Groundhog day as some media indulge in anti-Green spin

I nearly choked on my kangaroo curry the other night watching the commercial television news anchor ask viewers: "Who is running this government?"

This question was posed in an introduction to a story about the Greens announcing the Renewable Energy Agency, prior to the Carbon Tax announcement.

Several other mainstream media outlets parroted Tony Abbott's lines in similar fashion, parading for all their ignorance about Australia's multi-party democracy and some reporters' lazy willingness to let Mr Abbott write their news copy.

I don't know why I was so shocked.

When I worked for the Australian Democrats at the peak of their popularity with "nine senators in 1999," some sections of the media were similarly outraged at the temerity of a minor party for being so damned effective and popular.

Who did we think we were? Legitimately elected political representatives or something?

I thought that over a decade later more members of the media might be more literate about the democracy we live in, which is based on proportional representation and gives all Australians the right to be represented in the National Parliament.

That means that the party representing around 13 per cent of Australians has the right to vote, negotiate with the major parties and independents and make policy and legislative announcements when and how they see fit.

That means, Seven News, I am speaking to you now, that in a multi-party democracy, all elected representatives, including the National Party supported by fewer than five per cent of Australians and the Liberal National Party (LNP), supported by fewer than 10 per cent, and the Greens, supported by almost 13 per cent, all have a right to act as elected representatives.

The party that forms government does not get to tell the other elected representatives what to do, how to vote, when to make announcements or how to act, particularly when the party that forms government does not have an outright majority.

There are these things called 'the cross benches' and the members of parliament who sit on them represent actual voters and the government of the day, and ideally the media has to respect that.

It's not a totalitarian system.

So when the Greens announced the Australian Renewable Energy Agency prior to the Carbon Tax announcement, it does not mean the Greens were trying to, in the words of Tony Abbott and several commercial newsreaders, "run the government" or "guzump Julia Gillard."

It means the Greens were being effective negotiators on behalf of the sizable proportion of Australians who voted for them and they were announcing a policy win.

This initiative, delivering billions of dollars for renewable energy projects, on top of the stunning 2010 election result delivering a four per cent swing, indicates that the Greens may enjoy as long a run or longer as that enjoyed by the Australian Democrats for over 25 years.

Compared to the Democrats, the Greens have more union support, better youth appeal, about as many potential prima donnas, less political experience, and a charismatic leader who is highly unlikely to defect to the ALP.

Nevertheless, their media team needs to be more effective at counter-spinning with the Canberra Press Gallery heavyweights, because the anti-minor-party line is prevailing and there is a perception that the Greens are wielding power without a mandate.

The Greens are still 'green' at running national Senate election campaigns and tend to over-focus on pet issues like Coal Seam Gas which, while worthy, do not deliver large amounts of votes. While CSG is an important issue upon which to campaign, at election times progressive minor parties need to focus their campaign efforts in the areas where those progressive votes are to be harvested (the professional, youth and education sectors and the leafy suburbs).

However, if the party continues on current form, the next election is looking good with the Greens on track to win a second senate seat in at least two states to become the most successful minor party in Australian history.

It reflects badly on journalists and commentators who run the Opposition line that minor parties have no legitimate rights to be major players in our parliamentary democracy. It makes those journalists and commentators look like they need to go back to school to study 'Political Institutions 101' so they can get their heads around what most voters already know.

Australia is not, and has not been for decades, a two-party political system and old school members of the media who struggle with that are going to have to come to terms with the political reality.

The evidence suggests that the voters and Julia Gillard already have.