THE ELECTION CIRCUS ROLLS ON
THREATS, personality clashes, scaremongering, tiresome tit-fortats, senseless gotchas … and still two weeks to go until election day.
This campaign has been more acrimonious than usual, with the chief protagonists, the lesserknown alliances and the wannabes falling over themselves for publicity, while the anonymous keyboard cowards have been plumbing new depths.
The media darlings of the Left have been in their vindictive element, the Right too has been up to its ears in the free-for-all and absolutely everything, piffle included, has been on the table, from national security, economic management and climate change to party wrangling, signage vandalism and bloopers.
The circus has been particularly tainted by “intelligent” politicians and their opponents at each other’s throats – constantly.
Example: Mr Negative, Opposition Treasury spokesman Jim Chalmers, accusing the PM of being a “pathological liar”.
All class Jim!
The only laugh has been Labor’s Pacific solution that includes a funding increase to the ABC to expand its transmissions in the region.
How that will shore up security in the Pacific is anyone’s guess!
This election has served to reinforce many people’s views that politics is a dirty, rotten business.
Which partly explains why voters are leaving the major parties in droves and are joining the swingers.
The latest research indicates about 4.6 million of the nation’s 17.2 million eligible voters are undecided who to support on May 21, with a hung parliament a very real possibility.
That, with all its uncertainty and instability, is not a comforting thought.
But former Queensland premier Peter Beattie has a contrary view.
He believes a major party does not need a sweetheart alliance with minor parties or independents to form a minority government, but an agreement with other MPs to support supply.
For the record, the PM and Opposition Leader have said they will not do deals.
Well, anyone who follows the antics in Canberra knows full well that in that cocoon far removed from reality promises are made to be broken.
Right now, voter ebb-and-flow points to the new government being decided by one or several of the minor parties – the Greens, One Nation, the Jacqui Lambie Network, even the United Australia Party (heaven help us!).
But that eclectic bunch calling themselves independent may very well call the shots. Now selfconfessed independents have the same democratic right as anyone else to contest a seat in parliament, but are they really independent?
Yes, there are legitimate ones.
At a state level, Western Victoria MP Stuart Grimley springs to mind.
So too does Andy Meddick, but for a very different reason. He won his Upper House seat under the banner of the Animal Justice Party, but appears to have become very chummy with the state government. Then again, not surprising for a former unionist.
Federally, the independence of the teal independents is under question. With the considerable support of millionaire environmentalist Simon Holmes a Court, they are contesting 22 seats and pouring millions of dollars into the campaign.
This loose alliance has a common goal – climate change – while they are heavily committed to unseating moderate Liberals, which is an indicator of which way they will lean.
We also know several appear to have Labor links, such as Monique Ryan, who is challenging Treasurer Josh Frydenberg in Kooyong, with Liberals branding them “fakes”.
Former PM John Howard in particular has been uncharacteristically outspoken: “They are not independents; they are anti-Liberal groupies”. (As an aside, yesteryear’s leaders like Messrs Howard, Turnbull, Rudd and Keating should shun the spotlight at election time; they have had their time.)
Voters deserve the full picture. They should be demanding the independents, particularly the teals, reveal any political affiliations, past or present. Ditto their entire policy platform, not just single issues, and which party they would support to form government (they have refused to date).
Further, in the interests of transparency and greater disclosure, what will their financier or financiers expect in return?
Surely this is an obligation on anyone vying to become a parliamentary representative.
The 2022 federal election result will reshape one or both major parties. It could also see a menagerie of minor parties and independents having a disproportionate influence on how the country will be governed after May 21.
SELF-CONFESSED INDEPENDENTS HAVE THE SAME DEMOCRATIC RIGHT AS ANYONE ELSE TO CONTEST A SEAT IN PARLIAMENT, BUT ARE THEY REALLY INDEPENDENT?