Like fellow voters, I will vote hoping for a better Australia in the upcoming election. The sort of Australia where the cost of living is affordable, people can pursue their dreams and express opinions freely, disagreements can exist without division, the health system delivers world-class care, and essentials like good roads and quality education are guaranteed.
The question many voters are asking themselves is, “Which government will make all this happen?”
In order to “help” us make our decisions, the media continue to offer their analyses, opinions, and spin.
Today’s media, more than ever, seem to be about sales and clicks and less about objective journalism.
Playing right along with the astute observation of economist and historian Thomas Sowell, the media capitalises on the fact that “people do not want a factual or analytical explanation that leaves them emotionally unsatisfied. They want villains to hate and heroes to cheer.”
Yes, the media have cast our political leaders as villains and heroes. Who the villains and who the heroes are all depends on where you get your news from.
Deciding on which political party to vote for can be a difficult choice.
However, if we want Australia to be a greater country than it already is, where nobody is left behind, then I think we’re asking the wrong question.
What we should be asking is: “What can I personally do in my home, neighbourhood, and community to make a difference?”
Perhaps we have been so preoccupied with the villains and heroes show, that we’ve conveniently forgotten to look at ourselves.
I’m not letting the government off the hook. It should be held to account. It must closely monitor immigration, tax policy, foreign aid, energy, research, manufacturing, and more.
However, I do feel that too many people expect too much from the government.
They believe that the government must fix everything.
The government can and should provide opportunities, but ultimately, we need to expect less from the government and more from ourselves.
There’s a critical mass of citizens who do more leaning than lifting, always rorting the system and looking out solely for themselves.
Nobody knows how large this critical mass is, but they do make it hard for any government to make a significant difference with limited resources.
Consider as one example of too many leaners, a story reported in The Daily Telegraph last month.
According to the paper, NSW’s compensation claim system has become a massive burden on the state—“driven in no small part by an explosion in dubious psychological injury claims.”
Of course, there are genuine claims for compensation due to psychological injury.
However, according to NSW Treasurer Daniel Mookhey, “The number of psychological injury claims has doubled in six years … By comparison, all other injuries have grown by just 16 percent during that same period.”
It seems the workers’ compensation safety net has become a hammock for too many.
Thankfully, here in this great country, we have many people doing more lifting than leaning. Without them, our country would collapse. These are the sorts of people we love to live with, work with, and play with.
So, what would more lifting entail?
Here are some simple starting points: picking up rubbish, mowing your neighbour’s footpath, letting the person with only three items go ahead of you at the checkouts when you’ve got a whole trolley full, cooking a meal for a friend or family member who needs it, and joining any of the many grass-roots community organisations.
In short, we need more people with a service mentality and less people with an entitlement mentality.
So yes, think carefully about which political party you will vote for, but also think about how you can continue contributing to society if you are already doing so, and how you might start if you are not already doing so.
And don’t think, “But I’m only one person; I can’t make any real difference.”
This is similar to the leaners who think, “Well, I’m only one person; it’s okay if I do what I do; it’s not going to hurt anybody.”
But it does hurt!
What each of us does, makes a big difference. Let’s do the right thing and make that difference a positive one. We don’t have to wait until May 3; we can start now. Let’s make Australia great again.
