We have reached a huge watershed in Australian political history.
There is now no Member of the House of Representatives in the Australian Parliament who holds a safe seat, not one, no matter what their current majority may be, not even Scott Morrison and Bill Shorten.
And neither the Coalition nor the ALP can be certain of getting more than one Senate candidate over the line in any State. Their number two Senate candidates cannot be confident of getting the required quota. And I joke not.
Some, quite wrongly, will see this as a terrible catastrophe that will ensure huge a period of very unstable government.
However, it is far more likely to provide a refreshing change in which the political establishment will self destruct and never again be able to return to its inefficient complacency and its inability to be accountable.
Above all, it shows that Australian voters have had a massive gutful of bad government and blame it on all the major parties, without exception.
Incredibly, most politicians are blithely unaware of their very uncertain future and need to be blasted into recognition by getting a brutal dose of acute voter anger.
How have we reached this incredible political crisis?
It has been brewing for a decade.
It began with disappointment that the Howard Costello years actually frittered away a decade of prosperity and failed to provide the infrastructure the nation needs, even though our roads were clogged, our power stations were in decline, we failed to store and conserve water and did not bring our educational institutions up to world standards.
The anger grew over a series of ridiculous political coups that saw us have seven Prime Ministers in a decade without voter choices ever being respected.
Now, we have a Parliament that is quite simply a hopeless rabble.
Recently, the Wentworth By-Election provided endless evidence of the wide spread discontent that is embedded in Australian society.
The Morrison Government suffered a swing against it that has never before been suffered by a government in an election for a vacant seat. They should be thoroughly ashamed of themselves as it was humiliating in the extreme.
At the same time, the votes for the ALP and Greens went backwards which simply has not happened before to Opposition Parties as they normally get a huge protest vote in their favour. There is a clear message for them to ignore at their peril.
For the first time in history, the combined votes of the Liberals, Labor and Greens came to less than 50% of registered voters showing a massive rejection of political parties as viable participants in responsible democracy.
And the issues on which those three main parties ran their campaigns were ineptly stupid and irrelevant. Incredibly, we even had Barnaby Joyce trying to make a comeback in the middle of it. The insanity of it all was mind boggling.
So, what will happen as the result of a general election, presumably to be held next May.
The Morrison Government will fall. They are without hope.
A large group of Independents will deny Shorten an absolute majority so he will have no option but to run a minority government. This will curb the power of Trade Unions to interfere in good government.
Independent Senators will indisputably control the Upper House, even though Hanson will not be among them.
Refreshingly, a large number of quality candidates are running in both Houses, more so than ever before. For example, Jane Caro will easily knock off Abbott and Rob Oakshott will return. High profile Anglican clergyman,Rod Bower, will clearly win a Senate seat in NSW and there are many others like them.
Can good government arise from all this?
Yes.
In the first ten years of Federation, the Australian Parliament did not ever have a single majority government and yet it was the best decade of government that our nation has ever enjoyed.
But, then, we had giants in Parliament like Barton, Deakin and Fisher who were superb legislators and negotiators. Sadly, no one in today’s Parliament comes within a mile of them.
But, you and I can look forward to the next Parliament being a great one. The political hacks will be gone. And good riddance to them.
Yours in enthusiastic hope.
Everald
PS. If you would like to buy my book THE MAN ON THE TWENTY DOLLAR NOTES just send me an email to compton@everaldatlarge.com. I will post you a signed copy, plus an account for twenty dollars plus postage. For an additional ten dollars, I will include a signed copy of GOONDEEN, a book in which I am one of three characters.
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