SOS POLITICAL PARTY
SOS has won its appeal against the State Electoral Commissioner's failure to register SOS as a political party able to stand candidates in the March 2003 NSW State Government elections refer Supreme Court ruling
SOS can now stand candidates in any NSW State or Local Government electoral district.
Our association has been repeatedly requested to form a political party by many people actively involved in combating the overdevelopment and inappropriate development that is ruining Sydney.
PlanningNSW, formerly the Department of Urban Affairs and Planning currently imposes detrimental policies — that do not go before Parliament — onto unwilling communities. The Department's policies degrade heritage, the environment, infrastructure and quality of life.
PlanningNSW is shielded from community anger by hiding behind coerced Councils and the Land and Environment Court. The Department has proved to be completely unable to justify these policies and has failed to alleviate widely expressed community concerns that they are developer-driven and not devised for the benefit of the community.
It is well known that developers make huge political donations to the governing party. Members of the community are saying to us that the actions we and other concerned people have taken so far have been insufficient to counter the ill-conceived obsession of PlanningNSW, combined with the pull that developers currently have on Government. We have attempted to objectively discuss policy merits with PlanningNSW and the Minister, we have been appearing in the press, on radio and TV, we have organised meetings and petitions, we have lobbied parliamentarians. All to no avail!
People told us that the only alternative is to escalate our activities by taking political action. This we have done. SOS is now a registered political party as well as a lobby group, and can stand candidates in any NSW electorate. NSW State Government elections are in March 03 and Local Government elections Sept 03.
SOS has as its main aim a desire to protect neighbourhood character, the environment and residential amenity — a difficult task under the current population growth paradigm. This narrow starting position logically extends into wider policy concerns. For example, policies are needed to encourage the viability of rural communities to allow those communities to protect their own environment and to relieve pressure for migration to urban centres, which in turn results in pressure for urban consolidation and a threat to neighbourhood character and residential amenity.
Sydney is clearly under enormous pressure. Now 4 million, Sydney's population, driven by existing government policies, is to be 6.5 million by 2050. This incredible pressure rubs off onto all coastal areas and the Southern Highlands as well, while inland NSW is being starved of development funds.
Our fight is everyone's fight.
SOS Political Party has been formed to fill a political void; a grassroots party — there will be no political power to grab, and hopefully we'll avoid the problem of self-promoters attaching themselves to the SOS Party to its detriment.
Resident Action Groups are able to use the SOS vehicle to engage in the political process by joining SOS (SOS membership form) and SOS Political Party (registration forms). The name of the political party should be specified on the form as "Save Our Suburbs" in handwriting by the person signing the form).
Of course SOS is only in its infancy, we have no warchest. Local campaigns will have to be locally organised and funded, but we believe that a lot of people are fed up with the existing choice of political representation and SOS can expect a high level of support.
Any proposed candidate would need to be able to demonstrate a background of working for the community, be independent (ie have no ties to a major political party) and be prepared to work for adequate infrastructure provision and the right of residents to participate in the decision-making process regarding the residential amenity, environment and heritage of their local neighbourhood.
A donation to assist with SOS campaigns would be much appreciated — an SOS membership form on the website can be used for this purpose. Please mail the completed forms to SOS, PO Box 492, NSW 2076.
So far, our activities, vigorous as they have been, have not been strong enough to counter the huge influence of developers. We therefore have to consider different approaches. By fielding candidates in the next State election we will be taken far more seriously by the Government. There are no guarantees that we will get there, there are many hurdles to be crossed, but at least we will not be kicking ourselves later for not having initiated the attempt.
Yours sincerely
Tony Recsei (President)