I once voted for the Greens and lived to regret it: Steve Price

I am having trouble remembering exactly why, but I once voted for the Greens. My chances of doing it again are as about as likely as Adam Bandt becoming prime minister.

Greens leader Adam Bandt at Parliament House, Canberra. Picture: AAP

It’s sad to say, and I’m embarrassed to publicly admit it: I once voted for the Greens.

There you go, it’s out there, and I am having trouble remembering exactly why it happened. My best recollection is it was the 2004 federal election and I voted in the seat of Warringah.

Tony Abbott was the local federal member, and I might have been having some trouble with some of his ideas at that time.

The 2004 campaign was full of strange events, including, of course, the famous crunching handshake from Mark Latham on John Howard.

That Latham was even the Labor leader is hard to believe these days, and that a bully-boy act on the PM cost him victory is even harder to reconcile.

It was then, and still is, the only time I have ever voted Green and my chances of doing it again are as about as likely as Adam Bandt becoming prime minister.

Bandt is the Melbourne-based leader of Australia’s Greens Party and a stain on Australian politics.

He is also an embarrassment to the party that started out as a conservation protest movement saving forests and river systems.

Bandt this week couldn’t help himself, and in the process made a complete goose of himself. Keen to get on the nightly news he wandered outside federal parliament and thought – as he always does – that spouting garbage about climate change and global warming would be a good idea.

What happened next should have the few Greens left in Canberra wondering aloud about their leader.

Melbourne’s lower house member was keen to slam Prime Minister Scott Morrison and the climate plan that he is taking to Glasgow.

Bandt said: “When they see this document in Glasgow, they won’t be calling Scott Morrison heroic, they’ll be calling him a joke”.

Then this zinger: “This isn’t a plan, it’s climate fraud. There’s no new money, no new policies, more coal and gas and 2030 targets that will cook our kids.”

Seriously – cook kids? He went on: “Weak 2030 targets are a death sentence”.

So, Adam Bandt believes the way to conduct a debate on global warming is to flap his mouth around and tell people children are going to be cooked and die in just nine years’ time.

He went on to argue we need to immediately phase out coal and gas – without offering up any alternatives – and accused the PM of putting our lives at risk.

This bloke is a joke.

He has no idea, he has no plan, he just has a habit of trying to scare people while making himself look ridiculous.

Bandt joins protesters in Treasury Gardens to call for action on climate change. Picture: Andrew Henshaw

Australia’s Green movement has been led by some serious and committed political leaders and adults. Bandt is not one of them.

Incredibly, he has won the seat of Melbourne at four federal elections and has increased his majority each time to now hold the seat by the third-largest majority of any Australian MP.

What that says about the Melbourne electorate I’m not sure, but it means, of course, that the inner-west living Bandt has no idea of what happens outside Australian capital cities.

If he has ever visited a mine site in his life, I would be very surprised.

The university educated industrial lawyer would plunge Australia into a darkness we’d never recover from.

Nonsensical made-for-TV scare mongering might work for Greta Thunberg but she’s a teenager not a political leader.

Polls this week that Adam should have a look at include that just eight per cent of voters would accept a significant increase in their energy bills to reduce Australia’s emissions. Another 43 per cent would accept a small cost.

Almost half those polled don’t want to pay anything more.

If he wants to be taken seriously, Bandt ought to take a leaf out of a legend of his movement: Bob Brown.

Bob Hawke with Bob Brown in Hobart during the Franklin Dam protest in 1983. Picture: Hobart Mercury archives

Bandt was just 10 years old when the Tasmanian veteran ignited conservation as a political issue leading the Franklin Dam protests and convincing a newly elected Bob Hawke to put a stop to that dam.

In early 1983 the late Melbourne Herald newspaper photographer Bruce Howard and I were the first mainland media to reach the headwaters of the Franklin.

The Brown-led protesters plucked me off the Strahan based ferry in a rubber dinghy for an interview inside their protest camp – a headquarters that remained for four months.

Bruce took a famous shot of the Wilderness Society banners and I rejoined the ferry for the ride back.

That protest movement saw 1400 people arrested and a blockade that swelled to hundreds.

It was a serious and successful action by passionate people well-argued and led by Brown. It’s a pity for the Greens movement the current leader acts more like the 10-year-old kid he was back then.

Australians from all walks of life – not just inner-city Greens – care about the environment they live in.

We all recycle and avoid littering and drive vehicles engineered to not be polluters.

Support for global action exists but not at the cost of the Australian economy and jobs.

That was proved during the last election campaign and all the way back to the Carbon Tax era.

Bandt simply misjudges the intelligence of wider Australia seemingly because of his wild popularity in Brunswick.

A stint in the bush might open his eyes.

THIS WEEK’S DISLIKES

• Proposed new Covid laws Daniel Andrews wants to pass sending people to jail

• Heartless Tasmanian politicians and health bureaucrats banning families entering to farewell dying relatives

• Confusion over whether unvaccinated tennis stars can come for the Australian Open

• Ongoing bans for the unvaccinated just dividing an already divided community

LIKES

• International borders opening up on November 1 for Australian travellers including Singapore

• More freedom for Victorians including trips to the regions and the opening up of the border to NSW

• Increased crowds at the Spring Racing Carnival and the inspiring jockeys who are so brave

• Food businesses that have survived by doing takeaway throwing the doors back open