Capitalising on 'me-tooism'

It was inconsistent with the spirit of the occasion but highly consistent with the spirit of opposition for its own sake. Strategically it won him no friends. Further it will serve to weaken his credibility at the table when he meets with Rudd to thrash out a bi-partisan way forward. Yet he will still be at the table.

Our political duopoly is likely to persist delivering poor quality outcomes for some time to come unless there is some form of circuit breaker applied to the system. The emergence of a few Independents has been touted as a possible solution. Yet there is no indication that any of the minor parties will make substantive in roads into the political landscape any time soon.

And what if they do? It could be argued we run the risk of rendering a rather dysfunctional system more so. A hostile Senate manipulated by a few lucky independents has little to recommend it. Or worse still we could end up with a lower house run by cobbled-together coalitions forming and reforming like partners on a square dance floor.

In spite of their protestations the parties agree on so much in principle. Why not exploit that fact and harness the energy wasted on bickering about the detail? Invest that energy in developing long term bi-partisan policies on health, education, the environment and defence, for example.

Some may say it is simplistic for me to say that our common national objectives can be described as a desire for better health, better education, a better environment and a sound system of defence to protect our national interest, to list just a few. I am sure the more pedantic political animals reading this are chortling away at my naiveté. They might be right. But what’s wrong with simple?

With that in mind what is wrong with using the time we have to ask our leaders to give serious thought to moving towards a more consensual and participative way in which to achieve those aspirations? Kevin Rudd’s’ meeting of the minds is the perfect occasion to rethink our government processes. As a nation we have nothing to lose.

Unless you subscribe to some doomsday theory we have plenty of is time. Why don’t we use some of it to look for a better way of governing our selves that really reflects the will of the people and not merely that of the politicians?