ON THE WALLABY- 8th March 2006

LABOR IN SHACKLES- HAS KIM BEASLEY THE COURAGE TO BREAK THEM?

"Before you can persuade Australians of your credentials to run the country, you have to show that you can run your political party. And to do that we must unshackle our party from factions."- Julia Gillard, Labor Shadow Minister for Health

Those words from Julia Gillard , when combined with Simon Crean’s near Lazurus like comeback in his pre-selection ballot, have created, amongst those who choose not to see, yet another “schism” in the Labor Party whilst those with what I would call a grasp of reality, realise she is spot on.

It is said that “time and tide wait for no man” and unless Labor has a fundamental change away from being solely union based and biased, then ”time and tide” will apply to them also.

When Ben Chifley brought in the Commonwealth Bank in the late 1940’s to counteract the rorts of the then banking system, one of his colleagues warned that ”all he would do is turn Australia into a nation of small capitalists”.

How accurate he was and whilst it has been nearly 60 years since those words were spoken, the truth is today those who made up the then Labor heartland are, as electoral results show, in the main Liberal supporters.

Why and how?

Simply because Labor bogged down in factional disputes, placed people on front row benches who were there because of factional alliances and not ability, lost touch with the people and John Howard never forgot the lessons of his years in the wilderness and the effect of having the Liberal Party full of Party hacks and people lacking what I call "life skills", as is the case with Labor today.

So will Bomber take Julia Gillard and Simon Creans’ advise?

Nope.

Why?

Because he has neither the ticker nor, because Swan,Conroy,Smith et al have him by the short and curlies for previous favours done, the inclination.

Which means that the government, even allowing for the AWB fiasco (what did Sir Joh say? Something about never run an enquiry unless you already know the result?), will get a clear run and that is a dangerous thing.

As a former national President of the Australian Democrats I saw all too clearly up close just how damaging and destablilising it can be, especially in a small party, when people chase their own agendas.

That we were able to eliminate this for such a long time was one reason the Democrats performed so well for such a long period, as their legislative record shows or at least, did show.

The only brake on any government, whatever their colour or persuasion, is a strong opposition and right now Labor couldn’t pull the skin off a cream can!

And that is a national tragedy of massive proportion.

Carpe diem

Tony

Tony Fountain

Professional Speaker, auctioneer and author

tony@rainbowchaser.com.au

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