Elections and Tea

With all the fuss about the US election of late, I wondered about tea.

All that footage of people lining up to vote for hours brings us the obvious questions: Why the big lines? Surely they knew that people would be wanting to vote?

And why so few flasks of tea?

I guess if you have a two-hour wait, you don’t really want to fill your bladder with anything, even if it is a charming First Flush that would help to pass the time with a dash of class. Even if your instincts are to take along a picnic basket, your best china, some lavender scones and a nice blackberry and brandy jam to help while away the hours before you exercise your right to vote, you might skip the whole thing to avoid discomfort in the near future.

I turned up at an on-line tea forum to talk about tea last week, and ending up giving the mainly American attendees a quick run down on the Australian system, where we have compulsory voting.

“Compulsory?” I hear you gasp. “You mean you HAVE to vote”.

Technically, you have to attend a polling station (or register an absentee vote) . No-one actually comes into your little cardboard booth and makes sure you tick a box, or 138 boxes in the case of a recent senate ticket. And actually ticking a box renders your vote invalid anyway.

To add to the fun, we have preferential voting, so you have to assign a number to EACH candidate, so if there are 7 candidates on a lower house voting slip, you have to number them from 1 to 7.

Whilst that’s not that hard, with regards to the Senate, every candidate for your state is listed and you can do the same – there are always over 100 candidates.

There’s an escape clause on that – you can elect to tick ONE box to go along with a preference deal your favoured party has worked out. Personally, I would never do that, because each of the major parties would rather preference a whole slew of lunatic candidates ahead of each other. It’s a cop out, and sadly, the vast majority of Australians now go down that path.

So, election day for me dawns clear and bright – I can’t remember a rainy election day, for some reason.

At the last election, I had a nice Saturday breakfast, brewed a Sikkim Temi in my tea glass and set of for the polling booth, which is a local school. I walked along my street, across a short section of the Heyson Trail and through a tunnel designed to carry a creek but is usually dry.

A few more metres and I walked through the gates; next to an enormous sign covered in black plastic. This is a sign profusely thanking the Federal Government for funding the new school Gym, which was a mandatory part of taking the funding. The Australian Electoral Commission deemed it to be election advertising, and therefore it is not allowed with a certain distance of a polling station on Election Day.

As I neared the door, I was assailed by people handing out “How to Vote Cards”. This is because most Australians don’t avidly follow the process like I do, and just get the party they have planned to vote for/always vote for to provide an “idiot’s guide”.

I politely declined the Australian Labour Party and Liberal Party of Australia ones, tried to stay upwind of the Greens volunteers, and loudly declined the religious nutter’s ones.

The State Emergency Services were there, with a fundraising table, trying to sell me a barbecued sausage on bread or a can of cold soft drink. Despite it being very hot, they were doing a roaring trade in sausages and were going through a lot of drinks. I declined both, however, as I sipped my Sikkim. I also notice they were seliing tea bag tea using Kenyan Tea, and I tried to image how the Kenyan tea workers would love to have a system like ours. For example, no-one has been shot in a polling place in Australia that I can remember, and “how to vote” instructions here are not accompanied by a man leaning over you with a machine gun. At least I was drinking a more democratic Indian tea.

When I was 17 years old I had an economics teacher who said that there was virtually no difference between the political parties in Australia, and indeed, in most Western countries. At the time, I thought that was the most ludicrous thing ever – many of us are raised on the “we’re good, they’re evil” myth that pervades. Thirty years later I think that she was right, and it’s even more true these days.

I do love politics. It’s a brilliant alternative to rule by force, which is the norm for the majority of history, and sadly still for many people alive today. Whether repression is by gunpoint, holy book or social engineering, it’s still a far greater evil than a robust political system with all its inherent cronyism and factionalism.

So, I’m standing in the sunshine, drinking my tea, and thinking about the issues. And for me, it came back to one issue: a government programme, designed to stimulate the economy, create jobs and have an environmental benefit – enhancing the government’s green credentials – directly led to people’s deaths. And despite warnings, the Government had not reacted until it had happened several times.

I’ve spent much of my life in Human Resources, and it’s not unreasonable to suggest I have written more that a few safety manuals and Occupational Health and Safety Guidelines. And yet, despite all the resources of the Federal Government, inaction and a failure to heed warnings had led to several young men leaving home for work, and not returning.

As I stood in the line, I though about that – a person saying goodbye to their family in the morning and never coming home, and tears welled up.

I took the papers offered, drained my tea, and headed to the little cardboard booth, to make a difference.