Talking to news.com.au as he attended the Sydney Gay and Lesbian Mardi Gras on Saturday evening, Mr Shorten questioned why Mr Turnbull wasn’t marching in the colourful parade with the tens of thousands of other participants, including members of his own party.

While Mr Turnbull is the first sitting Prime Minister to attend the Mardi Gras, which brings central Sydney to a glitter soaked halt, it’s understood he is watching the parade from a vip viewing area rather than marching along the streets.

“You can’t be half arsed when it comes to equality,” he said.

“The old Malcolm Turnbull would have marched in the parade but the new Malcolm Turnbull can’t march because he’s so in thrall to the right wing of his party.”

Mr Shorten said he had attended the event on many occasions, but was marching for the first time on Saturday night and had brought his family along.

He said Mardi Gras was still “incredibly important” for the message of equality it conveyed.

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Deputy opposition Leader Tanya Plibersek told news.com.au she should “couldn’t remember” how many times she’d marched.

“Same-sex couples deserve the legal recognition, social recognition and recognition of their love that marriage can bring to a relationship.”

IT’S a parade of firsts at this year’s Gay and Lesbian mardi gras, despite it being the 38th edition of the iconic Sydney event.

Malcolm Turnbull arrived to watch the parade, making it the first time a prime minister has attended the event.

Mr Turnbull was mobbed as he moved into the crowd, with many hands holding aloft mobile phones as members of the excited crowd tried to snap a selfie with the PM.

AUSSIE ATTITUDES: One in five believe homosexuality is ‘immoral’

The member for Wentworth, in Sydney’s eastern suburbs, has often visited the colourful party but he won’t be marching in this year’s event, unlike opposition leader Bill Shorten who is expected to roll down Oxford Street on one of the parade’s 175 floats.

The dykes on bikes were the first to kick off the parade.

Up to 500,000 revellers are expected to line Sydney’s Oxford and Flinders Streets.

They’ll see Mr Shorten atop a float as the first leader from one of the two major parties to take part, as well as the first float to feature Olympians and Paralympians under one banner.

Mr Shorten will be the cherry atop the Rainbow Labor float, while Australian Greens leader Richard Di Natale will be aboard his party’s Transcend Bigotry, Transform our Communities float.

Some of Australia’s top athletes have joined forces for the Rio-themed #OneTeam float, comprising more than 80 Olympians, Paralympians and their supporters for the first time, ahead of the Olympic Games in August.

Gold medal-winning Olympic swimmer and float co-ordinator Daniel Kowalski said the team aimed to prove “there is no place for homophobia in sport”.

 

But among the 175 floats and beneath the 230kg of glitter, a group of founding marchers will be celebrating much more than diversity for the first time.

Yesterday morning, NSW Police seconded last week’s apology from the NSW government to the so-called 78ers, the group of activists subjected to violence at the hands of officers during the first mardi gras.

Members of the group were bashed by police when they descended on Darlinghurst in June 1978 to protest against the criminalisation of homosexual acts and discrimination against the community.

“For that, we apologise,” said LGBTI spokesman Detective Inspector Tony Crandell on behalf of Commissioner Andrew Scipione at the 38th parade launch.

“We also acknowledge the pain and the hurt that the police actions caused at that event in 1978.” One of the 78ers, Joseph Chetcuti, said the apology was a “very, very important step” in the LGBTI community’s plight almost four decades on.

Fellow 78er Steve Warren said the march remained an example of “grassroots community action leading to positive, special change”.

Up to 12,500 participants are expected to pound the pavement at this year’s parade, themed Momentum.

 

“I don’t really know what people are afraid of because nothing would happen except that more people would be happier than before,” Wurst said at her Sydney Opera House concert.

Drag songstress and mardi gras global ambassador Courtney Act has taken to wearing a rainbow ring on her wedding finger as a personal protest against the issue.

 

Turnbull ‘an unelected, dud Prime Minister’

Turnbull ‘an unelected, dud Prime Minister’

One of Australia’s most respected political analysts has labelled Malcolm Turnbull an “unelected dud prime minister” for pursuing Senate voting reform.

Malcolm Mackerras has also predicted the voting changes will be immediately challenged in the High Court because they are unconstitutional.

Mr Mackerras is among the experts giving evidence to Parliament’s joint committee on electoral matters conducting a rushed inquiry into the changes.

The Australian Electoral Commission told the inquiry it would need a minimum of three months to implement the changes, which the Government has introduced to make it harder for micro parties to game the electoral system and get elected.

The changes will abolish the system of group voting tickets, which have been exploited by parties to secretly harvest preferences.

Instead, voters will be able to allocate their own preferences and asked to fill in six boxes sequentially.

The Government has stitched up a deal with the Greens and popular Nick Xenophon to get the changes through, with Labor and the remaining seven crossbenchers are opposed.

But Mr Mackerras, a visiting fellow at the Australian Catholic University and creator of the “Mackerras electoral pendulum” argued the changes breached Section 7 of the Constitution, which requires senators to be “directly chosen by the people of the State”.

He said Senate elections had to be a candidate-based system, not a party-based one. He believes Senate elections since 1984 when group voting tickets were introduced have been unconstitutional and the coalition’s proposed changes do not alter that.

“The Commonwealth Electoral Amendment Bill as is it now stands is breathtaking in its contempt for the Australian Constitution.

It is a bad Bill,” Mr Mackerras said.

He said it would be the duty of a Senator to challenge the legislation in the a day after it was signed by the Governor-General.

“I’m confident such will happen. If that challenge fails I would be devastated,” he said.

Mr Mackerras said he would blame the “arrogance” of the Chifley Labor Government and its attorney-general Herbert Evatt and the “bloodymindedness” of the Liberal Party in 1974-75 and 1983 if he could no longer say senators were directly elected by the people.

“In the third place I would blame the filthy 2016 deal between the Liberal Party , brackets led by the unelected, dud Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and the Greens, that party noted for its moral vanity,” he said.

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Comment: Brendan Power

Malcolm Turnbull’s assention is the most conceited and disgraceful act of political bastardry ever perpetrated by any grubby collection of Liberal MPs.

I have rarely ever been in agreement with any Malcolm and that includes Malcolm Mackerras, however I am always prepared to acknowlege notable exceptions, and this is a big one.

“In the third place I would blame the filthy 2016 deal between the Liberal Party , brackets led by the unelected, dud Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and the Greens, that party noted for its moral vanity,” he said.

Turnbull ‘an unelected, dud Prime Minister’

Great stuff Malcolm MacKerras.

 

 

Food for thought – Turnbull x Shorten

 

In a fit of non-stop hysterical laughter, I managed to get through watching the latest episode of South Park season 19 ‘Tweek x Craig’ where the Asian-American students use the Japanese “art-style” yaoi to decide who is homosexual.

 

While watching, I was thinking how this episode may fit into the context of those occupying the upper echelons of our Parliamentary system (i.e. Newspoll Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull and unelectable Opposition leader Bill Shorten).

Like Tweek and Craig the two leaders clearly have some “emotional tension” going on. With the Speaker Tony Smith acting as the “PC principal” character, guiding the two through “affirmative consent”, it appears both parties want to shy away from the pressing question of “can I touch your policies?”

However there is a third player in this “love” triangle with Richard Di Natale and his merry band of trendies in the wings. They would be best represented as the “Cupid me” character, in the sense that they fly around the place shooting people with their proverbial PC arrows, used in protecting those in the business of pissing in others’ mouths.

Food for thought.

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