März 2001
Australien:
Western Australian state election
Socialist Party gets highest vote on the Left
The determination in Labor areas to get rid of the Liberals was the main factor why Socialist Party candidate Neil Gray only received 259 votes (1.24%). However if we compare like with like the Socialist Party had a huge success. The Progressive Labor Party got 48 votes (0.41%) in Bunbury. The Democratic Socialist Party received 98 votes (0.53%) in Perth and 115 (0.57%) in Fremantle.
The Socialist Party to the streets with a military strategy to blitz the seat of Maylands with the socialist message. We distributed 10,000 leaflets (11 different leaflets over 8 weeks) and ran a stall or street activity almost every day. We had large feature articles for Neil in the Western Australian and every edition of the local newspapers for the election period. This is despite a virtual media ban on the small parties. Our media campaign was more successful than the Greens!
On only one occasion did we see any other candidate campaign in Maylands. Yet they were out in force on polling day! What contempt for the people of Maylands! What a heartless vote-grabbing approach to an area wracked with social problems of housing, health, education and a huge drug problem. None of the other candidates were there every day to see the mentally and physically challenged struggle with minimum support from the health agencies. Nor to listen to every second person who had been directly or indirectly affected by the heroin crisis. This was one of our main campaign issues. We received huge support on this campaign getting 1,000 signatures, raised almost $400 on Heroin Campaign stalls and were sincerely thanked hundreds of times by people for honestly trying to do something about the problem.
From this election campaign we have grown and built links with the youth and trade unions. The Socialist Party has laid the basis for a much larger and dynamic Socialist Party in WA. We will dig deep roots into the working class communities, the trade unions and the youth of WA.
Australien:
Article from the Voice, Australien Socialist Party newspaper
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