Observers are divided:will the newly minted independent quickly turn her back on politics or forge a new force in parliament.
Billy Hughes managed to thrive in the fraught business of stepping from one political party to another. But he was a rarity,and defections tend to end badly.
The Greens are emerging as a party to shape progressive government policy,rather than letting the perfect be the enemy of the good. Lidia Thorpe’s exit will help that cause.
It is an immoral and abhorrent value system that dismisses the pain of some through interest rate rises as “unfortunate but necessary”,while others feel nothing.
The Voice is not a race issue,but a necessary precondition for the development of a multicultural Australian identity.
Some countries don’t allow politicians elected on a one-party ticket to defect mid-term and keep their seat in parliament. It’s not easy to impose such a law in Australia.
Lidia Thorpe’s freelance advocacy against the Voice while a senator for the minor party highlights two enduring pathologies on the political left.
Human rights activist Julian Burnside,KC,who sought the Senate position in a ballot against Thorpe two years ago,said she had treated Greens supporters badly.
We shouldn’t doubt the senator’s deep personal commitment genuinely outweighs her loyalty to a political party. She is being honest in the face of hostility.
On her first day as an independent Thorpe said she was eager to meet with King Charles and challenged the government to put First Nations’ sovereignty into the Constitution.
James Conlan said Thorpe had been abandoned by her own party and he was resigning in opposition to the Greens’ rejection of grassroots democracy.