The Greens have pre-selected Thomas Campbell to challenge for the seat of Great South Coast…maybe he has one or two surprises up his sleeve (or inside his coat)….[dropcap style=”color: #a02f2f;”] W [/dropcap]hy did I decide to run in this election?
Our politicians take responsibility for representing our community values, infrastructure needs, future investments and the economy.
One of the most important aspects of our governments, local, state or federal, is whether or not they are profitable. From this, we have a Liberal party who pursue nothing but profit, showing no community values, selling off all investments and public assets, purely to afford grand election commitments in marginal seats.
Our “alternative” government, the Labor party, repeatedly show their willingness to waste public money. The Myki system and the Wonthaggi desalination plant, both initiated by the previous Labor government, were both economic disasters. Myki blew out by $1 billion and the desalination plant, costing billions to build, will cost Victorians $1.8 million a day for the next 26 years, even if it never supplies water.
My greatest concern, beyond this mismanagement, is that neither of the major parties seem interested in supporting the entire state, but instead fight elections in marginal seats.
Living in a Liberal safe seat here in the South-West Coast has its drawbacks. We all know it takes a contestable seat to have the two major parties actually invest a fair share of public taxes into the community. Here in the South-West our trains are a joke, our TAFE has been marked as high risk by the Victorian-Auditor general and the East-West link threatens all infrastructure funding for years to come.
Plans to untangle Melbourne’s traffic jams by building an East-West link will do nothing but create an expensive white elephant, say the Greens. Image: www.topgear.com[dropcap style=”color: #a02f2f;”] S [/dropcap]winging back and forth between Liberal policies of “sell it all” and Labor policies of “waste it all”, we find ourselves heading towards the 2014 election.
We’re still endlessly searching for fossil fuels to exploit, trashing our TAFE system for a quick buck, watching our public roads crumble and investing in the next white elephant infrastructure project that will deliver nothing but congestion and pollution, the East-West link.
I’ve mentioned the East-West link twice now, this is because when the Liberal party was elected in 2010, they correctly stated that Melbourne couldn’t build its way out of its congestion problems and had no plans to build the East-West link. It seems that statements made before an election mean nothing to political parties.
I also seem to remember a pledge that Victorian teachers would be the best paid in the country, though in fairness, that was a whole Premier ago.
I won’t deny it’s easy to throw dirt at political parties. It’s easy to point out the mistakes, the flaws and unfortunately, the corruption of political parties and politicians (Geoff Shaw, Aaron Lane and leaked tape recordings come to mind).
But still, I want to support my community. When I moved to Warrnambool I initially worked two casual positions, one at the Warrnambool Cheese and Butter Factory, the second at Murray Goulburn, before taking up a Bachelor of Education at Deakin University.
Through my jobs, education, joining and creating various clubs and speaking to the public, I truly believe that the Greens can achieve great things for Victorians. Our Upper house candidate Lloyd Davies, a qualified engineer and previous councillor for Queenscliffe, is a caring, optimistic, compassionate and intelligent person. He not only exemplifies community values, but was also my inspiration for running in this election.
The Greens have been among those opposed to unconventional gas exploration and fracking. Image: ABC online.[dropcap style=”color: #a02f2f;”] B [/dropcap]ut what impact can the Greens have in Parliament? What does it mean to vote Green?
Over the past four years, the three Greens members in the Victorian parliament have been fighting to ban unconventional gas and fracking, to give firefighters fair access to Workcover and to support ambulance paramedics for pay parity.
We’ve been bringing forth policies to encourage investment in renewable energy, standing up to a government that’s trying to push through an $18 billion toll road and fighting for our public TAFE system to be fully restored from the major parties failures.
The past four years have been characterised by bad policy and a lazy government. Thousands have lost their jobs while the state government just stood by, no fight, no plan, leaving thousands with an uncertain future. A vote for the Greens will start re-investing in Victoria to solve these problems and create new jobs.
That’s why I joined the Greens and that’s why I’m standing for this election.
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Very well said, Thomas. It’s great to have an articulate, intelligent young person engaged in politics enough to put his hand up in this seat. It may well be a ‘safe Liberal seat’, but together those of us on the progressive side of politics can make it less safe for the Liberals, more marginal and more contested. I look forward to campaigning with you over the next three months.