It is somehow fitting that democratic socialist Zohran Mamdani was overwhelmingly elected Mayor of New York, despite desperate attempts by billionaires to keep him out, just a few days before the 50th anniversary of the coup against our radical reformist Prime Minister Gough Whitlam.
Mamdani has a program to assist the poor, including free public transit, free childcare and rent freezes. While these policies are regarded as ‘communist’ by Republicans, they are normal in Scandinavia and other countries.
In 1972, Gough Whitlam was the first Labor prime minister to be elected in 23 years. His government inherited a country that had stagnated under the conservatives.
In his three turbulent years in office Whitlam changed the face of Australia.
He immediately ended conscription and brought Australian troops back from Vietnam.
He established Medibank, free universal health care, abolished university fees, established the Family Court of Australia, introduced no-fault divorce, normalised relations with China, established the Legal Aid Office, passed the Racial Discrimination Act, and appointed the first minister for the environment. The list goes on.
Where he came unstuck was trying to take on the might of America.
He had announced that ‘there should not be foreign military bases, stations, or installations in Australia’. The top-secret Pine Gap facility was under threat.
Alarm bells began ringing loudly in Washington. They started to move on him. Subsequent American involvement in the coup was confirmed by the apology President Jimmy Carter made to Gough Whitlam in 1977.
In early November 1975, after Whitlam had demanded a full list of CIA operatives in Australia, the head of the department of defence met with Governor General Sir John Kerr and stated, ‘this is the greatest threat to the nation’s security that there has ever been’. Days later Kerr sacked the Whitlam government.
Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Peterson had set the scene for the dismissal by choosing Albert Field to replace deceased federal Labor senator Bert Milliner, despite Labor nominating Mal Colston.
Albert Field had expressed opposition to the Whitlam government. Field was expelled from the Labor Party for accepting the nomination and sat as an independent.
The Coalition took advantage of the situation and blocked the budget, leading to the crisis and giving an excuse to John Kerr to sack the Whitlam government, as urged by the American CIA.
Australian voters had the opportunity to re-elect the Whitlam government, but the chaos alarmed them, and they gave Malcolm Fraser the mandate instead.
Malcolm Fraser took no time in demolishing Whitlam’s ‘socialist’ Medibank and forced Australians back to paying for their own medical costs.
Nine years later, Labor’s Bob Hawke reintroduced universal health care, Medicare, and despite attempts by successive conservative governments to water it down, we still have it, albeit still deficient.
A conservative government today would have great difficulty in axing Medicare as it is supported by all Australians.
Whitlam had the ‘crash or crash through’ mentality of a revolutionary reformist.
Despite his untimely demise, much of his extraordinary legacy lives on. His three years in office was worth ten years of any other prime minister. He didn’t believe in the slow glacial change from which we now suffer.
I was fortunate enough to meet Gough Whitlam on several occasions.
One time in the NSW parliament, shortly after I was elected, he was visiting and whispered to me smiling, ‘This must be an important occasion, Richard, you’re wearing a suit’.
I replied, ‘Yes, and it’s made of hemp.’ He burst into loud laughter. I believe it was the first suit in Australia to be made of hemp fabric.
One time I bumped into him at Canberra Airport, and I moaned, ‘Gough we need you back.’ He sighed and boomed loudly, ‘Yes, I know’.
Australians, like New Yorkers and Americans in general, want a return to the ‘fair go’ ethic that used to exemplify this country.
The taxation system is in urgent need of repair to even out the inequality. Capital gains tax, almost dismantled by John Howard, is still hopelessly inadequate. Timidity seems to be the order of the day.
Mamdani’s meteoric rise to prominence and his record vote indicate a deep yearning amongst people for real change. Let’s hope that he can fulfill those bold promises to the people of New York.
He’s bucking both the Republican and the Democrat establishment. Like our duopoly, they are too conservative to introduce much-needed reforms and are also locked into corporate donations and influence.
Under successive governments of both persuasions, here and in America, the wealthy have become incredibly richer while ordinary income taxpayers are shouldering an unfair burden. The uber-wealthy receive tax breaks and foreign corporations ship our commodities overseas, paying virtually no corporate tax. Young people can barely afford to rent homes, let alone buy them. This inequality must be addressed.
Perhaps Mamdani is a sign of change to come.
Richard Jones is a former NSW MLC, and is now a ceramist.
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