Tuesday, November 06, 2018

RIP Ted Mack 'father of independents' dead, aged 84

"Power never concedes anything without a fight ..."
~ Ted Mack's and John Hatton's favourite saying




We’ve lost one of Australia’s truly great politicians with the death of Ted Mack. He loathed the snout in the trough of so many colleagues, selling the Mayoral Merc to buy community buses & quitting parliament 2days before becoming eligible for pension. RIP




I am very saddened to learn about the death of Ted Mack.
Along with John Hatton, Ted Mack showed what could be achieved by Independents who acted with integrity and were solely motivated by serving their communities and the public good.
I was proud that Ted endorsed me when I first ran for Bligh in 1988 and I was honoured to serve with him in the Legislative Assembly for several months after I was elected. Ted purposely resigned two days before he had served seven years as an...
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Ted Mack 'father of independents' dead, aged 84


He became a giant of independent politics in a career that spanned two decades, and saw him elected to all three tiers of Australian government.





ted mack from amp.theguardian.com
The former New South Wales independent MP Ted Mack, who served in both state and federal




“I didn’t have any burning desire to change the world - just a few simple principles like the workings of government should be totally open to public scrutiny.” A public memorial service will be held in Sydney later this month.



Mr Mack said the strangle hold the two major political parties held in Australia created a “minimalist democracy”.


“Being in opposition is basically a form of political death.

“We have an elected dictatorship – the electoral system should represent the will of the people.

“On many levels we are one of the worst democracies in the world.”



Rebels with a cause | Inside Story




An authorised biography of John Hatton, OA - Research Online - UOW



The author titled his new book after Chinese leader Xi Jinping’s slogan, almost daring him to have to censor his own key words. “The reality, Ma acknowledges, is that censorship is now so all-encompassing that the novel will very probably not be allowed to exist in Chinese, even in Hong Kong, which has historically provided a toehold for work by dissident authors banned on the mainland.”