I'm a True-Blue Green, Says Rhiannon

I'm a true-blue Green, says Rhiannon Nicola Berkovic | The Australian | 30th August, 2010 GREENS senator-elect Lee Rhiannon has insisted she will support leader Bob Brown's pragmatic approach to politics. And, she says, she has no leadership ambitions. The former NSW upper house MP brushed aside suggestions her past membership of the Socialist Party means she will want to steer the Greens towards a more radical agenda. Instead, Ms Rhiannon has nominated tackling climate change as her No 1 priority when she enters the Senate, followed by reform of political donations and electoral financing. Ms Rhiannon has been labelled a "watermelon": green on the outside, red on the inside. She comes from the NSW Greens, who are seen by some as the urbanised hard Left of a bigger and more factionalised Greens party, long dominated by Tasmanian-based wilderness campaigners. But she strongly rejects terms such as "Stalinist" and other "Cold War warrior language" to describe her politics, and is offended by suggestions she is not passionate about the environment. "For 20 years I have been an active member of the Greens," she said at the weekend. "I am not a communist, and I and Greens members condemn the crimes committed under Stalin." Ms Rhiannon said she had no desire to make changes to the Greens' approach to Senate negotiations nor Senator Brown's positioning of the party to the centre-left of politics, describing the Senate team and its achievements as "super-fantastic". She said holding the balance of power was nothing new for the Greens, and that at the state and federal level the party did not "horse-trade". "We're not setting forward a set of demands, and we never have done that," she said. "We don't say 'We'll give way on this one if you do this'. We judge legislation on its merits, and we'll work hard to improve that legislation. In the end the legislation may not be exactly Greens policy, but if it's positive legislation in terms of the environment and people, we will obviously support it." Ms Rhiannon said she supported new Greens MP Adam Bandt's willingness to form a coalition with Labor if it meant keeping Tony Abbott out of power. "Adam's done a fantastic job. He's articulated that need really clearly," she said. With votes still being counted, Ms Rhiannon looks almost certain to enter parliament on July 1 next year. She said she had no designs on a particular portfolio, but with nine Greens senators instead of five, each portfolio could be covered in more depth. Ms Rhiannon, who last year signed a petition against Julia Gillard's visit to Israel, said foreign policy was one area in which the Greens could do more work with more hands on deck. She said she supported economic growth but only if it reduced disadvantage and did not harm the environment. "It depends who it's for and who benefits," she said. Ms Rhiannon strongly defended the Greens' federal election result in NSW. While the party's vote rose 5 per cent in Queensland and 4.7 per cent in South Australia, in NSW it increased by just 1.93 per cent. Ms Rhiannon said NSW accounted for 48 of the 150 seats in the House of Representatives, and the Greens had made no secret of the fact they had difficulty staffing every booth in western Sydney and western NSW. .

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