BY CHARLOTTE GRIEVE
Pat Sheil is a 59-year-old journalist, author, playwright and self-proclaimed “enthusiastic political maverick.”
Having recently left his position as column editor of The Sydney Morning Herald after twelve years, Mr Sheil is now running as the Australian Sex Party’s candidate for the NSW seat of Grayndler. This electorate is one of Australia’s smallest, located in inner western Sydney covering only 32 square kilometres.
The Australian Sex Party claims to uphold the basic principles of freedom of expression and exists to protect the civil liberties of all Australian citizens.
“It’s about acceptance, it’s about Australians protecting the rights of Australians to live the lives they choose to live, so long as they do so without harming the rights of others” said Mr Sheil.
Among the party’s key policies include voluntary euthanasia, the removal of tax exempt status for religious institutions and dramatically cutting defence spending.
The Sex Party employs a “common sense approach” to government policy and budgeting.
“There is this idea that when it comes to working up a budget there is a sacred cow that can never be harmed and that’s called defence. An Australian submarine has not fired a shot in over 100 years and we have just spent $50 billion on submarines. This is the sort of dumb stuff we’re dealing with,” he said.
On a local level, Mr Sheil fails to see the value in the extension of the CBD lock out laws to Newtown, “it’s a blunt instrument. To shut the life out of an area to stop a few drunks from punching people, you’ve got to think there’s a better way to do it. 99% of people behave themselves” he said.
The joy in politics for Mr Sheil is not winning the election, but rather the process of engaging with the community and providing new ideas. He has unsuccessfully contested the past four Federal elections as an independent in the Federal division of Wentworth, now held by the Prime Minister, Malcolm Turnbull.
“While it was never realistic that I would win Wentworth, it was satisfying to be able to introduce some new ideas, and some refreshing humour, into that rather staid and predictable contest,” he said.
Sheil is not holding his breath to secure a victory in the seat of Grayndler either.
“The Sex party’s chances of winning the seat of Grayndler is 20 per cent the square root of bugger all. If you win 4% of the votes you get your deposit back and we’d be very happy with that” he said.
“The wider reason we ran in Grayndler is because it’s a great microcosm of what Australia can be and what can go wrong all at once” he said.
