{"id":7914,"date":"2013-08-11T18:35:50","date_gmt":"2013-08-11T08:35:50","guid":{"rendered":"http:\/\/nofibs.com.au\/?p=7914"},"modified":"2022-05-02T00:18:33","modified_gmt":"2022-05-01T14:18:33","slug":"socialists-launch-election-campaign-in-wills-and-corio-reports-takvera","status":"publish","type":"post","link":"https:\/\/archive.nofibs.com.au\/socialists-launch-election-campaign-in-wills-and-corio-reports-takvera\/","title":{"rendered":"Socialists launch election campaign in Wills and Corio: @takvera reports"},"content":{"rendered":"
\"Margarita

Margarita Windisch – Socialist Alliance candidate for Wills<\/p><\/div>\n

By John Englart<\/a><\/p>\n

11 August 2013<\/p>\n

Socialist activists launched their election campaign on Saturday night in support of candidates in two ‘safe’ Labor seats in Victoria: Margarita Windisch in Wills, based on Melbourne’s inner northern suburbs, and Sue Bull in Corio centred on the regional city of Geelong. <\/p>\n

The electorate of Wills (See Seat profile<\/a>) still has a radical tinge, with many socialist, social justice and union activists making it their home. The event was held at the Anatolian Cultural centre on Sydney Road, Coburg. Leftwing Turkish migrants established this social centre 20 to 30 years ago.<\/p>\n

If you judge by voting patterns, Socialists have had a small resurgence in Victoria in working class areas. Sue Bolton was elected to Moreland Council in a surprise result last September. The Fitroy ward of the City of Yarra council re-elected Socialist Party candidate Stephen Jolly. He received more first preference votes than any other candidate in his ward, a reflection on his active grassroots campaigning on local issues with local residents over many years. Down in Geelong Sue Bull stood as a Socialist Alliance candidate last September and received over 10,000 first preference votes (8 per cent) in the mayoral race.<\/p>\n

Both Maragarita Windisch and Sue Bull have no illusions about their chances of being elected. They are running in this election to advocate their socialist policies directly to people. It provides an opportunity to meet with people to raise issues of inequality and social justice and the campaigns for workers rights, women’s rights, refugee rights, climate action and other pressing social issues. <\/p>\n

And they deserve to be heard as much as the Labor, Liberal or Greens candidates. It is one of the primary reasons why I became a citizen journalist. That the mainstream media and journalists were, for the most part, ignoring the local, the grassroots. But these stories also need to be told and shared in any society that has true democratic aspirations.<\/p>\n

The Socialist campaign event drew a reasonable crowd, perhaps 80 people, and was as much a fundraising and cultural activity as a political event. Activists from a variety of left organisations and various ethnic communities were present. Even competing Wills candidate Dean O’Callaghan from the Save the Planet Party turned up later and was made welcome. There was a real sense of community in the hall.<\/p>\n

Public housing activist Kate Borland, who is standing as an Independant for the seat of Melbourne gave a speech in support of Ms Windisch. <\/p>\n

\nI am not doing this to be a politician, as I’m sure Margarita is the same. We don’t want to be politicians like the politicians we are actually seeing. We just want everybody to be a part and to have a say in what kind of life we want to live and what sort of world we are going to create for our children. Unless we start speaking up: we need Independents in parliament.\n<\/p><\/blockquote>\n