Yet another politician has resigned

from the party on whose platform they were elected. 

This time the resignation is on a very personal issue indeed. The politician in question has failed to get pre-selection at the next election. 

In this instance the election is four years away. The politician is half-way through an eight year term in the Upper House. The party in question is a very minor one and likely to remain that way. 

All this however is beside the point. There are some issues here. Not least of those issues is that the politician was elected as a member of that party and not as an individual. Their presence in parliament is a result of enough people having made a decision to vote for or preference that person to represent them as a member of that party. There is also the issue of the stability of government. Immediately post election we were told "this is the result" and "this is how the parliament will look". That is, or should be, democracy at work. If that does not happen then we could have very serious problems. And of course there is the issue of "who paid to get the politician elected?"

Some years ago the then elected member went "independent" almost as soon as the results were announced at the new election. He claimed to do this in the interests of the "stability" of government but almost immediately took up a ministry with the opposite party.  He had been the leader of the party, a man touted as the next Premier. Whatever he might have claimed his move was made out of self-interest. At the next election he received less than ten percent of the vote he had previously obtained. That is as it should have been. It would have been better still if he had been required to resign immediately and face the electorate again.

This seems to be an increasing problem. The last election saw a Senator resign from the government benches over her personal views on Gaza. Another fiery Senator resigned from the party which helped to get her elected over her personal issues on the "Voice". A lower house MP quit the party she represented at the election and joined another. It was almost certainly done so with a leadership position in mind - but it might also have prevented that same thing from happening. 

We need to change this. Those who stand for election must recognise that they are not there to represent themselves but to represent the people who elected them even if they disagree with the majority decisions.