In a huge swing election with help from the Greens, the ALP look like they will either secure enough seats to form government or fall just short and create a hung parliament. Either option, it is a massive outcome for all of Queensland that voted against the Newman government. They put an end to a government suspected of widespread corruption that took them back to the Joh years and the Fitzgerald inquiry. While not identical, a quick look back shows the sheer arrogance of the Newman government:
- Severe cuts to the public sector
- Undermined and insulted the judicial sector
- Threatened the health sector
Like a mirror held up to the state, Australian federal politics played a negative role for the Queensland LNP government. More significantly, it re-highlighted the fallibility of a capitalist society through prioritising profit before people.
It shows the continuing inability of the ruling class to convince the public with the virtue of austerity.
As in Greece - and seemingly soon in Spain - the people are waking up to stand against the ideological attacks on public servants, state assets and subsequently the common wealth, i.e. implementing neo-liberalism.
The Greek Finance Minister (Yanis Varoufakis), - who until recently had been teaching at the University of Sydney - sums up the feeling rather poetically in an ABC article;
"The obvious answer is that austerity was never about tackling public debt. It was not even a political campaign to end the ‘culture of entitlement’. In the UK, in the eurozone, and now in Australia, austerity is, and always was, a thinly disguised campaign of invoking fiscal prudence and public virtues in order to indulge private vices and redistribute entitlements at the expense of the majority."
Once euphoria subsides from these major policy rejections, what does it mean for the newly formed government in both Victoria and Queensland? Simple answer, they must implement the peoples mandate:
- Cleaning up politics and removing draconian laws.
- Reversing the neo-liberal cuts to public service and privatisation.
- Create more sustainable jobs that protects the environment.
- Increasing social welfare and assisting the lesser advantaged.
- Increase political participation between elections.
If there is one thing to take from the recent Greek elections, it is the pace in which positive reform has been introduced.
This mandate would have been preferable with some Green MP's elected, however while their overall vote increased and some candidates achieved more than 20%, none won outright. This is due to the snap election, the lack of volunteers, first time candidates, but primarily because Queensland doesn't use a proportional representative style election. This highlights yet another undemocratic principle in Queensland electoral system. While the Greens received almost 10% of the votes, they won't receive a single representative even though their preferences helped the ALP win seats over the LNP and hugely influence the outcome of the election.
For me the problem lies with the capitalist system we live in. By it's very nature it constructs a hierarchical anti-democratic platform to maintain the status-quo of the capitalists. This is exemplified by wealth inequality where the top 1% is expected to own the same as the bottom 99%.
Fortunately there is a solution at both federal and state levels. Nationalist the Commonwealth Bank of Australia, tax the rich and invest in science, health and education. You might think this is a nonsensical argument, but we should not forget how we arrived in this current economic mess. The failure of the financial sector and the approach of governments worldwide to bail out banks. It was only by sheer coincidence that Australia was saved by the mining boom.
As a result, the left and all anti capitalist organisations must take this opportunity to communicate and educate the flaws in our society. They must take this time to reignite hope within society that burns beneath the surface of growing social disdain. To reignite the passion within social movements that has been dormant for too long.
Only by pragmatically explaining the problems and connecting to people on common ground does the progressive left have any hope of being the change in Australia. You can wish for an Australian Syriza or you can build one.
No comments:
Post a Comment