Socialist Equality Party - Marrickville - Response to REDWatch Questionnaire
The Redfern Waterloo Authority and The
Minister for Redfern Waterloo (Q1 to 8)
The Socialist Equality Party opposes the Labor government’s
Redfern-Waterloo redevelopment plan and its establishment of the Ministry for
Redfern-Waterloo. The plan is not aimed at revitalising the area in the
interests of the working class across Sydney,
but at transforming Redfern to the benefit of commercial developers, corporate
investors and residents of higher income brackets.
The plans of the RWA will exacerbate social inequality in Sydney. The city is
polarising into “global” inner Sydney,
inhabited primarily by the better-off and out of reach of ordinary working
people. The majority of the working class has been pushed further and further
to the west, where residents endure inadequate public transport, overstretched
health and education services, and a general lack of cultural and social
infrastructure while at the same time confronting financially crippling
mortgages or excessive rents.
The RWA redevelopment epitomises processes taking place
internationally. The competition between local, regional and national
governments for investment capital has led to the massive erosion of working
class living standards in order to finance concessions and hand-outs for a
wealthy elite—from lower company and income taxes, public-private partnerships,
or, as in the case of Redfern, opportunities to purchase and develop prime inner-city
real estate.
The latest Business Review Weekly 2006 survey, for
example, found that the wealthiest 200 individuals in Australia now
have a combined wealth of $101
billion, up an extraordinary 22 percent from 2005. These fortunes have become
increasingly detached from any connection to the development of productive
capacity and are instead bound up with speculation, government largesse, and
other forms of parasitism. More than a quarter of those who made the 200 rich
list amassed their wealth through property speculation.
At the other end of the scale, in excess of 3.5 million
Australians live in households earning a combined income of less than $400 a
week. A 2004 federal senate report found that as many as 4.1 million
people—22.6 percent of the population—lives in poverty.
A sustained assault on working conditions and wages over the
past three decades has produced a new and vast category of “working poor”—into
which many residents of Redfern-Waterloo fall. More than 57 percent of
households in the Heffron electorate earn less than $500 per week, with the
average being just $407. In the Marrickville electorate, 51.8 percent of
households earn less than $500 per week.
There cannot be genuine democracy or a broad participation
in planning decisions under conditions of such extremes of social inequality. The
manner in which the Labor government has concentrated all decision-making power
in the hands of a Minister for Redfern-Waterloo flows logically from the
interests it serves: those of a small ruling elite. The concerns and long-term
interests of ordinary working people are being ignored.
The key lesson from the past two decades that working people
must draw is that community pressure and protest cannot force the existing political
and legal setup to defend their needs. Behind
the Labor government stands a corporate establishment, which holds the levers
of financial and economic power in its hands and which is motivated solely by
the accumulation of profit.
Opposition to the RWA must merge with the broader struggle to build an independent political movement of the working class that will end the power of the corporate and financial oligarchy.
The SEP advocates the establishment of a workers’ government
based on socialist policies, which will put the major corporations under public
ownership and democratic control. Massive inroads into the vast reserves of
wealth that are held in private hands are a vital prerequisite for a major program
of public works. The socialist reorganisation of the economy would create the
conditions to address the needs of all, regardless of wealth and background,
for quality living standards, housing, education, health, public services,
transport and infrastructure.
The SEP makes a particular appeal to Aboriginal workers and
youth in Redfern-Waterloo, and across the country, to draw the necessary
conclusions from their past experiences.
Every indicator—from health, housing, unemployment rates,
life expectancy, rates of imprisonment and deaths in custody—demonstrates that the
land rights perspective and the “engagement” of Lands Councils and other
state-funded Aboriginal bodies with various levels of government have done
nothing to improve the conditions of the Aboriginal working class.
Instead, a privileged minority has benefited from the
establishment of a legal mechanism, through lands rights legislation, for the
corporate exploitation of disputed lands for mining and other purposes, such as
real estate development in Redfern. The vast majority of Aborigines have not benefited
in the slightest. The way forward against the ongoing oppression experienced by
Aboriginal communities is as part of a unified movement of the working class fighting
for socialism.
Funding for Redfern Waterloo (Q9 to
14)
The Socialist Equality Party does not support the sale of
state-owned land to fund the plans of the RWA.
The Labor government’s claim that no additional funding is
required for human services in RW serves only to highlight that it has no
intention of doing anything to seriously address the long-standing poverty,
lack of employment opportunities and inadequate health, education and
infrastructure that have been endured by significant sections of the community.
Despite the various guarantees about maintaining affordable
housing ratios in the area, the Labor government is calculating that the RW
redevelopment will lead to gentrification and increased housing and living
costs. The long-term consequences will be intensified financial and social
pressures on lower-income earners to move out.
Government law-and-order campaigns have already led to a
massive increase in police harassment of working class youth in the area. The
death of TJ Hickey following an unnecessary police chase in February 2004 was
one of the consequences. Public housing tenants whose circumstances mildly
improve face having their leases terminated and being unable to afford private
rental accommodation in the area.
The Labor government is also calculating that the value of
state-owned real estate will rise substantially. Under conditions of federal
government cutbacks to funding and state budget deficits, there are clear
financial incentives for the state government to continue to sell-off public
housing stock to private interests, as it attempted to do in Erskineville and
is doing in Minto.
Transparency and Community
Engagement (Q15 to 21)
A genuinely democratic plan for the development of the CBD
and Redfern-Waterloo can only be developed by elected working class representatives
from across the city, operating with the fullest transparency and the
involvement and input from qualified experts.
This would necessarily include a publicly released study of
the education, health, aged care and other services that would be needed for
the residential and working population of the CBD and surrounding areas.
What exists in the
form of the RWA is a corporatist plan for the development of the city. The
central question facing working people in Redfern-Waterloo, as with their
counterparts worldwide, is not what we or any other candidate promises to do,
but rather how the working class itself can begin to collectively fight for its
own class interests.
This requires
abandoning the illusion that Labor or some other capitalist party, like the
Democrats or Greens, can be pressured to advance the interests of working
people through lobbying, protest, or any other means. The working class must
establish its political independence from the entire official
political establishment.
Built Environment Plan (Q22 to 33)
The SEP does not oppose development. The over-riding issue
is in whose interests the development is being carried out.
Under conditions where the living standards of working
people are being eroded, where poverty is increasing and where large parts of
the city suffer from a lack of adequate, let alone quality, infrastructure, the
RWA plan will ultimately benefit only a wealthier minority of Sydney’s residents.
For this reason, no aspect of the Labor government’s RWA plan
should be supported. It is a redevelopment that will exacerbate the social
divide within the city. In the long-term, the working class faces being
excluded from the area.
The fate of the Block epitomises this process. Whatever
commercial arrangement the Aboriginal Housing Company finally negotiates with
the RWA over how many houses will be built and how the land it owns will be
developed, the impact has already been to pressure some of the most vulnerable members
of the Aboriginal community to move away.
Redwatch asks whether the SEP supports protecting heritage
sites associated with the former railway workshops, underground cabling, the
provision of infrastructure for high-speed internet access, the provision of
greater public open space and building codes that compel developers to
construct quality buildings and infrastructure that takes into account
environmental considerations.
The answer is an emphatic yes. These are socially necessary
and socially beneficial initiatives. The task at hand, however, is the construction
of a mass political movement of the working class that can fundamentally
reorganise economic life and place such initiatives at the centre of planning
decisions. There is simply no other way they will ever be implemented.
In regards to public transport, the Socialist Equality Party
advocates the creation of a comprehensive and publicly owned public transport
network that provides accessible train and bus services free of charge. Access
to free public transport must be considered a social right that is essential
for the full participation of all people in social, cultural, and political
life.
The development of such a system must form part of a
comprehensive urban development plan that addresses every aspect of Sydney’s rapidly
deteriorating social infrastructure. That infrastructure—including roads and
transport, water and sewerage, power and electricity—must be publicly provided
and properly funded. All Public Private Partnerships signed by the state
government must either be repudiated or renegotiated with full public
participation.
Public Housing (Q34 to 41)
The systematic narrowing
of access to public housing has been among the most destructive of the policies
that have been pursued by successive Liberal and Labor governments. This has been
a significant factor in the huge increases in house prices and rents, as well
as causing incalculable hardship for thousands of financially stressed families,
who have not been able to access public housing when they need it.
Between 2005 and 2006, the NSW waiting list for public
housing was cut by 20 percent, not because the government provided more people
with accommodation, but because it is now almost impossible for anyone except
the permanently disabled to qualify. In the last 12 months, Labor has hit
existing public housing residents with increased rents and charges, expected to
bring in an additional $64 million per year.
The SEP advocates an immediate step to alleviate the stress
on working class families caused by housing costs. Mortgage repayments and rent
should be capped at no more than 20 percent of a residents’ income.
As part of a public
works program, the SEP advocates large-scale state investment to renovate
existing public housing and to purchase or construct tens of thousands of new homes.
Affordable, quality, and secure public housing should be available to all those
who want it. At the same time, public housing maintenance must be dramatically improved.
The substandard high-rises that exist in areas like Redfern-Waterloo must be
replaced with quality buildings.
These demands can only be realised through the development
of a mass movement of working people directed against the private profit system
itself.
Human Services (Q42 to 45)
The hardship that is endured by elderly people of working
class backgrounds is among the greatest indictments of the profit system and
the political parties that defend it. Men and women who have laboured for
decades are literally cast aside, denied the adequate income that would enable
them to live out their retirement in dignity, security and comfort.
The SEP proposes to address the unmet needs of the working
class elderly by developing a political movement that will implement the
necessary socialist policies. These include a state-funded pension system in
which all retirees receive the average wage; free specialised health clinics that
cater to the requirements of the elderly; the design of all transport services so
the elderly and disabled can use them; adequate resources for the full-time
care of all those who need it.
The finances for such policies would come from a radical
redistribution of social wealth. The conversion of all major corporations into
publicly-owned enterprises, combined with a progressive taxation system that
targets the assets of the financial aristocracy, would provide the vast
resources necessary.
Eliminating
the unprecedented social gulf that separates rich and poor in Australia is
the solution to social problems such as crime and substance abuse. They will
not be solved by policing measures or imprisoning ever greater numbers of
people who really require treatment and assistance. The SEP opposes the
law-and-order campaigns of the Iemma government and the claims that the state
is fighting a “war on drugs”. Only the systematic raising of the material and
cultural conditions of millions of people will address the real causes, which
are economic, social and cultural deprivation.
The SEP advocates immediate measures such as a dramatic
increase in funding for mental health services and drug and alcohol treatment
and rehabilitation facilities. We support the establishment of facilities that are
specifically resourced to cater for the needs of Aboriginal patients and
immigrant communities, including full translation services. In the final
analysis, however, the scourge of drug and alcohol addiction can only be
overcome by transforming the economic and social conditions and pressures that
have given rise to it
Employment and Enterprise
Plan (Q46 to 47)
The SEP proposes the following policies to address
unemployment. To create additional employment, and to allow all workers to
fully participate in political, social and cultural life, the working week
should be reduced to 30 hours, with no loss of pay. All workers should receive
five weeks’ annual paid leave, maternity and paternity leave, sick leave and
rigorously enforced health and safety standards. All working people whose
skills need upgrading should have access to re-training at quality, free
education facilities, during which time they should be paid the average wage.
Question 48—Issues not addressed by
Redwatch’s questions
Like all Socialist
Equality Party (SEP) candidates in the NSW state election, we are standing in
order to provide an independent political voice for the working
class and to advance a socialist and internationalist program against war,
inequality and the destruction of democratic rights. We stand in complete
opposition to the Iraq war, Washington’s
preparations for a military attack on Iran,
and the aggressive militarism of the Howard government.
We reject the
attempt by the media and political establishment to censor and suppress all
mention in this election of the Iraq war, the preparations for another war against
Iran and the neo-colonial interventions by the Howard government in the South
Pacific on the grounds that only “local” or “state” issues should be discussed.
The eruption of militarism and war is the sharpest reflection
of the destructive impact of the capitalist profit system, which is responsible
for all the pressing problems affecting ordinary people—from the impact of the
corporatist development in RW, to declining working and living conditions,
deteriorating public services, the degradation of the environment, escalating
social inequality, to the destruction of basic rights.
The failure of the 2003 antiwar protests to stop the
invasion of Iraq graphically demonstrated the
futility of appealing to, or seeking to pressure, the existing parties and
institutions. A new political movement of the working class, based upon a
socialist and internationalist perspective, must be urgently built.
We urge all working people in Redfern-Waterloo to support a
socialist perspective, vote SEP in Marrickville and Heffron and, above all, to contact
our party and join our efforts to build a new international revolutionary
movement of the working class.
Patrick O’Connor
James Cogan
March 13, 2007