Green bashing campaign grinds on

Bob Briton

There is considerable excitement in progressive circles in 
Australia about the likely increase in the vote for the Greens at 
the October 9 federal elections. Years of grass roots activism 
and the self-destruction of the Democrats are combining to make 
the party's target of one million votes appear quite realistic. 
Polling agencies report that nine per cent of voters are planning 
to place a "1" beside the name of the Green candidate on their 
ballot paper. It seems everyone is talking about the influence 
the Greens might have in the event of a hung parliament and 
holding the balance of power in the Senate.

However, not all the interest in the Greens has been of a healthy 
kind. A campaign of vilification and disinformation is being 
waged in the hope that the expectations described above are not 
met. As reported in The Guardian last week, mainstream 
politicians like Deputy PM John Anderson have been working the 
"watermelon" metaphor (green on the outside, red on the inside) 
for all it is worth.

On the alleged "other side" of parliamentary politics, the member 
for Melbourne and ALP front bencher Lindsay Tanner has warned 
voters " the better the Greens go, the better Howard's chances of 
re-election".

The media has got in on the act. The Herald Sun claims that it 
"exposed" the Greens "soft-on-drugs" policies in the first week 
of the campaign. Last week Sydney's Telegraph carried a table of 
the Greens "Hidden Policies" — including the outrageous (to 
them) proposal for an increase in company tax.

Nobody from powerful circles appears to have a kind word to say 
about the emerging third force in the Australian Parliament. At 
the same time, there are long lines of power brokers forming 
outside the door of Bob Brown and the various Green candidates. 
Preference sharing is the hot topic and the same characters that 
are happy to denigrate the Greens are at the front of the queue.

"We do not agree with Greens' policy but I don't think there's a 
chance of the Greens winning the election. But there is a chance 
of Labor winning the election: that's why we won't be 
preferencing the Labor Party", Treasurer Peter Costello told The 
Australian in explanation of the Libs' overtures to the Greens.

In fact, The Daily Telegraph was keen to promote the idea that a 
blue-green deal was already in the bag. Online news commentary 
magazine Crikey also ran with the "news". Comments from Bob Brown 
that the party would be willing to work either major party to 
good ends in the event of a hung parliament may have fuelled this 
damaging speculation.

Geoff Ash, Federal Election Campaign Coordinator for the Greens 
NSW had this to say about the allegation: "The Greens have never 
preferenced the Coalition ahead of Labor in a federal House of 
Representatives seat, let alone a marginal seat, and I do not 
believe it will happen this election either.

"While The Greens will need preferences to win any lower house 
seats such as Sydney, Cunningham, Melbourne or Grayndler there 
will be no direction of preferences from the Greens to the 
Coalition. The Coalition will either preference us or not — we 
will take our chances — but we will not preference Howard's 
Coalition."

Another simple fact ignored in the mischievous media speculation 
is that Green voters clearly know their own mind. At the last 
election in the PM's seat of Bennelong, 90 per cent of Green 
preferences went to the ALP.