WHAT THEY SHOULD DO ...

The Sunday Age

Sunday June 28, 2009

By ANDREW TATE - The Sunday Age's Andrew Tate is a Fitzroy resident and Essendon supporter.

WHAT THEY SHOULD DO is ban Carlton footballers and their fans from becoming politicians. Playing to the home crowd at Princes Park is one thing, but after Justin Madden's divisive comments last week can they really be trusted in the wider world?Not since Peter Jones' unsuccessful tilt at a political career under the dubious slogan "Point Percy at Parliament" has there been a greater need to guard against Carlton's arrogant and insidious influence in public debate.Not enough that former PMs Menzies and Fraser were Blue boys, we now have an aspiring premier in Victorian planning minister "Harry" Madden, whose recent travails at Brimbank Council and planned move to the lower house just happens to coincide with some good old "us versus them" in the pages of The Age.In a divide-and-rule opinion article straight from the John Howard handbook, the big fella king hit opposition to his urban growth expansion, describing it as "cultural snobbery".Look out, the great hero of Lygon Street will be bagging the lattes next!With one eye on his move to the seat of Essendon, "Harry" recounted misty-eyed memories of growing up in Airport West, saying it was "affordable and had plenty of open space, good for growing boys with too much energy". Well fair play to Harry Highrise, but it makes you wonder why the kids of the "tramline suburbs" - already crammed cheek to jowl - have so much trouble maintaining any decent open space to kick a ball in? For example, the one patch within cooee of the Fitzroy Atherton Gardens housing estate is a disgraceful dustbowl instead of a vital recreational asset for the community.Throw in the government's "parks-for-corporates" attitude, writ large in the vandalism of the Grand Prix and Melbourne Flower Show, and suddenly recreational areas for city kids are thin on the ground.Big blocks on the fringe may help develop some young footballers, but pity those without a backyard who have to take to the back streets or the carparks for that old-fashioned kick to kick. The carparks are now dollar signs for developers and the speeding rat-runners funnelled in from car-rich, train-poor growth suburbs make even getting to school unsafe.Higher density living is a good thing for Victoria, but as the AFL discovered when flooding became the only strategy, just throwing players on top of each other can result in ugly play that rarely makes the game fun for anyone. It's certainly a strategy that breaks down unless every player pulls his weight.Carlton may well be getting "the arrogance" back, but now he's up for the safe lower house seat of Essendon, "Harry" may need to channel his inner Bomber. Despite what brother Simon says, Madden-the-younger just seemed so much more reasonable in his 45 games with the Dons. And, as a Carlton bloke in Napier Street, who ever heard of a safe seat?So while it may be a Labor party full of hacks that turned good-Harry bad, "football snobbery" says don't discount the Princes Park influence. Another Carlton bloke who fancied himself as a politician, John Elliott, hasn't had a great week either.The Sunday Age's Andrew Tate is a Fitzroy resident and Essendon supporter.

© 2009 The Sunday Age

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