The head-on collision between NSW Premier Morris Iemma and his own party at the annual conference on 3 May at Sydney Town Hall will be one for the history books.
Iemma and his Treasurer Michael Costa have indicated in advance that they will ignore a conference rejection of their plan to part-privatise the state’s electricity industry and go ahead anyway.
The party’s rules are explicit:
The annual conference is the supreme policy making and governing body in NSW.
Furthermore:
The annual conference has the power to alter or change the Rules and Platform (policies) of the party.
And Rule A 35 states:
Any member can charge another member … with not supporting the Platform (policies) and Rules of the party to the best of the member’s ability and any member found in breach of not carrying out the Platform can be suspended or expelled.
Enter the party’s Alexandria branch in inner-city Sydney, which initiated action against Iemma and Costa for breaching the party’s current platform, and which is anti-privatisation of the publicly-owned power industry.
(For trivia buffs, the branch secretary is Ben Aveling. So what? Karl Marx’s third and youngest daughter Eleanor “Tussy” Marx’s lifelong partner was Edward Aveling. Any relation?)
The anti-selloff policy has been in place since the 1997 conference when premier Bob Carr failed to raise a single vote in support of his privatisation plan.
Only one other sitting NSW Labor premier has been rebuffed by the conference: in 1942 Bill McKell was roundly defeated when he opposed Prime Minister Ben Chifley’s plan to impose uniform tax. Delegates voted overwhelmingly to support “Chif”.
But the more interesting historical footnote belongs to Premier William Holman. In 1916 the NSW ALP conference “solemnly pledged itself to oppose conscription by all lawful means” and directed all affiliated trade unions and branches to oppose Labor members who supported conscription.
Holman defied the conference decision and joined Prime Minister Billy Hughes in campaigning for a “Yes” vote in the commonwealth referendum. The conscriptionists were defeated and Labor endorsement was withdrawn from Holman for his seat of Cootamundra at the next election.
On his re-election by a narrow majority, Holman formed a National Government with the conservative Sir Charles Wade, provoking a devastating split in the NSW party and was expelled.
These are some of the skeletons rattling around the cellars of the NSW ALP as Iemma and Costa prepare to do battle with their own party. They seem to be adopting the view of Henry Ford that “History is more or less bunk” and have convinced themselves that they can run a Labor government without the support of the Labor Party. Bigger Labor personalities than Iemma and Costa have attempted that strategy with sobering consequences.
Iemma wants my local MP Tebbutt to revitalise Cabinet. but she knows the $B’s from the power sale will go on $5B tunnel with cancer smog stacks IN Teb’s seat of Marrickville (hence bail out, not just son Nathan?). Spouse is Fed MP Albanese positioning to head off Green ballistic revenge by posturing/planning a 2nd airport (again) to claim reduced noise pollution impact (would be popular). As Alex Mitchell points, the poker pot is getting very big here. Rudd similarly wants the dinosaur economics for ALP Inc who gave him the numbers. Combet similarly has clean central coast air to breathe. Meanwhile, Yvette Andrews is 5 months now GM in Addison Rd Community Centre (‘biggest in Oz’) as career ALP Lefty staffer in heart of Grayndler/Marrickville (Fed/State seats) with her publicly funded job NEVER advertised to public applications since Oct 07 (illegal?). Andrews is just another screw holding down this lid on the Inner West pressure cooker and it’s about to blow with the rest.
A few slight sequence errors with Alex Mitchell’s chronology on William Holman. Holman formed a National government with Wade and then extended the life of the parliament so he didn’t have to face the election that was then due. Governor Strickland didn’t immediately agree with the request but had his reserve powers clarified by Downing Street. Then early in 1917, deciding that the time was right, Holman called an election and was re-elected as head of a Nationalist government. To keep the new Coalition together and keep conscription off the agenda, all the government candidates had signed a pledge not to again raise the conscription debate. The government was re-elected, but Holman and co faced acute embarrassment when later that year, Highes called another plebiscite on conscription.
I have been astonished in recent times at the apparent contempt the NSW Government has for the people of NSW. Now its clear that this contempt extends not only to its own membership base, but to its own rules and traditions. They (along with the hopeless opposition) certainly make the case, without even trying, for the abolition of the states. More to do, but heading for a train wreck? (Bad metaphor, I know – I live in Northern NSW, where there are no trains anymore!)
This is where it gets REALLY interesting: Kevin O’Great is due to address conference on the Sunday. He is already on record supporting the Iemma/Costa plan. He will have two choices: stare down the mob and continue to back them or squib it and allow the party to tear them down and probably itself with it. Whichever way he goes, it will be no weekend love-in and perhaps the biggest test of his leadership to date.