Sometimes, a conversation opens up in national politics that is so riddled with inconsistency, so revelatory of hypocrisy, that the only sane response is to quake in horror. Quake either at the intellectual failings of our representatives in Canberra, or their mercenary double-standards.

I speak of Opposition leader Tony Abbott’s recent observation that Welcome to Country ceremonies are a “genuflection to political correctness” and “out-of-place tokenism”. Or, as coalition MP Wilson Tuckey and Senate Opposition leader Eric Abetz put it, constitute faddish, farcical, paternalistic formalism no longer appropriate in 21st century Australia.  “Why don’t we acknowledge a whole host of other people and … deities?” Abetz asked.

Columnist Miranda Devine also feels worried. On Monday night, she told the audience of ABC TV’s Q&A that if ceremonies that acknowledge the original inhabitants of Australia are not “done with … feeling”, or undertaken as a “mandated practice”, they could become “ritualistic and useless”.

Interesting observations, though not ones we have heard from conservative politicians or commentators before. Indeed, when a similar issue arose in the late 1990s and again in 2008 — about the ongoing relevance of the Lord’s Prayer as the daily convocation for both houses of Federal Parliament — conservatives were either silent, or had something quite different to say.

In 1997, Bob Brown moved that the Lord’s Prayer be replaced by an invitation to Senators to pray or reflect on their responsibilities. The motion, referred to the Procedures Committee, was ultimately rejected, on the notably generous grounds that those senators who joined in the prayer considered its retention important, and those who did not deem it important, didn’t think the issue mattered enough to upset those who cared. At that time the Catholic Independent Senator Brian Harradine spoke at length about his view that Australia’s heritage and history justified the prayer’s retention, as well as his belief that retaining it had been the right move. “At this time of all times, we need the guidance of God…”

When Speaker of the House of Representatives  Harry Jenkins questioned the relevance of the prayer a few years back, the response was similar. The then-Minister for Aboriginal Affairs Tony Abbot said he thought the Lord’s Prayer should stay, as it expressed principles universal to all religions. The now Shadow Finance Minister Barnaby Joyce defended the prayer on the grounds that while, “…reading the Lord’s Prayer is encouraged, it is certainly not compulsory”.

If the legitimacy of Welcome to Country rests on it being spontaneous, sincere, feeling-filled and done only where accompanied by similar acknowledgements of the beliefs and practices of the many peoples who populate Australia, then surely this must also apply to the Lord’s Prayer.

If it is right that in a secular multi-faith democracy such as Australia, our representatives — some of whom follow non-Christians faiths or are atheists — start the day with a Christian invocation because that prayer references our history and heritage, and no one is forced to say it, then retaining Welcome to Country can be justified on the same grounds.

If secularist and non-Christian politicians can be generous to their Christian colleagues when it comes to the Lord’s Prayer, why cannot Christian political leaders be equally as generous to Australia’s first people, the Aborigines?

Consistency on this question is not just required of us intellectually, but morally, too. Whatever brand of ethics you support — religious or secular — moral prescriptions must be universal. In other words, as reasons “because that’s me you’re talking about”, or “Christianity is different”, don’t make the cut.

Given this, does the rise of this latest skirmish in the culture wars prove our leaders are intellectually lazy, or just plain hypocritical?

On the evidence, the answer seems to be both, but I think it’s worse than that.

The Welcome to Country skirmish was a dog-whistle, not just to the racists who are part of the Conservative base, but to Howard’s lost battlers: voters who deserted the coalition for Labor at the last election. By raising questions about Welcome to Country, Abbott was promising these segments of the electorate that he could, and would, take them back. Take them back to the days when selfishness was right because it was cloaked in Christian morality. To the time when they could feel good about the mystifyingly named “elites” getting it in the neck in policy and rhetorical terms — working women, single mothers, Aborigines, boat people, aborting women and lesbian parents — because this was what was necessary to preserve Australia for all of us.

This was our lot when it came to God, history, policy and politics under Howard. Now, under Abbott, we know it will be the same.

Dr Leslie Cannold is an ethicist, researcher, author and commentator.