Is teal the real deal? It’s not just the right facing a shake-up from independents on May 21

by Mark Sawyer | Apr 16, 2022 | Government

Decapitating the Liberals, eliminating the Nationals from the councils of state: what’s not to like for progressive voters about the strong push by the climate independents at the May 21 federal election? Apart from the fact that they are pushing Labor where it cannot realistically go and eating the Greens’ lunch, quite a lot. Mark Sawyer looks at the progressive case against these independents.

Joe Manchin is a member of the Democratic Party who represents West Virginia in the US Senate. On contested issues, in a chamber split 50:50 between Democrats and Republicans, every single vote counts. And Manchin has surely made his vote count.

One media outlet describes Machin as ‘’the lead obstructionist to President Joe Biden’s congressional spending plan.’’

In opposing some key measures from the Biden White House, Manchin has frustrated his own party’s progressive agenda. Kyrsten Sinema of Arizona is another Democratic senator who has bucked the party line.

Here’s some of the headlines Manchin has attracted, from media on all sides of the political divide:

He’s a villain: Joe Manchin attracts global anger over climate crisis (The Guardian)

How Joe Manchin knifed the Democrats and bailed on saving democracy (Rolling Stone).

Joe Manchin swings at Biden’s billionaire tax, possibly dooming it (Business Insider)

How Joe Manchin aided coal, and made millions (The New York Times)

Joe Manchin insists Democrats do unpopular things (The American Prospect)

Joe Manchin opposes unrealized tax gain /Joe Manchin decided Elon Musk has suffered enough (Esquire)

Can Biden get a climate candidate past Joe Manchin? (E&E News)

F**k Joe Manchin (Defector; yes that’s quite high on the Google search)

Now what does this have to do with the big push to elect independents to the House of Representatives on May 21? In particular, those associated with Simon Holmes a Court’s Climate 200 political lobby, and the Voices Of movement?

Well one of the big pitches of this movement is that these candidates, if elected to Parliament, will vote not on the party line, but consider every issue on its merits and in keeping with the wishes of their electorates. And while it’s an uncomfortable comparison to make, that’s exactly what Manchin and Sinema are doing.

It’s not the thing the rising independents have in common with those so-called enemies of progressive policy.

It’s not only the right under threat

A lot of the attention surrounding the independents standing at the May 21 federal election has come from the right. Not surprisingly since they are a threat to the Liberals. Why would Labor get in the way – the enemy of my enemy is my friend, right?

Smarter heads on the progressive side of politics are likely to be looking a bit further. They know the short-term gain of putting Liberal MPs to the sword could lead to long-term pain.

For a start, there are elements of the progressive agenda that are neatly suppressed by the Independents. Redistributive policies on private schools, taxes, negative gearing  and franking credits are not a priority. In 2019 successful independent candidate Zali Steggall pledged to oppose any Labor government action on these issues. They are absent from the Labor agenda in 2022.

The most progressive of the mass-membership parties, the Greens, have switched focus to the Senate as the independent push diminishes their chances of adding to their one MP in the House of Representatives.

The Greens have their dossier of House votes by independents in favour of Stage 3 tax cuts for the wealthy and reforms which effectively restricted class actions against companies. Party hard-heads are making the best of the rise of the green-tinged independents whose economic stance is anathema to them.

As a senior Greens figure, who asked to be not named, put it: “We are glad they are there. We are all for it. They are stealing some of our funding – but that’s not our money anyway – and some of our voter base but they are on the same platform on climate and integrity. 

“What we are most worried about is that they are against reform to the tax cuts.

“We still prefer them to LNP any day of the week but they will still pursue an inequality agenda whenever they get the chance.’’

Has the party system run its course?

Then there is the delegitimising of political parties as a vehicle for beneficial change. The Greens have derided the ‘’old parties’’. The independents shove them aside. The latter candidates refuse to answer direct questions about who they would support – Coalition or Labor – in the event of a hung parliament.

Their stance is dictated by the need to maximise support in traditionally conservative electorates. Partly this is because it has proved impossible for candidates to state clearly who they would support in the event of a hung parliament, knowing that most of their supporters want Labor and yet such an admission would open them to claims by the Liberals that they are captive to the left.

Better to argue that the party system has run its course. The future is not only female (in the case of almost all the candidates), but independent. The cause has been helped by the narrative that political parties are toxic places for women, full of bullying, assaults, cover-ups, sexism and even mean girls picking on other women.

But there’s a less comforting side to this individualistic vision. Collectivism is one of the keystones of progressive politics. ‘’Better together; stronger together’’ and all that. ‘’The people united, will never be defeated.’’ Now we are being told to trust the vision of one gifted individual, generally someone who has excelled in elite sport, the corporate world (such progressive beacons as McKinsey is on one CV), medicine and charitable activities. Calling Ayn Rand, it’s Margaret Thatcher on the line.

No person is an island and of course the independents have their networks and their supporters. And their big four pledges (climate, integrity, fiscal discipline and treatment of women) do chime with the interests of their electorate. But there are other issues.

As that previously quoted Greens operative puts it: 

“They have to look after wealth, we get that.’’

A government of independents would be an unwieldy beast

Another little examined aspect of the independent push is the difficulties a big bloc of independents would experience and present under the current system.

Nobody reading this article needs to be told that the system expects MPs to form a government, not a ginger group. Over time, the system has demonstrated that political parties are the best way to form a government. And that’s the case even in Australia, where our constitution does not mention parties. The executive is formed from the legislature. The prime minister and other ministers have to be members of parliament.

A parliament of independents could only work in Australia if we separated the executive from the parliament, as in the US and France. 

The last time Australians supported a referendum proposal, three propositions were adopted. One was designed to ensure that in the event of any vacancy in the Senate, a person from the former senator’s political party be appointed. The people agreed, in effect, that no independent  could replace an elected member of a party if a Senate vacancy arose. The referendum was held 45 years ago on May 21, this year’s election day. 

Our parliamentary system is representative democracy, not participatory democracy. And in the chamber, it is that MP alone, voting on government and opposition bills, setting the laws of our nation. An individual, thinking for himself or herself – like Joe Manchin and Kyrsten Sinema. When it comes to a vote in parliament, it can’t be argued that every independent is at the top of a tree made up of grassroots supporters.

It’s not so simple with Simon

Which brings us to Simon Holmes à Court, convenor of Climate 200. Wherever he has made the money he is bestowing on the independents via Climate 200, well, it’s his money and he can do what he likes. And despite attempts by Liberals such as Warren Mundine to make the link, he’s not the Clive Palmer of the left.

But even in the softest interviews, this seemingly reluctant svengali leaves the impression something’s not right. It’s not just tendentious claims that Coalition MPs take their seats for granted (would that be true of any?), or statements that, with just one word change, would be racist or sexist: ‘’There are enough white men in Parliament, we don’t need any more.’’ (And in an era that rightly emphasises diversity in all aspects of society, the diversity presented by the climate independents is something readers can make up their own mind about).

Take the issue of a possible hung parliament and the question of who the independents would support. Interviewers allow Holmes à Court to claim that the Liberals are already in a minority government because of their coalition with the Nationals. Other candidates may be running that line, certainly Zoe Daniel (Goldstein) has said it.

It is political sophistry to match Clive Palmer’s claim that his United Australia Party is the same party that provided two prime ministers in the 1930s. The Liberals and Nationals are in a formal coalition that has been presented, explicitly, to the voters in advance of every election since World War II (except in 1987). The media should challenge the false claim that the Liberals are in a minority government. Hating the Nationals is one thing for a progressive, but to blot out the choices of 16 electorates is anti-democratic.

Holmes à Court hasn’t told us the public would happen to any erring candidate who deviated from the path, who voted in opposition to their colleagues, or gave the government a vital vote, in other words, did a Joe Manchin. 

In the end we are left with a Mr Moneybags doing his small bit for a bunch of aspiring parliamentarians. Now there’s a new way of doing things!

Blue-sky thinking: just the fun bits

It seems clear that ‘’Community Independents’’ have a program that cherry-picks the fun bits of the progressive agenda.

Labor accepts that fossil fuels still have a place on the energy grid and as export income. Labor’s man-mountain candidate for Hunter (NSW), Daniel Repacholi, isn’t talking about getting out of coal in a hurry. Labor makes its spokespeople sit on the ducking chair of progressive opinion and defend the continued association with fossil fuels and that emissions target that is more modest than the one the voters rejected in 2019.

Climate change and energy spokesman Chris Bowen battled gamely on the ABC’s Q+A (April 14) but the deck was stacked. It’s easier to shout ‘’no brainer’’ and soak up the applause when calling for an end to the use and export of fossil fuels than get down into the difficult details.

The tough part (raising the money) is left aside. The Greens state they’ll make billionaires pay for their program. The independents don’t even give us that level of complexity. Take Georgia Steele in Hughes (NSW).

Like the fellow independents, Steele’s key planks are, as described on her website: Taking action on climate change; Integrity in politics; Building a robust, sustainable economy; Working towards a more equitable Australia. Opening up any of those topics gets a few extras, such as support for the National Disability Insurance Scheme, help for small business in recovery from the pandemic, truth in political advertising, enshrining a First Nations voice in the Constitution. Stuff Labor would do (minus the subjectivity quagmire of truth in advertising).

Steele’s policy states: ‘’Long term (but starting immediately), we need to transition the economy from one reliant on fossil fuels to one with renewable energy at its centre.

‘’The opportunities here are endless, and the Government needs to recognise and run with them. Maintaining a strong economy is key to a bright future for all.’’

Blue-sky thinking without any sharp edges, such as maintaining the level of exports that underpin the economy. In other words, the perfect pitch.

The new populism

It is possible the Liberal Party could be destroyed by the independents if elected. The Coalition would be reduced to a right-wing rump. That’s the good news, right?

Maybe. But maybe, too, Labor would be sucked into the undertow. In the 1980s Labor decided it needed more than the politics of the ‘’warm inner glow’’ to make lasting changes to Australia. But now we seem to be seeing some sort of mass hypnosis, using key words of integrity, climate and equality, on environment-destroying posters in some of the most affluent places in the nation.

The idea that broad-based political parties are the healthiest thing for Australian democracy might sound hokey, but it is true. Broad-based parties gave us Medicare, the NDIS, anti-discrimination legislation – an endless list of civilising measures that have enhanced our democracy. Whether the independents make a better replacement to these mass movements, and whether they are the solution to the challenges facing the nation, is a question that should be posed by the progressive side of Australian politics.

In 2016, progressives were stunned by the election of Donald Trump and the victory of the Brexit forces in the UK referendum. Hot on the heels of those earthquakes came the victories of Bolsonaro in Brazil and Orban in Hungary, and the strong electoral showing of the right in France and Italy. Some analysts saw these events as the revolt of the masses against the elites. But more analysts, especially on the progressive side, saw populism triumphing over policy.

Now we have populism’s respectable cousin. This is not the ‘’populism’’ that has become a byword for toxic rabble-rousing. This is sane policymaking. We are being told that there is a voice of the people that should be directly transmitted through the parliamentary process. And we are being told that it can only be delivered by independents, not the political parties.

The Climate 200 and Voices Of movements make no bones that, beyond the implementation of a few key principles, the electorate comes first. These movements are focused on some of the wealthiest (and least ethnically diverse) electorates in the nation.

But that’s a story for another day.

Mark Sawyer is a journalist with extensive experience in print and digital media in Sydney, Melbourne and rural Australia.

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