by Shaun Newman

Shaun Newman says it seems there is a political party for everyone in Australia — except the most disadvantaged in society.

Having followed Australian politics since the age of 14, I have come to realise a few things concerning the political parties of our nation in the intervening 42 years.

Most of what my grandfather told me in the 1970s-80s has come to pass:

  1. That the ALP would never deliver much for working Australians, especially in the wages and conditions department — and he was spot on.
  2. That the Liberal Party never, or very rarely, builds anything or improves anything for the general public, and that they survive as a political party by creating dramas or inventing crises that do not actually exist before blaming the ALP for whatever it is.
  3. That the National Party is indeed the collective of agrarian socialists they claim not to be.

I have seen the dismissal of a popularly elected democratic government; seen armed men in balaclavas with attack dogs on the wharves to intimidate workers; seen the supposed crisis, where children were supposedly thrown overboard (a claim proved incorrect after the political damage had been done); the Tampa beat-up, perpetrated by the tory government (Liberal-National) at the time. I have also seen some positive moves take place, such as pricing carbon – which Bill Gates is very much in favor of – to try to avoid climate change.

Thankfully, among the positive changes I have seen include the formation of new political parties, such as The Greens and Katter’s Australian Party, to give a voice to the changing political mood of Australians. Now it seems that everyone is represented except the 3.6 million people in the workforce who earn less than $37,000 per annum.

It’s time that lowly paid Australians had a voice and a party to represent them; hopefully I will see this occur before I die.

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