Effective leaders are reassuring figures who do not leave you counting your fingers after you shake their hand. Explanations of how renewables are the cheapest form of energy should not leave you guessing which thimble has the pea, and how the trick was done. Or wondering if the whole show is a rickety Potemkin village of painted canvas, wire, and budget fraud. Or wondering if they actually said that the Australian national identity does not exist.

In the early BBC Dr Who programs, cheap castle wall scenery wobbled even as the Daleks came hunting for the hero. We need a hero.

Until recently, we noisily pretended that the Australian melting pot was fine. That people with different backgrounds worked, became prosperous, and left each other alone. Low-key national celebrations were enough. But we can no longer operate using traditional language and unsatisfactory political deals. They have lost the confidence of the people they are supposed to serve.

The federal government was reluctant to act even as obvious problems grew. A high degree of firmness about our national identity and intolerance of those who feel free to treat our values with contempt is not currently their signature policy.

Successive governments used our multi-ethnicity to undermine the national identity, instead of using it to unify the country through building awareness of the improvements Australia brought to the lives of all. That would be insulting.

This was a chronic mistake. A correction would be to severely limit usage of multiculturalism as a policy term and of multiple flags. New terms such as ‘co-operative or unified and multi-ethnic’ or ‘fraternal’ should be used to replace or in conjunction with older, tired language. New language is needed which signifies unity. It might place pressure on some to be actually co-operative.

In the same way that Australia used the term ‘British’ to lessen divisions between the English, Scots, Irish, Welsh, and others of our original colonist population. Divisions which continue today in the British Isles. And which one or two idiots continue here today.

It is easy to ventilate all manner of theoretical objections to ‘hate’, national identity, and Judeo-Christian values while having no practical idea what to do and quibbling about any attempts at suggesting an answer.

The Christian tradition is separate to the Judeo some will say. Or it is ‘privileged’, which is illegal. Official cultural quibbling Attorneys will take over. What do you mean by Judeo-Christian values? It is easier just to be negative, Australia’s dominant intellectual force.

Quibbling is a key practice in modern Australia. Perhaps it is Socratic, or mostly bloody-minded, the great Australian art of misrepresentation.

We are for example unable to describe and celebrate the Australian achievement of a first world democracy and economy. Although we were more direct in the past. A Grand National Banquet was held on July 17, 1856, to commemorate the start of self-government of NSW. Sir William Bland was chairman and said that the Australia Constitution Act 1850 ranked with, ‘…those splendid, those wise measures: the Emancipation Bill, the Abolition of Slavery, the Repeal of the Corn Laws, and the inauguration of Free Trade … the epic poetry of history.’ (Sweetman)

Our current leaders are unable to say anything similar. Parliament House Canberra does not provide a list of Australian achievements to demonstrate that our democracy works for ordinary people. Even though one or two states do. Surely our democracies, including early colonial democracies, did work for ordinary people…

Economic development, development of a social safety net, and peaceful evolution into a fully independent nation controlled by ‘the people’ – these are achievements which are obviously not present in much of the world.

But under our system of tolerance it may not be entirely uncontroversial to say that. Someone might be offended by our nation and its values and complain.

The lineage of our current ideas is a long one. Australian leaders learned the art of drawing appropriate lessons from the rubble of history.

Our earliest leaders were strong supporters of establishing Australian Parliaments, based on Britain’s Parliament and its long process of difficult development. Australian Parliamentary one man one vote innovations eventually overtook those of the Empire. The British Constitution was incorporated in the Australian Constitution, Edmund Barton said.

The Australian people have seen little reason to amend the resulting Constitution, with only eight amendments since 1901. The idea that we got the Constitution largely right is a new idea that more are now openly willing to admit. Parts of our 1850s State constitutions are still in force. Both are surely a sign of stability and insight on the part of our Founding Fathers.

Despite what anyone tells you, Christianity had an incalculable effect on the development of Europe and its colonial offshoots. ‘Love thy neighbour becomes in law, you must not injure your neighbour’ Lord Atkin said as he created the law of negligence (Donoghue v Stevenson). Sir William Blackstone said in his commentaries on the laws of England that, ‘The doctrines thus delivered … are to be found only in the holy scriptures…’

Equality of all souls before the law and God, an idea that developed in Europe had a Christian origin (‘we are all one in Jesus Christ’). And led to the idea of the dignity of man, which is central to international law.

And to our safety net and welfare, even to natural justice and the right of all to put a case before suffering legal consequences from the State, it is important in the way we address the needs of those who have fallen into gaps in our general prosperity.

The Peasants will shortly be given reassuring messages about how immigration is under control, and that the melting pot is working fine. Perhaps a few new screws and a bit of angle grinder are needed. Some will be suspicious and wonder under which thimble the pea has been placed. But they are doubting Thomasinas, and possibly un-Australian. Can we trust the wobbly Dr Who scenery? Sure can.

The Hon. Reg Hamilton, Adjunct Professor, School of Business and Law, Central Queensland University