Lidia Thorpe, to immediate applause/infamy, has departed the Greens to sit on the Senate crossbench as an independent, just over seven months after she was elected on a party ticket. We’ll come to her reasoning, but first, is it cricket?
The practical consequence of her move is that she is looking at the balance of a six-year term wielding the power, and collecting the salary, of a senator with no strings attached. There’s no ambiguity about this, and certainly no legal consequence.
The constitution establishes the basic mechanism by which we elect senators, and it speaks only of them as candidates; it does not mention political parties. Once elected, on whatever ticket, and sworn in, the successful candidate takes their seat and it’s theirs until their term ends. Unless there’s a double dissolution, that’s six years.
The cricket analogy comes in when we measure the constitutional facts against the reasonable expectations of voters. In Senate elections, electoral law has created two voting options, as you’ll know from your intense scrutiny of the typically eight-foot-long ballot paper: above the line for parties or groups of candidates; below the line for candidates by name.
Most voters go above the line, putting a “1” next to the party they prefer. Senate seats are allocated by quota, so the more votes the party gets, the more of its candidates get seats.
Thorpe had the top spot on the Greens’ Senate candidature for Victoria at the election. She got 40,174 personal votes below the line, while the party scored 529,429 primary votes above the line. Simply, she’s in the Senate because her party got the votes that put her there.
People who voted Green undoubtedly didn’t contemplate this: that one of the Senate seats the party secured is now held, for the next half-decade, by an independent. That’s the practical consequence.
The ethical question is more complex. Thorpe has not done anything illegal nor broken any convention. However, her decision to leave the party is generally frowned upon as a breach of faith with her (or rather, the Greens’) voters.
Can the party demand its seat back? No, because it isn’t theirs — it’s hers. Finders keepers, in a way. (To be clear, the party isn’t asking for that; they’ve copped it on the chin.)
There is a counter-argument applicable to Thorpe’s particular circumstances as an Indigenous politician: that it lies ill in the mouth of settler Australians to be complaining about an Indigenous person taking something that institutional society claims to be its property.
It’s an interesting thought, the idea that what Thorpe has done can be fairly characterised as a legitimate exercise in counter-sovereignty by a representative of the illegally dispossessed.
That notion ties directly to what Thorpe said when announcing her exit: that she wants to “represent” the “strong grassroots Blak sovereign movement” she believes exists in Australia. Her opposition to the Voice proposal has been based on her concerns about sovereignty, and she has been consistent in her position that treaty should come first.
It should also be noted that, in 2020, after she was first given a casual vacancy in the Senate to replace Richard Di Natale following his retirement, Thorpe said, “It is my people that have put me here. The Greens just stamped it.” So, she did flag her first loyalty clearly enough, before the party decided to run her as its candidate at the general election.
Giving Thorpe the full benefit of the doubt — and I don’t see why we shouldn’t — it’s hard to find a substantive inconsistency in her words and actions. Sure, if she always intended to do what she’s done, then there was deliberate artifice in her choice to stand as a party candidate in 2022, and the voters in Victoria are entitled to feel dudded.
However, accepting she is sincere in her basic convictions around sovereignty and the illegitimacy of our constitutional framework (remember, she did have to be sworn in twice after first refusing to express her allegiance to the queen), it’s fair for her to ask why she should comply with conventions made by settler society in furtherance of its long-term illegal occupation of territory never ceded?
In that frame, taking a bit of liberty with voters’ faith while doing nothing remotely illegal, to secure a seat in the upper house and wield some actual legislative power for a while, is a long way from bomb-throwing anarchy. It could be described as, well, a poignant fuck-you to the power structure she believes keeps her people down by design and intent.
Personally I’m not a big fan of Thorpe’s decision, but I do get it and I kind of admire it. More importantly, I have no business telling her what she should or shouldn’t do. I think we should let it be. If you don’t like it, the next election isn’t that far away.
Was Lidia Thorpe’s move cricket? Let us know by writing to letters@crikey.com.au. Please include your full name to be considered for publication. We reserve the right to edit for length and clarity.
I’m not a Greens voter and never will be, but here goes…She had carte blanche to speak and act according to her views, the Greens placed no restrictions on her. Where does the disassembling around her views on sovereignty come from? She speaks as if she is a lone Indigenous voice in the current parliament, as we know this current parliament has a range of members who are Indigenous and they represent a range of views, it is quite brilliant. Why are we moving to both forgive her actions and explain it away? Again, Bandt and the party room gave her every assurance that she could both express her views and campaign freely, so much so he offered to take the portfolio to allow her to speak according to her beliefs. What exactly is the problem here in terms of staying within the Greens party room?
As with Bernardi in 2016, why is it that no one in media asks them about standing down at the next election (2025) and testing their mandate to go independent? If she is that confident that she will have the support of the Victorian electorate then why not test it in 2025? She doesn’t have to step down and resign, let her stay there, but surely she should go to the polls at the first available opportunity? Where are the Victorian voters in this? They voted for a Greens candidate and the Greens platform, where is the concern that their wishes are not being respected?
Finally: dies anyone truly think she will win election as an independent? Buckley’s and none.
I, too,think she should be challenged about standing in the next half senate election, likely in 2025. She’d have to resign and stand as an independent or join another party, possibly replacing an incumbent on that party’s ‘ticket’. I imagine if she resigned a replacement senator would be appointed by the Victorian government, presumably a Green, to complete the six years. However, she could be forced to do that anyway if Albo gets the grounds for a double dissolution of both houses, and goes for it. That would test her mettle.
I am a little sceptical of this move, and had never heard of the ‘Blak sovereign movement’ till her move to the cross benches? Cute timing and increased profile along with seemingly other media platformed or ‘go to’ outliers on the Voice including Jacinta Pryce and Warren Mundine?
Similar has been observed in parallel universe i.e. supposedly left/centrist journalists in the US, who switched, and are now promoting right wing views indirectly supporting the imperialism of Putin, GOP Freedom Caucus etc.; some explain as a symptom of more centrist middle class mobility following their career over their craft, i.e. they were never left in the first place?
From MSNBC on Glen Greenwald, Tulsi Gabbard and Matt Taibbi ‘How the populist left has become vulnerable to the populist right. A new political subculture could funnel people from leftism to authoritarianism….A group of journalists and media personalities who once were at home on the far left has formed a niche but influential political subculture that encourages leftists to abandon leftism for the populist right.’ (By Zeeshan Aleem, 9 Jan ’23).
In line with the last paragraph, I do not think it is the best path, but sort of understand and admire her for it.
Perhaps she doesn’t really see that change is incremental and opportunities come and go. A failed referendum will push further positive change just that further back.
We need to see this for what it is: a brilliant strategic gambit by the Blak Sovereignty movement that has paid off handsomely and also made a profound philosophical point.
They – including Thorpe, as a key operative rather than puppet – have infiltrated the Greens with their most charismatic and European-looking agent (any Aboriginal person will tell you the latter quality is important for getting a foothold in any establishment power structure) and manipulated those guilt-ridden political cosplayers to give her the prime Senate slot without working for it, in the traditional party-political sense.
Once there, she establishes her brand from the get-go (including the possum-fur cloak that had no personal significance, it was pure dress-ups) and lays out her agenda quite clearly before seizing the first real opportunity break cover … and now she’s got at least five years to pursue her objectives.
Will she succeed? I don’t know, she comes across as more show than go with no real track record of delivery (and an effective ban from Uluru and surrounds, which is quite a negative) but she has effectively seized control of settler / invader territory in a manner not dissimilar to how her ancestors were dispossessed … you’ve got to pay that.
I wouldn’t be surprised in years to come to see her sitting alongside attention seekers like Latham.
Good take.
I have to respect her, and I think I’d be a bit annoyed if I’d voted above the line for the Greens in Victoria.
Same here. Thorpe, whether one agrees with her politics or not, has not been hiding her views and is consistent. So far as this outcome can be criticised, the criticisms should be aimed at
Sorry, cannot agree. She gained her seat by false pretences – using the resources and backing of the Greens party machine. I doubt she would ever have been able to get the seat if she had been honest and campaigned as an independent.
As for the argument that her actions are “a legitimate exercise in counter-sovereignty by a representative of the illegally dispossessed” – what rubbish. That argument is similar to the quackery used by ‘sovereign citizens’ who believe laws don’t apply to them.
Don’t vote above the line, kids, not even once.
I don’t, and never will. But people are lazy.
This Moll has opened my eyes to this ! Will not do it again !
Wow… you must be another person who needs a hug! Whatever you think of her political actions, that kind of language, the personal aiming of it and the attitude behind it, is unacceptable. Let’s see if we can hug it out of you. Peace love and light to you while we’re at it.
She was first on the ticket. An ATL vote for the Greens was vote for her.
The Greens out her first on the ticket, not the voters. I think many Green voters will feel dudded.