Party games

No Morgan poll this week. Here’s some of the other mail:

• The Launceston Examiner reports that Brigadier Andrew Nikolic, veteran of numerous overseas postings and until recently the Australian Defence Force’s director-general of public affairs, has “confirmed that he is interested” in Liberal preselection for the federal seat of Bass. Also said to have his eye on the preselection is Senator Guy Barnett, who will otherwise have to settle for the slighly less appealing prospect of number three on the Liberal ticket.

• Michelle Grattan reports on a “glowing reference” for Kooyong preselection aspirant Josh Frydenberg from John Howard. Another of Frydenberg’s backers is Andrew Peacock. His principal rival, industrial relations lawyer John Pesutto, is supported by Institute of Public Affairs executive director John Roskam, who was himself sniffing the breeze before deciding not to proceed. Former Liberal president and Fraser government minister Tony Staley has given his seal of approval to Peter Jonson, a 62-year-old former Reserve Bank official known to the web at large as Henry Thornton.

• The Townsville Bulletin reports there are rumours that prodigious McDonald’s franchiser George Colbran again hopes to run for Labor in Herbert, where he narrowly failed to unseat Peter Lindsay in 2007. Colbran reportedly says he “won’t commit either way”.

• David Rood of The Age reports that John Brumby has “cleared the way” for Keilor MP George Seitz to be dumped at the next election, amid the fallout from the Ombudsman’s recent report into Brimbank City Council. The party’s administrative committee will decide this evening whether to take preselections for western suburbs seats out of the hands of local branches, in which Seitz and others remain powerful. Also affected will be Kororoit MP Marlene Kairouz, whose preselection ahead of last year’s by-election formed the backdrop of much of the shenanigans investigated by the Ombudsman, and Derrimut MP Telmo Languiller. Labor sources quoted in the article wonder why both Languiller and Western Metropolitan MLC Theo Theophanous aren’t equally being targeted along with Seitz, so it evidently should not be taken for granted that either Languiller or Kairouz are endangered.

• Taking his cue from Manmohan Singh’s assumption of the Indian prime ministership from the upper house, Malcolm Mackerras argues for an end to the convention that Australia’s party leaders must sit in the lower house, which he relates to the anachronistic presumption that it is the more democratic chamber.

• Final score from the Fremantle by-election: Carles 10,664, Tagliaferri 9,100. Margin: 3.96 per cent. I expected Labor would rein it in a little on late counting, but no.

• With the whiff of a dying government in the air, talk of electoral reform is very much in vogue in London this season, just as was when the scandal-ridden Major government was breathing its last. Conservative leader David Cameron opposes proportional representation but promises to “look seriously” at fixed terms. Health Secretary Alan Johnson – “still the favourite to lead Labour if Gordon Brown is removed from the top job“ – has suggested the government at last look seriously at the “Alternative Vote Plus” model which has been floating around since the 1998 report of the Jenkins commission, which was set up when Tony Blair came to power. It proposes a slightly watered down version of German/NZ style MMP, combining constituency members with party list members to produce a proportional result. Unlike Germany and NZ however, there would be a cap on the number of party list members which might make results less than fully proportional. The “Alternative Vote” part of the title refers to Australian-style preferential voting for the constituency seats, which the Jenkins commission appeared to be taken with as it had just helped defeat Pauline Hanson. From the Jenkins commission report, a “note of reservation by Lord Alexander”:

My colleagues also think that AV will contribute to a less confrontational style of politics because candidates will be inhibited from attacking rivals too strongly as they wish to gain their second votes. I do not see it as particularly desirable that candidates from different parties, who are different precisely because they do not agree on all issues, should be pulling their punches in order to seek approval from voters who support other parties. In any event, from my observation of Australia, which is the only single large country to use AV, their politicians tend to be, if anything, more blunt and outspoken than our own.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,122 comments on “Party games”

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  2. [I heard Hilary is organising some theatre tickets in Dallas for obama]

    I think Obama would be happy as long as it isn’t theatre tickets in DC 😉

  4. [I heard Hilary is organising some theatre tickets in Dallas for obama

    I think Obama would be happy as long as it isn’t theatre tickets in DC ]

    Hilary likes to make sure every omen is right.

    I mean she even has offered him a open top car ride thru the city, if the theatre dont work out
    😉

  6. [Love the comedy people, this is great ]

    You would be having this arguement as well if there waqs no coalition between Liberals and Nationals.

  9. [And Bill is giving free Sax as an enticement]

    Gus, is there a typo here?

    [And Bill is giving free Sex as an enticement?]

  11. http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,25566460-5006301,00.html

    [THOUSANDS of jobs will be axed and consumers face higher grocery prices and a cutback in shopping hours because of sweeping changes to workplace laws.

    Despite forecast unemployment of 8.5 per cent, retailers and local pharmacists will have to pay millions of dollars in extra overtime from next year. ]

    Thankyou for infection the media John Winston Howard.

    [Poll: Are we better or worse off under Labor¿s IR laws?

    Yes

    No]

    Well done News Ltd retards.

  12. Oh and don’t you love the Hypocrisy by the Greens about pre-selecting High Profile Candidates, when in 1994 thney pre-selected Andrew Wilkie for Bennalong, especially in light of his recoent announcemtn of standing as an independent in Tasmania with policies which are somewhat opposite to those espoused by the Greens ?

  14. [Love the comedy people, this is great ]

    Gotta give you something to smile about Glen, considering since 2007 it’s just bad news after bad news for your mob! 😀

  15. [Do we have any Nats hack here at PB?]

    John Howard’s lack of telecommunication investment has its advantages 😉

  16. [THOUSANDS of jobs will be axed and consumers face higher grocery prices and a cutback in shopping hours because of sweeping changes to workplace laws.

    Despite forecast unemployment of 8.5 per cent, retailers and local pharmacists will have to pay millions of dollars in extra overtime from next year. ]

    Yet the Morally Pure claim we now have Workchoices lite 🙂 But guess who helped pass the legislation ? If you thought it was morally wrong, then why didn’t you block it ? Or was it a case of doing that being your Meg Lees moment ?

  17. [Love the comedy people, this is great

    Gotta give you something to smile about Glen, considering since 2007 it’s just bad news after bad news for your mob! ]

    Frank, Bob

    Glen’s referring to the Turnbull ad
    🙁

  18. [Yet the Morally Pure claim we now have Workchoices lite ]

    Parts of the new laws are very similar to the previous. Are you denying this?

  19. Too busy milking the cows to kill some time on PB me thinks but if you’re up in QLD you are a Nat as well as a Lib LOL!

  21. [Parts of the new laws are very similar to the previous. Are you denying this?]

    As they were under the Hawke Govt IR Legislation, and we didn’t hear the ACTU complain then.

  22. ACTU rails against Work Choices ‘lite’

    http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24387925-5013404,00.html

    [UNIONS are increasingly frustrated that the Rudd Government is making so many revisions to its industrial relations plans that the final product will be little different to John Howard’s Work Choices.

    ACTU secretary Jeff Lawrence said yesterday that unions were bitterly disappointed Julia Gillard had blocked their ability to bargain freely with employers.

    Mr Lawrence said the Deputy Prime Minister and Workplace Relations Minister had reneged on a promise before the election to give unions the right to bargain on any issue except unlawful ones. Ms Gillard’s restriction — similar to Work Choices — that bargaining must be linked to the employment relationship was too limiting, he said.

    “We would urge the Government to take a contemporary view,” Mr Lawrence said. “There are issues in which workers have a legitimate interest — you shouldn’t put restrictions on them.”

    Mr Lawrence was speaking after a meeting of the ACTU’s industrial legislation committee in Melbourne, where union leaders focused on difficulties confronting them over Labor’s Forward with Fairness policy.

    Senior officials are angry that Ms Gillard, by announcing detail of Labor’s policy during a National Press Club speech last week, has pre-empted any possibility of addressing their grievances. They believe she has locked the Government into commitments on the scope of bargaining, no arbitration role for a new industrial umpire and tough restrictions on strikes. ]

    Damn that bong-smoking, basket-weaving hippie Greenie ACTU hey Frank! 😉

  23. Bob you’re a far more patient man than I to argue with Frank when he’s in one of his “morally superior” moods.

  24. [As they were under the Hawke Govt IR Legislation, and we didn’t hear the ACTU complain then.]

    Fraser wasn’t exactly a hard-right thatcherist. Howard was, and went way too far.

  25. [Bob you’re a far more patient man than I to argue with Frank when he’s in one of his “morally superior” moods.]

    Oh, I don’t do it for Frank. I do it for the readers who don’t post, to make sure they aren’t left with his crap and potentially leave them at risk of believing it.

  26. Oh please, dont give encouragement to the Libs.

    They could split into two as well: “The New Liberals” with good assets …….. (fill-in the blanks) and the “Old Liberals” with the bad assets like Turnbull, Hockey, Mesma etc.

    [Investors turned down an earlier deal to swap their $27bn worth of GM corporate bonds – IOUs issued by big companies – for a 10% stake in GM. This made bankruptcy all but inevitable.

    However, bondholders with slightly more than 50% of GM’s bond debt agreed to support a new restructuring plan although this is not seen as enough to prevent bankruptcy, the New York Times reported.

    That plan would split General Motors in two – “Old GM”, with all the “bad” assets like defunct car plants – and “New GM”, which will own the “good” assets, such as viable factories and brands like Chevrolet and Cadillac.

    The bondholders were offered up to 25% of “New GM” if they would come on board. ]

    http://news.bbc.co.uk/2/hi/business/8075818.stm

  27. Glen

    the simple fact is that the Libs have become so irrelevant, we can’t be bothered talking about them.

    Re preselections: I’ve outlined the process before. As a general rule, local selection works so well things rarely go any further. However, there are cases where the locals select someone who is (for some reason) totally inappropriate.

    Remember, people who are members of political parties, such as myself, are by definition aberrant. Less than 1% of the population belongs to a political party, so those that do tend to be very passionate about what they do and that can blind them to larger realities. It’s quite easy to get carried away by a candidate who appeals totally to the local Labor bods but who is unelectable to a wider audience.

    The Nats had an experience like this in Tim Fischer’s old seat. They held a local plebescite, with the candidates going on a sort of travelling road show and then being voted on by the local membership. (It was lauded by the media at the time as a very powerful process, grassroots democracy in action etc).

    Because the average Nat member in the electorate is a farmer in his sixties, the candidate who got up was a farmer in his sixties – and he was soundly thrashed by the middle aged woman the Libs ran against him.

    So there are occasions when ‘higher powers’ – who have the expertise in politics, and sometimes have seen the various candidates in action in wider political fora – look at the field of prospective candidates and either veto the winner of the local vote or go for somebody else altogether.

  28. [UNIONS are increasingly frustrated that the Rudd Government is making so many revisions to its industrial relations plans that the final product will be little different to John Howard’s Work Choices.]

    I would not take an article from the OO as fgospel on this.

    It is called COMPRIMISE.

    Something that the Morally Pure find alien.

  29. It’s callled getting behind your leader – and you are aware that not doing so results in disunity which doesn’t win you Government.

    Add this to the long line of reasons I can’t stand the Labor Party these days.

    Bob Brown’s been a great leader for the Greens, and he’s an enormously popular figure. I wish he’d stop building up expectations the party can’t possibly hope to meet about federal lower house seats, but that’s a small thing by comparison.

  31. [I would not take an article from the OO as fgospel on this.]

    Again criticising the source I see. The point remains the same. The unions including the ACTU criticise Rudd’s WorkChoices Lite for the reasons stated.

    [They believe she has locked the Government into commitments on the scope of bargaining, no arbitration role for a new industrial umpire and tough restrictions on strikes.]

    But go ahead, ignore the facts, criticise the source, it’s what you’re best at.

  32. [Add this to the long line of reasons I can’t stand the Labor Party these days.

    Bob Brown’s been a great leader for the Greens, and he’s an enormously popular figure. I wish he’d stop building up expectations the party can’t possibly hope to meet about federal lower house seats, but that’s a small thing by comparison.]

    And you’ve contradicted yourself within one paragraph.

  33. [And you’ve contradicted yourself within one paragraph.]

    Frank what are you on? There is no contradiction. Saying it is so doesn’t make it so.

  34. [ I would not take an article from the OO as fgospel on this.

    Again criticising the source I see. The point remains the same. The unions including the ACTU criticise Rudd’s WorkChoices Lite for the reasons stated.

    They believe she has locked the Government into commitments on the scope of bargaining, no arbitration role for a new industrial umpire and tough restrictions on strikes.

    But go ahead, ignore the facts, criticise the source, it’s what you’re best at.]

    So you would prefer Gillard go the other way and have the Libss mount an even bigger anti unions campaign and upon retaining Govenment ensure that Howard’s original legislation be introduced.

    It’s called being concilatory to ALL parties and not playing favourites.

    Try it sometime.

  35. [Frank what are you on? There is no contradiction. Saying it is so doesn’t make it so.]

    Rebecca is being a hypocrite in that paragraph.

    [Add this to the long line of reasons I can’t stand the Labor Party these days.]

    First she says being behind a leader is why she hates the Labor Party, but in the next Breath she is behind Bob Brown as leader.

  36. [First she says being behind a leader is why she hates the Labor Party, but in the next Breath she is behind Bob Brown as leader.]

    She didn’t say this, but i’m going to let Rebecca answer this rather than fight her battles.

  37. [She didn’t say this, but i’m going to let Rebecca answer this rather than fight her battles.]

    Oh yes she did.

    [Bob Brown’s been a great leader for the Greens, and he’s an enormously popular figure. I wish he’d stop building up expectations the party can’t possibly hope to meet about federal lower house seats, but that’s a small thing by comparison.]

    If that’s not a ringing endorsement of a leader, then I don’t know WHAT is.

  38. [So you would prefer Gillard go the other way and have the Libss mount an even bigger anti unions campaign]

    Let them mount a bigger anti-unions campaign. The public don’t listen.

    Howard did many controversial things in his 11 years and he won 4 elections. Would the member for conviction please stand up?

    [upon retaining Govenment ensure that Howard’s original legislation be introduced.]

    With a Green balance of power. LOL. I can’t wait to see how rusted Laborite attitudes toward the Greens change when the Libs regain power and have to side with Labor or the Greens to get legislation through.

  39. I can see why Glen is having fun.

    The Greens are going to have some trouble when Brown goes unless Milne can make herself presentable to the general public. The hard-on Greens will love her of course because she is smart, uncompromising and to the point, but she like Turnbull is pretty hard to listen to for the rest of us. She seems to always have an accusing mode of talking that is fairly grating.

    I wonder how many actually support the Greens because of Brown? And for that matter I wonder how many supported the Liberals because of Howard and now that he has gone….

  41. Oh and this is what Greg Comet, who is now a Government Member says of “Workchoices Lite”, and remember he was the former boss of the ACTU.

    [The laws, of course, do not represent all that employers or unions are seeking. As a former leader of the ACTU, I can understand the concerns expressed by some of my former union colleagues, who will no doubt continue to press for further changes.

    However, I am confident that the fundamental rights contained in the Fair Work Bill are consistent with the goals of the Rights at Work campaign and will contribute enormously to the decent treatment of working people]

    http://www.theage.com.au/news/opinion/a-fairer-deal-for-nations-workers/2008/11/25/1227491545311.html?page=fullpage#contentSwap1

  42. [Oh and this is what Greg Comet, who is now a Government Member says of “Workchoices Lite”, and remember he was the former boss of the ACTU.]

    Uhhhhhhhhh. He is a member of the LABOR PARTY. In Labor, you cannot talk against the policies of your party, ESPECIALLY when you’re a minister. If you vote against a party’s policy, you get BOOTED from the party.

    Democracy in action. Wheeeeeeee.

  43. [I wonder how many actually support the Greens because of Brown? And for that matter I wonder how many supported the Liberals because of Howard and now that he has gone….]

    Exactly – Bob Brown IS The Greens and the party is baving like a one trick pony.

  44. It’s fun debating with people like Frank, the points are so easy to debate and dismiss. With someone like GP, it’s actually a challenge because they know what they’re talking about. 😀

  45. [Exactly – Bob Brown IS The Greens and the party is baving like a one trick pony.]

    So why is it that the state Greens in Newspoll are all in double digit polling?

  46. [Uhhhhhhhhh. He is a member of the LABOR PARTY. In Labor, you cannot talk against the policies of your party, ESPECIALLY when you’re a minister. If you vote against a party’s policy, you get BOOTED from the party.]

    It’s called singing from the same song sheet and prevents you from becoming an unorganised Rabble – and remember a lot of private businesses have a similar policy on speaking aghainst company policy as well.

  47. [It’s fun debating with people like Frank, the points are so easy to debate and dismiss. With someone like GP, it’s actually a challenge because they know what they’re talking about.]

    And it’s just as fun exposing what a hypocrite you are about being an “ALP Supporter” 🙂

    And if you don’t like it, join the Greens 🙂

  48. Greens Newspoll primary:

    NSW – 13%
    Vic – 15%
    QLD – none since election on 8.4% with no upper house, but polled 7.4% prior to.
    SA – 10%
    WA – 13%
    Tas – 17%

    And Tas aside, the vote continues to climb after each election. Hardly the sign of a party going nowhere, or a party dependent on its federal leader.

    Now comes the part where rusted Laborites glaze over those double digit polling figures that continue to climb, and continue to attack.

  49. [So why is it that the state Greens in Newspoll are all in double digit polling?]

    Because all their advertising has a picture of Bob Brown – even Adele was pictured with him.

    Need a reminder ?

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