2014-08-25
Chris Johansen
As MC Chilla Bulbeck pointed out, the #BustTheBudget campaign was the first substantial campaign conducted by WA Greens outside of a regular election campaign.
Ogy Simic, overall campaign coordinator, updated progress achieved over the previous seven weeks of the campaign — some 2540 doors had been knocked and 1300 phonebank calls made, resulting in contact with a total of more than 10,000 people. Campaigners were present at various markets, university open days, Centrelink offices and rallies (eg March in July).
Although still being tallied, more than 5000 signatures were gathered on the petition protesting the Abbott government's first budget. This nationwide petition will be presented to federal Parliament when it resumes at the end of August, to emphasise community unease with this budget.
Scott Ludlam briefly appeared out of the ether — via Skype — thanking all involved and reiterating the importance of face-to-face contact with voters. He pointed out that WA Greens continue to poll high after their record result in April's Senate re-run. Chilla then gave a flavour of some of the conversations, elucidating the personal concerns of individuals relating to the various budget measures.
Rachel Siewert provided an insight into happenings in the Senate in its previous session, the first with the newly elected senators. She summed it up as 'chaos', particularly with respect to actions of the new cross-benchers — eg unsure about which side of the floor to go to in Senate votes. Rachel also pointed out that she'd had an opportunity to ascertain which of the government's measures individual cross-benchers may oppose – an important strategy for busting the budget.
She indicated that The Greens had already punched some holes in the budget via amendments to, or outright refusal of, various budget measures. Examples included retaining the taxable income threshold, the school kids' bonus, low income super payment and supplement, etc.
Also, Senate enquiries have been set up to examine proposed attacks on welfare and rising income inequality. Rachel has sensed widespread public discontent with this budget, and that increasing numbers of people are looking to The Greens to do something about it.
At the end of the meeting some Noongar people gave an insight into their overwhelming discontent with the existing political system. Examples included the ineffectiveness of government funding for indigenous wellbeing, the failure of “Native Title” and extreme incarceration rates. They compared themselves with the inhabitants of Gaza. While charging all Coalition and Labor governments with complete failure in this regard, they questioned what The Greens could and would do.
Rachel pointed out some of the areas where the Greens were indeed addressing these problems. However, there seems to be great scope for sitting down with representative groups of indigenous people to really understand how they view the way forward, rather than continuing with top-down approaches, such as the Andrew Forrest Report.