new political electoral laws<\/a> \u2013 including spending and donation caps \u2013 which disadvantage smaller players. Those changes, passed by Labor and the Coalition, place limits on the style of campaigning which has helped elect \u201cteal\u201d independents around the nation, but provide more benefits to politicians who exist inside more traditional party structures.<\/p>\nSpender earlier said the move wasn\u2019t all about the donations changes, but in an email to supporters on Thursday afternoon, she said: \u201cthe reality is that new donation laws and structural advantages enjoyed by the major parties have made it harder for grassroots campaigns to compete.<\/p>\n
\u201cA party structure helps put us on a more level playing field, while preserving everything that makes the community independent model valuable.\u201d<\/p>\n
Steggall and Spender said they weren\u2019t working with Climate 200, or its major donors like Scott Farquhar or Mike Cannon-Brookes, on the new party.<\/p>\n
4. What about the other teals?<\/p>\n
Most of the rest of the crossbench has ruled out joining the party, at least immediately.<\/p>\n
Monique Ryan and Kate Chaney quickly ruled themselves out of joining the party several weeks ago. Other independent MPs like Helen Haines, Andrew Wilkie and Rebekha Sharkie also won\u2019t be part of the new political alliance.<\/p>\n
One exception is the member for Bradfield, Nicolette Boele. She congratulated Steggall and Spender, saying she would remain independent but was \u201cstill working through what this party would allow me to do for the people I represent that I cannot already do as a community independent\u201d.<\/p>\n
Boele did not rule out closer ties and said she expected to work with the party \u201coften\u201d on policy issues. Spender and Steggall said they also expected to keep working closely with other crossbenchers on policy issues.<\/p>\n
5. What are the party\u2019s policies?<\/p>\n
The policies are still to be decided, and the party will develop some, but representatives will also retain a free vote in parliament \u2013 meaning they won\u2019t be bound by a party room decision.<\/p>\n
Steggall said members would have to \u201cpledge to the core values\u201d and \u201cpolicy pillars\u201d of the organisation.<\/p>\n
On its website, Community Strong lists a number of \u201ccommitments\u201d including:<\/p>\n
AI and tech opportunity with guardrails to protect data.<\/p>\n
A respectful multicultural society.<\/p>\n
A productive economy.<\/p>\n
Intergenerational fairness.<\/p>\n
Energy security.<\/p>\n
Spender said there would be a 100-day period of consultation with supporters about other parts of the party, saying \u201cthere is more listening to come\u201d.<\/p>\n
6. Where will the party\u2019s candidates run?<\/p>\n
The party will run candidates in the House of Representatives and Senate. Steggall and Spender wouldn\u2019t say how many candidates they expected could run under the Community Strong banner, but \u201ccommunity engagement\u201d would be a barometer for which campaigns they could seek to support.<\/p>\n
The party\u2019s website speaks of \u201clocal communities playing a central role in candidate selection, policy development and accountability\u201d.<\/p>\n
The three parts of the party\u2019s logo are meant to represent the sunrise, a speech bubble, and an outstretched hand, respectively. Photograph: Community Strong Australia7. What is that logo?<\/p>\n
The logo is in three parts, with a red orb at the top, a white stripe in the middle and a teal swirl below. We\u2019re told that is meant to represent the sunrise, a speech bubble, and an outstretched hand, respectively; while the logo as a whole is also in the shape of a heart.<\/p>\n
Those shapes weren\u2019t immediately clear to some political observers on Thursday, however, with some remarks the logo reminded people of other things. Some claimed it looked like a Santa hat or Papa Smurf from cartoon The Smurfs, while others suggested a few more inappropriate things we won\u2019t name here.<\/p>\n","protected":false},"excerpt":{"rendered":"The party describes itself as \u201ccommunity-powered political force\u201d and \u201cintegrity-led\u201d. It was formed, the party states, \u201cto extend…\n","protected":false},"author":2,"featured_media":759697,"comment_status":"","ping_status":"","sticky":false,"template":"","format":"standard","meta":{"footnotes":""},"categories":[4],"tags":[64,63,44],"class_list":["post-759696","post","type-post","status-publish","format-standard","has-post-thumbnail","category-australia","tag-au","tag-australia","tag-news"],"_links":{"self":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759696","targetHints":{"allow":["GET"]}}],"collection":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts"}],"about":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/types\/post"}],"author":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/users\/2"}],"replies":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/comments?post=759696"}],"version-history":[{"count":0,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/posts\/759696\/revisions"}],"wp:featuredmedia":[{"embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media\/759697"}],"wp:attachment":[{"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/media?parent=759696"}],"wp:term":[{"taxonomy":"category","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/categories?post=759696"},{"taxonomy":"post_tag","embeddable":true,"href":"https:\/\/www.newsbeep.com\/au\/wp-json\/wp\/v2\/tags?post=759696"}],"curies":[{"name":"wp","href":"https:\/\/api.w.org\/{rel}","templated":true}]}}