Sarah Stephen
The rise in the Greens' vote in the March 27 NSW council elections, which almost doubled the 28 council positions they held previously, has firmly established the Greens as the third force in electoral politics.
The strongest support came from the inner Sydney shires of Marrickville and Leichhardt, where they averaged 30-35% of the vote.
In Byron shire on the NSW north coast, Jan Barham became the Greens' first popularly elected mayor. There will most likely be five Greens and two supportive independents out of the ten councillors in that shire.
The Greens' support in Byron Bay is strongly driven by concerns of rapacious over-development in the area. Byron Bay's March 31 Northern Star reported that "Barham wasted no time in outlining her vision for her new environmentally focused shire. Her brave new world will see high-density urban sprawl eradicated, new buildings will have to conform to strict environmental design principles including solar power, water-saving and energy efficiency and, on top of that, developers will be paying more for the privilege of building in Byron."
In the inner-western Sydney suburb of Ashfield, the Greens' vote rose by 17% and they got three councillors elected for the first time. Two councillors were elected in Ryde, where they previously held none.
The Labor Party and conservative commentators have been eager to dismiss the Greens' strong results, arguing that they are confined to areas dominated by inner-city middle-class lefties and don't reflect a deeper trend in Australian politics.
But that doesn't explain the Greens' success in the working-class, migrant shire of Auburn, in Sydney's west or the outer Sydney shire of Penrith, where they stood for the first time and got councillors elected. The Greens polled 11% in Penrith.
Greens state MP and Marrickville councillor Sylvia Hale told Green Left Weekly that she wasn't surprised by the Greens' strong vote, pointing out that "the election of Michael Organ in Cunningham, a win in a lower house federal seat, cemented a perception that the Greens were a serious political force". She added that people now see Greens' "platforms and policies that are broader than the issue of the environment" such as refugees and the war on Iraq.
The Greens also did well in a range of regional towns across NSW. Both Orange and Wagga Wagga shires elected a Greens councillor, where they stood for the first time. Representation on Newcastle council increased from two to four, in the South Coast shire of Shoalhaven from one to three, and in Bega from one to two.
Hale explained how the Greens' work with rural communities on the issue of forced amalgamations of local councils won them wider support, as they were able to talk to people who were previously suspicious of the Greens. In rural and regional areas, the Greens have taken up issues of water rights, the genetic engineering of crops and the privatisation of softwood plantations.
State campaign coordinator Stewart Jackson pointed out that, while concerns about sustainable agricultural practice, salinity and erosion have made the Greens attractive to a growing section of voters in country areas, there was also strong sympathy for the Greens' positions on refugees and the Iraq war.
The council election results represent a consolidation of electoral support for the Greens. In the November 2001 federal election, the Greens scored 5% of the vote. By February 2004, polls indicated their support was closer to 9%. Among 18 to 24-year-olds, the Greens scored an impressive 19% of the first-preference vote.
This has occurred amidst widespread disgust and disaffection with the ALP in NSW, particularly in reaction to Labor's underhand attempts to entrench its domination of councils. Labor changed the number of wards in Marrickville and Leichhardt councils from four to three so that candidates required 25% of the vote, rather than 20%, to get elected. This, they hoped, would work against the Greens and independents.
The ALP majority on Marrickville council also changed the ward boundaries to cut right through the shopping strips of key suburbs where some sitting independents were based, attempting to splinter their support base.
The Greens' candidate outpolled Marrickville's Labor mayor, Barry Cotter, by 41% to 38%. In Leichhardt, the Greens outpolled Labor in every polling booth.
Leichhardt Greens councillor (and likely mayor) Jamie Parker told GLW that he thought the Greens' support came from their grassroots approach. "If you're involved in community groups, in campaigns, people get to know you and trust you.
"People are looking for a group of people who will truly represent their interests, who have a commitment to social and economic justice and will take on the powerful interests that are against community: the developers, the private transport lobby, governments doing the wrong thing."
Parker said that to deepen their electoral support, the Greens would need to put into practice the policies and vision that they stood for, and "devolve power to local communities".
He said that within Leichhardt council, the Greens plan to "spend $25 million on infrastructure to improve parks and public space. We'll hold community meetings in local areas and ask them how they think that money should be spent, working closely with people and making them feel they're part of the process. We'll get communities involved in local campaigning with resources and support from council."
Parker argued the importance of taking up broader issues as well. "We're the sphere of government closest to community, and we need to reflect their views. That's why we put motions on the Iraq war, refugees and the [Australia-US free trade agreement]."
Hale explained the importance of "using our councillors to continue to take initiatives", pointing out that it was the Greens who pushed for Marrickville council to take a stance in support for refugees.
Asked if she thought it was important to move beyond simply representing people, and carrying out progressive changes on their behalf, Hale explained that she thought the Greens' role was to be educative, and to take a stand on issues, to be at the cutting edge, and not capitulate to populist pressures in the way that Labor does.
"Being elected is not an end in itself. It gives us a platform from which we can pursue broader objectives, put up alternative scenarios."
Sam Byrne, a Greens councillor in Marrickville, told GLW: "I hope our strong result can help to build alliances." He envisages councils providing support and resources to community campaigns. "If council says it supports an issue, I hope it can put money where its mouth is."
Raul Bassi, Socialist Alliance candidate for Bankstown council, pointed to the importance of closer collaboration between left-wing parties and activists. "The only way to stop the offensive of the conservative wing of Australian society is to get together the progressive side of politics.
"We should be working together around issues we agree on, such as troops out of Iraq. There are big problems that we can only address by working together."
Socialist Alliance national co-convenor Louise Walker told GLW that she thought "Greens councillors could start agitating to declare their councils 'no war zones', in the way that they were often declared 'nuclear-free zones' in the 1980s", adding that this would need to be "built in workplaces and on the streets".
Walker also suggested initiatives to "press Labor on the promise to withdraw troops from Iraq".
Lisa Macdonald, Socialist Alliance candidate for Auburn council and one of the alliance's national co-convenors, told GLW that the Greens' NSW council results are "very good news for the broad left in Australia".
Macdonald described the Greens as a "growing thorn in the sides of the major parties. With two senators, a federal House of Representatives member and more state MPs, the Greens are now seen as a serious governmental option, not merely a protest vote — for all those who for many years have voted for Labor between gritted teeth only because they have not seen an immediately viable progressive alternative."
She added that the Greens' increasing vote reflects "a healthy dynamic developing in Australian politics, which is not just a deepening disillusionment with the big business parties, but revolves around more willingness on the part of an increasing proportion of the population to take action against those parties, even if at this stage it is mainly through the ballot box.
"The Greens' stance against the war on Iraq, for example, was in stark contrast to both the Coalition's lies and trampling of democracy and Labor's betrayal, and there is no question that the people are rewarding the Greens for it. Certainly, [ALP federal leader] Mark Latham knows this, thus his recent 'troops out by Christmas' gesture to his left flank."
From Green Left Weekly, April 7, 2004.
Visit the Green Left Weekly home page.