Community Voice gears up for elections in two weeks

The Wollongong council election campaign is in its final two weeks now, and the Community Voice campaign is ramping up.

The CV campaign  has letter boxed nearly 60,000 houses across the three local wards, and candidates have  addressed numerous meet-the-candidates forums, while receiving sustained media coverage, with campaigning on the streets with stalls, door-knocking and more!

If you are in NSW and want to experience campaigning at the grass roots, help CV out for the last two weeks, and email Tim Dobson to volunteer.

The weekend edition of the Illawarra Mercury featured a half page photo of the CV meeting to decide  its preferences. 

Click here for TV coverage of CV launch of CV's youth unemployment policy.

The campaign to stop coal seam gas mining continues to gain strength too, and it's having an impact on the election campaign.

Stop CSG Illawarra's 200-strong meeting on Sunday is pictured above left.

Nearly every candidate (excluding Labor and Liberal) has pledged to back Stop CSG's demands if elected.

Check out WIN TV news, ABC TV news and Illawarra Mercury coverage, all of which feature Jess Moore!

Click here for CV latest media release on the BlueScope sackings.

If State Greens back Libs in Victoria is class the issue?

In a later comment on his attack on the Greens for being middle class, SAlt's Ben Hillier's final straw proof that the Greens crossed the class line was their support for Liberal governments .

I think Hillier's exposition  in this post is very useful.

He maps out a sort of standard far left argument against the Greens. Despite their platform -- according to this POV the Greens are not 'of the left' certainly not of the left to the left of the ALP.

In the sense that the Democrats were also never supposedly 'of the left'...

The ALP -- because it has that old warhorse, "a trade union base" in its corner -- is supposedly, unlike the Greens, working class aligned (or is it contained?). 

But is the ALP class aligned that way? Aligned that way at all in the sense that the Liberals supposedly aren't -- being avowedly with the bosses? And if the ALP doesn't support Liberal governments what has it been doing for over the past 100 years in parliament after parliament, state and federal , in peaceful coexistence, taking turns running the state apparatii so that the shift from one administration to another is seamless?

Maybe the class question is ruled by the fact that subjectively workers think that the ALP is their party? But the collapse in ALP's primary vote and the growing hostility to the party within the trade unions themselves doesn't suggest that notion rules the collective POV. In fact if you want to ascribe to the perspective that the ALP is a working class party you are keeping company only with some comrade Marxists and maybe a swag of 'true believers' -- and among those would be a loyal layer of trade union bureaucrats who see the ALP primarily as a career resource.Right wing ideologues similarly see the ALP as  working class and thus  held hostage to the trade unions.

The complication is that if you take the class argument up to the Greens -- or at least some Greens (how many we don't know) -- greens people are going to ask," what do you mean, it's Tweedle Dee and Tweedle Dum. You are trying to tell us that regardless of anything the ALP does we need to support the ALP over the Liberals because one's supposedly got working class connections?"

The complication is that you then fall into the trap of having to argue that a Greens agenda will be better served by supporting Labor rather than the Liberals.

But do we know that to be true? If we think we do , on what basis can anyone say it? 

I think supporting the Liberals would be nonetheless political suicide for the Greens,  primarily , if we want to be concrete and not ideological at all, because 70-80% of their second preferences are usually sheeted to Labor.

That suggests to me that the more the Greens play up their support for the Liberals the less they will be trusted by their progressive electoral base and the more they will be blamed for the rigors of any Liberal/Coalition administration that may ensue and in which they will be complicit (...juist as they will be complicit in any ALP government they support).

The associated complication is that the more the Greens engage in the politics of hung parliaments -- and we are indeed in for a swag of hung parliaments around the country -- the more they leave themselves open for criticism, hostility and distrust for their manoevreing.

Of course, the Greens major problem is not so much whether they are with the Libs or Labor for the sake of cabinet guernsays or whatever -- but that their politics is contained totally by electoralism and -- to be frank -- if you passively accept the parameters of the capitalist state you are sentenced to its class alignment anyway. It wouldn't matter if you were prole rich or your reps were blue collar in origin.

Nonetheless, if the Greens are going to run an election campaign flagged by their determination to enter a coalition type agreement with the Liberals then we all face a major tactical problem -- not so much because we may or may not support the Greens , but because the Greens will take a progressive platform and trade it for a cheap pragmatism -- even before the polling day.

And let's be blunt about this: even if they backed the ALP instead of the Libs they would be indulging in the same realpolitick with the same or similar consequences for the progressive program.

So the main problem with the Greens(at least some Greens) it seems to me, is not so much their class demographic but their overriding pro-capitalist perspective wedded to parliamentarianism regardless of any other consideration.

The mistake that some Marxists are making in regard to the Greens is to try and rule their POV by schemata as though history doesn't move and the imperialist state and (what we called ) social democracy are static entities. These same Marxists may also be victim to the mistaken view that there has been a historical working class presence in parliament which in itself -- independent of the vagaries of struggle outside parliament -- has been significant enough to impact on the day to day business of the capitalist state.

I think it ironic that if the we seek to be ruled by which of either of the two major parties should be supported then we have two rural and regional independents who are more class aligned, albeit by default, than the Greens seem now willing to be in Victoria.

Ideology and Populism after the Penrith By Election.

The malaise at the heart of Australian electoral politics is this: not only the active rejection of the Labor Party as indicated by the Penrith by election, but the realisation that the option is a pack of dogs also. There's a treadmill sense about it without a policy difference between them worth a snippet of excitement.

Howard's industrial policies be dammed, go ask Ark Tribe about that one. Two more diggers killed in Afghanistan -- killing business as usual....

At the same time, the coalitionist perspective embedded in the Greens is asserting itself as they seek to embrace the middle ground.

Nonetheless, in the Penrith  by election, the Greens percentile was half the ALP vote -- up 7% to 12.6% compared to the ALP's 24.4%. But the main voting shift was to the Liberals.

But that's around where the Greens support level is in the polls nationally. The main point is that even with the Labor vote being halved, the Greens only picked up a 7% swing -- as the intentional preference was to vote #1 for the Liberals.

I think that suggests something that may be much broader: that while the alternative vote may go up at the elections before us (eg: federal, Qld, Vic, etc) where the ALP may lose, there will be no major abandonment of the major parties only staccato gains for the Greens (and perhaps left of them?).

Whether Labor holds onto or loses office federally or in whatever state, is collateral to that. While NSW Labor stinks absolutely, NSW is its fiefdom -- and the state by state shift to the Coalition have very little to do with them being 'better' -- in any way at all -- than the ALP. They're just  there -- the other end of the same dog; the one engineered into optional placement by the media. In these circumstances, a populist surge has a niche but it's hard to envisage a remake of One Nation's platform because much of that is now owned by Labor and the Coalition..

This political log jam can suggest a watershed moment --says he before the onset of hindsight. While we may be facing down a Coalition ascendancy, it is very hard to believe that any victory of anyone of the Coalition players -- whether it be Tony Abbot or a local franchisee -- can ever be embraced with same  fervour  as  Jeff Kennett was in 1992  or  John Howard in 1996.

Outside the mining industry -- partisan sectors of the populace aren't very vocal. I'm sure there are registered zealots on both sides, but it is a measure of the political  malaise that Labor's progressive base is currently very quiet, and,  probably, very  silently embarrassed.

In this context, I think the Dutch Socialist Party's approach to the 1994 elections has merit.

In 1993, in order to achieve the parliamentary breakthrough, the party leadership made its most daring decision ever. Instead of telling the electorate to vote SP for a better society – worthy ideals for a distant future – the party chose a more rational and better thought out position: that of radical and effective opposition. “Vote against, vote SP” became the provocative slogan. The message being: if you don't agree with current politics, vote for us. Then we can voice your dissent in Parliament. You don't need a majority for that, even one person would do. The new strategy is symbolized by a tomato. Full of healthy vitamins, but also a feared weapon against bad political theatre -- Brief History of the SP.

This is rank populism of course. But when you review our political options, even Hugo Chavez is a dedicated and skilled populist

In the 21st century, the large numbers of voters living in extreme poverty in Latin America has remained a bastion of support for new populist candidates. By early 2008 governments with varying forms of populism and with some form of left leaning social democratic or democratic socialist platform had come to dominate virtually all Latin American nations with the exceptions of Colombia, El Salvador and Mexico.This political shift includes both more developed nations such as Brazil with its ruling Workers' Party, Argentina's Front for Victoryand Chile with its Socialist Party, and smaller income countries like Bolívia with its Movement towards Socialism and Paraguay with the Patriotic Alliance for Change. Populist candidates have been defeated in middle-income countries such as Mexico, in part by comparing them to Venezuela's controversial Hugo Chavez, whose socialist policies have been used to scare the middle class. Nevertheless, populist candidates have been more successful in poorer Latin American countries such as Bolivia (under Morales), Ecuador (under Correa) and Nicaragua (under Ortega). By the use of broad grassroots movements populist groups have managed to gain power from better organized, funded and entrenched groups such as the Bolivian Nationalist Democratic Action and the Paraguayan Colorado Party. ^*

My point is that the option of any fortunate rise -- at least in the electoral arena -- won't be driven by  ideology and that there may be an opening -- a niche -- for a foray from the left.

Of course what Australia needs is a popular coalition on the left -- but we ain't gonna to get that. Sorry. Not allowed apparently. Too many differences among the tribes...

So its' a case of making do.

How you engineer such a 'popularity' I don't know. But I do think the 'Dutch Turn' has merit just as the 'populism' of Chavez --as well  his true grit and courage -- established a platform to  begin engineering socialist transformations.

The challenge is to format a perspective that advances the notion that 'dissent' -- regardless of how popular it may be -- has to be an ongoing  and extra parliamentary activity.

In that regard, I think the Dutch SP has failed miserably since 1994...

Australia: Elected socialist's goal of `campaigning' local council gained wide support

Sam Wainwright with Justine Kamprad.

Justine Kamprad is a co-convenor of the Fremantle branch of the Socialist Alliance, in Western Australia (WA), and was the party's campaign director for the October 17, 2009, Fremantle City Council election, which saw socialist Sam Wainwright top the poll and get elected with 33.44% of the vote. Wainwright is the first member of the Socialist Alliance to be elected to public office in Australia, and one of only two socialist party members currently in an elected local council position in the country. Jim McIlroy spoke to Kamprad about the successful campaign.

* * *

What were the main aims of Sam Wainwright’s election campaign?

The main goals of the campaign were to engage the local community, and create the hope that their activism could be effective. That was a huge part of the campaign. When Sam announced he was going to run a number of people approached him about forming policy with him and actively engaging in developing community interest.

The clearest example of this is the disability rights area. There were many people who came to Sam wanting to become involved as individuals and with their organisations in writing quality policy for the Fremantle council around disability support services.

But also they had the respect for Sam as an activist who they thought they could work with to try to get that policy implemented, knowing full well that even if Sam was elected he wouldn’t hold the majority of votes on council.

The Socialist Alliance wasn’t running as a ticket to take over the council, to create a council that would be able to do all these things on behalf of people. Sam was running as a councillor to give a community voice for peoples’ campaigning, to be another tool in the campaigning arsenal in the Fremantle area.

Often we know that for all the good intentions of the councillors, sometimes policy doesn’t get voted on or isn’t exactly what people want, or it gets trapped in the bureaucracy or the committee stage.

This was about getting an activist onto council, rather that somebody who wanted to be involved in the bureaucracy.

Sam is a declared socialist, well known in the local area, and had run for the Socialist Alliance in the previous state government by-election for Fremantle. What was the structure of this campaign? Did he get support from other groups and individuals to run for the council?

Sam has been a longstanding candidate for the Socialist Alliance in the Fremantle area. He has been living in the community for about six years. He is very well known as an activist.

But in this case, there was additional support that was quite deep and came from a variety of political backgrounds. There were a number of reasons for this. One was that most people believed his campaign was winnable. And another was that they believed that Sam was a very genuine activist, non-sectarian and that he would work tirelessly for the community and its campaigns.

Sam has built up that level of credibility over a long time. Those things coming together meant that there were a number of people who would not necessarily support us in other elections who were prepared to support us this time.

Also we received a large amount of publicity during the Fremantle by-election. In some ways Sam was already a well-known public figure. During the course of the council campaign, people walked up to him in the local hardware shop and supermarket saying, “You’re that Sam guy, good on you”, and that kind of thing. So he was already well recognised when the council campaign started.

What did the local Socialist Alliance membership see as the purpose of the campaign?

As a co-convenor of Socialist Alliance, I was really supportive of Sam’s campaign, and there were a number of reasons for that. One is that to have an open socialist elected in the way that Sam was brings a degree of legitimacy to socialism in Western Australia. It brings a level of respect to all those who talk about being socialists and wear that badge quite proudly.

The other part of it is that the Socialist Alliance is genuinely engaged in campaigning in Western Australia. We believe that Sam winning this position won’t be a panacea for the various campaigns. It certainly won’t fix some campaigns that are huge on our radar like the campaign against uranium mining and export.

But what [the election result] will do is put an extra tool in the toolkit for activists to draw on and to use to further their cause.

What made the Socialist Alliance’s campaign different from other parties?

All of the policies Sam campaigned on are values the Socialist Alliance supports. In particular, in the election policy leaflet, Sam clearly stated that he was co-convenor of Socialist Alliance in Fremantle and had served on the state executive. He explained that as a trade unionist [he is a member of the Maritime Union of Australia] and as a socialist, he had learnt important skills that would help him represent the community in a positive way.

It wasn’t about saying, “I am qualified to do this job because I am a socialist”, but rather, “These are the skills that being a socialist brings me, and means that I will bring to you in supporting your campaigns.”

So the election campaign strongly supported the ideas of socialism. And for me, one of the strengths of the Socialist Alliance is that we are a collective of activists, a collective of people who want to change the world.

All the things the Socialist Alliance is fighting for, if they were fundamentally implemented, would make Fremantle a better place. And some of them would make the world a better place. And that’s what Sam’s campaign was all about.

It’s about having hope as well. It’s was about having the hope that we can campaign and that we can win by openly being who we are, as socialists. That we can speak openly to the community as socialists, not shying away from the fact.

What were the main policy planks of Sam’s campaign?

First, we said we wanted to make Fremantle a “fight climate change” council. There have been many environmental campaigns that have a strong base in Fremantle. There’s a large base of the Sea Shepherd environmental group in Fremantle. There’s also an organisation called the Fremantle Anti-Nuclear Group. They had a little bit of a break for a year or so. Unfortunately due to the election of the Liberal Party state government, there’s very much pressure on WA once again to be part of the nuclear industry.

Climate change is one of the issues around which Fremantle residents are very conscious. If Sam’s plans for council action on climate change are implemented, it will serve as a model in WA for how councils can shift to a less wasteful and more climate-friendly footing.

But it also puts responsibility on the councillors to speak out against wasteful things and negative things in terms of our environment. When someone is elected on that platform it allows him or her to engage with and help the climate movement — climate change activists — who want to make a difference.

The second plank was better public transport, including linking Fremantle to [the suburbs of] Beaconsfield, Hilton and Samson with free Central Area Transit (CAT) buses. That links in with the first policy. Public transport is one of the practical steps that we need to take in order to de-congest our roads, to stop spending the inordinate amount of money that we are now on roads and also to get people out of their cars and into public transport.

The original CAT buses were in Perth. The fundamental principle of the CAT bus is that it is a free service. There are only two such services in WA. One is the Perth Free Transit Service and the other is the CAT bus, which runs basically as a tourist service in Fremantle — and it only goes to suburbs that you have to have a lot of money to live in the first place. We should provide free public transport for the people who live in the poorer suburbs of Hilto, Hamilton and Willagee to give them more of a chance to engage in our community.

We would like the Fremantle City Council to have a look at the needs of the community, and fundamentally shift from being a car-based community to being a public transport and bicycle-based community.

Sam's campaign also focused on fighting for the rights of council and community workers. This is quite a hot topic. In the Fremantle state by-election there was a lot of debate. The outgoing mayor had been preselected for the Australian Labor Party (ALP) for the seat of Fremantle.

One of those who spoke out and urged people not to vote for him was the union that represented the employees of the Fremantle City Council, the Australian Services Union (ASU). Council workers are now on a non-union collective agreement. And some work conditions have been undermined for future workers.

The existing workforce managed to keep hold of what they had, but some provisions of the new agreement adversely affected new workers. The ASU and its members didn’t want that to go forward. They thought that it essentially meant taking [rights and conditions from] the next generation of workers. Their opposition created a large amount of conflict within the council.

Sam’s position was clearly to support the right of workers to be unionised. One of the things that he’s done since he’s been elected has been to engage with his union (the Maritime Union of Australia), and a number of other unions, to organise a community float for the Fremantle Festival, which is called “Unions: Part of the Fremantle Community”. The ASU was one of the initiators of the float. It was about putting Fremantle back on the map as a trade union town, has it has been for a long time and needs to stay that way. That we need to respect workers’ rights within our institutions.

Another big campaign issue for the Socialist Alliance was maintaining the area’s beaches, parks and green spaces for everyone. Fremantle is a beautiful place. The beaches are very nice. And there’s a lot of open community space. But there has been the move to privatise those spaces, and sell some of them off for high-density urban development. This includes the Three Harbours Project, which was trying to create a Dubai-style development in WA. Sam was involved in the campaign to stop that. But more fundamentally, we need to keep the beaches as public property — available to everyone.

For a long time Fremantle was a poor working-class area, but when people caught on to the idea that it was a beautiful place they started to move there. And unfortunately that has been a contradiction. Although we welcome people to our area, it has resulted in development pressure on beaches and so on. We want to make sure we maintain the green spaces that we do have. But not only the big ones like the beaches, but we want to maintain in our suburbs places for children to play and places for people to walk and to enjoy the green spaces when they want to.

All this makes us a more healthy community.

Next, we said council rates should be based on the ability to pay. I’m quite excited about this. We have a really massive problem in Fremantle, which is that there is a lot of land which is exempt from rates -- educational institutions, state government-owned properties and those kinds of things.

Where the state government isn’t putting in its fair share, we need to be looking at making sure that this is actually happening. And that includes land such as that owned by the Fremantle Port Authority, and other places like that. But also we need to make sure that where educational institutions are private and run for profit, that they’re not taking advantage of the rates situation.

Notre Dame University owns quite a lot of land in Fremantle’s western end, and many of the buildings there have been saved because of council orders around heritage. It is a rapidly growing institution, which is run for profit. The ironic thing is that every time Notre Dame buys another building, that undermines the council rate base. So there’s a memorandum of understanding between the council and Notre Dame University and it needs to be reviewed to make sure that it is paying at least the equivalent of business rates that would be paid by any other private profit venture.

We have a lot of long-term residents who may have bought their properties before Fremantle became a trendy place to live in. We want to make sure that those older and longer-term residents are valued and that they are encouraged to stay in the area.

I don’t think there is any magic formula in terms of rates, but it really does need to be looked at by the community, as to how we keep these people, whether it’s rate freezes, or banding like they have in England. There, they have a number of different bands, which can mean that some residents are exempt from rate rises.

Nearly all the rates in our area, whether it be Melville Council or Fremantle, have gone up much higher than inflation and we need to look at how we are going to address this problem in Fremantle.

And the last major issue we raised, a big one, is “council democracy”. As socialists we argue for more democracy. More democracy in the council arena is definitely a good thing. But what we need to do is to give the community real control over its resources, how money is spent and where it is spent, and also how we address key issues.

At present there are regular precinct meetings, which allow residents to bring up issues. But there is no binding mechanism on the council to actually address issues that are raised. We need a discussion about how we can get people more involved, and how we can bring new standards of democracy to the council. But what it is really about is encouraging activism, and valuing our activists. We need to get people speaking their minds and thinking of real solutions to the problems that we face.

Could you clarify the concept of a `campaigning council'?

It’s about saying that the council needs to more than just be a functional institution for running local government. It should have a deeper role in our community than that. One of the things the council can do is to get behind and support key campaigns that they know the Fremantle community is on board with. For example, we know that the Fremantle community is overwhelmingly against the nuclear industry and has been for a long time.

It’s not just about standing up periodically and saying we’re against the nuclear industry, but looking at a real plan for how we can support those campaigns being run by the anti-nuclear groups and deciding what the council is willing to do to prevent the expansion of the nuclear industry in WA. That’s the question that Sam will be looking closely at.

It seems ironic that the council has a formal position of being anti-nuclear, and yet there was a large uranium mining conference held here only months before the state election.

What about the campaign for Aboriginal people's rights?

There’s a large Indigenous community in the electorate, mainly in the suburb of Hilton. There is also a very vital campaign being run in regard to the death of an Indigenous elder, Mr Ward, in a prison van. It is very important that we build support for that campaign in Fremantle.

But more broadly than that, we have to look at the criminalisation of our young Indigenous people and the huge incarceration rate they suffer.

One of the things that we do need to look at is how to make positive community change. There’s the Nungar patrol that’s happened in Fremantle for a long time. Basically it’s a service to make sure that Nungar people [the local Aboriginal people] are not left on the streets, when they are vulnerable to attack. At night it helps Nungar people get home and it is also a culturally relevant service in terms of conflict resolution and so on.

Part of Sam’s campaign was to support the Nungar patrol being extended into the suburbs. It is a culturally relevant solution, rather than criminalisation.

How did this relate to Neighbourhood Watch?

Essentially, there are a layer of people in our community who are older and are frightened, and to whom law and order issues are very real. And they do feel threatened. We have to make sure that the solution that the community comes up with doesn’t just mean more criminalisation of young people. We have to actively engage in this dialogue, rather than just shut it out and say, “Oh that’s just law and order politics, and socialists just don’t do it.” It is not ok to abstain in these discussions. We want to have an open dialogue with Neighbourhood Watch that says that if there are police in our community, they have to be accountable. We have to recognise the negative role of the police, but we also have to look at ways to make our communities a better place to live in, which includes stopping the cycle of violence and criminalisation in our communities.

And if we can open that dialogue up with people who are campaigning around law and order issues, it will be a much more positive dialogue — rather than the one that tends to happen, because the mainstream media presents all of this fear-based politics.

The main solution currently offered is: if we lock everyone up, all of the community’s problems will be solved. That hasn’t worked, and we need to engage with the community members directly, to find out what the their concerns really are.

A lot of work went into the election campaign. How did it develop?

Sam and others did a lot of work during this campaign. But we did use a formula, devised by the campaign team at the start of the effort. Essentially that formula went something like this: Sam had to tell people exactly who he was, but he also had to ask people what their opinions were.

A very powerful tool that he used was to survey every household in the community, asking people what their priorities were for their community. Sam doorknocked the majority of people in the area. He held community BBQs and picnics in an attempt to find out the issues that were impacting on the community. Because there is no point saying you want to represent people if you don’t know that community, if you’re not genuinely interested in the views and concerns the community has.

Now that you have a socialist elected to the Fremantle council, what is the future for the community and the campaign for socialism?

It’s a very positive sign for socialists. There were a lot of people who said, “Look, people really like you, but this socialist thing really scares them”, or “You can’t do that if you want to get elected”.

Despite this, Sam said clearly on the front of all his leaflets that he was a socialist. He was running because he was a socialist, he was committed to left-wing principles, and if people didn’t want to vote for that, they shouldn’t vote for him.

And it was a really positive sign that he was elected. It is positive for the Socialist Alliance, but also for activists in WA. The state needs more activism. We need more people to get out on the streets and get into all these different forms of campaigning to effect some real change from the grassroots level.

Sam will be a spirited activist in favour of that form of change, and I’m sure he will lead the way in that area. I’m really excited about what he’ll be able to achieve, and what socialists in WA will be able to achieve.

There are a lot of positive lessons that socialists around Australia can learn out of the campaign. But what it clearly shows is that people aren’t afraid of socialist ideas. The community in general isn’t afraid of people campaigning on principled ideas.

One crucial idea is that capitalism has had its day. And we need to replace it with something that is more positive, more humane and more environmentally sustainable.

That a socialist could be elected in Fremantle, or anywhere, to represent that idea, and be proud to wear that badge, is a really positive change.

It’s breaking out of the idea that the inner-city “left ghettoes” of Sydney and Melbourne is where change and activism happens. It shows the outlying capitals and the regional areas have just as much to contribute in terms of conscious political change as those other places do, and just as much power to make it happen.

Red Councillors have a history in Australia

Recent electoral victories in Australia by socialists at the municipal  council level -- the Socialist Party's Stephen Jolly in Victoria and Socialist Alliance's Sam Wainwright in Western Australia -- have sparked renewed interest in the experiences of other socialists who have been elected to such bodies. With permission of the Rough Reds Collective, Links International Journal of Socialist Renewal is publishing Beverley Symons' paper that examines the example of Communist Party of Australia members elected to the Sydney City Council in the 1950s. This article first appeared in the 2003 book A Few Rough Reds, published by the Australian Society for the Study of Labour History, Canberra Region Branch.

Read more.....

Some notes on local government elections and socialist councillors

Background

The Socialist Party's Stephen Jolly was initially elected in 2004 to a Melbourne council position on 12% of the vote  but received a much  larger figure when he stood for re-election. The Socialist Alliance did better than that 12% -- without getting a candidate elected -- at the last council elections in Victoria. SA candidate,Stuart Martin,  who stood for Maribynoing City Council, received 18.9% of the vote.   Jolly's initial win was also facilitated by preference flow .

Now the left has 2 socialist activists elected to local government and both are identified as members of socialist organisations.

It is also adamantly clear to anyone that this marks a first for the Alliance.

I mean it had to happen sometime and leading up to the SA's 7th National Conference -- which will be married with the merging of the Democratic Socialist Perspective into the SA -- is a great opening to the lead up to the conference.

And SA members, around the country, are pleased. The news seems to have gone viral.

How useful is a councillor's position?

But insofar as we know, being elected to a level of government is indicative of a different political presence than what you'd garner within, say,  a trade union. I don't mean to suggest a hierarchy of engagements -- but an election campaign is usually an opportunity to strut out your stuff, and unlike trade union positions have been traditionally difficult to nail in Australia by the socialist left.

That said, in terms of a classic Marxist view of the state I think there is a qualitative difference between local government and other levels of state administration. The experience of Liverpool City Council under Militant leadership and London for a time in the 80s under Ken Livingstone suggests that these local gov't 'units' can be harnessed very effectively to advance the political struggle.

The tragedy of Australian politics is that the Greens have not done that very effectively at all as they are so often willing to be contained by electoralism.

At the local level of council you not only have a role in your local ward area in way of a certain administrative influence -- but you are also a free agent to get up to whatever mischief your position empowers you for the sake of your duty to your electorate.

At the moment, Stephen Jolly, for instance, is running a campaign to stop a new local law aimed at driving Aboriginal people from Smith St, Collingwood.

The ALP councillors I've worked with see their agency as baby kissing opportunities, dealing out largess, patronage and glad handing for the sake of photo ops while chummying up to the key local players -- real estate developers, major retail and commercial businesses,the RSL and their party's prospects at the next poll. Similarly, I've always found councillor status a great networking tool as I've used that marker to build stuff in the local community. Without councillor patronage it would have been no go and councillor support can make or break any community group. So it's a superb, almost essential, networking tool.

The challenge is to politicize it.

In effect, council level politics more or less has been used to mediate directly between the 'business community' and working people. In that sense I guess they function like a trade union but the key question is whose side are you going to be on? If you are feral in terms of the needs of capitalism then they have to organize to get you thrown out of office but have to wait 3 or 4
years before they can do so.

And if socialists in local office can move the goal posts to the advantage of community campaigns...That's fantastic.

It is also worthwhile pointing out that winning a ward and gaining attention for your outlook while serving as a councillor is often a prerequisite to doing well at the state election because your politics -- and that of your party -- is more familiar to more people in that area.

For instance, while Jolly was an out of left field candidate in 2004, he doubled his vote at the next poll.

Sam Wainwright, Socialist Alliance Councillor

Here are some photos of Sam Wainwright being sworn in as a councillor at the swearing in ceremony last night:

Also, check out all the messages of congratulations that just keep on pouring in (including from Scotland, NZ, South Africa...):

Sam Wainwright being sworn in as a Fremantle City Councillor
19 October 2009


Sam's (temporary) council name plate


Fremantle Council


Sam with campaign manager Justine Kamprad

New councillor for Hilton Sam Wainwright thanks his supporters

First socialist elected to Fremantle Council

Newly elected Hilton councillor Sam Wainwright summarised what he saw as the significance of his election to Fremantle Council, “It’s a victory for all those like me who believe that the council can and should play an active role in involving people in decision making, protecting the environment, campaigning for workers rights and making a place in the community for people who are too often left out, such as indigenous Australians or people with disabilities.”

Wainwright is a Co-convenor of Socialist Alliance in Western Australia and activist in the Maritime Union of Australia. He said, “I think I’m the first socialist elected to public office in WA for a long time, if not ever. Most candidates for council try to appeal to the middle ground and keep their political affiliations quiet. I don’t believe in that approach. I think it’s better to be upfront about your beliefs. Throughout the campaign I emphasised that I was a staunch socialist, unionist and environmentalist.”

He added, “I didn’t expect everyone to sign up to everything I stand for. But I did ask people to believe that I would be a hard working campaigner for their rights. I’m really grateful and humbled that so many people have shown their confidence in me and saw my background as a positive.”

Wainwright thanked the diverse range of people that supported his campaign, “Active support came from all sorts of places: members of Socialist Alliance, the Greens and the ALP all pitched in; many unionists and community activists helped out; and last but not least, everyday residents who don’t wear a political label but want to see the sort of change that we talked about in the campaign. The election result belongs to these people and I know that the hard work now begins.”

Commenting on the mayoral election Wainwright said, “With three different Greens members running for mayor I was worried that they would takes votes from each other and allow a more conservative candidate to win. However Brad Pettit’s win was emphatic and I extend my congratulations to him for his strong and vibrant campaign. There has been a real changing of the guard on the council and I expect there will be some passionate and intense debate about the future of Fremantle. I think this is a good thing and will be arguing my case like everyone else. At the same time I pledge to work constructively with the rest of council where we can find common ground on the way forward.”

www.samforhilton.blogspot.com

For more comment:

Sam Wainwright
21A Jarvis St
O'Connor WA 6163
08 9331 6331 or 0412 751 508
Skype: sam_and_jp
samuel.wainwright@yahoo.com.au

First election victory for the Socialist Alliance

SA wins a local government seat in Fremantle.

---

Comment:
There's sure to be a lot of lessons we can learn from this very creatively managed and pitched campaign. After doing so well at the Council elections in Victoria last year, the SA is beginning to register in the electorate.

And those on the far left -- who denigrate the project -- maybe should reconsider their stance  in regard to the Alliance.

With Stephen Jolly's win in a Melbourne council ward  in 2004, a socialist left may indeed be crawling back into political focus. If we are to assert ourselves the only way to do it is together in a spirit of unity and shared outlook.

---

Victory for Sam by 100 votes

Sam Wainwright won 438 votes (33.44%) - over 100 more votes than Sam's nearest competitor and enough to put him over the line for the Hilton Ward of Fremantle Council.

Official election results are here.

At a victory celebration last night, Sam told supporters that this victory was for the whole Socialist Alliance and the diverse supporters of his campaign. He was proud that this campaign had been successful while being fully open about his socialist, environmentalist and unionist convictions.

Sam is the first Socialist Alliance member to be elected to a local government position in Australia.

Go here to leave congratulations.

Sam Wainwright: SA for Freo

Sam Wainwright: What I Stand For

Community Activist, Socialist, Unionist

Local community activist, socialist, wharfie and unionist Sam Wainwright is standing for the Socialist Alliance in Fremantle Council's Hilton ward in October.

Download Sam's whole election flyer here.

For more information about Sam's campaign, visit his campaign blog http://samforhilton.blogspot.com, or or contact Sam on 0412 751 508.

Reconnect Samson with Fremantle City

Stock Road cuts Samson off from the rest of Fremantle, discouraging pedestrian and bicycle traffic between Hilton and Samson. We need an underpass or over-bridge across Stock Road to connect the two suburbs. We also need to campaign for better Transperth services to Samson.

Maintaining our beaches, parks and green spaces for everyone

As we build more medium and high density housing we need to maintain and even expand access to parks and other recreational space. This is why I’ve joined the campaigns against the various attempts by some developers to build on and privatise our coastline. The beaches belong to everyone.

Value older and long term residents - Rates based on ability to pay, not just house value

As property values have increased so have peoples rates. This puts an unfair burden onto pensioners, retirees and other people on modest fixed incomes who own their own homes. Like income tax, rates should be calculated on people’s capacity to pay. Let’s value older residents by making sure that fees and charges don’t price them out living in our community.

Council Democracy and Services Provision

We need to bring back all council services into council hands and stop further outsourcing to protect working conditions and services; and so residents have a say over how services are delivered.

Samson Shops

The lack of shops and community facilities in Samson has gone on too long. It’s ridiculous that people need to drive or cross busy roads to buy milk and bread. The council needs to step in and take ownership of the project.

Make Fremantle a fight climate change council

All levels of government - including Fremantle Council - need to ensure we make an urgent shift to a zero-emissions economy. Fremantle Council can help with its own infrastructure development and universal environmental standards in all new building approvals. More importantly, the council can help pressure state and federal governments to implement 100% renewable energy and free and expanded public transport. A Transperth Free Transit Zone in Fremantle and the implementation of the council bicycle plan would be a good start.

Council support for community gardens

Creating a Hilton community garden is a great idea. Let’s support communities that want to turn underutilised council and other land into community garden projects.

Hilton Precinct

The council’s done some great work in projecting how the Hilton shopping area could be transformed from a chaotic eyesore into a people friendly area, but the hurdle is the Main Roads classification of that part of South Street. This is no longer a justification because the Fremantle Eastern Bypass is not going to be built. If needed the council can organise to put public pressure on Main Roads and the State Government to get the project going.
Support rights for council and community workers

The council is an extension of the community and should set an example in workplace rights and standards. It should not use individual contracts or anti-union laws to drive down wages and conditions. The idea that this is good management that saves money is completely wrong because it undermines the working conditions of everyone in the community. Councilors have a right and responsibility to take an interest in employment conditions in our community.

Challenging the "Two-Party System"

Challenging the "Two-Party System"
How far can we go?

A public forum to discuss the Fremantle election result and the prospects for building a workers' alternative to Labor.

Speakers:
Adele Carles (Greens member for Fremantle)
Les McLaughlin (CEPU Electrical division state secretary)
Sam Wainwright (Socialist Alliance state co-convenor)

Tues 30 June
6.30pm, Fremantle Education Centre
(cnr Cantonment & Parry Sts, Fremantle - next to Clancy's)

Entry by donation. Ph 9218 9608, 0412 751 508.
www.socialist-alliance.org

The European election results and the British far left

Now that the significance of the EU electoral debacle has set in the outcry is strident. Even Lenin's Tomb ( situated in the SWP camp)has had enough. Phil Hearse offers a straight talking analysis in a piece aptly titled If this debacle doesn’t wake up the British Left, absolutely nothing will.

As Lenin writes:We fluffed it, boys and girls. It has been obvious for some time that a fundamental crisis of social democracy was brewing, and that this was going to be deeper than ever before, and that nothing the left could do - even if it was so deranged as to want this - could rescue it. We watched a yawning political vacuum open up and, due to our shibboleths, totems and taboos, our inward-lookingness, our traditions of feuding, and many other flaws, we failed to fill it.Elections are not the be all and end all, and ultimately what will matter far more than such votes will be what we do between elections. But this was one important way for us to assert ourselves in this crisis, and we handed the initiative to everyone but the radical left. I am not saying we should hammer ourselves over the head repeatedly with such facts, but I think it would be healthy to begin by acknowledging them and resolving never to let that happen again.

On similar lines:

Phil Hearse points out: The outcome of the county council and Euro elections means that the British left – the left to the left of New Labour – has to wake up and break out of its dire sectarian, bureaucratic and factional mindsets. Nothing is more shameful than the lack of of united left slate, around a minimal set of demands in the interests of the working class, in these elections. The near-absence of the Left from the electoral field was one important reason – though far from the only one – that such a large number of the protest votes against the main parties went to the hard right UKIP and the fascist BNP. It is shameful that the Left abandons so much of the electoral field to the far right because of nothing more than hardened, bone headed, factional idiocy – topped off by bureaucratic exclusions and anathemas

.
Locally , Duroyan Fertl has a sharp analysis of the results here in the GLW elist.

The tragedy is that the British far left has had years of hard Labour to get its proverbial shit together and has cynically squandered it.

Which part of that do they not understand?

Even the initiative for the No2REU package had to come from outside the main socialist left orgs. Crappy program. Formed late in the show. But hey, it's something ....!

I don't mean to suggest that regrouping the left is a walk in the park. The Australian experience has been very difficult to negotiate (see:Uniting the Socialist Left: the Australian Experience for a review)

But at least we've been able here to keep our eyes on the prize and rather than wank on about unity and collective action, actually work at the coal face creating a small beginning pointed in that direction. Our task has often been handicapped by the very same political myopia that infects the English left -- a myopia that the UK left exports via a distribution network of various toy international franchises.

But will or can the English left change its spots?

See also:

• "We need a Left of combat, not a Left of co-administration:.." -- French NPA on the European Elections
• Socialist wins European seat in Dublin
• Sample results: Scotland (SSP proscribed from No2EU)
• Irish SWP call for left unity after Joe Higgins elected as MEP

"Our" democracy -- the QLD example

200 000 Queenslanders with no political representation

Media Release Friday 3 April 2009

As counting for the Queensland elections is being finalised the Queensland Greens are set to receive a record number of almost 200,000 primary votes.

The Queensland Greens say that the result proves that they are clearly the third force in Queensland politics and that it is a travesty that the Queensland electoral system has denied them any representation in the parliament.

‘Any fair system would have given representation to such a large body of voters. It is time the state considered electoral reform to bring it in line with the other states and territories,’ Queensland Greens spokesperson Libby Connors said today.

Under Queensland’s unicameral, single-member electoral system, the ALP which has won 42.28% of the vote is going to take more than half the seats in the new parliament. Under a proportional system they would be entitled to 38 seats but are set to take 51 seats.

The LNP with 41.57% of the vote is expected to win only 34 seats, whereas under a proportional system they would be entitled to 38. Independents, who are likely to take 4 seats, would be entitled to 5.

‘The Queensland Greens on 8.37% would have won 8 seats if Queensland had a proportional system along the lines of every other state and the Australian Capital Territory,’ according to spokesperson Libby Connors.

‘The unfairness of the system is further highlighted if we look at the figures for Brisbane. In the five inner city electorates of Brisbane Central, South Brisbane, Mt Coot-tha, Indooroopilly and Yeerongpilly, 25 526 people voted for the Greens, equivalent to one whole electorate, but they will have no Greens to represent their interests in the Queensland Parliament.’

Socialist Alliance contests Fremantle by-election

Union activist, waterside worker, community campaigner and former Young Labor leader named as Socialist candidate for Fremantle by-election

The Socialist Alliance is pleased to announce that its candidate in the May 16 Fremantle by-election will be Sam Wainwright. Wainwright, aged 38 is a wharfie, member of the Maritime Union of Australia and activist in the Fremantle Community Solidarity group.

Wainwright is a former member of the ALP and was Secretary of Young Labor in Tasmania where he grew up. He commented, “Both the Liberals and Labor are loyal servants of big business. Liberal plays tough cop while Labor plays soft cop. It’s long overdue that we have a discussion in this country about creating a 100% pro-worker, pro-environment and pro-community political force. That’s what we want to do in this election.”

As a waterside worker Wainwright is particularly passionate about the environmental, planning and social challenges relating to Fremantle Port. He said, “Because the Fremantle Port Authority like Western Power was corporatised, it functions like any other profit hungry business at the expense of its workers and the community it is supposed to serve. Witness its ludicrous ING property development which has nothing to do with running a port.”

He continued, “The corporatisation of state government owned instrumentalities must be reversed. The CEOs should be removed and replaced with boards elected by the community and people that work there, and state government representatives. Let the community decide what hazardous cargoes they are prepared to have loaded there, how the port should be developed and so on.”

He went further, “Stevedoring operations should also be taken out of the hands of private operators and assumed by the state as well. It’s long overdue that we reverse all the privatisation that has taken place and expand the state sector.”

Wainwright explained, “In order to confront the challenges of the recession and halt global warming, vital sectors of the economy such as transport, telecommunications, power and mining need to be nationalised and community controlled. Without this we will simply not be able to protect peoples’ living standards or save the planet. Look at the Pacific Brands debacle and Kevin Rudd’s worse than useless emissions trading scheme. Yet to my knowledge Socialist Alliance will be the only party advocating this course.”

On global warming he said, “We are committed to the campaign to convert Australia’s power generation to 100% renewables by 2020. This means no expansion of coal fired power at Collie. Instead this must be rapidly phased out and the region developed as a centre for the production of renewable energy technologies.”

For more comment contact Sam Wainwright 0412 751 508 or fremantle@socialist-alliance.org

In praise of A frames on campaign stalls

sBy Dave Riley

A Very Public Sociologist has a charming post on campaign stalls. It's nice to know that on the planet there are still others who do politics as we do, week in week out, behind each cover of Green Left Weekly.

On the Activist Toolkit wiki I had worked up an entry on How to run a campaign stall and AVPS entry into the discussion has tweaked my interest in trying to explore such hardware as A frames.

This may seem a touch obsessive. Who wants to discuss A-frames?

Well, here we've just finished with the state election campaign and A frames were our most useful item of paraphernalia. If your sign is made from corflute -- corrugated plastic -- it's light, extremely portable and stands out visually at some distance . The Socialist Alliance has been exploring and creating corflute signs for a few years and while they are usually associated with real estate agents and main stream party electioneering -- we reuse these over and over again by attaching new graphics and slogans to them.

We even recycle other peoples corflutes which we come across or purchase from recyclers -- so that you are just as likely to find the ALP insignia and sundries on the hidden side of our corflute and our politics on the other.

While we have tended to use newspaper grill A-frames , what we really need is some one with carpenter knowledge and skills to bang together a dozen A frames in pine. These are simple affairs, hinged at the top with a light (preferably cotton) rope holding the bottom frames apart at such a distance as will create an A frame lean of about 70 degrees.

So if you are bored at home with nothing to do and you have a workshop sitting there idle -- get in touch with your local SA and start producing those very light A frames out of pine.

You could bash together maybe 5 in an hour.

If anyone has an easy to follow DIY description of how to build these please let me know ASAP and I'll publish the blueprint.

A frames in use. Foreground A frame is a newspaper style metal frame. It looks ugly and is designed to hold paper posters and signs rather than corflute. One at the back ("For the millions...") is a pine wood A framed. These are much easier to use and adapt for different uses and are more stable Although you have to screw, tape , tie or staple the corflute to the frame..Cut off to right i in the bottom of the picture is a black, metal, commercial A frame which is the heaviest of the lot.

Queensland state election 2009 : my provisional post mortem

By Dave Riley

I can't read the ALP result in terms of making a conclusion about how they managed to hold onto enough seats to keep government almost comfortably, albeit with a reduced margin.This was the flattest and most boring election imaginable and I doubt anyone got excited about any aspect of it.

The boredom impacted on the Socialist Alliance campaign too but we still managed to mobilise comrades and supporters to staff the booths in the two electorates 16 kilometres apart. There was an actual blackout of coverage for alternate parties as there was too much money to be made from the massive LNP and ALP investment in newspaper and other media advertising. This extended to the local 'community' press.

While this neglect helps to explain the weak alternate vote a more potent factor was probably the way the vote for Labor was shored up in the last week of the campaign because of the general fear that the ALP could lose government. Because of that protest voting was stifled to some degree.

The Greens probably will not get Ronan Lee up in Indooroopilly -- their big chance to enter state parliament in their own right. Lee , a MP, left the ALP in October last year and joined the Greens. His final vote hangs on postal votes. The Greens had preferenced the ALP in 14 seats so that they' could secure ALP preferences for Lee. However the Greens stood in all 89 seats for the first time (there in no upper house in QLD) by , in most cases, parachuting names onto the ballot across the state.

So how did the Alliance candidates fair?

SANDGATE: Mike Crook (SA)

• STILLER, Kevin 396 1.85%
• SKELTON, Keith GRN 1,756 8.19%
• CROOK, Mike 313 1.46%
• GAFFEL, Lenard LNP 6,981 32.55%
• GRUNDY, Mark FFP 455 2.12%
• DARLING, Vicky ALP 11,549 53.84%
  

We had not stood in this seat before and will be following the campaign up by forming a local Socialist Alliance branch. We were in fact aiming for 1% result. There is a Greens branch in the area but we had more booth workers mobilised than they.

SOUTH BRISBANE : Sam Watson (SA)

• ROSBOROUGH, Derek 102 0.56%
• BLIGH, Anna ALP 8,849 48.41%
• RENDELL, David DSQ 225 1.23%
• HAINES, Merilyn 337 1.84%
• WATSON, Sam 276 1.51%
• KANE, Gary GRN 3,181 17.40%
• CARROLL, Mary LNP 5,055 27.66%
• COATES, Matt 28 0.15%
• MARTIN, Greg 225 1.23%
  

We've usually stood across the river in Brisbane Central. Initial figures suggest that in South Brisbane the Greens result fell from their last share of 21.49% probably due in part to the number of candidates
standing rather and that it was the premier's seat.

Its' also clear that Sam Watson's profile as an indigenous rights activist wasn't enough in South Brisbane to separate him more from the pack, especially the other 5 Independents .

The Socialist Alliance vote -- still small -- is nonetheless holding as ours has to be a very conscious choice by these hundreds who Vote 1 for us as we aren't listed as Socialist Alliance on the ballot paper because we are not registered in Queensland. Since we didn't scrutineer we don't know what sort of second preference trend we may have received.

While I was mainly involved in the Sandgate campaign I think we did a lot of exciting and creative stuff there in the very short campaign period that was open to us. When you only have your own resources of money, tools and labour it's a challenge of how you decide to deploy them. I think the highlights for me have been:

1. Sunday markets-- wonderful opportunity to place our politics in front of an audience in an atmosphere that is conducive to two way chat. Our weekly stall (from 6am) has been a great way to begin to connect with the community in a way no other local party has tied to do.
2. Leafletting railway stations. We did each of the five stations twice (in two weeks) capturing the morning peak traffic from 6am. No opportunity to chat of course in that situation but our literature boarded the trains.
3. Corflute pickets. This is an absolute corker. Parking yourself with corflute signs on the road side at a high profile location during peak rush hour times. Very effective technique honed by the local YRatW campaign.
4. Letter boxing is always hard to monitor. I think that we needed to put in something like 40 hours to leaflet the whole electorate and in the end we ran out of our flyer print run.

And in one very self conscious sense we see our methods of engaging people as a continuation of the Your Rights at Work campaign in the area.

Total Formal First Preference Vote by Party (As of close of counting):

• Australian Labor Party ALP 779,427 42.69% [ALP final vote in2006: 1,032,617 46.92% ]
• Liberal National Party 749,970 41.07%
• The Greens GRN 150,359 8.23% [Greens final vote in 2006: 175,798 7.99 %]
• Daylight Saving Party 18,410 1.01%
• Family First Party FFP 14,877 0.81 %
• One Nation ONP 7,298 0.40 %
• Other Candidates 105,519 5.78%
  

With the formation of the LNP in July and the fall of the Howard government in 2007 there was much less ideological traction for a One Nation reincarnation. One Nation's peak was the 1998 Queensland state election, at which the party won 22.7% of the vote and 11 of the 89 seats. Inasmuch as that reflected a rejection of Labor as well as the Coalition parties, maybe the election of the Rudd government federally and the shallow options on offer at this poll has kept that ALP's soft edge from being so mercurial as it was in 1998 and deserting the party for racist populism.

Party	Seats Contested (2009)	Seats Contested (2006)
Australian Labor Party	89	89
Liberal National Party	88	89†
The Greens	89	75
DS4SEQ	32	N/A
Family First	25	26
One Nation	2	4
Independents & Others	72	46

Note the number of "Independents & Others".

What changed for the main parties?

Party		Labor	Liberal National
Last election		59 seats	25 seats
Seats won		53	32
Seat change		–6	+7

See also:Related posts

• Election diary: on the hustings in the Queensland state election
• The Queensland Election: the prospect of a Labor loss surprizes no one
• The Queensland state election