Political Parties

Political parties with more than 500 members include the Australian Sex Party, the HEMP Party, the Shooters and Fishers Party, and the Communists.

Family First could probably muster 500 members from a single mega-church.

But the Australian Democrats, once the third force in Australian politics, are being threatened with deregistration because the Australian Electoral Commission says its national membership has fallen below the 500 threshold.

Continue reading "Are the Democrats dying or is it just a flesh wound?" »

Once upon a time, in city streets and in branch offices across the suburbs, people used to gather around with like-minded people who believed in the same things they did. Back then, these groups of people were called “political parties”.

Members of these “parties” would debate the big issues. Then they’d pick their most convincing and articulate to be their leaders. Their leaders would slug it out over their visions for the future with the leaders of other political parties. In Parliament, in the press, on the streets.

That’s all passé. In 2006, only 1.3 per cent of the adult population were members of political parties. Political parties and political leaders are so 20th century.

Continue reading "All those activists should come to the political party" »

Bob Katter gave a press conference today, to announce that he may or may not form a new party. In the end, that was hardly the point.

If the independent member for Kennedy was sketchy on the details of his immediate political future, he was as forthright as a charging bull on his concern for the future of the Australian economy, a concern the nation’s leaders appear to have forgotten.

As usual this week, our leaders are banging on about big picture crap. Gillard is flogging her dead horse of a carbon tax, Abbott’s busy telling us the sky is falling under the weight of asylum seekers, while Bob Brown continues to rail against everything except the destruction of the trees he was originally elected to protect.

Continue reading "If this hatter’s mad then invite me to the party" »

There could be some quirky or even downright hostile fellow diners with the Liberals who are now preparing to feast on the ALP carcass at the NSW election.

So many, and so non-mainstream, that perhaps they will ruin Barry O’Farrell’s appetite.

Voters who are keen to dispatch the ALP might also be in a mind to prevent the election of a Coalition Government which for four years could do what it wanted. There has been a bit of this type of electoral insurance taken out in recent polls.

Continue reading "A motley crew will feast on NSW Labor’s corpse" »

It’s reporting season for political parties in the 2008-09 financial year. Well in as much as political parties are forced to report in Australia.

The Government’s recent decision to stall its much publicised reform of the process means that parties still don’t have to report donations of less than $10,900.

Liberals Senator Michael Ronaldson has been jumping up and down this afternoon about union donations to the Labor Party, totalling a hefty $5.14 million Australia-wide.

Continue reading "Help us have a look at who’s funding our political parties" »