Senator Andrew Bartlett
Wednesday, September 01, 2004
 
A Not Crowded House & Senate, Cats & Dogs, Preferences & Drugs, Steak & Vegies, Rodents & Ducks

Tuesday was the 2nd full day of the election campaign (that technically hasn't really started as the Parliament wasn't formally prorogued until 5pm). For some reason proroguing is signified by firing a bunch of military guns - maybe it symbolises that a bunch of politicians are about to get shot down at the election?

The day starts with opinion polls and the usual "how do you predict the party will perform" questions. I know the party will perform well during the campaign and I know we have a good case to put, good policies and a good record, but I only get one vote and there's a fair few million other people out there who I haven't spoken to in the last day or so, so it's a bit hard to predict. The show is on the road and no one knows what the result will be, particularly with the last couple of senate seats in each state, and no one will know until the night of October 9th (at the earliest). However, I predict the sun will rise on October 10th and that will certainly be a good thing (better than if it didn’t anyway).

Cats & Dogs
The day also started with questions about a Liberal MP who referred to quarantining cats and dogs coming into Australia as an attempt to draw an analogy for why you have to detain refugees. I'm sure it was partly a case of foot in mouth that strikes us all occasionally where a half formed thought starts coming out wrong and by the time the thought is fully formed it's a bit too late to reword things - it doesn't happen too often and you always hope there's no tape recorders around when it does.

My understanding is that the Liberal MP in question is one of the more reasonable in her views about refugees, which in some ways is why she made such a terrible and grossly inappropriate analogy - not because she's a bad person but because it's very hard to find a sensible way of justifying the unjustifiable and if you have to try to do it, you can grasp at some pretty desperate straws.

The simple fact is mandatory, indefinite detention is unjustified and unjustifiable, which is why no other democratic country does it. Mandatory detention is so inherently offensive, which is why it's so hard to try to justify it without sounding offensive.

Preferences & Drugs
A rare joint press conference with Bob Brown from the Greens followed. Many progressive people often wish the Democrats and Greens wouldn't criticise each other so much, but it's pretty hard not to conduct an election campaign without differentiating yourself from the other contestants and that involves showing why you're better. It's no coincidence that no party has ever run on the slogan "Vote for the other mob if you want, they’re just as good" (or if they have they sure didn’t get elected). However today was about saying 'each of us are saying we're better than the other, but for God's sake at least make sure you don't for those major parties (especially in the Senate). Well we didn’t actually say that, but that's the general message. Vote Democrat or vote Green, but give your preference to the other before Labor or Liberal.

The press conference turned into a feisty session about the Greens' drugs policy, where I finally got asked another question on preferences - as in whether I'd ever had a preference for an illegal drug. I said I hadn't ever used an illegal drug, but I didn't condemn anyone who did. Bob said he'd inhaled once, which didn't bother me obviously. However he also said he ate steak, which caused me more concern.

Steak & Vegies
It was rather ironic that the Greens were being attacked in the paper for (among other things) encouraging vegetarianism and Bob was defending himself by inviting people to have a steak with him, whilst I was sitting next to him as the main 'out and proud' vegetarian in the Parliament.

Actually, I've always wondered why environment groups are so weak on encouraging a reduction in meat consumption - it's bugged me for years as the facts are so clear that meat production is far more consuming of resources than production of most other foods and it's such an easy thing to do to cut down your meat consumption. About the only group I know that does well in combining environmentalism with animal welfare is the Humane Society International - not sure what's wrong with the rest of them.

It seems strange to campaign against cutting down trees but do nothing to point out that heaps of trees get cut down to grow meat (either for grazing or to grow grain to feed to cattle). However, none of the other Democrat Senators are vegetarians either (much to my chagrin), so obviously my powers of persuasion still need some fine tuning.

Other policies released today – the Government pledged to misdirect another billion dollars towards military hardware that doesn't properly address our real defence and security needs. The ALP released their accountability policy, promising to introduce a range of measures to make Parliament work better, many of which the democrats have been pushing for years and some of which the Labor party has opposed in the Senate.

It's always good to see more pledges for greater accountability, but I'll believe it when I see it. Of course there's a better chance I will see it if there's more Democrats elected to the Senate so we can force more accountability. The big parties always like that extra accountability once it's there. It's a bit like feeding a kid vegies - they think it'll taste awful, but once they taste it they know it's good for them (and they'll be far less healthy without them).

Rodents & Ducks
Just when it seemed the day would finish predictably and I would struggle for any more ways to draw a link to vegetarianism or animals, up pops an exclusive on Channel Nine news - a Liberal Senator is accused of calling the Prime Minister a lying rodent! It's a perfect example of how you never know what twist an election campaign can take from one hour to the next. Suddenly the Lib Senator has to spend the evening doing media (and no doubt a bunch of phone calls) denying he's ever called the Prime Minister anything of the sort.

In another piece of unpleasant irony (unpleasant for the Liberal Senator anyway) that politics seems to specialise in, the same Senator would otherwise undoubtedly have spent his evening preparing for the Senate Committee hearing the next day where his main task is to defend the Prime Minister against other people who want to suggest he's a lying rodent.

Knowing the Senator as I do, I'm sure he'll still do a good job defending the Prime Minister in the Committee hearing. However, Wednesday's Committee hearing will reveal all (well actually it will probably only reveal some of it and people will contest the veracity of that, but it will certainly help create a more complete picture for people.

I finish the day having dinner with a few people discussing the Senate, the Democrats, housing and a range of other issues. During some casual banter, I try to prove my value as an enjoyable dinner companion by make a fleeting reference to the immense cruelty that intensively farmed ducks suffer to the fellow across the table (who by an amazing coincidence happened to be eating duck). He agrees to watch the video of a duck farm that I promise to send him and I promise to think more about how to get better policies developed with housing related matters.

That's what I call a win-win outcome (although now that I think of it, he only said he'd be happy for me to send him the video, he never promised to watch it - some people are just so tricky with words).

The Government is now officially in caretaker mode. About time they started caring about something. The dawning day will see more about honesty, truth, trust and accountability (including the Democrats' accountability package - way better than the ALP's if I do say so myself. I wonder if they left in my section about the link between better accountability and vegetarianism).

Check it all out and more on the Democrats' website - www.democrats.org.au

posted by Andrew Bartlett @ Wednesday, September 01, 2004
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