tag:theconversation.com,2011:/ca/topics/greens-leadership-16729/articlesGreens leadership – The Conversation2015-05-06T19:51:04Ztag:theconversation.com,2011:article/413632015-05-06T19:51:04Z2015-05-06T19:51:04ZGreens’ leadership shifts from Tasmania to the greenest state<p>The balance of power in Australian green politics has now shifted, with the choice of Victorian Senator Richard Di Natale as the Greens’ new parliamentary leader. And for a party renowned for its suspicion of the idea of leadership, the way that change was handled is a political lesson other parties would do well to heed.</p>
<p>Di Natale is from arguably the greenest state in Australian politics: Victoria. Victorians now has more Green parliamentarians than Tasmania – home to previous leaders Bob Brown and the now retiring Christine Milne – or that other important green wellspring state, Western Australia, birthplace of both the Nuclear Disarmament Party and the West Australian Greens.</p>
<p>In the past, the Greens were dominated by conservationists from Tasmania, who were politicised by the battle over that state’s wilderness. But increasingly it’s appealing more to urban-based social progressives – particularly those from the inner suburbs of Melbourne. (Though Di Natale has moved on from there; these days he has a farm in Victoria’s south-west.)</p>
<p>Among the inner Melbourne Greens, crucial causes include refugee rights, rights for same-sex couples, the need to battle the problem of climate change – and getting right under the skin of the Socialist Left faction of the Victorian ALP.</p>
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<a href="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=1000&fit=clip"><img alt="" src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&fit=clip" srcset="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=600&h=261&fit=crop&dpr=1 600w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=600&h=261&fit=crop&dpr=2 1200w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=600&h=261&fit=crop&dpr=3 1800w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=754&h=328&fit=crop&dpr=1 754w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=30&auto=format&w=754&h=328&fit=crop&dpr=2 1508w, https://images.theconversation.com/files/80636/original/image-20150506-22665-1nz4usy.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=15&auto=format&w=754&h=328&fit=crop&dpr=3 2262w" sizes="(min-width: 1466px) 754px, (max-width: 599px) 100vw, (min-width: 600px) 600px, 237px"></a>
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<span class="caption">The Brunswick Greens’ state election night party in November 2014.</span>
<span class="attribution"><a class="source" href="https://www.flickr.com/photos/takver/15910323915/in/photolist-pSGSXi-3HH3bX-pAvpwR-8tQnc3-pXv5YK-qeTiGd-qcEqUm-pXnDC7-qeWyZz-pXnHx1-qeLtM6-pibGdH-pibJqi-7Pe2uP-oW9b7v-pAxgK7-pAviRc-oW6hKC-pSSH9K-pT1Eh3-pAvtYB-pAxiaS-pArFw6-pArPzv-pSGBic-pAucmG-oW99Hi-oW9kxV-oW9cpa-7xGorg">Takver/Flickr</a>, <a class="license" href="http://creativecommons.org/licenses/by-sa/4.0/">CC BY-SA</a></span>
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<h2>Those who missed out</h2>
<p>The Di Natale ascendancy has been accompanied by the party’s decision to have two deputy leaders, his Senate colleagues Larissa Waters from Queensland and Scott Ludlam from Western Australia.</p>
<p>Seasoned Greens-watchers will immediately note the absence from this leadership team of South Australian Sarah Hanson-Young, one of the higher profile members of the Greens Senate team by virtue of her refugee advocacy. </p>
<p>Also missing from the mix is the party’s sole lower house member, Adam Bandt, who rose to national prominence in the 2010-2013 minority Labor government years. However, his profile has fallen since the 2013 election, by virtue of the Liberal-National coalition’s subsequent dominance of the lower house.</p>
<p>Amid speculation about whether he had been “<a href="http://www.news.com.au/national/christine-milne-resigns-as-greens-leader/story-fncynjr2-1227338254396">shafted</a>” in losing the deputy leadership, Bandt posted his congratulations on social media, saying he was happy to focus on the imminent arrival of his new baby. But realistically, Bandt was never likely to become leader when the rest of his party colleagues sit in the other chamber of parliament.</p>
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<p>Hanson-Young may yet have unrequited ambition, having made an unsuccessful bid for the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2010-10-26/hanson-young-challenged-for-deputy-position/2311792">deputy leadership in 2010</a> – and in political parties, thwarted ambition can always be a potential source of destabilisation. </p>
<p>But having said that, the leadership transition from Milne to Di Natale happened quickly, and he was <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-05-06/greens-elect-richard-di-natale-as-new-leader/6448948">unopposed</a>. Given the comparatively small number of parliamentarians, the decision was probably made by collegial consensus, in which Hanson-Young would have been involved.</p>
<h2>A lesson for other parties</h2>
<p>On reflection, <a href="https://theconversation.com/columns/view-from-the-hill-34">the speed and dexterity</a> of the change sits in complete contrast to more ham-fisted arrangements in other parties in recent years. </p>
<p>The now-defunct Australian Democrats had a protracted membership-based electoral process. The Labor Party now also has a <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-10-13/bill-shorten-elected-labor-leader/5019116">membership ballot</a>. The Palmer United Party has a leader, but most of the party don’t want to be led by him. And even the Liberal Party has suffered protracted leadership troubles, with commentators watching the 2015 budget and its aftermath for any signs of a leadership putsch against Tony Abbott.</p>
<p>Amidst all of this, the Greens have acted with breath-taking speed and unanimity amongst the parliamentary wing. It may well be that a strong sense of collegiality is one of the consequences of being a small parliamentary party that is constantly being attacked by all sides of politics and most of the media as well. </p>
<p>For all the pillorying of them as either dangerous ideologues and/or naïve idealists by their critics, the parliamentary Greens have demonstrated significant political acumen with this latest move. </p>
<p>In a sense, Di Natale was the obvious choice as leader in that his state has become a very strong electoral base for the party. Di Natale is the most experienced of the Victorian Senators, and his re-election is probably assured. </p>
<p>The party needs a deputy leader, and Scott Ludlam, who has been in the Senate for longer than Di Natale, has had a high profile in the recent meta-data debate. The fact that he comes from a state that has been integral to the evolution of green party politics in Australia also helped make him an obvious choice. </p>
<p>By appointing Waters as a second deputy, the canny Greens circumvent the otherwise obvious criticism of its leadership being dominated by blokes. Being able to maximise the sympathy and support of the party’s core constituency will be the primary task of the new leadership team.</p>
<p>That core constituency is young, well-educated and clustered in the inner suburbs of most of the Australian capital cities. So it makes sense that the party leader should now come from the Garden State, whose capital city has become the greenest of all.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/41363/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Nick Economou does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>The balance of power in Australian green politics has shifted with the choice of Victorian Senator Richard Di Natale as Greens’ leader – and the speed of the change is a lesson for other parties.Nick Economou, Senior Lecturer, School of Political and Social Inquiry, Monash UniversityLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/413702015-05-06T10:32:24Z2015-05-06T10:32:24ZNew Greens leader wants to send a message to those with ‘mainstream values’<figure><img src="https://images.theconversation.com/files/80623/original/image-20150506-22642-1kd3iev.jpg?ixlib=rb-1.1.0&q=45&auto=format&w=496&fit=clip" /><figcaption><span class="caption">The new leadership team: co-deputies Larissa Waters and Scott Ludlam flank leader Richard Di Natale.</span> <span class="attribution"><span class="source">AAP/Lukas Coch</span></span></figcaption></figure><p>The Greens mostly like to keep their party ‘internals’ internal. The <a href="https://theconversation.com/di-natale-elected-greens-leader-after-milne-resigns-41347">leadership transition</a> from Christine Milne to Victorian senator Richard Di Natale was marked by secrecy and tightly stitched up.</p>
<p>There were no leaks that Milne, who succeeded Bob Brown in 2012, was about to pull the pin. Within two hours of her Wednesday morning announcement that she wouldn’t be contesting the next election and was quitting the leadership immediately, the party had a new team, all elected unanimously.</p>
<p>There are now two deputies, Scott Ludlam from Western Australia and Larissa Waters from Queensland, ensuring a woman is still in a leadership position.</p>
<p>Previously it had seemed likely that if Milne stepped down her deputy, Adam Bandt, who holds the seat of Melbourne and is the only lower house member in the 11-person party room, would be a strong contender to replace her. Now Bandt is no longer even deputy. To have two Victorian males as the Greens’ face would never have been on.</p>
<p>Milne and Bandt have had a partnership of convenience and apparently he only learned of her planned resignation on Wednesday morning.</p>
<p>Sources close to Bandt insist he’s not unhappy at how things have panned out. His partner is about to give birth to their first child. But whether or not he feels miffed by the process – on which neither Milne nor Di Natale would be drawn – Bandt’s not likely to cause trouble. He has a seat to hang on to and Di Natale is popular in the party.</p>
<p>The leadership change is more than a generational one – it marks the end of the Brown-Milne era, that was born out of the environmental cause and centred in Tasmania.</p>
<p>Ben Oquist, a former adviser to both Brown and Milne, says they “have been the heart and soul of Green politics for a quarter of a century. Richard represents a great ‘generation next’ for the Greens”.</p>
<p>Di Natale, age 44, is little known, and will have the challenge of establishing a public and national profile while defining directions for a party that the majors want and need to demonise.</p>
<p>He’s regarded as a good communicator – better than Milne, who has often sounded too shrill and uncompromising.</p>
<p>Like Brown, Di Natale was trained as a doctor and there’s a touch of the GP about him still. He’s the son of an Italian immigrant family, played VFA football, and lives at the foothills of the Otway Ranges on his farm, which includes an apple orchard and olive grove.</p>
<p>Di Natale told their joint news conference: “Christine and I are different people. I came at this through health. I came not from a political background. I spent a few years as a GP and a public health specialist working in places like Tennant Creek and north-east India.</p>
<p>"It became pretty clear to me that if you want to improve people’s health, you’ve got to start looking at the things that make people sick…</p>
<p>"If you want to know about my general philosophy, I’m not an ideologue. I’m not going to say we want small or big government … We want decent government that looks after people…</p>
<p>"My view is pretty straightforward. People want access to health care, to education and they want the environment looked after. They want clean air and water for their kids, pretty basic things.”</p>
<p>With their critics branding the Greens as extreme, Di Natale talks up their appeal to the mainstream. “We are the natural home of progressive, mainstream Australian voters.”</p>
<p>From a working class background and an extended family of Labor voters, he said there was a good chance that if he’d been born earlier “maybe I’d be in the Labor Party right now”.</p>
<p>But his eye is not just on picking up support from the Labor side. “I think there are a lot of people who are small-l Liberal voters who have got strong concerns about the direction of the country and I want to say to them as well that you can trust us with your vote … We do have things in common and the values that those people care about are our values too.”</p>
<p>One big question is whether the Greens will now be more amenable to negotiating with the Abbott government. Milne wanted to deny Tony Abbott “wins”. Di Natale says he will talk with the Prime Minister however doesn’t see many areas of common ground with “a deeply ideological government”.</p>
<p>But he also strikes a pragmatic note: “I’m in this business to get outcomes, I want to get stuff done.”</p>
<p>An obvious (although relatively easy) test for the Di Natale Greens will be over the reintroduction of fuel excise indexation. The government implemented this 2014 budget measure by regulation when it couldn’t get Senate support, but has to validate it by legislation later this year.</p>
<p>Di Natale said he would not make “captain’s picks” but agreed that new leadership gave the opportunity “to talk about a whole lot of things”.</p>
<p>Now it is in operation, the Greens would be crazy not to support the fuel measure. It has been their policy – Milne was much criticised for her stand against it – and there is no way to return the money collected to the motorists.</p>
<p>Milne, who is about to turn 62 and who will leave the Senate before her term ends in mid 2017, has timed her handover well.</p>
<p>There has been some concern within the Greens about her taking the party to the next election – which will be a challenge because of an eroding vote – and periodic criticism of her leadership style. Pressure on her could have increased as the election drew near.</p>
<p>As it is, she goes out at a time of her choosing, having increased the Greens parliamentary numbers from 10 to 11, and leaving her successor a sufficient period in which to establish himself before the expected time of the election. Most political leaders exit a lot less neatly.</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/41370/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
The Greens mostly like to keep their party ‘internals’ internal. The leadership transition from Christine Milne to Victorian senator Richard Di Natale was marked by secrecy and tightly stitched up.Michelle Grattan, Professorial Fellow, University of CanberraLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.tag:theconversation.com,2011:article/413532015-05-06T07:43:55Z2015-05-06T07:43:55ZMilne got results from minority pacts with both sides of politics<p>Christine Milne, who has <a href="https://theconversation.com/greens-leader-christine-milne-resigns-di-natale-elected-41347">resigned</a> as leader of the Australian Greens, held the position for three years after succeeding the party’s founding leader, Bob Brown.</p>
<p>Immediately following her resignation, the parliamentary Greens elected a new leader, Victorian Senator and former GP Richard Di Natale – the first Greens leader not to come from Tasmania.</p>
<p>Milne’s explanation was that she will not be recontesting her Senate seat at the 2016 federal election, so decided to make way for a new leadership team (now comprising co-deputies Larissa Waters and Scott Ludlam) to allow for a smooth transition and give the party time to consolidate ahead of the campaign.</p>
<p>What sort of legacy will she leave, and how successfully has she guided the party’s agenda since Brown’s departure?</p>
<h2>Electoral ups and downs</h2>
<p>Under Milne’s leadership, and following the Australian Greens’ support of the previous Labor-led minority government, the party <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-09-29/greens-election-loss-christine-milne-labor/4987506">lost votes</a> at the last election, but nevertheless retained all of its MPs and picked up another senator.</p>
<p>In Milne’s terms, the Greens’ role is to build political capital and then, when an opportunity like supporting minority government arises, to spend that capital on achieving policy outcomes like Labor’s <a href="http://www.comlaw.gov.au/Details/C2011B00166">clean energy bill</a>, which ushered in the <a href="https://theconversation.com/au/topics/carbon-tax">carbon tax</a> in 2012.</p>
<p>This degree of influence on government policy was an impressive achievement for a farmer’s daughter, a fifth-generation Tasmanian from the state’s rural northwest, a one-time high school teacher and young mother whose life changed when she committed herself to environmental activism.</p>
<p>She was <a href="http://christine-milne.greensmps.org.au/about">arrested and jailed</a> in 1983 for blockading the flooding of the Franklin River, and then went on in the mid-1980s to unite farmers, fishers, scientists, environmentalists and community members against the billion-dollar Wesley Vale pulp mill.</p>
<p>Having risen from her self-described “humble beginnings in the rolling dairy hills of Wesley Vale”, she was elected to the Tasmanian Parliament in 1989 as member for the conservative, sprawling rural electorate of Lyons, and was party to the historic Labor-Green Accord in which five Greens supported a Labor minority government.</p>
<p>There were many environmental achievements under that Accord, including the creation of new national parks, additional world heritage and national estate forests nominations, abandoned forestry ventures and woodchip export limits. </p>
<p>Milne went on to become the Greens’ state leader – the first female leader of a political party in Tasmania. She remains the only female politician to have led a party at both state and federal levels. </p>
<p>In 1996, with Milne at the helm, the Tasmanian Greens ventured into new territory by supporting a Liberal minority government. The partnership <a href="http://www.researchgate.net/profile/Kate_Crowley/publication/264978962_Minority_Government_The_Liberal_Green_experience_in_Tasmania/links/53fa93d40cf27c365cf037d4.pdf">delivered achievements</a> such as national parks and forest reserve declarations, deferred logging, and greener state development policy .</p>
<p>Milne has <a href="http://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2008/february/1334530750/amanda-lohrey/green-christine">reflected</a> that her political highlights of this period, from 1996-98, included the introduction of gun law reform following the Port Arthur massacre, the liberalisation of gay laws, an apology to the Indigenous stolen generation and support for an Australian republic.</p>
<h2>The legacy</h2>
<p>Milne’s legacy straddles social and environmental policy successes. Her efforts as state Greens leader helped to push Tasmania towards what she <a href="http://christine-milne.greensmps.org.au/content/news-stories/about-christine-milne">called</a> a “clean, green, clever” future, and as federal leader she embraced moves towards delivering a more sustainable, low-carbon economy. </p>
<p>When supporting the Labor minority government from 2010 to 2013, Milne advocated a successful multi-party approach to the unprecedented introduction of carbon pricing in Australia and the establishment of associated bureaucracy and processes.</p>
<p>This aspect of her legacy was removed by the Abbott government (the only government in the world to have repealed such action), but Milne claims it is “the last stand of the vanquished”, adding that “the community is now leaving behind the fossil-fool age and getting on with realising clean energy”.</p>
<p>The repeal of carbon pricing was indicative of the Abbott government’s hostility to Milne’s environmental agenda. But Milne has claimed the acrimony as a motivating factor – one that has afforded the Greens an opportunity to recover their base as recent successes have shown at state elections.</p>
<p>This viewpoint was evident in her <a href="http://greensmps.org.au/content/news-stories/christine-milne-delivers-greens-2014-budget-reply-speech">dismissal</a> of Treasurer Joe Hockey’s 2014 budget as a “vicious attack on the fabric of our society” that let big business off the hook, that widened the gap between rich and poor, and that “abandons the environment and … jeopardises our future”.</p>
<p>Her resignation leaves behind a party with <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-15/greens-consider-major-reforms-amid-member-discontent-tasmania/5743158">reform challenges</a> but that has now made inroads not only in urban electorates but in some regional areas (including in the <a href="http://www.abc.net.au/news/2015-03-29/new-election-greens-say-voters-unhappy-with-major-parties/6356722">recent NSW election</a>) where Milne, as a farmer’s daughter, has helped built bridges on agricultural issues. </p>
<p>Action on climate change has been more than a political crusade for Christine Milne. And this area is where she will dedicate her efforts following her resignation. She has pledged to remain active in advocating for climate action, <a href="http://www.smh.com.au/news/environment/climate-wont-wait-mr-rudd/2008/07/19/1216163231976.html">saying</a>: “If ever our planet needed inspiring leadership, it is now.”</p><img src="https://counter.theconversation.com/content/41353/count.gif" alt="The Conversation" width="1" height="1" />
<p class="fine-print"><em><span>Kate Crowley does not work for, consult, own shares in or receive funding from any company or organisation that would benefit from this article, and has disclosed no relevant affiliations beyond their academic appointment.</span></em></p>Christine Milne has been seen as an ideological politician. But her record of working with minority governments of both stripes showed she could deliver on her agenda from outside the mainstream.Kate Crowley, Associate Professor, Public and Environmental Policy, University of TasmaniaLicensed as Creative Commons – attribution, no derivatives.