State Elections

The Victorian State Elections are being held this coming weekend, so this is a timely rave on the political situation in this state.

The two main contenders are the Liberal Party and the current incumbent Labour Party. The Labour leader is the bland Steve Bracks, a sort of non-threatening kind of guy. He’s quite popular with the electorate, though the rednecks in the regional areas think he is too Melbourne-centric and object to his policies regarding energy conservation and bans on logging and cattle grazing in various sensitive areas.

Being a State public servant, I’d prefer that Labour get re-elected. The last Liberal Government totally decimated the public service as well as selling off most of the State's assets, like the gas and electricity services. They also privatised public transport and closed schools and hospitals. So I will definitely not be voting Liberal, and wouldn’t in any case being a die-hard leftist.

The Liberal leader Ted Baillieu comes from a wealthy background. He’s quite a toff, though bland at the same time. He’s been going around demonstrating what an all-round regular guy he is, plunging into the surf for a swim, rocking it up in a band, while Bracksy is filmed reading stories to children in kindergartens.

It’s all been a bit of laugh, this election campaign, the lavish promises of both parties failing to impress me. Who cares, is the general consensus.

As I live in a solid Labour electorate, I can be fanciful in my choice of candidate. The current representative for my electorate has hardly set foot in the place since being placed in office. She’s retiring (ho hum) and another female candidate will be contesting in her place. Fiona someone or other...

As you no doubt gather, I’m disenchanted with Australian politics at the moment. There appears to be hardly any difference between the major parties. Federally, I don’t think Labour has a hope of winning unless they ditch the current leader Kim Beasley, who has been around so long – and has lost every election where he has been leader of the opposition – that the populace fail to hear or indeed comprehend any of his policies, which, in any case, are only slight variations on the Liberal policy. A new face to the fore would do wonders for the party’s chances, as long as they aren’t loopy like the last new face - Mark Latham - who went to pieces when he lost the last election.

Roll on Saturday – I will use my right to vote as wisely as I can.