A blue-print to shift further right
After six months of hoopla, the much-anticipated review of the ALP's
structures was released on August 9. The document is part distraction —
proposing minor changes to make the party appear more democratic — and
part substance — changing structures to assist the party to further shift
to the right.
The most interesting aspect of it is the honesty (if sometimes coyly
expressed) with which former prime minister Bob Hawke and former NSW premier
Neville Wran identify the frustrations of rank-and-file members with the
party: it is perceived as undemocratic, wracked by personal competition,
and most importantly, that its politics are almost indistinguishable from
the Coalition's.
It then goes on to propose nothing to change any of this. For example,
the document states: “No policy issue arose more frequently in our listening
to and reading submissions from party members than that of boat people
and refugees.” But it simply reiterates the ALP's support for locking up
asylum seekers on arrival! The only real “difference” with the Coalition's
policy is that the ALP is proposing to move the Howard government's “diaspora
of desperation” from Nauru and PNG to Christmas Island!
Despite rhetoric about involving women, the Emily's List proposal to
increase the proportion of women ALP candidates given winnable seats to
50% was rejected as part of a factional deal before the review was released.
The aspect of the review receiving the most corporate media attention
is the much vaunted “reduction in factional power”. However, despite much
anti-faction rhetoric, nothing in the document is likely to change the
factions' functioning much at all.
This is hardly surprising. The document was subjected to factional scrutiny
and deal-making before it saw the light of day and both Wran and Hawke
owe their very successful parliamentary careers to factional support.
Far from representing political differences, the ALP's factions are
just gangs held together by their members' common aim of gorging as much
as possible of the crumbs the capitalist class, through its parliamentary
system, uses to buy off some members of the working class.
The main proposal in the Wran-Hawke report is to establish a directly
elected component of “rank-and-file” delegates to the ALP national conference,
and the doubling of delegates. But the delegates would be elected in state-wide
postal ballots. Given that ALP members would then be asked to vote from
a list of names, many of whom they did not know, it seems likely that the
factions will be able to dominate this form of election.
Other proposals, such as replacing several temporary policy committees
with one permanent committee appointed by the national executive, will
actually tighten factional control.
The anti-branch stacking measures — restricting pre-selection votes
to members of two-years standing who are on the electoral roll — may cause
headaches for faction bosses but will hardly stop the process (particularly
since branch meeting attendance requirements have been dropped). On the
other hand, they will prevent young people and newly arrived migrants,
particularly refugees on temporary protection visas, from participating.
The most “controversial” proposal is to standardise the proportion of
votes held by affiliated unions at state conferences to 50%. At the moment,
in NSW, Victoria and WA the unions hold 60% of votes.
While in practice the proposed change will means very little — the factions
will continue to run the conferences as they do now — it is a clear signal
that the ALP wants to strengthen its links with big business. Other elements
of the document also indicate this. Statements about needing to “recognise
... without value judgements” that “the world has changed and we must change
with it”, indicate that the party is set upon jettisoning much of its feigned
commitment to defending the interests of working people. The report talks
openly of needing to pursue links with the “business community”.
At the end of the day, the internal organisation of the ALP is of limited
interest. The party is undemocratic not because its rules are badly formulated,
or antiquated, but because it is a party which pretends to be representative
of workers while enthusiastically supporting the needs of big business.
From Green Left Weekly, August 14, 2002.
Visit the Green Left Weekly
home page.
