Political wastelands and the idealism of democracy

tyr·an·ny

[tir-uh-nee]

arbitrary or unrestrained exercise of power; despotic abuse of authority.

Synonyms: despotism, absolutism, dictatorship.

Do you feel the despair in the air? Do you hear the growing chorus of discontent, state wide and nationally? 

More than two years ago a little man in Queensland proclaimed his desire to follow his reign as Lord Mayor of Brisbane with the Premiership of Queensland.  Campbell Newman had already shown his “think big” colours as mayor with his “Trans Apex” project for 5 tunnels under the city. History has shown that this was a dream not supported by reality.

After the opening of the much vaunted but severely under-used Clem Jones tunnel, RiverCity Motorways went into receivership.  Investors will never see a return on their investment. The tunnel was completed on-time and on-budget but, due to incorrect predictions of traffic volume, has been an economic failure.

The Airport Link tunnel faced similar problems when the share price collapsed as investors discovered the predicted traffic flow was fantasy and tried desperately to divest themselves of worthless shares.  Traffic forecaster Arup, acting for the developer BrisConnections, predicted 135,000 vehicles a day. Airport Link went into receivership in February 2013 with an average daily traffic use of only 47,802 vehicles.

The Go Between Bridge was estimated to serve 20,300 vehicles a day, but the highest number of vehicles to use the bridge in the first year after opening was 15,783 in March 2012.

Legacy Way, the latest part of the project, was predicted to be used by 24,000 vehicles a day – but traffic projectors tell a different story.

Prior to the state election in 2012 the LNP’s stated intention was to “get Queensland back on track”, which, it said, meant “restoring the economy, easing the cost of living and cutting government waste. It means planning properly to build better infrastructure and improving health, police, education and other frontline services.” This year, a pre-budget report issued to Newman’s government by the Australian Industry group showed that, far from restoring the economy, LNP is moving backwards. “Our research found 63 per cent of Queensland company CEO’s expect general business conditions to be weaker in 2013 than 2012. This compares to a national figure of 52 per cent, some 11 points higher.”

In the lead up to the 2012 election LNP waged wars on many fronts, always hyped by spin.  According to LNP, Labour was planning on cutting 41,000 public servants – but that figure was proven to be spin. After the election LNP went on to cut 14,000 jobs – 9,000 more than Labour had ever proposed, despite Newman, in a December 2011 interview, suggesting any reduced numbers would come through natural attrition rather than job cuts.

Everything the Labour state government did was challenged by LNP, with Campbell Newman at the helm.  An electorate which bought the LNP spin threw out the Labour government and gave free reign to Campbell’s despotic ambitions.  The electorate was warned by Anna Bligh that Newman would become a 'slash and burn' Premier whose cuts would impact on essential frontline services such as police, nursing and teaching, as well as on the environment. Time has shown her to be right on the money. Queensland’s LNP state government continues to break promises, lie, spin and thumb their collective noses at not only those who didn’t vote for them but also those who did, and their disregard for the environment is shameful.

Fast forward to the run up to the 2013 federal election, and history repeated on a national level, aided by a fawning Murdoch press.  The personal attacks on Julia Gillard mirrored and then magnified a thousand-fold those on Anna Bligh.  The Libs wasted no opportunity to heckle the federal Labour government, and Murdoch media headlines trumpeted calls not just to the Liberal faithful but also to those it felt were borderline and feeling disenfranchised in any way.  The drubbing the federal Labour party got in the polls echoed the defeat in Queensland.

And then the new federal government began breaking their promises, just as the Queensland state government had done. Déjà vu.

The subsequent shameless backflipping and reverse tactics have left the country numb with a sort of shock, as if the voters had no idea this betrayal was on the cards.  In only 100 days the Abbott government has shown that it doesn’t give a damn about parliamentary procedure, the environment, the economy – which, when they took power, was one of the best in the world – or, frankly, anyone but themselves.  They have offended Indonesia, China and Sri Lanka and failed to immediately fly flags at half mast on the death of Nelson Mandela, as the rest of the world did.

Newman in Queensland and Abbott federally continue to claim their “mandate” at election for the changes they are making, but no-one gave them a mandate to destroy the environment, take money from schools and claw back pay rises from pre-school educators, change parliamentary procedures that they themselves often used to their own advantage when in opposition, reduce frontline public service roles or feather their own nests at the expense of taxpayers.

The attitudes displayed by Newman and his cronies in Queensland and Abbott’s bunch of slash-and-burn upstarts in Canberra constitute an arbitrary and unrestrained exercise of power and a despotic abuse of authority.

Tyranny is alive and thriving under the Libs/LNP.  In any other workplace an employer could get rid of an employee who treated the “company” with such contempt.  Why, in an alleged “democracy” is the same redress not available to the employers of these politicians, Australian citizens?  Do we really have to wait until this mob completely destroys everything before someone will take definitive action to stop them?