AUSTRALIAN VOTERS DILEMMA…

A recent survey of Australians as to their attitude to the United States was undertaken and the results of the survey were interesting to say the least. The survey was undertaken by the U.S. Studies Centre at the University of Sydney and generally showed that the Australian public has lost confidence in George Bush and his running of the Iraq war. That’s really no surprise!

The dilemma here is that both the Liberals and Labor support our involvement in Afghanistan and, the Liberals will continue to be involved in Iraq notwithstanding that 64% opposed our involvement in the war in Iraq. Labor will not disengage in Iraq but rather reduce the number of the active troops on the ground. Both will continue the “war on terror” despite the fact that 75% of the population believes it makes us a more likely terrorism target.

On the other hand the public can NEVER be assured that the full party intent has been put before them. In other words, what is not being said is probably a lot more important than what is being said. Remember the introduction of the GST. No party got up before an election audience and said they were going to introduce a GST, John Hewson excepted, and look what happened to him.

As a further and more recent example, and a probably more important example of what isn’t being said is in relation to Iran. Iran could well be the trigger for the next global war and the hawks in the United States are hankering for it. The rest of the world is far more constrained.

So what is not said is extremely important.

The problem for the voter is that by voting for a member of a party the voter can be assured that what their member votes for will be the party view, almost certainly not necessarily that of the electorate. Just consider for a moment the Australia-US Free Trade Agreement legislation. Would anyone in Far North Queensland have voted to totally exclude sugar from the deal? Not likely, but that was the outcome.

In addition, there are countless ‘experts’ who provide advice to government, and for a backbencher to go against these experts can be politically hazardous to say the least. This is notwithstanding that there are usually equally ‘qualified experts’ suggesting an alternate approach but their views seldom get much publicity, unless of course they are following the directions of policy or can be used to otherwise raise the profile of an issue. Again exactly who influences the experts is an open question.

For example, did the electorate want to sell the Commonwealth Oil Refineries, the Commonwealth Bank, Telstra, Commonwealth Serum Laboratories and other such entities, which were really owned by the taxpayer in the first place? Do the public want the provision of water and energy privatised. For the answer to this just look at the rise in your last electricity bill since it has been ‘partially’ privatised.

The two-party system allows itself of easy management by the lobby groups and this is why we see so many “me too” matters in this as yet pseudo election period. It is also why the major parties attract the majority of private electoral funding.

The Independent has to be truly independent, has to be of integrity and must be willing to work both in and with the community. Furthermore, it is essential that the views of an Independent be known and the more an Independent publicises his/her views the more credibility that candidate must accrue within the public.

If we come to the point when we have a two-party system with the parties policies being ideologically the same, and our daily needs provided by multinational companies, and, it has been shown the Government is incapable of controlling them, we will then find ourselves in a very unenviable position. So now the future of your children’s grandchildren is in your hands.

One person, with the support of the community, can make a difference