Year ends on note of hope

Edition 1SUN 05 JAN 1997, Page 048
Year ends on note of hope
By RICHARD FARMER  THE two governments in Canberra, federal and local, ended 1996 in ways that give some hope of changes for the better in the way Australia is governed.
Prime Minister John Howard's government managed to end up with a privatised Telstra and at least some changes to industrial-relations laws because of the creation of a second group of Senate power-holders.
And Chief Minister Kate Carnell's minority ACT government defied all expectations by legislating to change land administration with the support of the Labor Opposition.
The example from the junior Canberra legislature was perhaps the more significant, for here was a rare example of an Opposition acting in a way that was against its own immediate electoral interests.
In the national capital, as elsewhere, people upset by a change are prone to alter the way they cast their next vote -and there are few things more controversial than changes to the rules allowing the knocking down of houses and the building of apartments in the suburbs.
In the year until the next local election, there are bound to be many groups angered by development that Labor leader Andrew Whitecross could have courted in his effort to replace Ms Carnell as Chief Minister.
That he chose to ignore that potential gain because he actually believes the Government's changes were right and proper, was a rare example of the bipartisanship that could give politicians a good name.
Up on Capital Hill, Kim Beazley should take note. His Labor Party is in no mood to abandon the traditional ways of an opposition opposing, which is what made the desertion of Senator Mal Colston such a blessing for good government.
With Federal Labor denying any notion of a mandate, the Liberal-National coalition has to win the support of one of the minority groups in the Senate before it can actually do anything.
With changes to the composition of the Senate from July 1 and the subsequent defection of Senator Colston to the cross benches with Tasmanian senator Brian Harradine, there are now three options. Any one of the Independents, the Democrats or the two Greens will provide the majority needed.