2014-11-03
Christine Cunningham
With National Conference just a week away, and where the elections for the new leaders of our party will be decided, this article marks my final communication with you all as co-convenor of the Australian Greens. It has been a great privilege to serve in this role for consecutive terms and while I have learned a great deal from my time in the role, I hope in turn I have been able to contribute significantly to the development and growth of our party.
I am very proud to have been one of the first co-convenors in the party and am hopeful of the likelihood that we will soon see the joint party leadership role become enshrined in our constitution. Sharing the role first with Ben Spies-Butcher and then with Penny Allman-Payne has been inspirational because of their collaborative natures, depths of intelligence and their awesome capacities for hard work. The convenorship has grown to an almost full-time role, so a team effort has become essential. Each week we are expected to keep abreast of all the happenings in our national party's organisational structures; line-manage national staff; facilitate countless working groups and committees; write reports and articles; liaise with our parliamentarians and their staff; and put out any spot fires that unfortunately arise sometimes in a party of this size and complexity.
With all this work expected in the role, it is perhaps unsurprising that many ex-convenors take a long sabbatical from party work after their term is complete. Others have continued on as active party members, a few have gone on to become parliamentarians for our party and sadly at least one has left the Australian Greens. I pay my deep respects to the convenors of the last decade whose contributions to the party have been fundamental in making our party what we are today: Andrea Millsom, Derek Schild, Adam Bandt, Alison Xamon, Karen Cassidy, Juanita Wheeler, Stewart Jackson and Paul Petit. Into the future, I look forward to seeing a diverse selection of new members take up the mantle and I dearly hope we can find a way to offer a stipend for office bearers so that others who are not in such a privileged position in society as me will be more able to take on this tireless but ever so rewarding role.
As for me, well, I write this article from my hotel room in Jinhua, China. I am here delivering an intensive teaching program in a Masters of Educational Leadership to 60 Chinese principals and directors of schools and other training institutes. Outside my room, the air is thick with pollution which reminds me so vividly why I must continue to advocate for our environment and good governance but now perhaps in a different way. For those who know me well, I am enjoying unleashing my creative side and I plan to concentrate on teaching and researching to change the world through the mediums of dance and music. If last night's Chinese welcome ceremony is any indication, global understanding is far more likely when fun, singing and imbibing are all enjoyed together…
As a long time sci-fi and fantasy fan, and of course as a Green who is worried about our planetary survival, I end here with a quote from Douglas Adam's poignantly funny dolphin song, “so long, and thanks for all the fish…”
[Editor's note: Penny Allman Payne will continue her tireless work with the Greens as the Convenor of the Queensland Greens; she is also re-nominating as co-convenor of the Australian Greens alongside Greens WA co-convenor Giz Watson.]