It is becoming more and more apparent to me how that voting for a particular party, (whether that be left, right, centre, etc) is unimportant. I have always grown up as a fairly strong leftist inclined person. I have always believed in unionism, the right of the individual, the rights of employees in the face of powerful employers, protecting, conserving and placing priority on the environment, etc.
I was very happy with the election of the Kevin Rudd to the position of Prime Minister, and the re-election of the labour party after it’s long recess from power. I’ve come to realise more recently, however, that what is more exciting is not so much that a party that has been historically inclined with my personal point of view is now in power. The exciting thing is that new, fresh ideas and perspective have been brought forward to the governing of Australia. The Labor government has brought with it change and “a breath of fresh air” to a platform that I believe was previously very stagnant, unchanging, and entrenched in old-fashioned thinking and reasoning.
The previous Liberal/National federal coalition Government came into power in 1996.
I find it interesting to read back over history and note that in my point of view, the Liberal/National Government government, along with the traditional conservative thinking, came into power brought with it a lot of beneficial change. This however can be seen to slowly decline throughout the 4 terms in office. I will briefly revise:
In his first term, (1996-1998) John Howard implemented “work for the dole”, widespread gun controls including the banning of semi-automatic weapons (although whether this was primarily a reaction to the recent Port Arthur massacres is left up to the reader), abolishing of the Wik10 point plan, partial sale of Telstra, private health insurance rebate of 30%, the modification of industrialrelations laws to introduce individual workplace agreements, Keating-introduced schemes involving training and education were scrapped, reduction in funding for indigenous bodies and infrastructure, introduction of the “Ministerial Code of Conduct”, and finally the introduction of the controversial Goods and Services Tax.
In the second term, (1998-2001) Australia saw a great reduction in the change implemented by the government. We did see the government taking a large role in the peacekeeping of East Timor in it’s bid for independence, introduction of the “first home-buyers grant” and increased government benefits to self funded retirees. We also saw a very stoic John Howard refuse to apologise to the Stolen Generation, despite very strongly increasing public demand, (as a side note, he was also the only living Australian Prime Minister to decline the invitation to attend the formal public apology issued by the Rudd government in February 2008) and it might be argued that the peacekeeping role Australia took in East Timor was largely due to the overwhelming outcry by Australian’s across the country. There was also to be a “more relaxed attitude to those apparent breaches or misdemeanours” to the previously quite stringent Ministerial Code of Conduct to be taken.
During the third term, (2001-2004) we saw a government focussing on a new wave of paranoia that was sweeping the globe. During the election in 2001, the government refused permission of the Norwegian ship Tampathat was carrying asylum seekers whose boat had sunk (apparently breaking United Nations conventions and internation law on the helping of distressed mariners), the introduction of the “border protection” legislation, the increase of importance of “national security”, changes to Australian Nationality laws, inclusion in the invasion of Iraq and Afganistan, ammendment to superannuation laws so that same-sex couples could inherit their partners private sector superannuation (however this did not include members of Commonwealth superannuation funds) and changing of the lawful definition of marriage to exclude marriage between same-sex couples.
In the final fourth term, (2004-2007) John Howard became the second longest serving Australian Prime Minister. Again, we see a continuation of the trend of introduction of less new innovative policy. During this term we saw a review and finalisation of previous policy, including the abolition of compulsory student unionism, introduction of the WorkChoices legislation, the decrease of restriction on media outlets being centrally owned by fewer and fewer super-media companies, the final removal of same-sex couples to become married in the ACT, the increase of defense personell sent to Iraq, further strengthening of anti-terrorism measures, the Northern Territory Intervention (seen by some as a means of removing native title which Howard had long opposed).
To me, it seems that John Howard’s Coalition government had reached a point where it had stagnated, and the amount of new ideas and proposals dropped away from a high when first attaining government, to almost nothing. John Howard has recently appeared at a Queensland Liberal party function, and interestingly, I note stated when asked what he considered his 3 top achievements, amongst his entire 11+ years as Prime Minister, he started with gun control.
Now that a new government has wrested power from the Coalition, in the form of Kevin Rudd, Julia Gillard et al, we have seen what seems like an explosion of change. Stolen Generations have been formally apologised to, Kyoto Treaties have been ratified, summits are being held. Again along the same trends as seen in the previous government.
This brings me on to NSW state government, where the Labor party holds power.
The Labor party has been in power in NSW since April of 1995, for a running totalof 13 years. Compare that to the previous federal Liberal government, who had been in power since 1996. As I have already stated, I am fairly leftist inclined, politically speaking, however it feels to me that the state Labor government is not only past it’s use by date, but is starting to smell a bit, and this is a fairly large problem. One would think that once a government got bad enough, there would be a change of hands of government, and the opposing political persuasion would gain power. However in NSW, when voters go to consider an alternative, they seem to be coming up short in terms of a candidate party. This poses to me a personally-newfound problem. Where do we get political dynamism from when the incumbent government has no real threat? Perhaps the Premier realises this as well?
Further to this, it seems that not only is the government stagnant, but government departments. As a government becomes more accustomed to no real threat, bad habits begin to set in, and this flows down into the various departments, such as the mismanagement of health, and the recently uncovered dealings in Wollongong.
To me, our only hope is that the Liberal party in NSW get’s it’s act together, and there is political changing of hands in NSW. I have my fingers crossed that this will bring with it some fresh ideas, cleaning out of cobwebs (and corruption) and revitalisation of the various government departments.
I have come to realise more important than having one party in power or not, is having a change of government, and the bringing of new ideas and innovation associated with a new perspective.
