Australia’s election result
Posted on 23 August 2010
A hung parliament.
Is that a gallows metaphor? Is it equine in origin? Or is something that you do to dead meat?
Either which way, sounds like we could be headed for the abbatoir.
One intriguing development from the Australian election is that the Greens polled over 10% of the primary votes. They will not only have the balance of power in the upper house, Labor needs their support to form a minority government (assuming Labor can get there – which is no certainty). It’s as if Australia has taken a large step towards the European political balance (and away from the US model).
This is not a bad thing if the Greens get it right. For example, it is likely that sometime in the not-too-distant-future the government will be called upon to spend large sums to support the domestic economy. If we are going to have a whole lot of new roads, bridges and housing developments, then having them built with an eye to how it impacts our longer term living standards has got to be a good thing.
The rise of the Greens in Australia as indicative of more than impatience with the major parties. For the first time since Thatcherism and Reagonomics were in vogue, the electorate has signalled that the myopic short-termism that has become entangled with free-market politics is on the nose.
2 responses to Australia’s election result
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“if the Greens get it right” – you’d have to say that’s a fairly large “if”. I’ve seen no signs so far of any Aussie Green understanding how economies work & how not to break them.
Point taken.
I guess what I’m really interested in understanding is what aspect of the Green’s brand that 1.5m Australians voted for. My sense is that the Green’s bring a longer term context. Wonder what the demographics of the Green’s votes were?