Australian Labor Party

Australian Labor Party
The Party for all Australians

Saturday 13 December 2014

What’s wrong with the two party system? - The AIM Network

What’s wrong with the two party system? - The AIM Network



What’s wrong with the two party system?













ChurchillQuote


I wrote recently about the mainstream media narrative
of ‘yes the Liberal government has problems, but they’re no worse than
the previous Labor government’- showing that these journos can’t
possibly criticise Abbott without throwing in the tired old ‘but Labor
was just as bad’ comment, to keep their Labor bashing credentials alive.
Now we have a new play on this theme, which isn’t really a new play for
this blogger as he’s been writing on this topic for some time. Tim
Dunlop has contributed this week
yet another edition of his narrative that the problem is the two party
system – and that the Abbott government is the two party system’s
symptom, not a problem in itself. Here are three recent Drum articles by
Dunlop on similar themes: this one is about the problems with a two party system being unrepresentative of community attitudes, this one is a suggestion that our elected representatives could be chosen by lottery, and
this one is about the community’s preference for independents and minor
parties which is a symptom of a ‘a deeper democratic malaise’
.



I’m going to go out on a limb here amongst left wing bloggers and will say to Dunlop, and those that agree with him, what are you
talking about? What if Dunlop and people who share his views are so
obsessed with their idea that our democratic system is ‘broken’ that
they’re purposely looking the other way, rather than seeing all the good
that has come out of our democratic system in the past, and how much
good could still be done?



When Gough Whitlam died this year, there was an outpouring of grief
combined with a celebration for what this leader had achieved in the
very short time he led a Labor government. Correct me if I’m wrong, but
this success happened in a two party system. And what about Prime
Minister Julia Gillard who led a minority government successfully, in a
two party system, so successfully that she was the most productive Prime Minister this country has ever seen.
So this broken system that Dunlop is writing about, this system that no
longer represents the wider community’s values, how was it able to
produce a minority government of such amazing, but admittedly unsung and
largely unappreciated, success?



I’m currently researching political narratives and framing, and I’ve
learned that once a frame is secure in someone’s mind – once it’s a
‘thing’, people find it very hard to see a situation through this frame
in the same way that someone else with a different frame sees it. So I
would argue that Dunlop and I both think we’re equally right and perhaps
we are. But let me at least argue my case as to why Dunlop’s frame
clashes with mine.



Dunlop’s frame is that the previous Labor government, and clearly the
current Liberal government are not interested in representing the wider
community and are only interested in ‘the echo chamber of the concerns
of the broader political class’. Dunlop therefore, having made this
decision, lets this perception of Labor and Liberal politicians run
through every judgement he makes about politics. Major parties are
apparently out of touch. Minors and independents the only true
representative leaders. Apparently minor billionaire Clive Palmer and
his PUP Senators, Motoring Enthusiasts, Family First’s Bob Day and the
now independent Jacqui Lambie amongst them.



My frame, however, is that politics is about good policies and,
equally as important, implementing good policies. My values align with
Labor’s values and a Labor government is therefore the best chance I
have of seeing policies implemented that align with my values. I don’t
just want good ideas from politicians, I want the opportunity to see
these ideas become reality and therefore I will fight for Labor’s
opportunity to do this. This doesn’t mean I agree with everything the
Labor government does. But broadly, I do see their values aligning with
mainstream Australia – at their very heart they aim for sustainable
economic growth, healthcare, education, employment and opportunity for
all Australians no matter what background. I see these values at the
heart of Labor’s policies and for the most part, I am happy to
passionately fight to see Labor achieve policy success with these values
that I know align to mine. So I clearly come at this from a different
view point from Dunlop. Where I see Labor government success, he sees a
problem akin to Tony Abbott.



Dunlop mentions that he sees the two party system as being only
interested in ‘allegiance to the economic system of market liberalism’.
Yet he doesn’t mention what system he would prefer they had allegiance
to. Perhaps this is where Dunlop’s disappointment comes from (and I
would argue that this is not a mainstream malaise). The Liberal Party is
the party of economic rationalists. The Labor Party promises to
civilise capitalism – to try to reduce the inequitable power between
labour and capital. But Labor has never promised to get rid of ‘market
liberalism’ altogether and perhaps anyone who expects that they should
is bound to be disappointed that they won’t. Again, I wonder what Dunlop
would prefer from a government? A denial of globalised capitalism and a
protectionist communist democracy instead? Or maybe he wants a
coalition government of random small and individual factions, who have
to fight out every policy to get a backroom deal done for themselves, at
the expense of the wider community, and at the expense of long term
planning and vision for the country? Maybe he wants a system of
self-interested pork-barrelling, as outlined by Kay Rollison here.
That’s the thing about Dunlop’s anti-the-system commentary; he’s very
good at saying what’s wrong with the way things are now, but never quite
gets to a point where he has a sensible suggestion of what could work
better. And no, I don’t count a ‘lottery’ as a sensible suggestion.



And speaking of a lottery, then we have Dunlop’s preference for minor
parties and independents, who apparently are another symptom of the
problem with the two party system (although this is where I’m confused
as to whether Dunlop sees them as a symptom or part of a solution). I’m
sorry to say this about a blogger I respect, but again Dunlop, what are you
talking about? The most uninformed voters I know choose the most random
of independents and minor parties because it’s trendy. Because it’s hip
to be ‘against the established parties’, to be an ‘anti-politician’.
Not because it’s smart. Not because it’s going to be ultimately
productive for their values into policies agenda. Not because they
actually have any idea what on earth these independents and minors stand
for. How many Family First voters realised Bob Day is on a mission to
destroy the minimum wage? Seriously – poll them and see how few took any
notice of Day’s very well-known values. Or what about another South
Australian Senator, Nick Xenophon, who has just announced that he is
starting a political party. A party based on what values? Xenophon got
elected to the Senate in 2008 on the values of getting his face on TV
through stunts and promising to axe pokies. I have no idea what happened
to his passion for pokies policies because it’s not been mentioned in a
long time. But I wonder how many people who mindlessly voted for him
were aware of the lottery of votes their elected representative would
contribute to in order to help the Liberals get their Direct Action
joke-of-a-policy through the Senate, and more recently to reinstate
Temporary Protection Visas. But that’s the thing about independents and
minor parties – they escape any sort of criticism from people like
Dunlop. Apparently they win the day they get elected, and after that
they have a blank slate to do and say whatever they like – and no one
who votes for them, or publically supports them, ever calls them out.
What about when the Greens blocked Rudd’s ETS. Sorry, I haven’t
forgotten because this is one policy I am extremely passionate about and
I hate the idea of minor parties playing politics with it for their own
electoral purposes, when the fate of our future is at stake. But no,
there’s no criticism from anyone who voted for the people outside of
major parties. No, it’s the major parties that are the problem
apparently. The hardworking, values driven Labor MPs are heaped in with
the conniving Liberals as if they’re all from the same stock. They’re
just as bad as each other.



If Dunlop was clearer about what is was actually advocating in place
of the two party system, I might be able to more clearly define why I
disagree with him. But ultimately, it’s his prerogative to keep writing
on this topic if that’s what he wants to do. And I’ll keep pointing out
that I disagree with him. I believe Tony Abbott is the problem with Tony
Abbott and I’m not interested in people trying to make excuses for this
problem by blaming the two party political system. And I’ll be
fighting, in our two party system, to get rid of him in 2016. Whether
the minors and the independents are interested in supporting this
campaign is also clearly, a lottery.













Friday 12 December 2014

Farewell Faulkner: long may you live to annoy

Farewell Faulkner: long may you live to annoy

Farewell Faulkner: long may you live to annoy



Posted



It's a rare political obituary in which
the words "honour", "integrity" and "service" make such regular
appearances. Annabel Crabb pays tribute to retiring senator John
Faulkner.
For Labor leaders over the years, Senator John Faulkner has been a mixed blessing.

On
one hand, he is a tremendous asset: principled, punctilious,
hard-working and circumspect, with the memory of an elephant, and a
clean-living elephant at that.


On the other, he is a frank and unswerving harbinger of doom.

If
- as a Labor leader - you peep out into the office waiting area and
spot John Faulkner looming there in the company of your leadership
rival, it's roughly 98 per cent certain you're about to be whacked.


At
the messiest existential junctures of a Labor leader's life (their
violent births, ignominious deaths, and the grinding election campaigns
that so often serve to contract the period of time elapsing between the
two first-mentioned events) solemn-faced Faulkner has a priestly
ubiquity.


He is not the author of political violence; rather, its
umpire. The guy that everyone wants in the room, for insurance. And yet,
his sudden appearance has something of the maritime albatross about it.


This
is also true for public servants, who at Senate estimates sessions have
faced thousands of hours of patient Faulkner invigilation, his long and
fluent periods of courtesy terrifyingly punctuated by the odd burst of
cogent annoyance.


Senator Faulkner gets the hard jobs. The
intricate unravelling of portfolio expenditure, the telling of difficult
truths to difficult people, the tidying-up of epic political messes.


He
was the party's messenger to Simon Crean, when Crean's leadership was
at an end. The night-watchman over its trickier recruits; he accompanied
Mark Latham on the 2004 campaign, and looked after Cheryl Kernot in
2001. (Later, after the shedding of many tears, he was the only member
of Labor's leadership to show up to the launch of Kernot's infamous
biography).


It is one thing to be the person to whom hard jobs are
assigned. It is entirely another to keep doing them well after one
might quite reasonably have begged off.


When Labor took office in
2007, John Faulkner was one of only two members of the Rudd frontbench
who had ever been a minister before.


As cabinet secretary, he
dealt uncomplainingly with increasing behind-the-scenes disarray in the
Rudd office, as well as sundry public humiliations like being called
"Faulks" by the nickname-mad prime minister.


As defence minister after the resignation of predecessor Joel Fitzgibbon, he brought calm authority to an always-difficult job.

It
was a job he left after Julia Gillard challenged successfully for the
Labor leadership, an act of political violence with which Faulkner
seemed unable to reconcile himself even over time, despite having - as
usual - been in the room at the relevant moment.


One would think
that a man whose career has been so steeped in difficulty might develop a
rather grim view of life, and certainly there is much in the Faulkner
countenance that would tend to confirm that suspicion.


But one of
his subtle legacies is his rich, dark sense of humour, much apparent in
this reminiscence about the 1993 election, which he fought as Paul
Keating's environment minister.


The anecdote, about Labor's
infamous candidate Peter Knott, was told by Faulkner at former Labor
national secretary Tim Gartrell's farewell dinner, and reported by Alan
Ramsey:


I am still recovering from a grand
announcement I made in Kiama to save a threatened species of frog, which
had the misfortune of living in Gilmore in an open drain, two metres
wide and two metres deep, that ran through a public park. I made the
announcement and turned to Peter for a comment. But he'd gone. He'd
pissed off, across the park, to where he yelled back to the cameras,
'I've found one!' It seemed unlikely but Peter yelled, 'There it is!'
And as the TV cameras swung round for his David Attenborough moment,
Peter fell arse-over-head into the drain.
Among
colleagues, Senator Faulkner was viewed with admiration, trepidation,
fondness and a readily-discernible streak of the annoyance people of
rigid principle tend to inflame in others.


It's a rare political obituary in which the words "honour", "integrity" and "service" make such regular appearances.

Thank you, Senator. Long may you live to annoy.

Annabel Crabb is the ABC's chief online political writer. She tweets at @annabelcrabb. View her full profile here.