THE DAY AUSTRALIAN DEMOCRACY DIED – JULY 28th, 1998

By Kevin Glancy – November 2018

To understand the significance of that July day and its critical effect on Australian democracy, it requires an understanding of how the political parties, as supposed guardians of our democracy, behaved and operated before and after that day.

For overseas visitors to The Issue, the political landscape in Australia is dominated by two major parties. On the left you have Labor and on the centre right there’s Liberal. The latter supposedly represents conservative voters but for many years there’s been little difference between the two parties as they both continue to veer towards the left.

Both Labor and Liberal are seemingly intent on taking Australia in a UN led, socialist direction. Yet, no Australian politician has ever gone to the electorate seeking its vote of approval to sign any UN treaty or agreement, including the Paris Agreement on climate change. Seems there’s no place for democracy when the United Nations and our leaders are involved.

This is despite the fact that Australian citizens from the age of eighteen are obligated to vote under a compulsory voting system. Compulsion does not ensure a considered vote nor guarantee an intelligent result. Failing to vote attracts a financial penalty so if you believe in democracy, putting a policy to a vote is not difficult with federal elections held every three years.

Referendums (a rare event) can also be used to secure majority approval on a policy and remain the only form of true democracy in Australia. It’s why politicians would prefer not to hold them.  Labor and Liberal, supposedly staunch believers in democracy, or so they claim, clearly share the same view; the less we know about what the people really want, the easier it is to ignore them. They will often use the cost of a referendum to avoid the process but will waste taxpayer funds on other follies at the drop of hat. Our democratic way of life is priceless and protecting and exercising it should be paramount.

Here’s an example of that ‘too expensive’ argument.

Liberal politician Tony Abbott went to an election promising a referendum on same sex marriage, similar to what Ireland had done earlier. He won that election but was removed from office before he could deliver, much to the delight of those on the left who also didn’t want to know what the majority of people thought about the issue. They had also used the ‘too expensive’ argument to avoid a referendum.

Abbott didn’t survive his first term due to undermining by his successor with the support of the left wing media. His successor, left-leaning Liberal leader Malcolm Turnbull, ensured that Abbott’s referendum promise would not see the light of day. His response was to hold an unreliable and voluntary postal plebiscite to appease the left who got the result they wanted.

I have no problem with that result, apart from the scourge of identity politics that the ‘yes’ vote unleashed but it was not democracy in action. As far as a postal plebiscite goes, its integrity is far from fool proof.

As for Australian elections? They’re like the movie Ground Hog Day. Polling days are always the same. There’s much media fuss and speculation beforehand but you always get the same result. Either a Labor or Liberal government with almost identical policies. Both parties have big election campaign machines. Apart from donations, they’re generously assisted by printing equipment and financial allowances via their electorate office funding and incumbent Member entitlements.

Labor and Liberal have another advantage. One of them will be in government with extra resources at their disposal and the other, in Opposition. You’ll seldom hear the opposition party complain about taxpayer funded ‘pre-election’ advertising conducted by the party in government.  This abuse of taxpayer funds is generally ignored. The party in opposition knows that sooner or later it will be their turn to walk through the revolving door of Australian politics and they will do the same thing before their next election, so! ‘Let’s not rock the boat.’

If that wasn’t enough of an advantage over any minor party wishing to compete, twenty years ago the two major parties, troubled by the need to further protect their dominance decided to act. They realised that there was one more thing they could do to ensure that only they would ever rule. So in 1998, these two supposedly opposing forces became allies in Parliament and set out to change the voting rules to suit themselves.

The simplified rules of the federal election game prior to 1998 were much the same as they are now with one crucial exception. More about that later.

There are 150 electorates in Australia. These are referred to as seats and the party winning the majority of seats (not votes) wins the election.

Winning a seat is governed by a two-party preferred voting system. This favours Labor and Liberal, the two parties that are either in government or in opposition and waiting to return to government. They have the promotional power of donor funds, extra taxpayer funded staff, organised volunteers and their own electorate constituent data, access to the electoral rolls, office stationary, communication systems and equipment.

Union money distorts democracy and wins elections

As insiders, the two major parties know the system well, they make the rules and can game it to their advantage. Labor also have the advantage of a seemingly unlimited supply of union funds. Unions also use their members’ union fees without consent of their members to run emotive election advertising campaigns.

Usually, actors pretend to be the person affected by a ‘cruel’ Liberal policy in television commercials in which they tell outright lies or heavily distort the truth in support of Labor.

These high frequency commercials such as the totally dishonest ‘Medicare scare’ campaign aired prior to the last federal election plays on people’s emotions. These advertisements also capitalise on compulsory voting. Those that don’t follow politics are easily led by these union funded fabrications and their compulsory votes can be easily swayed in Labor’s direction.

Whenever Labor politicians cynically campaign to stop donations from businesses, which is the only source of outside funding for the Liberals, they conveniently exclude the massive amounts of union money they receive themselves. This money is far more influential than any money that the Liberals receive from the business community. Labor also receive money from businesses.

Union entities do not have to pay taxes and their executive arms are not governed by corporate regulations that apply to every other business. They operate much like a business and also run superannuation funds to provide further profit. This favoured treatment reflects Labor’s pro-union policy stance when in government and opposition. Most Labor members of parliament are former union executives or members and they continue to sing the union song when elected whether at a state or federal level.

Recently, union thuggish behaviour motivated current Liberal PM Scott Morrison to deliver an accurate piece of biting rhetoric in parliament in reference to the Opposition Leader.

‘Bill Shorten is union-bred, union-fed and union-led, and that’s how he would run Australia.’

Shorten, a former AWU union leader agreed with that claim in a pre-election manifesto published by Melbourne University Press in May 2016, confirming that he would indeed run Australia ‘like a unionist’.

Yet, despite this long standing Labor government protection, union membership in Australia has been in decline since 1992 and is now less than 15% of the working population. (ABS statistics).

Unions control the Labor party and have far more power and say in how Australia is governed than they deserve in our democracy. Effectively, when Labor are in government, the wishes of the majority of Australians (the other 85%) take second place when up against union-friendly policies. During Labor’s Julie Gillard’s time as PM, child care centres and their employees were forced into the union fold and it has certainly not reduced the costs for parents.

When in government Labor usually stock the boards of government institutions and the like with ex-union members.  The Fair Work Commission, the body that rules employment regulation, is dominated by ex-union heavies. It’s also why most of the public service departments are controlled by the left side of politics. Unions also run the public education system and cultivate its resource as a socialist breeding ground.

When the Liberals are in government they are advised or handicapped by those same union bred executives. The irony of course is that those ex-union heavies have never run a business let alone, a country with a trillion dollar economy. They certainly do not gain those cosy executive positions based on merit.

It was reported in 2007 when Kevin Rudd won the right to be Prime Minister that unions contributed around $30 million to his campaign. You only need to look at the range of union-friendly policies introduced by Rudd to see how he repaid that massive debt.

There’s only two political parties born to rule

Labor and unions aside. This powerful Labor and Liberal election machinery cannot be underestimated and it’s almost impossible for any third party to win government. It would take a Trump style candidate with a bottomless pit of money and 150 very good candidates to overcome those odds. Even then the voting system would remain a barrier to such a win.

The two major parties are the architects of the Australian voting system and you can be sure that if any other party or person looks like a winner, they will change the rules. This is exactly why they changed the election rules in 1998.

But even before 1998, Labor and Liberal were the two preferred parties referred to in the two-party preferred (or preferential) voting system. They are usually (but not always) the two candidates leading the count after the first round of counting in each seat. If you are not in the top two places you will soon be eliminated from the ballot.

In theory it’s a democratic system but that’s not really how it works and it is manipulated.

Multiple votes and fake addresses

There has been a steady trend of illegal multiple voting for a number of years. In the 2013 Federal Election around 8,000 cases of multiple voting were discovered after the event by the Australian Electoral Commission (AEC). Multiple voting can be critical as seats can be decided on a handful of votes. Enough of those and you win the election.

To assist in that fraudulent endeavour voting is made easier. Despite the range of ID we tend to carry these days, Labor has always blocked moves to introduce identification at a polling booth such as a driver’s licence, bank card, pensioner card or similar before you vote. Claiming that it would be unreasonable to expect people to present ID when they vote.

Voting is a citizen’s privilege and it’s in everyone’s interest that the process is one of integrity. Labor’s position on ID suggests that strengthening that integrity is something they would prefer to avoid. One can only speculate as to the reason why.

As for the accuracy of electoral rolls which are relied on for integrity on polling day.  In an audit of multiple different surnames enrolled at a single street address on the electoral roll for the 1993 Dickson by-election, an Enterprise Council found that 813 addresses had more than 5 different names listed at each house. 49 addresses were on vacant caravan lots. Many names on the roll were no longer ‘in residence’ being regarded as having ‘moved’.

The Council also reported ‘glaring inaccuracies and discrepancies’ on the same electoral roll and challenged 1,532 names out of a list of over 5000 names that were verified as return-to-sender mail.  Labor’s Michael Lavarch had won that election by only 370 votes and despite that finding, retained his position.

Prior to the 1998 Federal Election, Liberal MP Jim Lloyd in the marginal NSW seat of Robertson did a mail-out and identified around 4,000 suspect names on the electoral roll.  Initially the AEC were dismissive about his concerns but eventually under pressure, conducted their own check which resulted in nearly 4000 names being removed from the roll.

Names and addresses on electoral rolls have also been traced to cemeteries and vacant lots. It would be naïve to presume that this practice has ceased. In the few months prior to an election there is usually an avalanche of new enrolments. There can be as many as 160,000 new enrolments in the few weeks before polling day and it’s logistically impossible for the AEC to check their validity beforehand.

The Australian Electoral Commission (AEC) which oversees our elections was set up by Labor PM Bob Hawke in 1984. He stated at the time that it would act; ‘without fear or favour’.

His statement was merely emotive rhetoric. He swiftly appointed six Labor union delegates to its initial 12 member National Consultative Council. Unions know how to ‘bend’ elections, branch stacking, violence and intimidation is the way they roll. The suggestion that the AEC is an independent umpire would be naïve. There are however, as I have personally observed, some excellent AEC Divisional Returning Officers  who work hard to maintain the integrity of their own electoral rolls but it is a difficult task.

The AEC is not obliged to investigate electoral fraud and rarely does the job with any zeal. Interestingly, the only political operatives found guilty and jailed for electoral fraud were three Labor members. It was obviously too hard to cover up their crimes.

In 1997 in Queensland, Andrew Kehoe a Labor office-bearer, became the first person in Australia to be convicted of electoral fraud under federal law.  Two years later former Labor state candidate Karen Ehrmann became the first Australian to be jailed for electoral corruption. Labor’s Peter Beattie who was campaign director at the time would later win a state election and became Premier of Queensland. Ehrmann’s conviction followed that of ex-Townsville Labor councillor Shane Foster who was also found guilty of similar offences.

In fairness to the AEC, they do conduct checks on enrollment addresses in electorates but it’s a big job and for the sake of voting integrity it would need to be a constant, never ending process. Fake addresses may not exist one day and appear the next. It’s of particular concern when the thousands of new enrollments are received in the weeks between when an election is called and polling day. Some have argued to no avail, that the rolls should be closed at the moment an election is called.

Common sense dictates that it’s a perfectly reasonable suggestion and would greatly assist in strengthening the integrity of our election process. Labor and Liberal continue to remain deaf to that proposal and I can only wonder why. However, what they did in July 1998 does shed a very bright light on the ‘why’.

A voting system manipulated

To win a seat a candidate must obtain an absolute majority of votes. (50% + 1 vote) This majority can consist of primary votes (a voter’s first preference) and if that isn’t enough, which it usually isn’t, the top two candidates then draw on preference votes as the count continues.

As each round of counting progresses, the candidate with the least amount of votes is eliminated and their preference votes (a voter’s second, third, fourth preferences etc.) are distributed between the two leading candidates until that absolute majority is achieved.

These preference votes can also be specifically directed by an eliminated candidate so deals are done before the election by the two major parties. This ‘trade’ further ensures that those extra votes are directed their way. Although money doesn’t always change hands, they might simply offer to pay for that candidate’s printing or provide campaign funds in order to buy that candidate’s votes. It’s corruption, plain and simple, whichever way you look at it.

This is also why candidates go to great lengths to issue How to Vote cards at polling booths on election day. These cards show the order of preferences as agreed to by that particular deal.

But back in 1998 there was a hole in the election dam. It caused massive preference vote leakage and the hole needed to be plugged. The hole was formed by the one crucial exception to the rules referred to earlier and it stood in the way of Labor and Liberal’s quest for a continuous hold on power.

The exception? Back then preference votes were optional.

A voter was only required to put the number one (primary vote) next to the candidate of their choice. They did not have to put a number (order of preference) in the box next to any other candidate on the ballot paper. They could ‘exhaust their preferences’.

The only way that the two majors could obtain preference votes was if voters voluntarily followed the major parties’ respective How to Vote cards. These showed the order of preferences that the voter should number accordingly to that party’s advantage.

This was a haphazard process. Labor and Liberal couldn’t force every voter to number all the candidates on the ballot paper to ensure that preference flow. They knew that if they had an automatic supply of preference votes, they would have the upper hand. They were in a much better position to do deals with minor parties and independents to ensure that their second, third fourth and so on, preference votes could be directed in their own best interests.

Candidates from minor parties know that Labor or Liberal will ultimately be in government and so it’s much easier for the two majors to persuade a minor contender that it would be in their ‘policy interests’ to favour them with their preference votes.

Most seats are determined by preferences and quite simply in 1998; the existence of preference votes was not guaranteed. It also meant that a minor party could gain enough primary votes to snare one of the two-party preferred positions after the first round of counting and potentially win that seat.

The task for Labor and Liberal was how to ensure that there were preference votes in the first place and to ensure that those votes came their way. They also wanted to minimise the chances of a third party winning any seats.

In early 1998, further motivation to change the voting system was provided when a third political force began to build on the horizon. A conservative party by the name of One Nation was soaring in popularity. It had become the favoured party by what was referred to as the inherently conservative ‘silent majority’, so something needed to be done quickly before the upcoming 1998 Federal Election just nine or ten weeks away.

The major parties had already, with media help, falsely branded the leader of the party, Pauline Hanson as a racist but that would not be enough. Much like the deranged left in America with their campaign of lies, hypocrisy and obvious hatred of Donald Trump, this type of media strategy only encouraged more support for One Nation as it will for the US President.

Desperate Labor and Liberal unite to weaken our democracy

Labor and Liberal party perspective was simple. They were born to rule and there was no place in their democracy for anyone else, racist or not.

So for Labor and Liberal, with voting compulsory, it became a question of how to rig the game to suit their objective. To lessen the value of a primary vote by guaranteeing that there would be a flow of preferences and that those votes would come their way. Decent citizens would like to think in terms of one person – one vote. All good in theory but Labor and Liberal were about to dilute that concept. They were determined to remain in control of the voting process even if you didn’t vote for them.

Bear in mind that the major parties could and do create so-called independent candidates. These are given names such as ‘Australians for the Environment’ or a name akin to any other prevailing issue. Knowing well in advance that anyone who voted for that ‘independent’ would be in effect, via their preferences, voting for Labor or Liberal, depending on which party played the smartest preference game.

Labor are particularly effective with this independent candidate strategy and voters who would not normally vote for them do not realise that in placing a second vote alongside ‘Australians for the Environment’ or such like, that they are voting contrary to their intentions. It’s also fair to say that Liberal vote for Labor and vice versa to avoid the prospect of a third party winning a seat.

Up until 1998, that strategy was no so effective because a voter needed to only vote for one candidate and could ignore so-called ‘independents’ and How to Vote cards.

So how could Labor and Liberal make that ‘independent’ preference strategy more effective?

It wouldn’t be difficult to change the electoral rules. They’d done it before and they had the power in Parliament House to vote in any change that suited their desires. Ultimately, the seat of democracy in Canberra became their war room as they planned their attack on Australian democracy.

And so it came to be.

On Tuesday, July 28^th, 1998 at 12.05 am while most of us were asleep, Labor and Liberal (with the help of the now defunct Democrats) combined their votes in parliament to change the two-party preferred voting system. It was third world dictatorship stuff; a deceitful act carried out just nine weeks away from the next Federal Election.

This dramatic change to electoral law meant that voters were now forced to vote for every candidate on the ballot paper like ‘em or not. A voter’s perception of one person – one vote might still be loosely intact but the full power of that vote was no longer in their hands.

In an election when we vote it’s our intent to vote for one candidate but Liberal and Labor had taken that ability away. The new rules meant that if there’s six candidates on the ballot paper in your electorate, you would now need to number them in order of preference for your vote to be counted. You could not simply vote for the candidate of your choice and walk away.

In reality a voter was now forced to vote for the likes of the pro-heroin party or the Sharia Law party or the Bring back a Nazi party.  It’s important to emphasise that in Australia’s form of democracy, a voter is obligated to vote for a candidate who they would never invite to their home or worse, wish to inflict on their country.

This manipulation to electoral law also meant that if a voter didn’t number every candidate in preferential order on their ballot paper their vote would be disqualified (declared informal). It also meant that the power of your number one vote was dramatically reduced because seats are usually decided on preference votes. Ultimately, your vote will more than likely end up in the hands of the two major parties and in an entirely different position than your preferred intention.

The ‘independent candidate’ strategy was now far more effective and guaranteed a further supply of preference votes for the two majors. This was apart from the preference deals made by them with other minor parties in exchange for their swag of preferences.

It also meant that only Labor or Liberal could ever win government by making a win by a third party virtually impossible.

If any proof of that statement is required then consider this.

In the October 1998 election that followed shortly after that electoral manipulation, One Nation won around one million primary votes without gaining one single seat in the House of Representatives.

The party secured more primary votes than the combined vote of the Nationals, the Greens and the Democrats (who all gained seats). With preferential voting now compulsory and despite their popularity, One Nation’s democratic chances had been successfully crushed by Labor and Liberal’s control of the now compulsory preferential system. Both parties used that power to place One Nation last on their how to vote cards and influenced other minor parties to do likewise.

Voters could no longer exhaust their preference so no matter how many voters gave their number one vote to One Nation they still had to put a number next to every other candidate on their ballot paper. These extra votes in effect diluted their primary vote and skewered their voting intentions. The beneficiaries of these extra preferential votes were mainly Labor and Liberal.

The federal election held on October 3^rd, 1998 was the day that proved beyond any shadow of doubt that Australian democracy was now well and truly deceased.

The same thing could have happened to any other conservative party. Even more so today when any conservative enters politics they’re quickly denigrated by those on the left as extreme or racist. These can be decent, compassionate people labelled as hard right, alt-right, far right and extreme right. It’s all a lie but as long as the left wing dominated media promote these lies then Labor and Liberal can justify their strategy to put other conservative parties last on their own How to Vote cards.

There are minor, single electorate exceptions and occasionally, the voting system that the two majors wilfully manipulated, does come back to bite them. However, it usually doesn’t effect the bigger picture and you’re always left with either Labor or Liberal running the country.

In the recent Wentworth by-election, the Liberal candidate, Dave Sharma was preferred by the majority in that seat.  44% of voters gave him their number one vote out of the 77.7% who voted. (Of the 103,810 enrolled voters, around 30,000 did not vote.)

However, their non-preferred choice, left wing independent (Labor/Green) candidate Dr Kerryn Phelps, won the seat despite receiving only 29% of the primary vote. She was clearly not the most popular candidate and her win would not have been possible without the flow of mandatory preferential votes. She was mainly helped by Labor who did not campaign for its candidate preferring to support Phelps. Labor’s candidate had little chance of winning in what was regarded as a safe Liberal seat and Labor knew that Phelps would align with their left-wing view of the world and strengthen its parliamentary position.

To suggest as Phelps did, that her win was ‘an historic win for democracy’ is plainly a dishonest claim. She gamed the system, good luck to her but that’s all it is in a wealthy, virtue signalling electorate that does not reflect the views of the broader electoral landscape.

Her victory serves as a harsh lesson for the Liberal party. They assisted Labor to interfere with the voting system and their short sighted decision in July 1998 to make preference voting compulsory, has come back to haunt them. They lost in Wentworth because of preferences and they will continue to lose more seats than they win for the same reason. Labor are simply better at playing the election game and there are more pro-left minor parties with which to do preference deals. As long as the Liberals veer towards the left and shun other conservative minor parties, as they did with One Nation, the more elections they will lose.

The death of our democracy continues to damage Australia

As an example of how the death of Australian democracy continues to affects us. In December 2018, two crucial conferences will be held in Poland and Morocco. Under a minority Liberal Government, Australians will be further entrenched by socialist United Nations policy whether we like it or not.

In Poland, more signatures look likely to be applied without our consent to allow the economic insanity of the Paris Agreement on climate change to further intrude on our lives. Those signatures will not only force a further unjustified increase in electricity prices but demand that we reduce our stocks of cattle. As far as farting livestock are concerned under the Paris Agreement, farmland Australia will probably become known as the killing fields. It will take the deaths of around one million cattle to meet that new obligation.

Other imposts include paying an exorbitant sum of money to an international climate change fund as well as ceasing coal production. Australian coal in the financial year 2017/18 was worth $65000,000,000 to the Australian economy and one of our largest exports. That figure also indicates the pointless stupidity of our economic insanity. Other countries like China, India and Japan who buy our coal are certainly not walking away from the black stuff as they continue to build new coal fired power stations.

The stupidity forced on us without a mandate in our supposed democracy

No matter what sacrifices we make, according to Australia’s Chief Scientist, Alan Finkel, none of it will make any difference to global temperatures.  However, you don’t need to be a scientist to apply some common sense.

Notwithstanding that the planet’s major emitters are doing nothing.

Forget the models and their predictions that have failed to align with reality; models that would always fail because they used ingredients that completely ignored the influence of the sun and its solar activity on our weather and climate.

Throw aside the alarmist, apocalyptic predictions that have obviously failed to materialise. The fraudulent claims like the host of Al Gore-isms that predicted amongst other things, that there would be no snow on the Himalayas or Arctic ice by 2013. You can see for yourself that they are all lies and scare-mongering.

Notwithstanding that scientific data reveals that the earth’s temperatures have remained relatively stable for the last 100 years or that there is a growing school of scientific thought that we are in fact, heading towards a cooling planet – a min-ice age.

Even ignore the UN-IPCC’s admission that despite claims by vested interests, extreme weather events have not increased and the seas are not rising dramatically.

Just consider the day to day reality.

Without carbon dioxide we would all die along with all plant and animal life. Our climate always changes. There is still no genuine evidence that CO2 has a warming effect on our planet. Levels of CO2 have been higher long before man entered the equation and the planet has both warmed and cooled throughout its long history. Our job, as it has always been, is to adapt to those changing circumstances without committing economic suicide.

Carbon dioxide represents only .04% of the earth’s atmosphere and Australia’s contribution is so minuscule within that paltry figure it’s a fool’s errand to worry about it. What is staggering however; is that supposedly intelligent folk like our political leaders and their supporters actually think what we do in Australia matters. That whilst ignoring the sun’s power, which is 300 times bigger than earth and the other 99.96% of the climate influencing gases within our atmosphere, that somehow we can miraculously change the climate by fiddling with the infinitesimal amount of carbon dioxide. This is the calibre of Labor and Liberal dunderheads that we are forced to vote for like ‘em or not.

We’re about to hand control of our borders to the UN without voting to do so

The second international conference which takes place in December 2018 is in Morocco. It looks like the Liberals will further damage our sovereignty under the Global Migration Compact. Australian public service bureaucrats were involved in creating that sovereignty crushing document. If that document is signed, Australia will lose complete control of our borders and our migration policy. Left at the mercy of UN directions on who comes to our country, how many come and how they come.

How our politicians have betrayed us – not just at home but abroad

Such is our democracy that none of our politicians have sought the approval of the population to enter any such international agreements. Polling of citizens has revealed that the majority of Australians want a reduction to our immigration because our infrastructure cannot support the existing population, let alone be at the mercy of enforced immigration by the UN.

The only democratic indication of how Australians feel about climate change was in contradiction to the Paris Agreement.

In 2013 Liberal leader Tony Abbott won the federal election in a landslide. He was elected Prime Minister due to his headline promise to remove the climate change, carbon tax inflicted by the incumbent Labor Government, which, true to his word, he did.

Defeated PM, Julie Gillard had previously sold her soul to win the support of the Greens and two independents in order to gain the position. With a knife edge election result insufficient to gain office she promised those supporters to introduce a carbon tax so that she could be Prime Minister.

This was completely contrary to the emphatic promise she had made to voters during her election campaign.   ‘there will be no carbon tax under any government I lead’.

It was the ultimate act of dishonesty and a betrayal of democracy. Julie Gillard was the first female PM in Australia and she lied her way into office. Not a good look for women in politics or a person who benefited due to Labor’s female quota system. Typically, as most left-leaning women tend to do in politics, Gillard would later play the ‘gender card’ to cover her incompetence.

However, Tony Abbott as Prime Minister would later sign Australia up to the Paris Agreement. Again, we didn’t vote for it. In fairness to him it was not a complete sell out. He did not ratify the Agreement. There was and still is a ‘get out clause’.

His government’s signature was probationary and dependent on whether major countries would pull out. When the US under Trump exited, Abbott would have also pulled Australia out. However by then. Malcolm Turnbull had sabotaged his own Prime Minister and Abbott was gone.

But on the eve of Donald Trump’s Presidential inauguration and knowing that he was about to exit Paris, Liberal PM, Malcolm Turnbull who had shafted Abbott, signed us up lock stock and barrel. Australia ratified the Paris Agreement without taking it to the people first.

Again, a deal done without the permission or approval from the majority of Australians in our supposed democracy.

When Turnbull, a climate change ideologist later went to the election, he lost the extra 14 seats gained previously by Tony Abbott and scraped home by one seat. Yet another example of the unwillingness of the majority of Australian citizens to swallow the greatest hoax ever inflicted on mankind – climate change. And still our politicians will not listen.

Every pro-climate change political leader has lost their position when people have had a chance to vote. Malcolm Turnbull has been booted out twice – once as opposition leader and recently, as Prime Minister but still political leaders persist in increasing the cost of living and destroying our economy in the name of climate change. Such is our democracy by deception.

Our greatest enemy in Australia is our own apathy and only a system of Direct Democracy can save us now and it may be too late. Of course the chances of Labor and Liberal surrendering their power to the people are Buckley’s and none. That leaves us with only one weapon left – anarchy.

It was something I predicted in my book, Garcia’s Smoking House written in 1995. Unfortunately, most of the other predictions I made in that book, have already come true. I hope anarchy is the exception.

I fear for Australia, the future for our country looks very grim and neither Labor or Liberal are acting appropriately on our behalf. There are other parties who are trying to arrest the decline including, Australian Conservatives, One Nation and the Liberal Democrats. But it is an uphill battle and they need all the support that they can get if we are to save our country from drifting even further into the divisive waters of socialism.