Democracy for sale again!

Labor: Local Members OUT, Big Business IN

For local ALP members, the irony must be stark and bitter.

After ignoring pleas from grassroots ALP members in Newcastle to allow them to choose their own local candidate (see the Ramsey article link in my previous posting), Labor’s federal leader Kim Beasley today announced that Big Business will be given direct input into Cabinet decision-making in any future Labor federal government.

Read the full story of Mr Beasley’s pitch to Big Business in today’s Sydney Morning Herald (Beasley & Big Business)

Why is it that modern Labor wants to keep ordinary people well away from important local decisions, but give Big Business a seat at the Cabinet table?

For information on the relationship between Big Business and both of the major political parties, see The Greens’ democracy4sale website at: Democracy 4 Sale. (This site has been established by Greens MLC Lee Rhiannon, our No.1 candidate for the upper house (Legislative Council) in the March state election).

Once you read the site (which is based on figures provided by the parties themselves in their electoral disclosure statements), you understand why State Labor governments want to take local planning decisions away from local communities (as they did with Honeysuckle’s long-wall hotel, and as they are doing now with the Royal Newcastle Hospital site), so they can pay back the debt they owe to Big Business.

The Greens believe that such donations should be banned.

During the State election campaign, I’ll be campaigning to expose this corruption of our democratic system.