A COMMON sentiment among Wannon voters during the oh-so-long 2016 election campaign has been a feeling of disengagement and disillusionment with the political process.
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To paraphrase American band Ben Folds Five, it’s been a “battle of who could care less”, according to many.
This is certainly not the fault of the five candidates. Each has proven to be an erudite and thoughtful speaker, aside from the occasional unscientific comment about the evils of wind farms.
But this year’s election has had a definite hint of vanilla to it when compared to the neapolitan feast of 2013.
On a national scale things have been fairly pedestrian. The Libs are still spouting three-word slogans (“Stop The Boats” has become “Jobs & Growth”) and Labor is just happy to have had only one leader since the last election (which may be a record).
But here in Wannon in 2013, instead of the five sensible and well-spoken candidates of the current day, we got three sensible and well-spoken candidates and another four who ran the gamut from “no-show” to “bigoted grandmother”.
Perhaps that was what was lacking from this campaign. Maybe the trick to having an engaged populace during the countdown to election day is having someone in the mix like Tess Corbett, whose thoughts about homosexuals were too hot for even the Katter Party to handle.
On the other hand, it is a relief to have only five names to choose from on the “little” ballot. In fact, it’s the smallest Wannon field since 2007, when it was Labor, Liberal, Greens and the then-fledgling Family First party.
