Dear editor,
We are starting to hear more about the upcoming elections and the various parties and candidates are coming into focus.
It seems like a good time to start thinking about what is important to us personally, regionally and as an Australian citizen.
This is our chance to make a difference by thinking and selecting carefully.
For me personally, the inadequate health system is my biggest concern, affecting me and my family – not being able to see a doctor or get attention for serious health issues.
Regionally, I wonder why all our hard-earned money from primary industry (fishing and farming) and its secondary businesses (transport, processing, sales and export) are being spent by the government in the eastern states or marginal electorates in SA.
Hospitals, roads and transport – we need it here!
Our concerns are not being addressed or even listened to. I don’t know anyone in this fishing town who wants a desalination plant right at the entrance to our pristine bay and gulf. But has anyone listened?
We need the rail to prosper the whole of our region and connect us to the rest of Australia – and to keep some of those big heavy trucks off the roads and out of Port Lincoln. I often hear people complain about that.
Australia-wide and here locally, why are we allowing other countries to buy our land and businesses? And harbours?
Maybe it is time to stop unlimited migration putting pressure on our hospital and health system, not to mention pressure on housing which creates house and rental unaffordability.
These are some of the questions being raised at the moment and I can’t say I disagree.
If we are to make a difference – now is the time to do our research.
It is time for the silent majority to make our voices heard. It is so easy to let everyone else worry about that.
Some politicians have charisma and can talk us into anything, but look at their track record.
Some, like me, are traditionalists and have voted like our parents and maybe grandparents have done.
Maybe it is time to look at who will best represent our interests and make a difference.
Who is really listening to our concerns? Who is not dictated to by ‘party policies’? Who can make an independent, informed vote when it matters?
We want someone to represent us.
I saw a recent article in the Advocate about bringing back rail, submitted by Meghan Petherick, a new face in the political arena. She is a local. She is listening.
Maybe she is the one who can make a difference? She has had a longtime involvement in fishing, business and local issues. I will definitely give her consideration.
Make your vote count!
Deirdre Taylor, Port Lincoln
The Libs might not be worth saving
Dear editor,
Ian Macgowan has now written several letters decrying the parlous state of the Liberal Party and one can only agree with him.
In his latest letter (‘Party has lost its way’, Eyre Peninsula Advocate, 5 February) he makes the point that: “Australia urgently needs a strong and effective opposition that holds the current government to account.”
That is a proposition that holds no matter which party is in power.
With that in mind I wonder whether he has considered what is plain to many voters, which is that the Liberals are past saving and will probably never be a party capable of that role again and the kindest thing to do would be to quickly consign them to the rubbish bin of history.
As retired Queensland MP and now member of Cairns Regional Council, Rob Pyne, has recently pointed out, the Liberal Party was founded in 1944 as a “political shield for big business and conservative order” as “a coalition of property and privilege, designed to institutionalise class rule under a respectable facade”.
If you consider that among their claims to fame are the slashing of corporate taxes, the gutting of public housing and essential services like health, welfare and education, scapegoating migrants, refugees and Indigenous Australians, and deliberately delaying action on climate change – to name a few – I think he might be right and that we should be looking elsewhere for a credible opposition party in Australia.
As Pyne says, “our future demands their obsolescence”.
Phil Fitzpatrick, Tumby Bay
Conservatives need to unite in opposition
Dear editor,
Previously, in Australia’s political environment, the two major parties dominated parliament, while smaller conservative groups and independents struggled to achieve a significant impact on their own.
With the Liberal and National Party Coalition now virtually defunct, and One Nation’s primary vote now ahead of them, it is time to acknowledge and accept that the two-party system in Australian politics may well be over.
Conservative parties and independents, in the future, will need to unite to form an effective opposition in Australia, because only coordinated action will strengthen their ability to hold the current government to account, present themselves as an alternative and influence national policy.
Unity is the only option for them to present common values – such as fiscal responsibility, community stability and individual freedom – while still respecting diversity of thought within an alliance.
A cooperative opposition made up of conservative parties and independents can provide stronger accountability on the Labor government’s power and a more balanced and unified voice in shaping Australia’s democratic future.
Failure to accept the current situation, while hoping for a return to our two-party system, will ignore reality.
Ian Macgowan, Ceduna
