I resent Andrew Murray seeking to latch onto worker insecurities to boost the doomed Democrats eletoral prospects. Murray and his good mate Meg did no favours for the ordinary working man and woman when they were in a position to do so. I am no Democrat supporter, but it is infuriating to see Murray play the cleanskin when discussing the "madness" that descended on his Party. They shot themselves in the foot when they turned on Natasha. She was clearly (deserved or undeserved) the electoral vote winner in that mob. It was Meg, fully backed by ambitions beyond his abilities Murray, who sealed the electoral fate of the Democrats. They are heading for a train Wreck in the SA Election on the 18th March 2006.

This sort of comment from Andrew Murray is a bit rich when he is responsible for most of the infighting which will lead to the demise of the Democrats as an effective political party.

I'm not so sure about the validity of these postde comments regarding Senator Murray's article. It seems pretty well thought out to me. I'm a Liberal voter but I don't like the IR or Anti Terror stuff at all. Im certainly NOT voting for the Greens in the Senate. Bloody ratbags!

I don't know anything about the history of the Democrats over the past few years but I like their reasonableness and ability to debate ideas. My wife likes Lyn Allison's stand on the abortion stuff so I reckon there's some hope for them in the centre.

Macca, the lurch to the right under MEG and Murray is the very reason they are in big trouble. The centre and being honest is what gave them the balance of power. If Murray was really honest he would do a MCGauran and spend his last years in the Libs. Thats why you like him, his views are your views. I whilst not voting Democrats, once respected them. They were true to there policies and steered a middle consensus course. Meglomaniacs Meg and Andrew ended all that, thus sowing the seeds for there inglorious demise.

Sorry Andrew the Democrats are a spent force, poor Don must be rolling in his grave. The party has gone from a genuine third force in politics to an unelectable rabble. Meg, Cheryl, Natasha, Andrew all failures.

I listened to an ABC radio quiz recently and no one could name the leader of the Democrats.

Because we only elect half the senate at each federal election of course the coalition will keep their psuedo majority.

The elections in SA are irrelevant and sadly so are the Democrats.

Macca
If you don't know the recent history of the Democrats it is understandable why you don't realise they have no future!

The employees of this country have absolutely nothing to thank the Democrats for, first Cheryl Kernot agreed with Peter Reith's legislation on behalf of the Party, then Meg Lees agrees to the G.S.T. both of which are still hurting low income Australian families.

That said, one Australian University today offered its workforce AWA"s or the sack, the coal face has seen the first of many such actions. The University claims that the pay and conditions are better than could be agreed upon in a Union involved agreement? This seems very peculiar to me, if the pay and conditions are available why should the AWA offer more than would otherwise be offered, or is there a catch? This is a very interesting situation, which has not had a great deal of media coverage?

Could this be part of the conservative push to eliminate Unions, worker Unions that is, not employer Unions, from the Australian political scene, and so leave the employee COMPLETELY at the mercy of the employer, who would then slowly but surely lower employees pay and conditions over time, without opposition? Something to think about good people, please think long and hard....

SHONGA.

This is getting annoying, as a fully fledged member of the “Grumpy Old Man” club I find myself agreeing with yet another OLO post. You are correct.

It is because of the Democrats that we have a GST; it is also because the Democrats are such a failed party that we have the IR laws.

Of course there is a push to eliminate unions; this is where the labor party derives the majority of its income. It makes good political sense to deprive your opponent of funds. They can’t even bear the term Student Union.

The great IR scandal will unveil itself over the next few years, Johnny hopes he will win one more election before it really kicks in. He knows he cannot resign, he is the glue holding his parties factions together. The ALP-DLP split will be a picnic compared to what Johnny is keeping a lid on.

Like it or not John Howard is our executive government, the power of the Prime Minister’s Dept has grown incredibly during his reign.

It doesn’t matter what the Democrats do, it is a question of when the coalition factions explode my guess is it will be sooner rather than later.

OK no more agreeing with anyone. Yabby, Alchemist and SHONGA are enough for one year, let alone one week.

If the Rann Government is easily returned in the S.A. election, Mr. Howard will say it was fought on state issues and has no bearing on the federal scene,likewise if the Liberal Opposition cause an upset and win you can expect the same answer from Mr. Beazley.
I think Mr. Murray is just trying to get some attention for the Democrats which suggests to me that they may be facing extinction in S.A.
The pollsters seem to be saying it will be an easy win for the Labor Government so it would appear we can expect the above mentioned answer from Mr. Howard.
The funny thing is the S.A.Liberals only need to win 4 seats to win and yet according to the election experts they are hopeless, they must like being in Opposition.

Although our 6 year terms for Senators is excellent as a conservative mechanism - not allowing for radical change, but keeping the people behovant of their choices in the past and the present - and allows for gradual change over all else, it does have one failing: it allows those who have no chance at re-election to have a platform to be heard disproportionately. If Australians learn that they're stuck with the Democrats and Greens for longer than they bargain for, perhaps then it may be a good thing.

A Bit of Democrat History for soon to be Mr Murray
1992 IR Legislation helped by the Democrats - No Murray - Generally considered good ammendments
1996 IR Legislation helped by the Democrats - Murray major force - Generally considered bad ammendments
1998 GST Legislation helped by the Democrats - Pushed by Murray, Meg Lees, and advisor John Cherry, the never elected Senator for Qld. Andrew Bartlett and Stott Despoja crossed the floor. Huge member revolt and a disaster for the Democrats.
2001 Members sack Lees as the party is in freefall. Members elect new leader, Stott Despoja. Stott Despoja saves the party from election oblivion in 2002.
2003 Gang of Four Democrats Senators, unable to forgive Stott Despoja for her attempt to try and return the party to member control and the loss of the hugely unpopular Meg Lees (Murray being the major instigator)destroy the Democrats by ending the popular leadership of Stott Despoja.
2004 Election Oblivion for the Democrats.
Well Done Senator Murray

There are some good comments here but many are clearly motivated by a reconstructionist history of the major role the Democrats played in Federal politics.

The sheer lack of objectivity or critical thinking is redolent of those who have failed to move on and realise the Democrats are the only party who have ANY hope of taking the centre political ground and knocking off the more deleterious aspects of the recent legislation.

The chronology provided by the last entry on IR is blatantly false as the Democrats supported Consensus Marks 1-ix. Much of this 'commentary' ignores the major contributions of all past and present Democrat senators. Many of these comments seem fixated in the past. This psychopathology of pining for a halcyon 'yesteryear' underpins the core values of the Howard Government.

Get your heads in to the present and now and critique rather than personalise. Murray's post was a postulate - nothing more. I'd certainly like to hear from people who can make a logical and well thought out contribution on Senate balance of power issues.

Cheryl

The Australian Electoral Commission tracks House of Reps. Minor party votes as to their Labor/Coalition preferences. In 1996, 45.98% of Democrat voters were Coalition leaners, in 1998 43.28%, 2001 35.87% and in 2004 41.09%
Applying these percentages to the Senate, in 1996, 542268 Democrat voters could be described as Coalition supporters, in 1998 410268, 2001 302546 and in 2004 102878.

I can see where Senator Murray is coming from. In practical terms, if the Democrats fold, there are up to 500000 ex Democrat, Liberal leaning Senate voters with no centre party to vote for, their votes electing a Liberal Senate as a last resort.

It takes two to tango so those posts rubbishing Murray et al should note the % of Coalition leaners in 2001. The left activists won. These are the people who took the Democrats left of centre, to competing with the Greens and Labor. Their stupidity cannot be overstated.

What does the future hold for these 500000 voters? Not happy with either of the major parties, not believing in any Green ‘moderation’ from the far left, not believing that the Democrats have yet rid itself of their infighting activists, I am one of the 500000 who are looking for a home for their vote.
A political void is waiting to be filled.

Interesting analysis Goeff but the only thing that matters is whether the 500 000 "lost" voters preference Liberal ahead of Labor or vice versa. If there is no Democrat candidate they can vote for an independent or any minor party but as seats are determined on a 2 party preferred vote the order of preference is what counts in the end.
With the demise of the Democrats and the Nationals heading down the same path the only effective third party left is the Greens.
See http://www.ozpolitics.info/election2007/polls.htm for more.

I will leave the psychopathology and revisionism to the conservative foreign editor of the Australian Greg Sheridan

"All the Democrats' troubles really go back to the GST, their internal disunity and loss of the permanent protest vote that resulted from the Democrats' endorsement of the GST.

It's no small irony that when Brian Harradine, a supreme parliamentarian and doughty foe of extremism of all kinds -- leftists in particular -- refused to pass the GST, he left its passage to the Democrats, and that may have destroyed them. If so they are likely tobe replaced by the Greens, who aremuch further to the Left than theDemocrats.

We are likely always to have a significant minor party presence in the Senate. It is in all our interests if that presence is as moderate and constructive as possible. It was gruesome on Sydney radio recently to hear a trivia quiz where listeners were asked to identify Lyn Allison, the Democrats' leader. Listener after listener failed.

Stott Despoja is not running for the Democrats' leadership, but if the party had an ounce of brains they would restore her to that position so they had an outside chance of surviving the next election.

This would be in all our interests. The Australian 22/09/2005

There does seem to be quite a bit of revisionism to these posts, a lot of people seem to think that Meg Lees and Murray are the people who back stabbed the Democrats, this is not my recollection. Here is my recollection

John Howard went to the 1998 poll proposing to introduce the GST.
Meg Lees went into the election opposing the GST, but saying that if the electorate voted the coalition back in, and in doing so voted the GST in. She would not oppose the GST, but would try to make it fairer for low income earners.
John Howard won the GST election
Meg Lees did what she said she would do and she got concessions for Food, Health and Education.
Even through she was elected as part of Democrats and did not ever said she would oppose the GST during the campaign, Natasha Stott Despoya decided that she would oppose the party on the GST legislation

Thus sow the seed that eventually led to the demise of the Democrats. They lost the Left wing of the party dued to their support of the GST and lost the centrist part of the party when Stott Despoya took them to the left

And for those people who want to re-write history so that we can see how great Stott Despoya was in creating support for her party. You should check out the opinion poll during the time she was leader of the Democrat, she managed to lift the support for the democrats from 3% to 2.5%.

Until a new centrist party emerges, the small “L” Liberals will continue to vote the Liberals, and they will continue to have ½ the senate

Has anyone thought about this? yesterday I visited a small company of 45 workers.
Once a bit naughty,, they paid massive back payments and got the firm back on track.
Growing from the then bottom of about 12 workers they are as neat as a pin and getting work as the best around.
Yet they have been informed a blow in has moved to town waiting for the new IR laws they are to cut wages then rates.
That firm haveing got to the top must now jion a race to the bottom to stay alive ,nice one Johny!a dead rabbit hung around the head of small business.

Well SA is in the bag for the ALP, like to be as sure of IR reform from an ALP federal goverment.
The NSW goverment intervention into the Boeing lock out is interesting.
Could it be Howard will be called on to shake this tree? to again get involved to help his rich mates?