Hands up who can name a politician who hasn't a) been involved in a scandal b) said something daft or c) walked around in budgie smugglers. I'm suspecting that not many hands were held aloft there and that is a problem. Politics here in Australia is all focused on image rather than policy which looking back at the previous three prime ministers can confirm this notion.
Politics should be about debating the issues facing our nation but time and again, question time sitting for the first time since the change of government descended into a primary school playground with all the name calling that prompted the two party leaders needed to come together to settle it down.
The farcical opening to the new parliament is another salvo in a constant stream of negative commentary in our political landscape. The focus is always on the negative while the positive aspects are downplayed.
It extends to our policy, if there isn't sufficient debate around an issue – what emphasis does this give our leaders to put them up for this debate. Mark Fletcher underlines this point with his article on Guy Fawkes day.
Fletcher continues saying “governments have discovered that they don’t need to discuss, negotiate, or persuade” the general public of issues and looking at the main issues that dominated the last election and it was marriage equality and stopping the boats. Both are important issues in our society, there are other issues that deserve to be debated.
Politicians bank on this fact though – where there should be outrage or heated discussion on new bills being introduced there is an “an eerie silence from a public that is disaffected” continues Fletcher and it is hard to disagree with his point.
We as a general public, outside activists and those who are engaged in politics just seem to accept the laws that are passed then we all get outraged. People love to take to social media to express their outrage at these laws that pass right under their nose.
Through our acceptance of the apathetic nature towards the general public gives us the result we had in the last election which was a landslide towards Tony Abbott and his coalition. Question most Australians though about why they voted for him, mostly returned responses of “he's not Julia Gillard/Kevin Rudd,”; “Labor has had their chance”; or my favourite “he isn't labor.”
Now we as a nation have given Tony Abbott the reigns to our country – thus far he hasn't had to do much groundwork due to the manner of his election victory. He has played it safe because he won't get much opposition from the public due to the ambivalence born of our apathy.
If the trend continues of public apathy towards our leaders, the conversation will disappear from our society with governments doing the minimal amount of effort to get their point across before introducing the law.
I'll finish on a final point from Fletcher's article, “achieving good political outcomes is more than just getting your legislation into force.” Our current apathy hurts Tony Abbott as much as it does labor because without being pushed he won't be spurred on to try and push through things to help improve the country. So the message is to start the conversation and get involved to keep our politicians on their toes.
