This article reports that Australia will not reverse the broad sweep of its policies if it changes governments in the general election, which must be called by the year 1993. The opposition Liberal Party, headed by John Hewson, is less liberal on immigration, less generous on overseas aid and less inclined to kowtow to China. But it is at one with the Labor governments of Prime Minister Bob Hawke and politician Paul Keating in aiming to make Australia an open, competitive economy that can prosper as Asia's odd man in. The big differences are over means, not ends. In opposition, the Liberals, who are allied with the National Party, had a choice. They could occupy the same middle ground as the Labor Party and count on a bored electorate to vote out a government that had served four consecutive terms in office.