|
November 15, 2010
In a couple of paragraphs in The Age Kenneth Davidson describes the form of government in Victoria as a form of corporatism.
Davidson says:
Since the election of the Kennett government, Victoria has mutated into a corporatist state. Real decisions are taken well away from the Parliament by executive government working in a closed loop with powerful, rent-seeking vested interests - most notably property developers, the roads lobby and the private schools lobby.Changing the government won't shatter the corporatist state. Victoria's rent-seeking class have shown they can move seamlessly from one government to the next. The only way decision-making can be brought back into the parliamentary arena where it belongs is through a minority government.
He says that the arrogance and secrecy that characterise the Brumby government began in earnest after they won the 2003 election in their own right.
A state election approaches and there won't be a minority government in Victoria with Lib-Lab, now that the Victorian Liberals have decided to give their preferences to the ALP rather than the Greens. So a neo-liberal form of corporatism is being entrenched.
|
The Greens best chance of representation in the Victorian Parliament lies in the upper house. This now is elected on proportion representation rather than the single-member preferential system of the lower house, as a result of Labor's 2003 reforms.