voted Green and many rusted on ALP voters who voted One Nation. 

In one case, a 50 year ALP voter gave his vote to One Nation prefrencing in order, the independent, ALP and LNP.

I also know of a long term Liberal voter who voted Green, preferencing Independent, LNP and ALP in that order.

The vote is against you, not for the minor parties.

Mr Turnbull,

We welcomed your second ascendance to the Leadership with great optimism. We looked forward to a return to conviction based leadership and took comfort from your stand on Climate Change issues during your period as Opposition Leader. You had conviction.

I understand the desire for power however surely it must be far more satisfying to be true to yourself and your beliefs and achieve long term "power" based on substance.

It is difficult to believe you are truly committed to a policy setting that prolongs coal fired power generation. It is easy to believe this is a Right Wing compromise.

You have an interest in technology and an understanding of what it can do for us in the future. Take us there. 

As long as you continue to pander to the far right and the resulting neutral policy settings, you and your Party are doomed.  

Mr Shorten,

You are viewed as an opportunist, taking a popularist position to most things and a neutral position on others.

Sure, the banks have had some poor practices and people have suffered however compensation has or will be provided in most, if not all cases.

We, the voters have a poor opinion of banks, except for the bank we are with which is ok.

Banks are an easy target, but are also well regulated and we have the necessary legislation in place to prosecute poor behaviour. If you think we don’t, set a policy position outlining what you would change and what regulations you want to implement.

Your background suggests a passion for helping the cause of working people. Concentrate on this rather than corporate bashing.

Your acute understanding of industry from an employee viewpoint means you can best prosecute policy positions to prepare us for working class jobs of the future. 

I could go on and on, but I really have a few basic messages.

1.       Get back to conviction based politics and policy positioning and prosecute your beliefs.

2.       Be prepared to argue your case rather than simply criticise each other.

3.       Take a leaf out of your predecessors, Hawke, Keating, Howard, Costello. They believed in what they were doing and argued it accordingly. Like them or not, they displayed conviction.

4.       Ignore the short termism of social media banter. It is just that, short term

Finally, both of you and your front bench colleagues come across in the media as being indecisive and shifty. You all refuse to address the subject matter or if they do, it is in the negative.

For example, when asked a question about a position on a topic, answer it rather than saying, “we certainly do not have the position of the other".

In the meantime, we have no definitive policy position on most things and no clear alternative position of the opposition, at least on things that are important.

Alternatively

We will continue the trend of one term Governments or of Governments where the numbers in the second term are so tight, little gets achieved.

You both pander too easily to the extremes of your party. Stand up for what you believe in or hand over to the extremes, because they will stand up for their beliefs.

Alternatively, resign yourselves to the inevitable decline of your primary vote and cobbled together compromise coalitions, and coalitions where you may find yourself Leader of the Junior party.