The Victorian Election was lost for one simple reason: the Coalition has failed to live up to its promises of small government. No matter how much people try to blame the unpopularity of Tony Abbott, the simple fact is the election was lost on the inability of Denis Napthine to deliver an economically sound agenda for Victoria.

There should be no excuses: the Coalition ruled with an absolute majority from 2010 to 2013. Yet as a result of its unwillingness to implement economic reforms, it has overseen a period lacklustre economic growth, lower than that of the Labor-Bracks and Liberal-Kennett eras. In some respects, it even went backwards—and Victorians have suffered for it. The Victorian “Liberal” government has been behind in the polls long before Tony Abbott ever came to power – and their refusal to enact economic reform has been the sole cause of it.

I was once a member of the Liberal Party. But I quit. Why? Because it betrayed its principles and it stands for nothing but the latest media talking points.

Corporate welfare has been firmly on the Victorian Coalition’s agenda for the entire length of its term in government. The Coalition has thrown millions of dollars at profitable companies and multinational businesses on the flimsy premise that it ‘creates jobs.’

If taxpayer funding really created jobs the government would fund every business in the State. Of course, this is not the case.

In reality, businesses create jobs, not governments. They create jobs by providing the services customers want at the prices customers choose to pay.

So let us examine the Coalition’s “achievements” in handing out corporate welfare.They include bailing out Coca-Cola, which last year generated a profit of over a half a billion dollars, because it owned a failing fruit factory in Shepparton. The Liberals gave Coca Cola 22 million dollars. Coca-Cola wouldn’t invest in its own company – so why should the Victorian taxpayer?

The reason the Liberals are so generous with taxpayers’ money is simple: special interest politics. The workers at Coca-Cola and the people of Shepparton clearly thought they needed the jobs availed them. The lack of any clear free market reform agenda from the Coalition meant that they were unlikely to get jobs in any other way. So the Coalition thought it could bribe its way out of the problem with taxpayer money.

Yet for all that bribery the Coalition still lost the seat of Shepparton and the election as a whole.

Of course, what the Coalition should have done instead was scrap the payroll tax altogether in order to stimulate economic growth. Reducing government interference, rather than increasing it, is the only true way forward. Imagine how easy it would have been to lambast Labor for promising to keep around what is essentially a tax on jobs.

Another example of the Coalition’s “generosity” was its campaign promise to lavish the parents of Victorian kindergarteners with $100 cheques. One might well ask whether the Coalition is aware that there are parents out there with children who aren’t in kindergarten and who, in fact, also pay taxes. Why should they subsidise the parents of kindergartners? There is no economic reason or motive for this policy – it was a grubby vote buying exercise, pure and simple.

This is not to mention the incredible number of welfare payouts to businesses, grants to multicultural groups, arts groups and other handouts strewn about by the Liberals in this campaign.

Economist David Friedman was probably speaking of the Victorian election campaign when he wrote:

Special interest politics is a simple game. A hundred people sit in a circle, each with his pocket full of pennies. A politician walks around the outside of the circle, taking a penny from each person. No one minds; who cares about a penny? When he has gotten all the way around the circle, the politician throws fifty cents down in front of one person, who is overjoyed at the unexpected windfall. The process is repeated, ending with a different person. After a hundred rounds everyone is a hundred cents poorer, fifty cents richer, and happy.

The Liberal love affair with special interest politics has also caused Liberal Party members to abandon their party and join the pro-liberty Liberal Democratic Party.

I know – because I made the transition for this very reason, and saw so many of my former Liberal friends make the same choice. A substantial number of our members are former Liberals who are sick and tired of the waste, welfare, handouts and nanny-state politics of the Napthine government. Real liberals, classical liberals, to say nothing of conservatives, no longer feel at home in the Liberal Party. It’s as simple as that.

Speaking as a current Liberal Democrat I can report that I am more than happy to be part of a party that unreservedly opposes the politics of special interest and corporate welfare. And I am very far from alone. Victorian Conservatives and Classical Liberals supported the Liberal Democrats’ campaign in this election– and for good reason. Conservative columnist Andrew Bolt and free market economist Sinclair Davidson promoted our campaign launch online. Economists and columnists Mikayla Novak and Chris Berg spoke at our launch. The editor of Quadrant Online, Roger Franklin, also attended the launch. The reason they promoted us is simple. We were the only voice that stood up against big government—the Liberals’ big government—in this election.

I hope the Coalition will learn from its mistakes in future elections and make the case for a bold liberal agenda in future elections. But sadly, I doubt it. The Party seems to be filled with hacks who have no understanding of economics and who could easily find their place in the ALP. That’s not the Party for me—and it’s not likely to win any elections, either.

Vladimir Vinokurov is a solicitor, a former member of the Liberal Party and the current Public Relations officer for the Liberal Democratic Party’s Victorian Branch—a party committed to promoting free market policies in Australian politics.

First published at Menzies House.