I think its only fair to say fair well to these hard working pollies. In fact i would actually say that they are the harest working pollies in canbera and it will be sad to see the parliment without them. Natasha stock despoa was actually the person who got me so interested in politics and i hope to see her back in parliment in the future and i hope to see the democrats back as well.

It was quite sad to hear her last speach and the tributes to the democrats from all sides was quite revaling. Though the public belives that they sold out when they aproved the GST legislation i disagree. I have watched how hard they work both in estimates, on the floor of the senate and in commity and i think there loss will be a great loss to the country.

I hope the greens can step up to fill there shoes

OK, since we are at the Aussie politics, is there really a difference there between parties? I don't mean the greens, but the other 2. Actually, how many major parties do you have there?

2 major parties, Labor and the Liberals (well ok there is the national party two but read down to see why i only say 2 parties)

Structually there is a HUGE difference between the 2 but pollicy wise much less so because both sides have drifted towards the middle

The Labor party was formed by the trade unions and is actually older than federation. It is written into there consititution that 50% of the votes (internally im talking about) go to the unions. The other 50% is made up of the subscribed members. It was built to stand for the working people to surport there interests and eventually absorbed the socialist party and the comunist party into its members. They are the center left party

The Liberal party was formed through the amolgomation of the concervitive party and the Liberal party (dont ask me when) but is mostly viewed as the right wing party though it would be more correct to say they are center right. They are more concerned with buiness interest as small buiness forms a large part of there members (as do white collor proffessionals like doctors). They are surposed to surport small buiness but both sides have at times sold out there surporter bases to surport large buiness.

The National party is a rebaged party, it used to be called the Country party. There main constiuancy is farming comunities and they tend to do badly against labor in the major rural centers (like bendigo). In the NT they are actually called the CLP (country liberal party).

The reason i say there are only 2 parties is that labor ALWAYS govens alone but the liberals ALWAYS goven in a colalition with the national party. The way they share power is that the primary party (always the libs except in queensland) takes the PM or premures job and the deputy goes to the other party. The tresure is the deputy leader of the primary party (and down it goes).

One other difference between the two parties is that labor has NEVER govened without whats called a hostile senate. This means that a party (or parties) OTHER than the goverment hold the numbers to block legislation

This is what caused the consitutional crisis when the liberal party refused to pass the surplie bill. This is also what made the democrats so powerfull

In the house the only people to really gain seats are Labor, the Nationals and the libs. Occasionally a few independents can get enough votes in an electrot to gain one or two seats (i think there are 2 currently in the federal parliment) if they are very strong personalities in there comunity. For the main however in people tend to vote for a party which means labor or the libs wins.

We have preferentual voting in this country which means you have to number EVERY box. This means no matter who you vote for at number one the likly hood is that your votes will keep dropping down until they reach one of the major parties for the house anyway.

The senate is different and thats where the minor parties come into there own. Its a states house so there are a set number of seats per state. This means that the voting system is more complex (if your really interested i will post a wiki link to it)

The main minor parties are the Australian Democrats, The Australian Greens, and Family first.

Family first is a new party whos members tend to be a split from the right of liberal party. They are quite a small party (only 1 senator currently) and tend to vote with the Libs and nats. They formed around the same time as the public push for gay rights and my personal opinion is they are there to stop this ajender. I THINK they started in queensland but im not sure on this.

The Greens started in tasmaina to stop the logging of tassie old growth forests. They used to be a one policy party but have diversifide to probably the most left wing serious party. They have around 3 senators currently. They tend to vote with democrats and labor (actually there was talk of those three parties being forced into there own cohalition a few years ago because of One nation).

One nation was pauline hansons party and its only real policy is an anti imagration party. It was anihalated in the election before last but not before it self distructed from the inside. It expelled its founder and her deputy around the same time she was charged under the electrol act. It was also formed in queensland (country queensland is closest to the stero type of texes)

The democrats also split off from the liberal party but they did it 35 years ago. There founder Chip Dunston was fed up with the way the 2 parties had unlimited power and he formed this party SPECIFICALLY to keep the balance of power between them and "keep the bastards honest". Until tomorow they have 4 members in the federal parliment and they have been the longest serving minor party. For most of there time nither party could pass legislation without there votes. They specilised specifically in legislation rather than a specific policy and from my own opinion they were the best at it. Also because of the age of there former leader Natasha they had a huge apeal to younger voters who tend to be ignored by all the other parties. They were also very aprochable in that if you wrote to them you could garentiee getting a serious responce from the party members rather than a minor staffer printing off a pre written proformer which is what you tend to recive if you write to either of the major parties. There main downfall was in surporting the GST legislation for the libs and a perception that they had drifted to the left of labor. Unfortunatly there experties in legislation isnt very "sexy" to the public so it tends to be ignored. There other main problem was the fact that in the last election the libs won outright power in the senate. This ment that the minor parties couldnt do there work and they suffered for it. They didnt win a seat in the last election though i would like to belive that natasha would still have her seat if she had chosen to stand (she just gave birth to her second child and wanted to spend more time with them).

To be compleatly honest alot of the blame for there defeat must lie on the media because this sort of work isnt saleable and so they have never really given the praise to the democrats they deserve.

ops it was 31 not 35 years, oh well:p

Anyway i found a news artical on this, it was depressing that i had to search so hard to even find one

'Thank you and goodbye': Democrats farewell Senate


Posted 4 hours 59 minutes ago
Updated 2 hours 1 minute ago


It is the final day in the Senate for the four Australian Democrats and the end of 31 years of Democrat representation in the Upper House.

There have been tributes to the party but also a focus on those who will replace them.

"Thank you to all the colleagues in this place and goodbye," party leader Lyn Allison said.

Government Senate leader Chris Evans left a sliver of room for a Democrat comeback as he paid tribute to Lyn Allison's leadership.

"The grace in which you've led the Democrats when you knew things were coming to a bad end - at least temporarily if not longer term - does you great credit," he said.

The Coalition's Senate leader Nick Minchin thanked the Democrats for doing the GST deal that some see as the beginning of their demise.

"I do acknowledge the enormous damage that that issue did to the Democrats as a political force but I think history will prove that those who did vote for the GST did absolutely the right thing," he said.

"I truly hope that those who succeed the Democrats will learn from that and be equally responsible.

"We farewell not only four Democrat senators but quite remarkably and historically, we farewell the Australian Democrats itself."

Democratic Senator Andrew Bartlett did not vote for the GST and he says the party was full of dramas.

"A very tumultuous 30-year history - we actually had a lot of upheavals quite frequently," he said.

He also says he is concerned the numbers on the cross-benches have gone backwards.

"Actually [it is] at a level that's lower than it's been for more than 20 years," he said.

Natasha Stott Despoja says the end of the Democrats is not good for anyone.

She says they will be hard to replace.

"Among the four of us we have 47 years of legislative expertise ... I've seen 69 senators come and go in this place since I've been here," she said.

From July, five Greens, Family First's Steve Fielding and the Independent Nick Xenophon will share the balance of power in the Senate.

Viewed 26/06/08 at 10:42 (http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2008/06/26/2286111.htm)

Thanks for the essey. You do realize that I usually stop reading after 3 sentences?

I promise I will go through it though...

you asked so i gave you the infomation, its up to you to either read it or not as the mood suits you:p

I surpose it depends how much you wish to know about countries that ARNT the US:p