This statement was issued by Sam Watson, leading Indigenous activist and Socialist Alliance Senate candidate for Queensland. To sign or comment of the statement, or to view what others have said, visit
As Australia's most important federal election in decades approaches, we urgently need a new vision for this country's future.
Traditional politics — Coalition and Labor — is more and more hostile and irrelevant to that future.
What hope can a government that has engaged in criminal wars in Iraq and Afghanistan and attacks on Indigenous communities in the Northern Territory offer us?
What hope is in there in a Labor "opposition" that stands shoulder-to-shoulder with PM John Howard in his latest racist attack, supports anti-terrorism legislation that destroys civil liberties, and retreats from its promises to tear up Howard's hated anti-worker and anti-union laws?
It's time to put the shameful and disgusting politics of the major parties into the rubbish bin.
It's time to enshrine the values of the just, democratic and sustainable society we need in a bill of rights — something Australia's ruling elites have never felt its people could be trusted with.
At the core of such a bill should be reconciliation with and justice for Indigenous Australia.
Most of all, it's time to build a political alternative that rejects the economic rationalist agenda of dog-eat-dog "competitiveness", which threatens our planet with a permanent tragedy of war and environmental disaster.
The alternative we need must put people and our planet before the profits of the giant corporations. It must enshrine the principles of democracy, solidarity and cooperation. It must learn from Indigenous tradition and respect and live in balance with the natural world.
As a Socialist Alliance candidate in the 2007 federal election I am standing [along with other Socialist Alliance candidates] to advance these values and the concrete policies that can promote them.
If you agree with our approach, express your support by signing on. By working together we will build the future we all need!
[To sign on, visit <http://www.socialist-alliance.org>.]