The Reason Party is an Australian

political party A political party is an organization that coordinates candidates to compete in a particular country's elections. It is common for the members of a party to hold similar ideas about politics, and parties may promote specific ideological or po ...

founded in 2017. Its leader, Fiona Patten, describes the party as a "

civil libertarian Civil libertarianism is a strain of political thought that supports civil liberties, or which emphasizes the supremacy of individual rights and personal freedoms over and against any kind of authority (such as a state, a corporation, social nor ...

alternative". Patten was elected to the

Victorian Legislative Council The Victorian Legislative Council (VLC) is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Victoria, Australia, the lower house being the Legislative Assembly. Both houses sit at Parliament House in Spring Street, Melbourne. The Legislative ...

as at the 2018 state election in the

Northern Metropolitan Region Northern Metropolitan Region is one of the eight electoral regions of Victoria, Australia, which elects five members to the Victorian Legislative Council (also referred to as the upper house) by proportional representation. The region was creat ...

, after formerly being elected as a Sex Party member for the same seat in the 2014 state election. Reason is registered at the state level in Victoria, and as a Federal party.

History

In August 2017, Fiona Patten announced the launch of a new Federal party called Reason Australia that in part was borne from a merger of the Australian Sex Party and the

Australian Cyclists Party The Australian Cyclists Party was a minor political party in Australia. It was registered with the New South Wales Electoral Commission in 2014, and unsuccessfully contested the 2015 New South Wales state election. It was also registered later wit ...

. In January 2018, the

Victorian Electoral Commission Victorian or Victorians may refer to: 19th century * Victorian era, British history during Queen Victoria's 19th-century reign ** Victorian architecture ** Victorian house ** Victorian decorative arts ** Victorian fashion ** Victorian literatu ...

officially changed the party's name from "Australian Sex Party – Victoria" to "Reason Victoria". In May 2018, the party applied to the AEC for registration for federal elections as "Reason Australia", which was approved on 30 August 2018. In December 2019, the NSW branch of the Voluntary Euthanasia Party merged with the Reason Party, and changed its name to "Reason Party NSW". In December 2020 it was announced that Patten would enter a coalition with independent Mildura MP, Ali Cupper who sits in the Legislative Assembly. Cupper ended the agreement on 13 May 2021. In February 2022, Jane Caro announced that she was standing as a candidate for the party for a New South Wales

Australian Senate The Senate is the upper house of the bicameral Parliament of Australia, the lower house being the House of Representatives. The composition and powers of the Senate are established in Chapter I of the Constitution of Australia. There are a to ...

seat in the 2022 Australian federal election.

Parliamentary actions

The party's main goal should they be elected was to establish voluntary assisted dying laws for Victoria. After a long process and a marathon legislative session, the bill became law on a conscience vote. In 2017, Patten renewed calls for a pilot program of a safe injecting room in North Richmond, in response to a large increase of Victorian drug-related deaths in the last several years. In the first session for the Legislative Council of the year, she introduced the Drugs, Poisons and Controlled Substances Amendment (Pilot Medically Supervised Injecting Centre) Bill 2017. At the time there were regular overdoses in the streets of Richmond, and that number has been reduced significantly since the centre was opened, with various estimates about the number of lives saved due to the opening of the centre.

Policies

The party's policies include:

Drug law reform

* Drug use to be treated as a health issue, not a criminal one * Cannabis to be legalised, regulated and taxed * Trial hydromorphone (analogue of heroin) on prescription * Increase in medically supervised injecting centres * Electronic vaporisers and liquid nicotine should be legalised * Pill testing at every music festival

Cannabis

In regards to cannabis the party supports the following: * The legalisation and regulation of cannabis for people over the age of 18 * Support for the legal possession and use of cannabis for people over the age of 18 * Amending drug driving laws to test for impairment not presence * The cultivation of a defined number of plants in their principal place of residence * Regulations that allow for the establishment of cannabis social clubs * Establishing a regulatory body to oversee the industry * Regulation on the potency of THC in legal cannabis products * Market controls to avoid the creation of a ‘Big Cannabis’ industry * Restrictions on advertising, marketing and promotion products * Competitive pricing to undercut the illicit market * An appropriate tax framework to help fund cannabis related programs * Expunging all historical personal-use cannabis criminal records

Tax and churches

* Remove tax exemptions from businesses owned by religious institutions, while protecting their charitable activities * Prevent religious organisations from discriminating by reforming anti-discrimination laws * Religious oaths to be removed from parliamentary proceedings * Extend mandatory reporting laws to religious institutions and end exemptions for admissions disclosed in religious confessions

Social housing

* Encourage build-to-rent and rent-to-buy schemes and remove tax barriers *Stamp Duty to be reduced from investments in social housing

Gambling

* Setting a maximum bet limit for poker machines and limiting the influence of the pokies industry

Health

* Vaccination to protect public health and reduce the spread of preventable diseases *Establishment of health hubs * Early intervention and evidence-based prevention are the main focus * Create an ombudsman for aged care and retirement housing, and establish a statewide ageing strategy

Internet and media

* Expand free wifi in public spaces including on all public transport * Anti-ISP filtering * National media classification and introduction of non-violent sexual content label

Other areas

* Focusing on community housing and ensuring that at-risk people have a place to live * Decriminalise sex work and remove censorship so that people can make their own choices about what they want to watch * Improving public transport especially for high growth outer suburban areas * Increasing oversight around politicians and tighten the rules to prevent unethical behaviour by the state's politicians and public figures * Taxing the non-charitable business arms of religious institutions. This includes the estimated $9 billion portfolio of the Catholic Church in the state * Holding a referendum on whether or not Australia should become a republic * A nationwide trial of a

four-day workweek A four-day workweek is an arrangement where a workplace or place of education has its employees or students work or attend school, college or university over the course of four days per week rather than the more customary five. This arrangement ...

* Provide improved, interconnected and safer walking and cycling paths, including: ** Investment in safe, direct and continuous bike routes, separated from other forms of traffic ** Revitalisation and expansion of existing cycling trails ** Providing bike racks on buses, trams and trains * The right for terminally ill people to choose voluntary assisted dying ** Repealing laws that prevent the territories from enacting voluntary assisted dying legislation ** Promote and support legalisation of voluntary assisted dying in every state and territory of Australia

Electoral history

Victorian state elections

In addition to fielding candidates in a number of Victorian Legislative Assembly seats, the party stood candidates in all regions of the Victorian Legislative Council after 2017. In 2018 the party succeeded in re-electing Fiona Patten to the

Victorian state by-elections

*Chipp was endorsed by the party, but the party was not registered with the VEC at the time, as they were in the process of changing their name.

Links

The party has had some involvement in

Glenn Druery Glenn Druery is an Australian political strategist, electoral campaigner and ultra-distance cyclist. He has played a leading role in the electoral success of various micro and minor parties in Australia since the mid-1990s. He acquired a reputat ...

Minor Party Alliance The Minor Party Alliance (MPA) is a collaborative undertaking of small Australian political parties, created by Glenn Druery's "Independent Liaison" business, which assists in organising preference meetings and negotiating preference flows between ...

. However, in the lead-up to the 2018 state election, Fiona Patten had a falling out with Glenn Druery due to his new conflict of interest as chief-of-staff to Federal Senator,

Derryn Hinch Derryn Nigel Hinch (born 9 February 1944) is a New Zealand-born media personality, politician, actor, journalist and published author. He is best known for his career in Australia, on Melbourne radio and television. He served as a Senator for ...

, who was running candidates in the election and receiving favourable preferences due to Druery's private business dealings as the "preference whisperer". She claimed that he demanded that the Reason Party pay him money, or she would not be re-elected. Patten made an official complaint to the VEC, and Druery is now subject to an ongoing police investigation over this complaint.

References

External links

Reason Party
official website of the Federal party
Fiona Pattens Reason Party Victoria
official website of the

Victoria Victoria most commonly refers to: * Victoria (Australia), a state of the Commonwealth of Australia * Victoria, British Columbia, provincial capital of British Columbia, Canada * Victoria (mythology), Roman goddess of Victory * Victoria, Seyche ...

party {{Political parties in Victoria (Australia) 2009 establishments in Australia Political parties established in 2009 Sex Party Sex Party Censorship in Australia Civil rights and liberties in Australia Drug policy reform Drugs in Australia Euthanasia in Australia Liberalism in Australia Libertarianism in Australia Progressive parties Secularism in Australia Sex industry in Australia Sex positivism