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By\u00a0Lisa Kremmer<\/a> @LisaKremmer<\/a><\/p>\n 26 August 2013<\/p>\n On Wednesday 21st<\/sup> August I attended a candidates forum organised by a local Murdoch newspaper.\u00a0 Most candidates for the Macarthur and Werriwa electorates were present.\u00a0 It was an eye opener, that\u2019s for sure.<\/p>\n I came away with great dismay over what I had witnessed.\u00a0 It wasn\u2019t just the answers to questions of policy that was disturbing, but the manner in which they were delivered. \u00a0Unfortunately, there were no magic moments where I felt ah ha, that\u2019s the clincher of a response from a candidate I\u2019ll be voting for!\u00a0 What the forum did demonstrate to me however is that there is one candidate who will not get my vote under any circumstances.<\/p>\n Some candidates Mick Williams running for Katter\u2019s Australian Party did not need a script or notes to be articulate party\u2019s policies and why he was standing at the election. He said he was unashamedly protectionist.\u00a0 I suppose Katter has tapped into issues of importance for some people, but he is not serious contender.<\/p>\n The Greens’ Patrick Darley-Jones spoke in response to questions around CSG wells \u2013 Camden is littered with them.\u00a0 He did credit to the Greens, speaking passionately about the environment and often referring to research and other evidence to support his party\u2019s policies.\u00a0 I was blown away by his arguments. <\/p>\n The Palmer United Party candidate Robert Grosche did a reasonable job as well.<\/p>\n Naturally there were only two sitting members in the room \u2013 Laurie Ferguson (ALP, Werriwa) and Russell Matheson (Lib, Macarthur).\u00a0 Their familiarity of party policies and politics garnered from being in the current Parliament was obvious, but not in the ways I had expected.\u00a0 Both had the knowledge and experience to detail what their respective political party\u2019s stood for. They didn\u2019t need to refer to notes and Russell Matheson in particular held firm to the opposition campaign scripts \u2013 the word \u2018trust\u2019 was used many times!<\/p>\n Werriwa\u2019s spick-and-span Liberal candidate Kent Johns did a reasonable job considering he\u2019s new to federal politics. However, Johns is the current Mayor of Sutherland Council and previously served as a Labor Councillor on Rockdale Council.\u00a0 While he deferred some questions to Russell Matheson, the one question only he could answer he sadly avoided. When asked when he would move from Sutherland, if elected, to live within Werriwa, he stalled and evaded answering the question.\u00a0 You might remember a photo from Claymore (a suburb in the Werriwa electorate) in my last post \u2013 worlds away from where Kent Johns chooses to reside.\u00a0 That he feels he can represent the electorate from the Shire says more to me about his personal ambitions than his desire to represent the people of Werriwa.<\/p>\n Ian Fulton, the Labor candidate for Macarthur, was a creditable speaker.\u00a0 While Ian needed to refer to his notes on occasion,,what he had to say was well put and believable.\u00a0 Ian came across as a nice bloke.<\/p>\n However the same cannot be said for the sitting member.\u00a0I was appalled and distressed at the aggression and arrogance I felt Russell Matheson displayed.\u00a0 It was disheartening for so many reasons \u2013 a policy debate in front of constituents, not in the bear pit of parliament, doesn\u2019t need to deteriorate into an attack on political opponents; it doesn\u2019t need to discredit the Teachers\u2019 union for \u201ctelling lies\u201d; it doesn\u2019t need to denigrate the ALP candidate for \u2018conveniently\u2019 supporting a second airport at Badgerys Creek.\u00a0 Sound policy should be defensible on its own merits.<\/p>\n On filling my husband in on what he had missed, he wasn\u2019t surprised.\u00a0 Apparently, the sitting member was widely known as Boxer.\u00a0 The words of the Simon and Garfunkel song come to mind \u2026..<\/p>\n