Pearls and Irritations

The Chinese in Australia have lost our voice. In contrast the Jews, not even a tenth of us in numbers, have a very strong voice. They even got six of our ex-PMs to sign a letter condemning the 7 October 2023 HAMAS attack. Is it not time, for Chinese Australians to find our Voice in 2024?

In 1888, Lowe Kong Meng, Cheong Cheok Hong and Louis Ah Moy took the moral high ground in The Chinese Question booklet. They were ignored, of course. It was the heyday of the all-conquering British Empire.

A century later, in 1998, the Queensland Chinese Forum denounced the Queensland Liberal Party for its decision to preference Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party at the forthcoming state elections. Our media release pointed out the moral failure of the Liberal Party — abandoning liberal values for short term political gain — and encouraged all Chinese Australians to withdraw support from the Libs. It was a historical moment – we spoke up, on principle and on moral grounds. The next evening the Liberal Party president invited us to his office; he wanted us to issue a joint media release to say that it was all a misunderstanding on our part! We refused. Subsequently the Libs lost 11 seats and with that the mandate to govern, for years to come. But at the time, the Chinese votes were far too few to have made a difference.

Since then we seem to have lost our voice.

Instead we have regressed into the timid mode, so necessary during the post-Federation White Australia era. But despite the march of time, with multiculturalism and all that, we seem to have got stuck in that mode. Not daring to speak up, we continually complain about being mistreated: Clive Hamilton’s Silent Invasion; Morrison’s Covid laser bomb at China that bespattered Chinese Aussies; Eric Abetz’s demand of three Chinese Aussies appearing before a Senate hearing to affirm their loyalty to Australia by condemning China, in Abetz’s prescribed words, and so on.

Otherwise we, as a minority, have not broken into the media, as vital citizens, or on moral grounds, on issues like the Voice Referendum or the scorched-earth bombing in Gaza.

Fortuitously, there is an unprecedented opportunity for us to break our voice in 2024.

A rare opportunity

The (final) Report of the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters (JSCEM Report), tabled on 28 November 2023, has thrown us a light: to make Parliament democratic, in substance, rather than just in appearance; and to afford Chinese Aussies, and all other minorities, the chance to enter Parliament, as independents, un-indentured to any political party.

In the JSCEM Report’s first chapter, the “why” and “how” for adopting Proportional Representation (PR) covered 14 pages. One characteristic of PR stands out for us: it will enable “candidates with significant minority support to be elected, and for that candidate’s supporters to be represented in the House of Representatives”.

This is the catalyst for us to make it happen: agitate for PR to be legislated in the post-May 2025 Parliament, and prepare candidates from our community to stand for Federal Lower House seats, as independents, in 2028.

How could this happen?

Briefly, Anthony Albanese just needs to lose three seats in 2025 for Labor to be in minority government. And since the Greens have had Proportional Representation on their platform for years, they could be prompted to insist on PR to support a Labor or LNP minority government (on budgetary matters only). Therefore, much will hang on the force of our campaign for PR in 2024.

Once PR is legislated for 2028, candidates from minority groups will have the chance to enter Parliament, as independents. As well, the bar for getting elected would be much lower than it is now. Currently, under the single member electorate a candidate needs to get over the 50% mark to win. Under Proportional Representation, say with five members to be elected for each Division (electorate), the quota, sort of like how current Senators are elected, will be about 16.7%. The quantitative proof is a little complicated, but this claim is not misleading.

With PR, the Chinese, being 5.5% of the population, could conceivably have six or seven MPs, all unindentured to the parties. Such outcomes have already been achieved by community-based independent candidates like Cathy McGowan, and the Teals. And Dai Le’s success is a sign that the time is ripe for community-based Asian candidates.

So how do we go about it?

We need to devise a campaign where we, the Chinese voters, publicly insist on supporting candidates pledging Promotional Representation in the Lower House in the lead-up to May 2025 federal elections. Focus on the handful of seats where our votes will tip the balance.

Well-managed, the launch of our campaign should create new political momentum, especially if other ethnic minorities join in. This will give us, at last, a political voice, but more importantly declare our commitment to making the electoral system for the Lower House fit for purpose – one-vote one-value, as discussed in the JSCEM Report.

Most of all, we will be creating a revolution in political campaigning. Media management would be critical. For instance, our launch could be via a national conference for a new network, C for PR, (Chinese for Proportional Representation, with thanks to the JSCEM Report). And this would be organised with media attendance very much in mind, and representatives from other ethnic communities invited.

1. Background

One in three voters voted for minority candidates in 2022: i.e. the Greens, Teals, Independents and other minor Parties.

Yet Labor with a 32% first preference vote rules unilaterally, but for the troublesome Greens and Independents in the Senate. As a consequence Labor has been compelled by the Senate cross-bench to compromise its stance on various bills. Yet this “consensual” outcome would indeed be the norm, had we had Proportional Representation in the Lower House: the Government proposes, honest debates follow, and a consensus for the common good ultimately prevails — a world away from the winner-take-all “mandate” to do what it likes — as Tony Abbott did.

Proportional Representation for the Lower House was discussed throughout the first 14 pages of the Report, but failed to be recommended to the government for action. The ostensible reason is weak.

Instead, it asks the government to look into increasing the number of MPs, perhaps by 24 or 49, thus increasing the current 151 MPs to 175, or 200. The LNP, in its dissenting report, is against this recommendation (because of the cost of living pressures!). So it is not likely that Albanese would take on this recommendation before May 2025.

We have seen significant cultural changes to our Parliament, as a result of the unexpected number of Teals and Independents since May 2022. Yet this is a mere foretaste of what PR would deliver in respect of a more civilised and collaborative Parliament that focuses on what is good for our nation.

For Labor, increasing the number in the House will be manna from heaven. More guernseys to bestow upon loyal aspirants for Parliament, while the power of the factional bosses remains unchanged, perhaps even enhanced, and the root of the dysfunctions of the two-party-preferred electoral system given a wider berth.

This is likely the reason for recommendation 1 of the Report, under the Chair of a young Labor MP.

Many of the other recommendations in the Report are either reasonable or essential, but it would be like fixing up the interior of an old mansion the foundations of which have rotted. As a result, the best renovated windows, reverse cycle air-conditioning, upgraded toilets and showers, new kitchen, and restful colours will not ensure a sustainable new ambience, if the rising damp and the crumbling foundations are not taken care of.

And, as if written for us specifically, P11 of the Report, Section 1.51 reads:

Ben Raue and Malcolm Baalman both argued that a proportional representation-based electoral system for House of Representative elections would bring the House more in line with one-vote, one-value principles, including:

• reducing the over-representation of major political parties in the House of Representatives that is a consequence of single member divisions
• enabling the representation of developing political movements
• enabling candidates with significant minority support to be elected, and for that candidate’s supporters to be represented in the House of Representatives; (emphasis mine)
• reducing the difference in the value of votes between ‘safe’ and ‘marginal’ divisions
• enabling the composition of the decision making and policy formulation bodies of political parties to be more geographically representative.

For ethnic minorities in Australia, the highlighted dot point above is the sweet sound of breaking rain after a long, long drought. For the Chinese, concentrated in suburbs around metropolitan cities, the music should be intoxicating.

2. Strategy – how to go about it

First thoughts:

• adopt and adapt the strategy of the Community Independent Project, founded by Cathy McGowan, to set up our movement for the express purpose of influencing the 2025 elections campaign and outcome.
• involve the younger generation, who are better acculturated
• focus on electorates where the Chinese vote was judged to have been pivotal or has the potential to be so in 2025
• set up state-based organisations, modelled perhaps after Climate 200, with a loose interstate network to coordinate a national approach.

3. Main messages

• (A) Make Parliament democratic, in substance, not just in appearance
• One-vote one-value
• A civilised Parliament – banish the gladiatorial putdowns
• A consensual legislative undertaking, with a honest and rigorous approach to verifying any claim of national interest, like punishing “loafers” through the Robodebt scheme, or proclaiming highly threatened national security to justify the hasty sign-up for the much touted, but very expensive, nuclear-subs-cum-AUKUS contract.

(B) Peace-broking, not war-mongering.

• Make peace, not war. War makes monsters of ordinary people – Ben Ferencz’s lifelong message since prosecuting one of the Nuremberg Trials.
• eform our war powers, vesting them in a multi-party “war cabinet” under PR or to the House itself. This will vaccinate our body politic against feverishly joining “righteous ” wars like Vietnam and Afghanistan. Too many Australians have died needlessly and many more are still suffering from physical and mental injuries due to being sent to war.

This second message is pertinent in 2024. The slaughter and intensive bombing in Gaza are barbaric. Will they spread to neighbouring countries in the Middle East? And “dead in the water” pronouncements about AUKUS by Hugh White, and others, in the Australian Foreign Affairs journal due in February 2024, are bound to stir up more heat about our docile subservience in following America into its endless wars in Asia, and elsewhere.

4. Will our voice be heard?

The old parties will hear us immediately, if we threaten to take Chinese support from them in electorates where our votes are pivotal. On this front, the 1998 Queensland Chinese Forum’s experience is likely to be applicable to the 2025 Federal Elections.

Secondly, the trust in politicians is at an all-time low. The government was elected by just 32% of the voters. The Albanese leadership is timid at home, but a little over the top on the AUKUS stage abroad. The Dutton leadership is Abbott-like, sledge-hammering this way and that to the top seat, as in the Voice referendum, and now the cost of living pressures and the perennial China threat, in the guise of greater and greater national security need.

Neither side has delivered, or will deliver during the next year, effective financial redress for the vast numbers of voters whose incomes have been stagnant or fallen behind inflation in the last decade or more. Their trust in the two old parties is likely to remain unchanged.

Thirdly, the Teals and Independents in Parliament are proof that the voters are keen to hear new voices which have relevance, integrity and authenticity.

And we would amplify our voice, twice, thrice or more times, if we can convince the Indian community and the Vietnamese community to do the same.

However, alone, we can have a credible voice that focuses on:

Renovating the foundations of our political system, through legislating Proportional Representation for the Lower House.

• The new blood that flows through consequently will give our political culture a new beginning. There will be more MPs we can trust, like the Teals and Independents.
• The democratic principle of one-vote one-value, a government of the people, for the people, and by the people, will be closer to reality as never before.

We have enough voters in a small number of electorates in Sydney and Melbourne, and perhaps even Brisbane, for the two old parties to take us seriously for 2025.

And once we break into the media, the momentum is likely to spread to the frustrated minor parties and disenchanted voters joining in to tell the old parties off as many did through voting for the Teals in 2022.

5. Will PR then be guaranteed?

For that to happen:

• no party should win more than 75 seats at the 2025 elections; and
• those holding the balance of power should insist on PR to be legislated, ASAP.

And the chances?

Labor has to lose just three seats. This is not impossible, given its timidity in redressing the cries of those doing it tough: inflated rents; cost of living pressures; real incomes falling.

The Greens have PR on their platform. If they should get a few more Lower House seats, they are likely to hold the balance of power alone or with some Teals and Independents.

With a good campaign on our part, the Teals, Independents and other minority groups are likely to take on board their PR campaign.

So the critical thing for us is to undertake an effective campaign that will jolt the entrenched duopoly of the two old parties and hopefully cause one of them to enter the new realm, to win government.

6. A vision for our future

Jewish leaders in Australia seem to be focused on control of our government leaders and the media, to protect their special place on earth: heirs of the Holocaust.

A small number of Arab (Muslim) leaders have spoken up, without adverse consequences, for the human rights of the oppressed Palestinians in Gaza, especially women and children. Muslims have been continually denigrated in Australia since the 9/11 event.

Sadly, our own First Peoples have just been put back in their age-old “white-settler” allotted place in terra nullius, made true and fit with guns, diseases, poisons, starvation, and most recently, a political/ideological putdown.

But we, the Chinese Aussies, 1.4 million of us, can take the next step to make this land a fair, compassionate, and enlightened homeland for future generations:

Make our Parliament fit for purpose, for all time.

The ensuing culture would also yield more MPs of the standards set by the Teals and Independents.

There will then be little chance of legislation being pushed through with ideological and establishment biases. Our national interests — those long neglected or now emerging — will take centre stage.

At home we will become a caring, honest, and generous people, and abroad we will become a peace-broking nation against the evil of occupying lands through the might of the military-industrial complex, built on decades of war-mongering – in Korea, Vietnam, Afghanistan, and elsewhere.

Restitution of past injustices to our First Peoples, in whatever feasible form, would then not only be possible, but a matter of course. And deaths and life-long sufferings emanating from being sent to needless wars would be minimised – Proportional Representation, with its diverse and independent MPs, will no doubt hasten the day we reform our monarchic war powers which even the UK and the US have abandoned.