Fast Buck$, Coorabell.
Is the same-sex marriage plebiscite a form of corruption?
I recall that in 1994 or thereabouts NSW premier Nick Greiner was having trouble with one of his elected ministers. He solved the problem by offering that minister a public service job. ICAC subsequently found that this was ‘corrupt’ because Mr Greiner had used public funds (ie public service wages) to solve what was essentially a private Liberal Party problem. (Later that was overturned 2–1 by the Court of Appeal in a judgment I never got round to read – but that was too late to help Nick Greiner, who’d already had to resign by then.)
So don’t we have a similar situation in relation to the plebiscite? Malcolm Turnbull would vote for same-sex marriage right now if he had a free hand, but as part of his leadership deal with the conservatives in the Liberal Party he has agreed to this delaying tactic.
In other words he wants to sacrifice $150 million plus of public funds to solve what is essentially a private internal Liberal Party problem. Sounds pretty corrupt to me. To be consistent about his concern for ‘everyone having their democratic say’ he’d in fact have to have a plebiscite before about any parliamentary vote, wouldn’t he?
Despite Malcolm’s bleating on and on about ‘innovation’ he himself remains a highly typical politician – nothing innovative about his approach; same old bullshit.
On the other hand those who oppose a plebiscite because it would give haters a platform and upset same-sex couples seem insane to me. What, you can’t have a free debate because some people might get upset?
For four decades The Echo has printed the stories some people loved, some people hated, and some pretended not to read. If you want us to keep telling the truth, the real truth, not the sugar-coated version. We’ll need your support to keep the presses rolling. 
