En Passant

The Andrews Labor Government not only won the Victorian State Election; it won in a “Danslide” I write in Independent Australia.

The disendorsement of sitting Liberal National Party member and Assistant Minister Jane Prentice highlights the sexist nature of the Coalition parties, I write in Independent Australia.

‘This is a government totally committed to the interests of big business and the rich. It’s now clear that Turnbull can be beaten. But that can’t be left to opinion polls and Turnbull’s gaffes, or electing a Labor government. There has to be a fight.’ To read the whole article in socialist magazine Solidarity, click here.

The desire for a better world is engraved on the hearts of workers and that longing gives hope to Labor. They will dissipate that desire for a change away from business as usual politics if they don’t make their arguments in class terms. Bill Shorten is no Bernie Sanders, but he is also not Malcolm Turnbull ether.

Turnbull can smile and pontificate all he wants. Ordinary workers want to see government action that improves their lives and that of their kids. The dilemma for Turnbull is that if he does that he has no room for cutting taxes on business. His shine is wearing off as the class nature of his government becomes clearer to us all.

The neoliberal snake oil salesman that is Turnbull is performing the role Labor wanted to play. He has stolen their ground and unless they come up with a real alternative, a radical alternative a la Corbyn that challenges austerity, then in the short to medium term, until the reality of Turnbull’s snake oil salesmanship is revealed in practice, they will continue to rot in opposition.

Just as changing Liberal leaders won’t change the fundamentals, neither will dumping Shorten for a fake leftie like Albanese or Plibersek, or promoting a smooth right-winger like Tony Burke.

There is a message for activists and socialists in the fall of Abbott. It wasn’t Labor who defeated him. It certainly wasn’t Shorten. It was those Aboriginal, education, refugee, Medicare, feminist and other activists, the gay community and their supporters, the teachers, nurses, public servants, wharfies, building workers etc etc etc actually fighting against Abbott and his rotten policies and sending a message to the wider community about Abbott’s rotten policies and the fact you could reject them and resist them.

It is the same message we need to develop in fighting Turnbull’s neoliberalism and that of whoever is leading Labor at the next election. On to the streets to fight for equal love, against the closure of remote communities, against climate change, to free the refugees, for women’s liberation and so on. Close down our workplaces to defend jobs and wages.

Here is photographic ‘evidence’ of my view that the problem isn’t who is selling us the shit sandwich. The problem is the shit sandwich.

James Supple writes in the socialist magazine Solidarity about the ongoing and deep-seated problems in bourgeois politics in Australia. He says that underpinning the turmoil in parliamentary politics is the low level of class struggle. The greatest strength the working class majority has is in its industrial strength and in mass movements to fight for change outside of parliament. This is where real reforms, for land rights, equal pay, penalty rates and long service leave, have been won. That is why socialists put such emphasis on fanning the flames of struggle—this is where the hope for change lies.

Leaders matter. What the ruling class wants and needs is not only a political leader with a program to continue and intensify the wealth shift from labour to capital but also to be able to implement it, and do so in a way that plucks the working class goose with the least hissing. Abbott is not that plucker.

The choice is clear. One of the likes of Abbott, Turnbull, Bishop, Shorten, Albanese or Plibersek leading the neoliberal attack on our jobs, wages, freedoms and social spending? Or us as workers defending jobs, wages and conditions and fighting for and winning better social services, better public health, public education and public transport, justice for aborigines and asylum seekers and a managed decade long transition to renewable energy?