Australia First Party

Infobox_Australian_Political_Party
party_name = Australia First Party
party_
party_wikicolourid = Australia First
leader = Diane Teasdale
foundation = 1996
ideology = Nationalism
international =
headquarters = PO Box 6358
SHEPPARTON VIC 3632
holds_government =
website = http://www.australiafirstparty.com.au/The Australia First Party (AFP) was a minor political party in Australia. The party's policies were nationalist and anti-immigration/multiculturalism. [cite web|url=http://www.australiafirstparty.com.au/cms/|title=The Eight Core Policies of the Australia First Party|accessdate=2006-02-16|publisher=Australia First Party] The AFP is not a registered political party with the Australian Electoral Commission, has never had parliamentary representation and has not contested a federal election since 1998.

History

The Australia First Party was founded in June 1996 by Graeme Campbell, who was an Australian Labor Party member of the Australian House of Representatives for the seat of Kalgoorlie, Western Australia, from 1980 until he was expelled from the party in November 1995. Campbell had become increasingly critical of the policies of the Labor government of Paul Keating, particularly in matters relating to economic deregulation, Aboriginal land rights and multiculturalism.

Campbell hoped to see the AFP became a serious political party, drawing on a current of populist opinion which rejected the policies of both the Labor Party and the opposition Liberal Party.Fact|date=February 2007 Many of the AFP's members came from the disbanded Australian Conservative Party Fact|date=March 2007. The AFP however was overshadowed by the appearance in 1997 of Pauline Hanson's One Nation, a rival populist party led by an independent MP, Pauline Hanson.

Following Campbell's resignation in June 2001, Diane Teasdale became the national president of the Australia First Party, but at the national level the party had not been very active 2001-2004 (it did not contest the 2001 election).

In 2002, a new AFP branch was formed in Sydney. The party announced the formation of a new "nationalist youth organisation", the Patriotic Youth League. This body's website suggests that it is affiliated to the British National Party, a mildly successful far-right political party in the United Kingdom. The phraseology at the AFP website, such as "the politics of New World Order liberal-globalist-capitalism", also suggests that the party has been revived by people of a more systematically extreme-right persuasion than was the case under Campbell's leadership. The Secretary of the Sydney Branch is Dr. Jim Saleam, a stalwart of the Australian far right who was convicted of organising a shotgun attack on the home of a local representative of the African National Congress in the late 1980s [cite news|first=Andrew|last=West|title=White separatist takes on Marrickville|url=http://www.smh.com.au/articles/2004/02/28/1077677015074.html|publisher=The Sydney Morning Herald|date=2004-02-29|accessdate=2006-07-14] . Dr. Jim Saleam has maintained his innocence of the charge, claiming he was framed by politicised police, and his legal defence has been published on the internet. [cite web|url=http://home.alphalink.com.au/~radnat/pardonme/index.html|title=Pardon Me: The Anatomy of an Australian Political Trial|accessdate=2006-10-20|first=James|last=Saleam|authorlink=Jim Saleam|date=1999-01-27|publisher=Australian Nationalist Ideological, Historical and Legal Archive]

In August 2006 Peter Watson (Chairman of the Warwick branch) was expelled from the Party.

In April 2007 Darrin Hodges, chairman of the Sutherland Shire branch, was expelled from Australia First. Hodges went on to co-found the Australian Protectionist Party.

In August 2007 Jim Saleam (and several other prominent organisers) was expelled from Australia First. Jim Saleam then took control of the NSW membership and incorporated "Australia First Party (NSW)" and claims to have taken control of the former AFP Newcastle and Toowoomba branches, thus splitting the party into two separate groups. One controlled by Jim Saleam and the other by Diane Teasdale. [http://slackbastard.anarchobase.com/?p=855]

Policies

According to their Murray Branch/National Office website, the Australia First Party had eight core policies:
* Ensure Australia retains full independence.
* Rebuild Australian manufacturing industries.
* Control foreign ownership.
* Reduce and limit immigration.
* Abolish multiculturalism
* Introduce Citizen's Initiated Referendums.
* Strengthen the family
* Strive to rebuild a united Australia.

Electoral performance

At the October 1998 federal election, Campbell lost his seat, polling only 22 percent of the vote in a seat he had represented for 18 years. The AFP failed to win significant support elsewhere, being heavily outvoted by One Nation. In June 2001, Campbell left the AFP in order to stand (unsuccessfully) as a One Nation senate candidate in Western Australia.

The AFP did not contest the 2001 election.

The AFP website says that the party fielded candidates in the 2004 local council elections in Sydney, Newcastle and Coffs Harbour. But the real extent of the AFP's organisation and membership is not known.

In November 2005, AFP president Diane Teasdale stood in the elections for the Shepparton Council Office and received 1373 first preference votes, representing 4.37% of valid votes cast [cite web|url=http://www.vec.vic.gov.au/sheppartonresult2005.html|title=Results for the Greater Shepparton City Council 2005 elections|accessdate=2006-03-05|publisher=Victorian Electoral Commission] .

In November 2006, Adelaide AFP representative Bruce Preece was elected as Councillor for the St John's Wood Ward of the City of Prospect. [cite web|url=http://www.lga.sa.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/2006_Election_Results_Update.pdf|title=2006 Local Government Election Results|accessdate=2007-01-20|format=PDF|publisher=Local Government Association of South Australia|pages = [http://www.lga.sa.gov.au/webdata/resources/files/2006_Election_Results_Update.pdf#page=47 p. 47] ] [cite web|url=http://www.prospect.sa.gov.au/site/page.cfm?u=981|title=Profile of Cr. Bruce Preece|accessdate=2007-01-20|publisher=City of Prospect] Preece is the first AFP representative since Campbell to be elected into any level of Government.

Most recently, AFP representative John Moffat contested the Electorate of Cronulla in Sydney during the 2007 New South Wales elections as an independent and received 968 votes, representing 2.8% of valid votes cast. [http://ausfirst.alphalink.com.au/moffatresults.html]

In September 2008, the Party ran a couple of candidates in councils around New South Wales [http://ausfirst.alphalink.com.au/councils2008/council2.html] . In the Sutherland Shire, the Party candidates got a total of 867 votes. In Blacktown, it got 1,229 [http://suprat.wordpress.com/2008/09/14/nsw-election-results/] .

Activities

* On 8 October 2005, up to fifteen AFP members (including Sydney AFP Secretary Jim Saleam) rallied outside Kirribilli House to protest against the suspension of Professor Andrew Fraser of Macquarie University.
* December 11 2005 the Sydney AFP branch, along with the PYL, distributed pamphlets, stickers and allegedly alcohol [cite news|first=Richard|last=Baker|title=Australia First: reclaiming the agenda|url=http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/australia-first-reclaiming-the-agenda/2005/12/13/1134236064358.html|publisher=The Age|date=2005-12-14|accessdate=2006-02-25] at the Sydney beachside suburb of Cronulla where an estimated 5000 people had gathered to protest against [cite news|first=Paul|last=Sheehan|title=A hot, wet trail - yet police remain clueless in Cronulla|url=http://www.smh.com.au/news/opinion/police-remain-clueless-in-cronulla/2006/01/29/1138469606720.html|publisher=The Sydney Morning Herald|date=2006-12-30|accessdate=2006-03-10] harassment by Lebanese gangs. SBS World News on December 13 2005 reported that Jim Saleam had organised around 150 members and sympathisers to attend the rally.
* Several AFP members returned to Cronulla the following month during the Australia Day festivities to further their campaign. [cite news|title=Cronulla's Australia Day shines despite racist campaign|url=http://www.abc.net.au/news/newsitems/200601/s1556022.htm|publisher=ABC News|date=2006-01-26|accessdate=2006-02-28]

* Australia First supporters handed out leafets at the rally in Melbourne on 28 June 2006 protesting against the Howard Government's industrial relations laws. The leaflets focussed almost entirely on the issue of "foreign workers" being brought into Australia and "undermining the wages of Australian workers". The leaflet gave post office box addresses in Croydon and Shepparton as contact points, and also gave two party websites

* 1 June 2006 - A branch of the Australia First Party opens in Warwick Queensland led by Peter Watson. Two months later Peter is kicked out of the Party and Peter along with most Warwick nationalists form the Stalinist League http://cpwcpw.wetpaint.com
* 7 October 2006 - Over a dozen members of the Sutherland Shire branch of the AFP rallied outside the office of Cook MP Bruce Baird to highlight their opposition to his liberal views on refugee and |accessdate=2006-10-13]

* In January 2007 Australia First supporters distributed 2500 leaflets in Tamworth New South Wales claiming refugees spread crime and disease. This was in response to the council's decision to approve a refugee program that would resettle up to five Sudanese families in the area. The council had initially rejected the program. [cite news|title=Tamworth target of Australia First|url=http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/wireless/story/0,8262,1-21141237,00.html|publisher=The Australian|date=2007-01-30|accessdate=2007-02-05]

Racism allegations

In 2006, "The Australian" newspaper carried a story on the group by Dan Box, who spent some time in the party without revealing that he was a reporter. Box alleged an Australia First member told him that "we leaned out of the window and shouted 'Sieg heil! Sieg heil!" at a rabbi. [cite news|first=Dan|last=Box|title=White supremacy in our backyard|url=http://www.fightdemback.org/2006/03/04/australia-first-beneath-the-surface/|format=Reprint|publisher=Fight Dem Back|date=2006-03-04|accessdate=2006-07-13]

Australia First also endorsed candidate John Moffat, who was criticised by B’nai B’rith Anti-Defamation Commission chairman Michael Lipshutz, Cronulla Liberal MP Malcolm Kerr and Lebanese Muslim Association spokesman Jihad Dib for "inciting racial hatred", risking undermining the local area's reputation with “ridiculous” claims about the Lebanese community, and unhelpful "divisive ideologies" respectively. [cite news|first=Greg|last=Roberts|title=Cronulla candidate campaigns for race hatred|url=http://www.fightdemback.org/2007/01/06/aus-first-campaigns-for-race-hate/|publisher=The Australian|date=2007-01-05|accessdate=2007-01-05]

See also

* Australia First Movement

References

External links

* [http://www.australiafirstparty.com.au Murray Branch/National Office AFP Homepage]
* [http://www.australiafirst.net/ AFP Melbourne branch]