Mike King*



 
Right or wrong the very small Australian territory Norfolk Island boasts nine representative seats in its Legislative Assembly and an electorate of only some 1100 voters.
  Some might say that is absurd but it gets worse when you take into account that a further 20 members or so of the community occupy positions on statutory committees; making Norfolk Island the most over governed part of Australia with one presiding community member to 40 voters.
  In 1979 (only four years after extending independence to Papua New Guinea and one year after giving self government to its Northern Territory), the federal coalition government under Malcolm Fraser extended self-government to its tiny South Pacific territory Norfolk island.
  Curiously, the federal government granted this little island powers and functions of responsibility from all tiers of Australian government; local, state and federal type.
  Somewhere in the mysterious and convoluted depths of the Fraser policy lay a belief that a community of some 1800 people could muster sufficient perception and capacity to fund and operate all functions of government as we know them. 
  Norfolk Island was offered and accepted the right to govern its own affairs including the heady items of customs, quarantine, health, social welfare, education, immigration, police and tax systems (adequacy being considered before fairness and equity) and to provide all public utilities at a fair cost and on a viable on-going basis. 
  It was regarded quietly then and more loudly in recent years by the federal parliament as an experiment; an experiment which many said would undoubtedly fail.
  Some have argued convincingly that the absence of political parties during the period of self-government has led to a lack of cohesion, a paucity of challenge and an entrenched hiatus in focused policy, all of which have contributed to the failure.
  In June 2009, ISLANDS BUSINESS reported the Australian Government’s view that Norfolk Island was on the brink of becoming a failed state.
  The then Australian territories minister Bob Debus referred the federal parliament to past parliamentary reports which said the island government was in danger of becoming insolvent and recommended the Australian territory be incorporated into the Australian tax regime.
  He undertook to place a long-term strategy to federal cabinet with a view to securing Norfolk Island’s future.
  Some 15 months later, signs of progress emerged with the new Australian territories minister Brendan O’Connor announcing on 13  February 2010 the imminent arrival in the middle of a local election, of Australian government representatives to discuss significant changes in governance. The timing is odd to say the least.
   In the meantime in 2007, the ALP entered the Norfolk Island political scrimmage with the establishment of a sub-branch, called Norfolk Labor. In the following two years, Norfolk Labor broke all records with its membership and attendance at monthly meetings.
  Norfolk Labor will field four candidates in the forthcoming election which, while not enough to gain political power of the Legislative Assembly, might well place Norfolk Labor in a dominant position to form a cooperative government for the island.
  President of Norfolk Labor Mike King, who is one of the four Labor candidates, said at the party’s campaign launch that Norfolk Labor had articulated its policy platform with great care and precision, so that voters will know exactly what they will get from Labor.
  He said self-government in Norfolk Island had indeed failed and the powers and functions of government responsibility that exceed its financial and administrative ability should be returned to the federal government.
  He welcomed the arrival of the Commonwealth officials but questioned their timing.
  “I’m not sure whether it is appropriate for Australian government people to be here during an election campaign.
  “While Norfolk Labor generally supports the kind of change indicated by their arrival and their possible objective of galvanising focus on governance change, it is for the local people to identify the issues in an election, not the Feds”.
  King is cautious about making any predictions about the election on March 17.
  But at the time of writing this article, the final list of candidates had not been finalised but it was expected there would be about 23 to 26 people contesting the nine seats.
  Norfolk Labor is the only political party and the first political party to step up to the mark at the Norfolk elections.
   It is the last frontier of the Australian Labor Party and ISLANDS BUSINESS will watch the outcome closely.
 
 *Mike King is president of the local sub branch of the ALP and a candidate for the forthcoming general elections in Norfolk Island.