The Commercial Hotel in Terang sprawls across a dreamy maze of rooms — guitars and books strewn here, a stage with immaculate old furniture on it there, all under the eyes of portraits of Johnny Cash, Jimi Hendrix and others.
It’s something of a progressive and creative hub in the town, hosting politics-in-the-pub nights, candidates’ forums and offering free accommodation to help artists and writers complete projects.
The owner, Les Cameron, a former professional footballer for North Melbourne, tells me that in recent weeks candidates for the seat of South-West Coast have been flocking to the town, which has just been carved away from the neighbouring seat of Polwarth. Given the change actually bumped up the Liberals (still marginal) vote here, it won’t surprise to hear that the Commercial would appear to be the leftiest part of the vote that came with it.
This is not an area where people are particularly keen to share their voting intentions — most places feature either corflutes for all candidates or, far more often, none. The Commercial thus is taking a real stand by featuring only the ALP candidate Kylie Gaston and local independent Carol Altmann in its window.
Altmann has been a journalist for decades. For the past few years, this has been via her website The Terrier — the entire Warrnambool council was voted out in 2020, including Labor’s candidate Gaston, and a lot of people trace that back to Altmann’s work. Most recently she’s been investigating Lyndoch Living, an aged care facility embroiled in allegations of bullying and intimidation. By mid-August its chief executive was on “leave”, and WorkSafe was making inquiries. It was Lyndoch that confirmed Altmann’s desire to run.
“I saw directly the impact of political inaction on our community, and I couldn’t just watch it any more,” she says. The investigation “really brought home to me that there was a lack of political will to intervene. And as a result of that, a lot of people suffered and they relied on me to be their voice.”
Altmann doesn’t outright reject the teal designation — she says she shares the values of climate change action and integrity — but she sees herself more as a community independent in the Cathy McGowan mould. Which is a special kind of challenge in regional areas like the south-west coast, as centres of community continue to bleed away to the city.
Joyce, in her 70s, selling poppies for Remembrance Day on Terang’s main street, tells Altmann she’s organising a series of walks to raise money for the Black Dog Institute, because “we’ve lost a few young people in the last 12 months”.
“It’s so hard to keep communities together once they lose, say, their footy team,” she says. Joyce is the kind of person you meet on every walk with a politician, the quick hello which becomes a 15-minute talk and a potted history of the area.
She’s from farming stock, her father set up here after the war as part of the soldier settlement program after the war: “The local farms are being bought up by their neighbours now. My father used to milk maybe 50 cows on 120 acres. You couldn’t make a living that way now.”
Later I ask Altmann about whether the processes Joyce talked about can be arrested.
“My feeling is we’re in a real transitional period — we’re moving from an old economy we were very familiar with,” she says. “Farming is still absolutely the backbone of this region, but the number of people working in these industries is going to shift. The farms are getting bigger and the workforces on them are diminishing. With renewable energy moving in, you get different job opportunities and alongside that, these smaller towns are reinventing themselves with micro businesses.”
She draws a parallel with Tasmania, dying towns revived through small distillers, breweries and artisanal shops.
“In Terang you’ve still got that [agricultural] backbone but the fingers and toes are changing. So that combination of the big legacy industry, renewables and micro businesses could see a renewal. Because if not, you get what Joyce was talking about, which is very worrying. Those towns will just die.”
On the road again
Of the afternoon I spend with Altmann, more than half is spent driving. Such is the reality of the rural candidate — hours and hours on the road every day, hoping to turn a handful of undecided voters in towns so small they don’t show up on the road signs until you’re just outside the place.
What strikes me is that everyone we speak to seems genuinely glad Altmann’s doing this, even those cagey about who they’ll vote for, or explicitly voting for someone else — “I’m voting for the sex party!” we hear in Panmure, and Altmann cheerily points out it’s called Reason Party now.
This is in the Panmure Hotel. Now run by Annie and Graeme, it’s a chaos of different rooms — the high- tea rooms, one pink and packed to the rafters with decorative teapots, the other with carpeting which wouldn’t be out of place in the The Shining (the building dates back to 1871). There’s a room where “the kids can play pool and listen to the jukebox”, Annie tells me. Above the jukebox is a soft-focus painting of Elvis strumming his guitar outside a diner at night, Bogart and Monroe looking on, leaning on vintage cars. I never wanted to leave.
We talk about the issues that affect people in the area — “The roads!” Annie and Graeme say in unison, Annie rolling her eyes so hard she risks a neck injury.
As the election drew nearer there’s been a flurry of activity, and a few small improvements on the roads that connect the towns of the south-west, but the car-quaking, crumbling infrastructure is a problem that spans several governments. It is this, not conspiracies about Dan Andrews, nor even much anti-lockdown sentiment that Altmann hears from voters.
“Interestingly,” she says, “I’ve not heard that specific post-lockdown criticism that you’re seeing in Melbourne, with the anti-Dan terminology. Here, people are focused on local issues. It’s the roads, the health system, the same stuff they’ve been dealing with for decades.”
Finally we head to Koroit, past the gleaming processing facility Bega bought there in 2018. Here Altmann strikes up a conversation with Lynne — a rusted-on ALP voter and, as such, appropriately dispirited.
“I don’t really give a shit,” she says with a wry smile when Altmann asks how she thinks things are going, before appearing to talk herself around. “It’s just the thing of talking to people around here, and it’s always been such a safe Liberal seat and …“ she bangs the counter “… no one wants change.”
“Still,” she says, “I see what you’re doing, and I… I mean I don’t read much about it, but I hear you on the wires and I see you on Facebook, and I like what you’re doing.”
“At the very least,” Altmann says, “we’re making them work that bit harder.”
