There is something strangely attractive and oddly compelling about the notion of the Independant MP. Freed from party bonds, they are able to leap small political obstacles in a single bound and leap high moral barriers that mere party members cannot scale. Or so the fiction goes...

The stark reality about independants in all of our governments is that they are not the altruistic, high-minded individuals standing up for our rights against the twin ‘evil empires’. In most cases they are nothing more than ex-party members disaffected by the machine in which they fought for position – and lost. There are some notable exceptions of course.  Senator Nick Xenophon is a classic example of the truly ‘independant’ independant supporting both sides of politics and actually have a genuine cause to support.  But as a rule, independants have been a sad and sorry lot whose life on the cross-benches passes without comment or interest until everything gets close on the floor of the house. This is when the character of independants comes under scrutiny and it usually isn’t pretty.

In 2002, the SA state election produced a hung parliament. The fate of the government hung in the balance of just one man – Peter Lewis, an ex-liberal party member who stood as a Liberal Independant in his seat. Carefully note the use of the word ‘Liberal’ in his name which was emblazoned all over his election material at the time. 24 hours after the election Lewis decided to support the then minority Rann Labor government in return for being speaker of the house. SA then suffered through 4 years of increasingly erratic behaviour by this clearly disturbed man who held the government to ransom. In 2006, Lewis was trounced in the general election and thoroughly rejected by his electorate who felt betrayed by their irrational turncoat member. His seat was a safe conservative seat and yet a supposedly ‘independant’ member had not only changed sides – the side he had campaigned for only 24 hours earlier - but had given government to a party that was not the preference of the electorate.  At the time, Peter Lewis was championing ‘representative democracy’ while doing the exact reverse in parliament.

And now we come to the bizarre situation in Australia 2010 where we have an entire nation being held ransom to the vacillations and amusements of three supposedly ‘independant’ members. Tony Windsor – an ex National Party member (disaffected of course) – has even had the gall to speak of wanting more ‘representational democracy’ while conveniently forgetting that his own electorate has overwhelmingly voted to reject Labor. Polls in these three electorates have clearly shown that the voters there want a Coalition government but apparently, these three exponents of ‘representational democracy’ consider these polls to be – in the words of Windsor - of ‘no interest’.
And so we have a nation being paralysed because three disaffected and irresponsible MPs cannot decide to support their electorates’ wishes and would rather create havoc and ‘payback’ on their former colleagues than follow the notions of parliamentary democracy they espouse noisily and often – when there is nothing in the balance.
Pressure shows up the character of a man and exposes him for who he truly is. The pressure of the last two weeks has shown these three men to be of small minds, limited vision and particularly ugly temperaments. True men of character would have taken 48 hours to support the party and the vision that their own electorates embrace.

These independants are NOT those men.

Thank God for the Independents I say :

so does;

1) George Megalogenis.~ The Australian

"JULIA Gillard has a reason to be prime minister that voters should have known about: the Coalition’s policies didn’t add up.
There is no sugar coating the Treasury verdict on Tony Abbott’s election promises.
Sloppy errors were made in the Coalition’s documents. They claimed a saving that was already in the budget. They made a false assumption about the public debt interest bill. The had spending cuts up their sleeve which they didn’t announce during the campaign."

2) Laura Tingle

Liars, clunkheads or both
September 4th, 2010 by Brian  |  Published in Economics, federal election 2010 
Laura Tingle is probably the country’s finest writer when it comes to sophisticated political analysis.
That’s what Mark Scott said the other day. In her Canberra observed column this week she didn’t hold back:
There are two possible explanations for how an opposition presenting itself as an alternative government could end up with an $11 billion hole in the cost of its election commitments.
One is that they are liars, the other is that they are clunkheads. Actually there is a third explanation: they are liars and clunkheads.
But whatever the combination, they are not fit to govern. (Emphasis added)
She says that Treasury and Finance found “what can only be described as a systematic exercise in creative accounting.”
The picture that emerges from the econocrats’ report is that the opposition very purposely created a dodgy set of numbers which were never expected to withstand any scrutiny and would require the intervention of the Australian Securities and Investments Commission if it was a company.
They tried to bluff their way through to polling day and are continuing the bluff now. The cliam that the bureaucrats’ document proves the budget would be $7 billion better off under them she describes as “complete bullshit”.
I pause here to mention that Tingle has credentials in economics and in reporting on financial markets.

http://larvatusprodeo.net/2010/09/04/liars-clunkheads-or-both/

Quote:


NONE OF WHICH changes the FACT that the people voted for Abbott way ahead of Gillard. Democracy doesnt run on dubious post-election analysis of documents. It runs on ELECTIONS where people chosee their member for whatever reason they choose and no one has the right to dispute their right to hold an opinion.

Now if only the 3 stooges can hear what their electorates are saying...