The latest weekly Morgan face-to-face survey of 883 voters shows Labor’s two-party lead down from 60.5-39.5 to 57-43. Labor’s primary vote is down two points to 48.5 per cent, the Coalition’s is up substantially from 34.5 per cent to 39 per cent, and the Greens are down two to 6 per cent. Between Morgan, Newspoll and Essential Research, there is now significant evidence that some of the gloss has come off the extraordinary spike Labor enjoyed from its response to the global financial crisis.
Elsewhere:
• The Geelong Advertiser reports on the federal Liberal preselection for Corangamite. Prospective nominees: former Kennett government minister Ian Smith, “considering his position”; Graham Harris, head of the party’s Corangamite electorate council; Victorian Farmers Federation president Simon Ramsay; “Moriac district resident” Rod Nockles; Simon Price, unsuccessful Colac Otway Shire Council candidate and former electorate officer Stewart McArthur who lost the seat in 2007.
• Mark Kenny of The Advertiser reports that “pressure is mounting inside the Liberal Party to dump its candidate for the state seat of Newland, Trish Draper”. Draper was federal member for Makin from 1996 to 2007, when she forestalled what seemed to be very likely defeat by retiring. Draper is seen to have been damaged by reports an ex-boyfriend has been identified as a suspect in a murder investigation, which is currently the subject of a defamation case. A Liberal source quoted by Kenny says Right faction powerbroker Senator Nick Minchin has told Opposition Leader Martin Hamilton-Smith to dump her.
• The ABC reports “speculation” that Premier David Bartlett is “planning to visit Tasmania’s Governor on Monday and send Tasmania to the polls as early as April 18”, resulting from the government’s failure to table long-promised legislation to enact fixed four-year terms. Bartlett denies this, and he would have to be pretty silly to ignore the still-accumulating evidence that unnecessary early elections are a bad idea.
• The ABC reports that Labor is courting Beaconsfield mine disaster survivor Brant Webb as a possible state election candidate for Bass.
• An interim report by the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters recommends an end to trials of electronic voting for the vision-impaired and overseas defence personnel on the grounds it is too expensive. The report said the 850 votes cast electronically in 2007 cost $2597 each, compared with $8.36 for each non-electronic vote. A dissenting report by Bob Brown argues the government should pursue electronic voting to assist disadvantaged voters, and investigate its use in the Australian Capital Territory and overseas.
• The Australian Parliamentary Library has published papers on women parliamentarians in Australia and the possibility of dedicated indigenous representation, a la the Maori seats in New Zealand.
Barnaby Joyce on Meet the Press giving his usual garbled rant, i liked him much better when he was himself instead of peddling the party line, at least then he believed in what he was saying and it showed.
The Pauline Hanson Apology from the Telegraph. The most insulting piece of egregious balderdash I’ve ever read. They blame the “photographer”.
http://www.news.com.au/dailytelegraph/story/0,22049,25220679-5001030,00.html
But this takes the cake:
[We believe readers are more than entitled to have a say and we encourage them to write in and, where they see fit, give us a whack.
Such an opportunity is a crucial right in a democratic society.
The Sunday Telegraph makes weekly judgments about all sorts of people, and many public figures have copped it from this paper. So if we’re going to dish it out, we have to be able to take the criticism.
We’re not politicians here. We don’t try to spin our way out of a jam.]
I hope she takes them to the cleaners.
The ALP and Australia is blessed with 2 great women in Australian politics in J Gillard and Anna Bligh.
Turnbull looks like he has just seen the ghost. He looks awful.
Allbull & Toad been sucking lemons since 9:30 last night ! Allbush to me must be saying to himself – why am I putting myself through this….
Allbull certainly toshed bile around in his interview with cassidy. Does the goose think ppl will believe him or vote for him. He is a dead man walking when it comes to continuing as fib leader.
Turnbull is setting up a huge “straw man” argument. Any increase in unemployment will be blamed on the new IR laws. He’s really pathetic. Now he’s just dishonest.
I decided not to watch the Insiders but it was still great to tune in at first and see the look on Gerard Henderson’s face when asked about the result. He eventually started to invent some spin about future risks for Bligh but in those first few seconds he just sat there and looked grim. He didn’t even try to suggest Federal implications because he knows they are all aweful.
Gerard Henderson wasn’t on Insiders.
Sorry it was Piers – got my nutbars mixed up.
[Turnbull is setting up a huge “straw man” argument. Any increase in unemployment will be blamed on the new IR laws. He’s really pathetic. Now he’s just dishonest.]
Well they credited WorkChoices with making unemployment fall, so they are just taking that argument to its illogical conclusion.
Turnbull on Insiders accused Xenophon of switching his vote so the Fair Work Bill could pass, it was actually Fielding who switched his vote.
Its curious that aside from the social issues on economics Turnbull is now reading very much from the right wing neo-lib script, despite it being quite discredited. There are a heap of potential wedge questions here. What would Turnbull do to rein in executive salaries – leave it to the market?
Yeah, right ….. how many different colour spots can one chameleon have anyways?
[
No interest in changing IR law: Turnbul
lMarch 22, 2009 – 11:14AM
The federal opposition says it is not keen to amend new workplace legislation if it wins the next election – unless it hinders job creation.
Work Choices is set to disappear on January 1 after parliament passed Labor’s Fair Work bill on Friday.
After 17 hours of debate, 231 amendments and a sitting of the Senate until 2.30am (AEDT) on Friday, the bill was finally passed.
Federal Opposition Leader Malcolm Turnbull on Sunday told ABC television, his party would not seek to make any changes to industrial relations (IR) laws in its first term if it won government, other than those set out in its election policy platform.
“I have no ideological interest in industrial relations reform,” he told ABC’s Insiders program.
“I’m only interested in laws which create or enhance job creation.
“So, if a law will make it more likely that jobs will be created, I’m in favour of it. If it makes it more likely jobs will not be created, then I’m against it.”
If the new laws did not help create jobs, Mr Turnbull said, he would be a strong supporter of change.
“There is a powerful argument for not changing your industrial relations laws every few years,” he said.
“So we will look at the results and if these laws are destroying jobs then I imagine there will be strong support for changes.”
]
Thought Cassidy was very soft on Malcolm’s response re alcopops: that it was all Roxon’s fault, it was up to her to persuade the cross benches to vote for it, it was nothing to do with the Libs as they had always made it clear they would vote against it.
So Cassidy’s original premise was right – the failure of the legislation was the Liberal’s determination to vote against it, regardless – but he didn’t follow through.
[“There is a powerful argument for not changing your industrial relations laws every few years,” he said.]
This will be used in the leadup to the next election to portray Turnbull and the Libs as hell bent on re-introducing WorkChoices.
Probably also Turnbull on radio saying “Just to clarify, Brendan Nelson actually said WorkChoices was dead”
Zoomster, Turnbull was right on a couple of things though. The Government could’ve introduced the legislation MUCH sooner and given themselves enough time to successfully negotiate its passage if they’d wanted to. To only allow a couple of days for consideration in the Senate is just not good enough.
Additionally, they could have introduced and passed legislation allowing them to keep the revenue raised over the past year, then tried again next year to keep collecting it from then on.
Turnbull and the Libs said they would not support the Alcopops legislation full stop. A bit rich to be implying the Government were inflexible.
[Turnbull and the Libs said they would not support the Alcopops legislation full stop. A bit rich to be implying the Government were inflexible.]
Yeah, loved that. When the government sticks to its gun it’s “inflexible”. When the Libs do it obstructively they’re “principled”.
The deal was done with the Australian people, who voted the Libs and their Great Helmsman right out. That is when the conditions of the bargain were set. a deal’s a deal: when you shake hands on a deal it’s not with a view to further negotiations down the track, certainly not renegotiations with a third party to that deal who was against it from the start, aka the Liberal Party.
TP, Vera and BK;
The situation in America at present can best be summed up by Green Day’s Song “American Idiot”. Link provided to lyrics here (not putting them into this post as it would cause William’s spam filter to have a stroke) Yes, GB is gone BUT the problems in America, cultural and societal wise, stem all the way back to Reagan and 1980 so are deep seated and just getting a Dem into the White House isn’t enough to get rid of them. As I noted earlier this weekend, don’t know when it will go.
[
http://www.azlyrics.com/lyrics/greenday/americanidiot.html
]
[Turnbull and the Libs said they would not support the Alcopops legislation full stop.]
No they didn’t. They said they’d allow the Government to keep the revenue they’d already raised. Then it would’ve been open to the Government to try again in the next financial year to continue collecting it.
The Government chose not to worry about it for whatever reason.
Was it just me or did someone else notice that Cassidy jumped in quickly this am to shut Akerman up every time he opened his mouth.
Poor Malcolm – he looked as though the knives were imbedded in his back more deeply this morning.
I am so sick of hearing his puerile name calling of the Rudd, Gillard & Co. It sounds so childish. I think he called Kev a “dumb banker” among other things.
BB was right – Kev must have been reading him because the Govt. is picking up on all the different positions Turnbull takes according to the time of day, month, whatever.
Juliem this verse from your song could almost apply to Australia and did when Howie ran the show.
[Don’t want to be an American idiot.
One nation controlled by the media.
Information age of hysteria.
It’s calling out to idiot America.]
[Howard enjoyed a few days in the city where his son Richard works for a hedge fund.]
Well that’d be right 😉
http://www.smh.com.au/opinion/two-new-leaders-two-issues-20090321-94zl.html
It was pretty apparent that Roxon is a light-weight compared to Gillard in getting legislation through. She should have accepted the offer to keep the $300M raised in alcopops so far, instead of spitting the dummy and turning it down. That was just childish.
Diogenes
re: the Senate:
The most exclusive club in Australia is jealous of its’ prerogatives and the Government will face trouble ‘a plenty if they try to bully or manipulate the Senate
Diogenes,
Once again you go the personal sledge based on sketchy reasoning and absolutely no personal knowledge other than what you read on the blogs.
Roxon is playing a longer game here.
Might be better to see how this unfolds.
Labor have done the right thing in not accepting the $300m. Why should they? The legislation was rejected therefore it would’ve simply not been right for them to keep it. If the Liberals wanted the government to keep the $300m, they should have voted for the policy. The Liberals are dead meat if the consumption of alcopops rises again before the next election!
If you ever want to see how a real beaten favourite looks – look no further than as soon as they crossed to Turnbull on Insiders this morning – priceless. Poor Turnbull, all that material he had prepared to throw at Rudd if Bligh had lost, down the tubes.
Btw, in my opinion, I reckon that was Pauline’s face in those photos, but NOT her body.
The forensic guys reckon it wasn’t her face.
GG
She may have a “grand plan” but on the face of it, turning down the offer of the Government keeping the $300M rather than giving it to an alcohol industry front organisation looks like a bad decision.
If i were to do a Fielding, i would say the Libs are caught between two devils and a deep blue sea.
👿 Devil no: 1 is Turnbull who is looking more and more like a dud each day. he cant seem to decide whether he is Malcolm or Arthur or Martha. So he, at first just ghostly, turns a whiter shade of pale.
👿 Devil no: 2 is Cossie. If they turn to him, the ceiling would simply flew away as the ghost of serfchoice would be humming harder. So he too, at first just ghostly, turns a whiter shade of pale.
😮 The deep blue sea is ALP, sailing for the coast nicely, full of depth, catching the wind of change, with the sixteen vestal virgins leading the charge.
[The Liberals are dead meat if the consumption of alcopops rises again before the next election! ]
Centre, the first figures out after the excise on the current stock is lifted “WILL” show a dramatic increase in alcopop sales. Let the party begin! You read it here first.
[I reckon that was Pauline’s face in those photos]
She would have to had dramatic plastic surgery in between in that case. Experts have done facial analysis and concur that there are substantial but supple differences in the two faces.
The most obvious one is the nose. In the photos, the nose protrubes. PH’s nose, even in the earliest photos I have seen of her are convex with a bump on the end. Totally different.
The face was different. The photos were genuine but were of someone with an uncanny resemblance to Hanson, who incidentally must still be out there and know who she is. I’m guessing her identity will be discovered some day. She’s not necessarily even Australian. She might be anywhere in the world and the guy saw an opportunity.
[She might be anywhere in the world and the guy saw an opportunity.]
There have been a few suggestions that the Pauline lookalike could be Russian
[It was pretty apparent that Roxon is a light-weight compared to Gillard in getting legislation through. She should have accepted the offer to keep the $300M raised in alcopops so far, instead of spitting the dummy and turning it down. That was just childish.]
Surely you don’t think that such a significant decision was left solely to the minister. That decision would have been debated long and hard in the tactics committee.
On Alcopops, there are two ways to damn the Libs. If consumption of Alcopops rises then they are caught. But there is also the question of overall alcohol consumption. Normally in a recession you would expect it to fall. But if it rises or even stays flat, then the Libs are again guilty. (Alcohol consumption per capita has been falling overall in the long term; we used to drink a lot more beer. So its the change in trend that will be the clincher.)
Probably only one way to be certain, and that is to compare photos of Pauline when she was around the same age. But like that entertainer in Afghanistan, Hanson should get stacks over it by suing.
You guys cannot be serious about Rudd keeping that $300m alcopops money? Fair dinkum, you blokes have watched too many episodes of the Brady Bunch! It’s HUSH money.
[She may have a “grand plan” but on the face of it, turning down the offer of the Government keeping the $300M rather than giving it to an alcohol industry front organisation looks like a bad decision.]
Only on the face of it.
The contrary indications are…
1. Could you imagine the kinds of ad the alcohol industry would run in an “anti-alcohol” campaign, centered on one of their most profitable products? It’s a preposterous thought. The government is the government of this country, not the Libs, not Fielding and certainly not the Alcohol Industry. Every time an ad went on telly – and you know they would be smarmy, back-pedalling, not at all hard-hitting – for “young gels” to quit drinking alcopops, it would be a reminder that the government wasn’t tough or principled enough.
2. When excess numbers of kids start wrapping themselves and a carload of their friends around light poles again, it will be the Opposition’s and Fielding’s fault. There is no doubt about this at all. The Labor spin people will make sure of that, that’s if the angry parents, police, medical bodies etc. don’t knock them out of the way first. You can just see the headlines…. “The Day a Town Died”. It will be ugly.
3. It’s not the government’s to keep. It was collected under a regulation that was not ratified. They must give it back. The Turnbull alternative is far too ad hoc and is not good government.
4. If they had given in on alcopops, if they’d compromised, do you think they’d have gotten the repeal of Work Choices through?
Bushfire, Goodness the Libs are lucky it’s not you they are debating on QANDA and the 7.30 Report etc. You’ve presented a very pervasive argument – not that I needed convincing.
1. That’s probably already going to happen. The $300M is going to be donated to an alcohol industry front called DrinkWise “to promote responsible drinking”. Given that just over 50% of it’s board members are I’m a bit sceptical about what they will do with it. I think that the government could have used that $300M better than DrinkWise will do.
http://www.theage.com.au/national/alcopop-refunds-to-be-donated-20090319-93fw.html
2. I agree that from now onwards, every alcobinge death and rape will eat at Fielding and the Libs. But that would have happened if they agreed to keep the $300M they had already raised (although I concede they wouldn’t quite have the moral high ground as much).
3. That’s where DrinkWise comes in.
4. True but $300M could buy a lot of favour from the Greens, X and Fielding.
Short term benefit to make Fielding a softer target to JG’s negotiations.
It could be that NOT giving it back underlines the ‘it’s not about the money, it’s about health’ argument.
If it’s a revenue thing only, then of course the government would like to keep the money.
By giving the money back (which legally they need to do), it emphasises that the tax was to do with harm minimisation.
Of course, what Roxon should now do is (as part of the Budget) come forward with a package which is even more clearly aimed at addressing the health problems caused by alcohol.
[Short term benefit to make Fielding a softer target to JG’s negotiations.]
I thought the same thing. Once Fielding found himself to be a pariah over the Malpops vote he was desperate to redeem himself. Julia played him like a violin.
[It could be that NOT giving it back underlines the ‘it’s not about the money, it’s about health’ argument.
If it’s a revenue thing only, then of course the government would like to keep the money.
By giving the money back (which legally they need to do), it emphasises that the tax was to do with harm minimisation.]
I agree. It’s a very smart move.
Some time ago, maybe a week or more? a handful of people were wondering about the percentage of rusted on Greens? One of my girl friends is just that and I’ve asked her that question. Got an answer back today as she always hands out HTV for the Greens candidate when they run here in WA in her area. She says those that take the HTV from her said they were going to vote Greens anyway but just take the HTV for putting the prefs. in. She estimates perhaps up to 80% of Greens are rusted on in her opinion. Just tossing in that .02 worth for those who wanted to know …..
Fielding was a pariah over Malcopops whether they gave back the money or not. His effort to say FF had broken the stranglehold the alcohol industry had over Australia was perhaps the most deluded thing I’ve heard all year, although Turnbull claiming credit for getting rid of WorkChoices came a close second.
You can do a lot of good with $300M….
Chris Uhlman actually said something I agreed with this morning, which was similar to Krugman’s comments here. Obama doesn’t seem to want to reform the banking system, he just wants to bail it out. We don’t have the same problem here but I gather Rudd is going to bring this up with Obama next week.
Unfortunately, if the US just puts more sand on it’s collapsed system without reforming it, they’ve still got a sand castle (which can fall down in us).
[The Obama administration is now completely wedded to the idea that there’s nothing fundamentally wrong with the financial system — that what we’re facing is the equivalent of a run on an essentially sound bank.]
http://krugman.blogs.nytimes.com/2009/03/21/despair-over-financial-policy/?scp=1&sq=The%20Geithner%20plan%20has%20now%20been%20leaked%20in%20detail.&st=cse
[It could be that NOT giving it back underlines the ‘it’s not about the money, it’s about health’ argument.]
Oh, but it is “about the money”, at least as much as about the “Harm minimisation” thing.
The original justification – world-wide – for taxing alcopops lower than other similarly potent drinks was that they were, technically, beer. That is, “unhopped beer”. Clear, devoid of bitter taste, with a hint of fizz: beer, without the hops added to make it taste like beer.
We have to remember the chemistry here. The active ingredient in beer, wine, scotch, vodka, fermented yak’s milk and whatever other drink you care to mention is ethanol. If you refine yak’s milk to the nth degree you end up with the same active ingredient – a clear, colorless, tasteless, intoxicating liquid – as you do if you refine sugar, wheat, barley or yes, hops…. It’s called ethanol. How you get to your final, distilled ethanol is a matter of culture and tradition. I hear potato peels were a favourite in the prison camps of WW-2.
“Beer: the “Workingman’s Drink”, the “Workingman’s Ethanol”.
So, if you brew a beer (note, no quote marks, it’s real beer) without the traditional flavour then add fruit juice you have a product that’s technically exempt from the excise on other forms of flavoured ethanol. Because it’s beer.
If you obtain pure alcohol – ethanol – from any other source, say sugar cane, or wheat (Howard’s mates at Manildra’s favourite), then fizz it up a bit, then add the flavour you get an exact equivalent of an alcopop, indistinguishable in every way… except it ain’t beer, so it’s taxed at the higher rate, and it’s a lot cheaper to make in industrial quantities. Why do youse think that when they make large amounts of ethanol for methylated spirits or other industrial uses they don’t brew it like they brew beer? Because ethanol from sugar cane or wheat grain is cheaper to make by the tonne.
The way around this conundrum – being able to make a cheaper intoxicating liquor that tastes exactly the same as an unhopped beer so the kiddies will drink it – is to bribe the government into recognizing that if the final result is the same, then why bother with all the palaver involved in brewing, when you can simply distill much cheaper? A large, ongoing donation to he party will get you your tax exemption.
All Labor did was to rectify this tax or excise anomaly. So it was “about the money”, but it was not a “tax grab”.
It was justice.
The mistake the government made was not to point this out. Instead they went for the heartstrings and put up young kids, particularly girls, as the victims. They made it into solely a health issue, when it was both a health issue and a matter of clear excise justice.
The Libs won this one because the government was too clever by half.
Bushfire
I kinda agree, but surely the answer is to tax the ethanol in the grog you buy? If you like light beer less excise.
But the wine industry would scream blue murder, because they are primary producers and the tax would destroy regions and jobs.
(Despite the winery I saw close to cessnock bottling Southern Comfort).
Bite the bullet Rudd. x amount of ethanol = x amount of excise. 🙁
Would an alcohol tax really make that much difference to the wine industry? Couldn’t you remove the Wine Equaisation tax (WET) at the same time to keep the effect fairly price neutral? Putting a price penalty on large volume wine flagons is precisely the objective from a public health POV. Saying it will harm some parts of the industry is the same argument the tobacco industry uses to survive – true but beside the point; the damage they cause is greater than their value.