Political Inclusion?

Julia Gillard spoke at the Melbourne University Centre for Public Policy last night, on the topic of ‘Labor's framework for social inclusion’. She spoke knowledgably and engagingly about what is essentially weet-bix dry public policy. It clearly not a particularly sexy topic because, the public lecture was not nearly as packed out with punters (and whackos) that an event like this would usually be.

I have long been a fan, but that was based almost entirely on the fact that she was a woman and a Melbournian. There was no rational basis on which I had formed my opinion.

Last night I was hugely impressed with her as a speaker and even more impressed with the depth of her knowledge of policy and ideas outside her own portfolios. During a Q&A session she fielded questions about gay & lesbian policy, the budget, indigenous affairs, women’s affairs, infrastructure and IR with ease and it was quite apparent that unlike certain minister within the current administration, she actually reads things that are given to her.*

Its not really a surprise to me that the punters didn’t turn out in droves to this lecture, because social policy, and particularly policy surrounding social inclusion, is just not sexy. This is for two reasons. One, is that its really, really hard to find anything that works and twice as hard to pay for it. And two, its about helping the old, the poor, the uneducated, the disabled, migrants and aboriginal people, and most of the population couldn’t give a stuff about any of them.

But it turns out Julia Gillard does. She actually believes in social policy and that we have an obligation to invest in social inclusion while the economy is strong enough to pay for it. It warmed my heart to see someone working within the government (or at least the alternative government**) talking about the things I care about and saying the sorts of things I like to hear. It has been a long time.

Like Tom, I am struggling to contain my pessimism (the dees season is quite obviously ruined and its only round 3) about the coming election and my disillusionment with the political climate in general, but last night’s lecture was a nice reminder that some of my values are also held by some of the politicians, some of the time.

*She also had this very clever way of mentioning the shadow minister for whichever portfolio she was talking about, a bit of a ‘getting to know the gang’ kind of a thing.

** I am enjoying the way Special K has started calling it the ‘alternative government’ makes it sound like they actually are an ‘alternative’ not just an ‘opposition’.

You can now get a transcript of this lecture from here.