The democrats will they be here much longer?

[wycbloods]

This is from David Winderlich


"Dear friends and supporters,
Today I announced that unless the Democrats recruit 1,000 members over the next four months I will become an Independent.
This challenge has not been made lightly. The Democrats are heading for yet another election defeat. We do not have the members, resources or the morale to run an effective campaign in 2010.
If the Democrats in South Australia are able to meet the task of engaging 1,000 new members they will regain their place as SA’s third party. They will have a viable future as a party that values compassion, honesty and tolerance.
As you would all be acutely aware, the public standing of the Australian Democrats has deteriorated significantly over the last 10 years. For a number of reasons, the party lost credibility in the eyes of the public and failed to adapt to the modern day difficulties it encountered.
For the party to regain credibility it must genuinely reflect the dreams and aspirations of South Australia. The only way in my opinion for this to occur is through an influx of new energy, ideas and most of all: people.
If the party does not rise to meet the challenge it will struggle to regain relevance for South Australians. I’m serious about getting the best outcomes for this State and its people and I cannot stand by twiddling my thumbs while the South Australian Government fails to secure our water supply, takes away basic rights and allows development to continue unfettered while neglecting regional communities (to name but a few concerns).
I am asking for your continued support to help make this State the place we all want it to be: free, compassionate and a land of opportunity.
I encourage you (if you haven’t already done so) to register to get involved at my website – davidwinderlich.com - your support would be greatly valued."

Yours truly,

David Winderlich

Member of the Legislative Council

South Australia

[wycbloods]

Message to Mods it might be time to remove them from the Politics title very soon .

[Leaping Lindner]

Thank you Meg "Oh look John Howard paid attention to me" Lees.

[Psyber]

Thank you Meg "Oh look John Howard paid attention to me" Lees.

It was Cheryl Turncoat who finally put me off them, and drove out all the moderates.
I'd known and liked John Coulter, and almost joined them as they were reasonably balanced back then.
I was speaking to his wife at the local supermarket only a couple of weeks ago.

[Leaping Lindner]

Thank you Meg "Oh look John Howard paid attention to me" Lees.

It was Cheryl Turncoat who finally put me off them.
I'd known and liked John Coulter, and almost joined them as they were reasonably balanced back then.
I was speaking to his wife at the local supermarket only a couple of weeks ago.

It may have been Cheryl Kernot that turned you off the democrats but it was Lees who killed the party. She got into bed with Howard over the GST and that was that. One political party dead.

[dedja]

[Jimmy_041]

It was Cheryl Kernot $hagging Gareth Evans that turned me off them - no taste / poor form

[mick]

The GST was a poor idea, I'm sure Mr Rudd will repeal that terrible bit of legislation soon. IMO the democrats were a party of protest that attempted to follow a central line. However, I think various leaders after Coulter defaulted to either ALP or Liberal bias. When Stott-Despoja was leader I saw them to the left of the ALP. I think "major" minor parties have a lifetime of about 25 years, DLP being a good example. Just as matter of interest was there ever a tie up of the "Australia Party" - a progressive centrist party of the late 1960s-early1970s with the Democrats? Pysber might know this one.

[Leaping Lindner]

The GST was a poor idea, I'm sure Mr Rudd will repeal that terrible bit of legislation soon. IMO the democrats were a party of protest that attempted to follow a central line. However, I think various leaders after Coulter defaulted to either ALP or Liberal bias. When Stott-Despoja was leader I saw them to the left of the ALP. I think "major" minor parties have a lifetime of about 25 years, DLP being a good example. Just as matter of interest was there ever a tie up of the "Australia Party" - a progressive centrist party of the late 1960s-early1970s with the Democrats? Pysber might know this one.

Mick as I understand it the Australia Party was formed (as you say in the late 60's) by members of the Liberal Party (LCL at the time) that were disenchanted with some of the LCL's social policies at the time - Conscription being the most obvious. They merged with the "new" Liberal Movement in 1977 and became The Australian Democrats. The new Liberal Movement being what was left of the Liberal Movement that had been formed by Steele Hall in the early 70's by disenchanted State Liberals. I remember there was a split over policy in the Liberal Movement and members where given the choice to back to the Liberal Party or form the New Liberal Movement. Steele Hall went back to the Libs and Robin Millhouse went onto the new LM became a major player in the Democrats along with Don Chipp ( a former Fraser Caretaker Government minister). Chipp was dumped from the ministry when Fraser won in 1975 causing severe tension between the two and eventually leading to Chipp leaving the Libs.
My parents were involved in the LM (pre-split)and were amongst those that went back to the Liberal Party. I spent many an hour handing out how to vote LM cards in my younger days. You reckon I didn't cop some abuse from supporters of BOTH sides of politics.
Also Mick why would Kevin Rudd repeal the GST??? He's the best Liberal Prime Minister we've ever had

[dedja]

It was Cheryl Kernot $hagging Gareth Evans that turned me off them - no taste / poor form

Maybe the party was rooted at about the same time as Cheryl?

... or when 'Tash and Meg has their GST tiff, doesn't matter, they're definitely rooted now.

Just as an aside, it has always bothered me for some reason when a politician threatens or actually leaves the Party that they got elected under or changes stripes mid-term, depriving them of the seat won under their banner. Even more so when that Member has never been elected by the people.

Is it just me or is there some constitional loophole here?

Kris Hanna seems to have turned this into an art form, but to be fair, at least he won an election or 2 under his changed banner.

[Psyber]

It may have been Cheryl Kernot that turned you off the democrats but it was Lees who killed the party. She got into bed with Howard over the GST and that was that. One political party dead.

Again, it is all in the perspective - at the time of the Democrats forming I had some loose association with the Liberal Movement but was not a member of any party.
From my perspective it appeared that the Democrats were born of the left of the Liberal Party, and built a stronghold in the middle ground where the swinging voters who would rather not vote Liberal or Labor live.

Then they vacated that middle ground, and after an initial success on the left, withered in the periphery of politics.
It appeared that Cheryl drove away any moderates who wanted an independent third party, that could achieve compromises by negotiation, and turned the Democrats into the left wing of the Labor Party.
In doing so she attracted membership from people who might otherwise have joined Labor or the Greens and did well for a while until her self-interest was revealed, and many moved their allegiance to the Greens.

The left element remaining then inevitably objected when Meg Lees showed signs of trying to move back to the middle ground and negotiate towards a balanced outcome as John Coulter might have done in earlier days. Then the Democrats clung to the left and slowly withered and died as the Greens grew in that space.

[Psyber]

... Just as an aside, it has always bothered me for some reason when a politician threatens or actually leaves the Party that they got elected under or changes stripes mid-term, depriving them of the seat won under their banner. Even more so when that Member has never been elected by the people. Is it just me or is there some constitional loophole here?

It is part of the fiction we maintain that the MPs are elected to represent their Electorate, not as a cog in a party machine. So, they keep the seat when they leave a party.
Once upon a time it was true, and MPs were primarily loyal to the people they were elected to represent.
Bring it back!!

[mick]

... Just as an aside, it has always bothered me for some reason when a politician threatens or actually leaves the Party that they got elected under or changes stripes mid-term, depriving them of the seat won under their banner. Even more so when that Member has never been elected by the people. Is it just me or is there some constitional loophole here?

It is part of the fiction we maintain that the MPs are elected to represent their Electorate, not as a cog in a party machine. So, they keep the seat when they leave a party.
Once upon a time it was true, and MPs were primarily loyal to the people they were elected to represent.
Bring it back!!

Couldn't agree more

[mick]

The GST was a poor idea, I'm sure Mr Rudd will repeal that terrible bit of legislation soon. IMO the democrats were a party of protest that attempted to follow a central line. However, I think various leaders after Coulter defaulted to either ALP or Liberal bias. When Stott-Despoja was leader I saw them to the left of the ALP. I think "major" minor parties have a lifetime of about 25 years, DLP being a good example. Just as matter of interest was there ever a tie up of the "Australia Party" - a progressive centrist party of the late 1960s-early1970s with the Democrats? Pysber might know this one.

Mick as I understand it the Australia Party was formed (as you say in the late 60's) by members of the Liberal Party (LCL at the time) that were disenchanted with some of the LCL's social policies at the time - Conscription being the most obvious. They merged with the "new" Liberal Movement in 1977 and became The Australian Democrats. The new Liberal Movement being what was left of the Liberal Movement that had been formed by Steele Hall in the early 70's by disenchanted State Liberals. I remember there was a split over policy in the Liberal Movement and members where given the choice to back to the Liberal Party or form the New Liberal Movement. Steele Hall went back to the Libs and Robin Millhouse went onto the new LM became a major player in the Democrats along with Don Chipp ( a former Fraser Caretaker Government minister). Chipp was dumped from the ministry when Fraser won in 1975 causing severe tension between the two and eventually leading to Chipp leaving the Libs.
My parents were involved in the LM (pre-split)and were amongst those that went back to the Liberal Party. I spent many an hour handing out how to vote LM cards in my younger days. You reckon I didn't cop some abuse from supporters of BOTH sides of politics.
Also Mick why would Kevin Rudd repeal the GST??? He's the best Liberal Prime Minister we've ever had

Nice story Nick, I think that era was certainly one of the most interesting in SA and Australian politics, I think the contribution to reform people like Robin Millhouse, Steele Hall and later David Tonkin are much underated, certainly in the shadow of Don Dunstan, these guys really had to fight against the cave dwellers on their own side of politics.

[Sojourner]

IMO where the Democrats went wrong was by not backing Meg Lees and supporting the GST. Post GST now there is little movment against the idea, Labor could if they wished to scrap it immediatley yet I think its fairly obvious that they wont be as again IMO the previous tax system had a massive amount of problems and I cant see them rushing back to it either.

By kniving Meg Lees in the back and having all their dirty laundry aired in public, the Democrats plummeted in popularity, why vote for someone to "keep the bastards honest". if they themselves are going to behave in exactly the same fashion.

I know two people who have now resigned as members of the Democrats, the reason they resigned was for the massive amount of constant political correctness continually shoved down their throats and made to influence democrat policy.

The other main issue in the Democrats is their move away from the supposed centre of Politics to the far left. The Left has a party, its called the Greens and the Democrats have no hope whatsoever of competing against them for the left wing vote. For the Democrats to succed they need to restore the balance between the number of right wing focused policies as to left wing focused policies, at the same time they need to be able to assure S.A voters that they wont have another situation where someone like Sandra Kanck comes along and votes to the extreme left on every issue irrespective of the views of the Democrat members.

This upcomming election could have been the best ever result for the Democrats with people looking for someone else other than Labor to vote for and the Opposition being regarded as is the current situation. Ultimatley most people will likely vote Labor again with a small % going for the protest vote with either the Family First or the Greens depending on if they prefer the right or the left option.

Its a huge shame because a strong centre based Democrat politicial party could get a lot of support and do a lot of good in the current politicial climate!

[dedja]

Zed's dead Baby, Zed's dead ...

[Leaping Lindner]

The GST was a poor idea, I'm sure Mr Rudd will repeal that terrible bit of legislation soon. IMO the democrats were a party of protest that attempted to follow a central line. However, I think various leaders after Coulter defaulted to either ALP or Liberal bias. When Stott-Despoja was leader I saw them to the left of the ALP. I think "major" minor parties have a lifetime of about 25 years, DLP being a good example. Just as matter of interest was there ever a tie up of the "Australia Party" - a progressive centrist party of the late 1960s-early1970s with the Democrats? Pysber might know this one.

Mick as I understand it the Australia Party was formed (as you say in the late 60's) by members of the Liberal Party (LCL at the time) that were disenchanted with some of the LCL's social policies at the time - Conscription being the most obvious. They merged with the "new" Liberal Movement in 1977 and became The Australian Democrats. The new Liberal Movement being what was left of the Liberal Movement that had been formed by Steele Hall in the early 70's by disenchanted State Liberals. I remember there was a split over policy in the Liberal Movement and members where given the choice to back to the Liberal Party or form the New Liberal Movement. Steele Hall went back to the Libs and Robin Millhouse went onto the new LM became a major player in the Democrats along with Don Chipp ( a former Fraser Caretaker Government minister). Chipp was dumped from the ministry when Fraser won in 1975 causing severe tension between the two and eventually leading to Chipp leaving the Libs.
My parents were involved in the LM (pre-split)and were amongst those that went back to the Liberal Party. I spent many an hour handing out how to vote LM cards in my younger days. You reckon I didn't cop some abuse from supporters of BOTH sides of politics.
Also Mick why would Kevin Rudd repeal the GST??? He's the best Liberal Prime Minister we've ever had

Nice story Nick, I think that era was certainly one of the most interesting in SA and Australian politics, I think the contribution to reform people like Robin Millhouse, Steele Hall and later David Tonkin are much underated, certainly in the shadow of Don Dunstan, these guys really had to fight against the cave dwellers on their own side of politics.

Couldn't agree more. Hall's Government actually fixed the gerrymander that Playford had in place which effectively saw him cost himself office. Now THAT is a politician. Unlike these "wannabe statesmen" we currently have.

[Psyber]

Couldn't agree more. Hall's Government actually fixed the gerrymander that Playford had in place which effectively saw him cost himself office. Now THAT is a politician. Unlike these "wannabe statesmen" we currently have.

Playford and the gerrymander..
Bring 'em both back!

[dedja]

The passing of this once strong political party has been completely missed by all during the election.

I think we can now bury the dead for good.

RIP Democrats.

[CK]

I noted it on Sunday, an amazing fall from a party that has evolved during my lifetime. Sad to see them slowly implode over the years. I guess the longer term problem with a minor party is just that - they are unlikely to govern in their own right, so ultimately, they become a little frustrated and infighting seems to occur, or their main issue slides off the agenda (Nuclear Disarmament Party?).

Greens certainly rising to the legitimate "third party" title in SA but would want to win a Lower House seat in their own right here if they are to continue to prosper.