The problem is that third-force parties tend to attract voters who want their politicians to be pure and unsullied by deal-making...
Certainly the Greens' record in the Tasmanian Parliament gives some cause for concern. But the experience of legislating moderates those who wield power, and it can reasonably be hoped that the Greens — and Family First's Senator Steve Fielding, and Senator-elect Nick Xenophon, too — will not respond to every impasse with doctrinaire intransigence. What matters is that politicians, whatever their allegiance, can distinguish between the public interest and sectional interests.
All parties in the Senate must wield their power ethically and "responsibly". But in determining what "responsibly" means, their duty isn't to some vague notion of "the public interest" as defined by other parties or newspaper editorialists. We have a representative democracy, and the Senators are there as representatives of their voters' views. Their duty is clear - uphold the policy positions for which they declared before the election they would advocate. That - and only that - is their mandate.
If that's "doctrinaire intransigence" or concentrating on "sectional interests" then GOOD. That's what being a representative means. Do you want the MP you voted for to stand up for your views, or roll over for someone else's?*
The notion that the Government has a "mandate" for any legislation it wants to pass is absolute poppycock**. It is not a flaw in the system for the Government to find itself blocked by the House of Review. It is a feature. If a majority of voters had wanted the Labor Party to be able to pass any legislation it likes, then they'd have voted for it in the Senate. They didn't.
It is of course conceded that the Senate is flawed in its representative quality as a result of the disproportionate weighting for smaller states. But the House of Representatives is even less representative because of its single-member electorates that pretty much entirely shut everyone but the two big parties (and one particular regionally-based smaller party) right out. (There ARE approximately 7-10% of voters out there who vote for the Greens; why do they still not have a single MP in the "House of Representatives"?) Ironically enough, of the two, the Senate is the house that far more accurately represents the diversity of public opinion.
The problem with the new Senate from today is that it's essentially one hostile to the Government - there are 37 Coalition Senators and two conservative independents (39), compared with 32 ALP Senators and five Greens (37). The only legislation the ALP will be likely to be able to pass will be legislation at least some of the above conservatives like - which is bad for us progressives, but is a remnant of the 2004 election which will hopefully be remedied next time. (The ALP and Greens certainly got more Senate votes than the Coalition and conservative independents combined in 2007.)
The Greens should have more power than Mr "1.9%" Fielding (who if the ALP hadn't screwed up so badly in 2004 would never have taken that spot from the four times more popular Green candidate in the first place) or Xenophon - many times more voters voted for them. They represent many more people. The problem is that there aren't enough of them to overcome the fact that the ALP has five fewer Senators than the Coalition. (If the ALP is unhappy with the Senate, then perhaps it might consider next time concentrating on taking winnable seats from conservatives rather than progressives.)
If that needs resolving by asking the Australian people to make their views known again, if they've changed from 2004, then by all means, dissolve the Senate. That's how you resolve a deadlock - not by parties betraying their constituents. Any party so weak doesn't deserve to be re-elected.
The Greens' job isn't to do what the ALP or Liberals want. It's to do what they told their voters they'd do; to insist on the policies their voters want them to push. That's why we voted for them. So long as they remember that, they will not share the Democrats' fate.
*That, incidentally, is why I don't vote for a "broad church" major party. In order to appeal to as many people as possible, they try not to let you know in advance which view they're going to uphold - so how do you know which of the several views within the broad church will actually end up getting the benefit of your vote?
**Three!
