F#$k Consensus...

To understand the AFL stadium debate is to understand Tasmania.

We deserved a VFL/AFL team decades ago. It’s ridiculous that we have been made to wait so long.

Generations of Tasmanians forced to leave the island to pursue sporting careers in the national game whose foundation stones can be traced back to our state.

But as the episode of the Working Dog’s masterpiece Utopia, about a federal government infrastructure department, which has been shared on social media in recent days suggested, we didn’t want nor ask for a stadium. The stadium was thrust upon us, a key ingredient in a totally disrespectful ultimatum that was never part of the average punter’s understanding.

The fictional conversation between characters about a new stadium in Tasmania, written some 15 years ago, remains perfect for present day although this time it’s not satire!

“What would you say to someone who was thinking of building a stadium?”

“Don’t”

“Right, but what if they really, really wanted to build a stadium?”

“Do it, but not in Tasmania.”

“What if it’s a multipurpose stadium?”

“What are the other purposes?”

“Yeah, you’re right, we are going to have to look into it.”

Tasmania is built on disagreement. And disagreements, underpinned by the parochial present and past, inevitably bubble to the surface as soon as anything of significance is proposed.

And while footy followers will be considering their allegiances in coming years, preservation versus progress will continue to be the most talked about game in town.

The arguments and fights and debates and discussions that radiate heat and hate in equal measure are as difficult to describe as they are to explain.

Basically, as Tasmanians, we rarely, if ever, reach consensus. It's difficult to think of a time when Tasmanians were able to band together and disagree agreeably over a contentious decision.

Consensus is a decision accepted by all; we don’t have to agree but we accept the outcome.

Its extension, consensus leadership, is basically impossible in Tasmania. Further complicating matters is the understanding that consensus leadership is viewed as weakness; an Achilles heel, particularly in politics, where being considered hard as nails, and even acting the bully, is respected.

So why is this the case? Why is consensus nigh on impossible in Tasmania.

As Tasmanians we are renowned for having a chip on our shoulder. We have been treated unfairly and mainlanders are out to get us, out to belittle us, and out to take what is good to make it their own.

So, we fight. Fight to protect and improve our reputation and we fight for what we passionately believe to be right. Consequently, we fight mainlanders, but we also fight each other.

Thankfully, times have changed and we are a destination, but the stigma survives, ingrained and entwined.

The answer to our inability to find consensus also lies in what remains the greatest challenge for Tasmania: the haves and the have nots. The gap between rich and poor has an ongoing history in our state: First Nations people and colonists, colonists and convicts, colonists and bushrangers, environmentalists and pro-development types, environmentalists and workers, and the university educated and the grade 10 leavers.

There are more poor than rich in Tasmania and they are suppressed. The masses remain voiceless, rarely taken seriously, with their issues seldom fixed or addressed in full because they are never heard.

Surnames matter. Old money matters. New money matters. Those with a perceived birthright matter, fostering a strong and powerful network that delivers privilege and ensures their agenda is heard over those who remain invisible.

To understand Tasmania, visit the Franklin River. To understand the proposed AFL stadium, visit Tasmania’s west coast. The most famous fight of them all, the proposed damming of the Franklin River as part of the expanding Hydro Electric Scheme during the early 1980s is the focus of a brilliant ABC Dig podcast that was recently brought to my attention. Listen to it, the conversations and reflections are poignant. It is also instructive.

Infrastructure does not have a heart nor a home, but it does create jobs. Yet the aggrieved are clear, their agency has been taken away because the billion-dollar industry, the AFL, is contributing a mere $15million while the taxpayers will stump up the soon to blowout budget required to complete the project.

However, there is significant water to go under the new Bridgewater Bridge, an infrastructure project first partially funded in 2001 with funding for Macquarie Point Development Corporation first announced in 2012.

Don’t hold your breath, the stadium will not be built for a while. We have a rich history of delay.

I remain a dreamer, an aspirational melancholic who leans on the inspiration of music and our environment to inspire. Could there ever be a Tasmania where power is not employed to divide and conquer but a Tasmania where we can find some semblance of consensus.

Alas the decision is now made and anyone who tries to split the stadium from the team will be accused of putting the Tasmanian AFL licence at risk – it’s pure political genius at our expense.