Created at federation, the electorate of Bendigo currently extends from the city itself south to Castlemaine and the Macedon Ranges around Woodend, also taking in smaller rural centres to the west and north. The redistribution to take effect at the next election has added the Macedon Ranges area from McEwen in the electorate’s south-east, and transferred Maryborough and its surrounds to Wannon in the west. The changes respectively affect about 7000 and 10,000 voters but have only a negligible impact on the Labor margin, which goes from 9.5% to 9.4%.
Bendigo was first won by Labor in 1913, having earlier been in Protectionist and Liberal hands. Billy Hughes contested the seat as the Nationalist Prime Minister in the wake of the Labor split of 1917, having recognised he would be unable to retain his existing safe Labor seat of West Sydney, and succeeded in unseating Labor incumbent Alfred Hampson with a 12.5% swing. Hughes would remain member for five years before moving to North Sydney. Bendigo was in conservative hands thereafter until 1949, except when Richard Keane held it for a term after Labor came to office in 1929. George Rankin gained the seat for the Country Party when United Australia Party incumbent Eric Harrison retired in 1937.
Bendigo emerged with the curious of distinction of being gained by Labor when it lost office in 1949, and next lost by them when they finally returned to power in 1972. The win in 1949 resulted from the redistribution giving effect to the enlargement of parliament, which accommodated the state’s northern rural reaches in the new seat of Murray and transferred Castlemaine and Maryborough to Bendigo. John Bourchier won the seat for the Liberals against the trend of a substantial pro-Labor swing in Victoria in 1972, which was variously put down to the entry of a popular Country Party candidate and attacks on Labor member David Kennedy over state aid and his liberal position on abortion. Bourchier would in turn hold the seat until the Fraser government’s defeat in 1983.
Bendigo was then held for Labor by future Victorian Premier John Brumby, who served for three terms before joining Victorian Labor’s extensive casualty list at the 1990 election. Bruce Reid served for three terms as Liberal member until his retirement in 1998, when Labor’s Steve Gibbons, a former Liquor Hospitality and Miscellaneous Workers Union official and electorate officer to Brumby, gained the seat with a swing of 4.4%. Gibbons came within 1.0% of defeat at the 2004 election before enjoying consecutive swings of 5.2% and 3.4% in 2007 and 2010. After announcing in September 2011 he would not seek another term, Gibbons became less disciplined in his public pronouncements, proclaiming on Twitter that Kevin Rudd was a “psychopath”, Tony Abbott a “douchebag”, Julie Bishop a “narcissistic bimbo”, and Australia Day an “Invasion Day” celebrated by “throwing bits of dead animals on a cooking fire just like the people we dispossessed”.
Labor’s new candidate is Lisa Chesters, a Kyneton-based official with the same Socialist Left union that once employed Gibbons, which has lately been rebadged as United Voice. Earlier speculation that the seat might be used to accommodate electorally endangered Senator David Feeney or even a return to federal politics for John Brumby was quickly scotched. Greg Westbrook, director of legal firm Petersen Westbrook Cameron, was an early nominee, but in the event Chesters was preselected without opposition. The Liberal candidate is Greg Bickley, owner of a local transport business. Other reported nominees for Liberal preselection were Jack Lyons, owner of construction business Lyons Constructions, and Peter Wiseman, a teacher and owner of a website design business.
briefly
While argument by analogy can be useful in illustrating what one asserts to be a set of relationships, it is never probative. I certainly know what is intended by ‘free-riding’ but I don’t accept that in this case, that is what I was doing.
You raise immunisation as an example of the evils of free-riding. I support compulsory immunisation in circumstances where the immunisation meets excellent feasibility standards. I believe that every child deserves the best shot at living well that we as a community can provide, and provided that seeing to it that he or she is immunised meets that test comfortably, that’s sufficient reason for me. I don’t see how any adult who cares about their child’s interest could deny the child that benefit.
That said, I do hear from time to time some doubtful claims made in support of immunisation. The idea for example that non-immunised children prejudice immunised children seems to me implausible. If for example, 90% of children are immunised against all forms of measles and they are eexposed to the 10% who are not (our ‘free riders’) assuming the immunisation is effective, it will be impossible for any of the immunised to contract measles and or pass it on to anyone in the protected ‘herd’. The non-immunised will continue to be at risk but they can’t harm the immunised, surely? They are free riding in the sense that they are getting protection without whatever personal costs might attach to immunisation, but they are not doing so at the expense of the immunised. And if one assumes non-immunisation was their free and informed choice, they are acepting a substantially increased risk of harm from preventable disease.
There is of course an indirect risk from non-immunisation to the immunised. If the non-immunised suffer and then are provided remedies from the common pool of resources, including those of the immunised we have a kind of collective action problem. Here is where the ‘free-riding’ lies. Again, for me, this would add to the case (were I not already persuaded of it) for compulsory immunisation. Not adopting the most cost-effective and life-affirming methods for constraining well-specified and preventable diseases harms those too who favour adopting them. Everyone loses, including those who understand how they can avoid loss.
But this is nothing like what was going on at the ballot box. Here, in my view, we have a clear instance of misrepresentation. The election is offered up as an earnest of the integrity of a governance that embraces all of the sentiment of the community it serves and yet it demands that even those who doubt this claim participate in it. Is that reasonable? I’d say not.
You suggest I’m in some way free-riding, because hardly anyone does what I did then. This is a kind of rule-utilitarian objection. What if everyone did that?. Fairly obviously though, if everyone did that, then what everyone would be saying is that such a system cannot serve the purpose claimed on its behalf. Of course, if everyone thought that, nobody would claim it. These kinds of exercises would rapidly fall into desuetude.
But what if 50% of people respected the system and 50% did not, walking away with their ballots? you might object? What then? Would there not be chaos?
The answer is, quite probably. What happens when a usage becomes chaotic and does not serve its purpose? We get system change and that continues until we get something that does serve the purpose or we agree that the purpose was not attainable. A dialog is forced and people learn. The integrity of community strengthens.
I don’t (and didn’t) suppose for a moment that my act that day would set in motion an existential crisis for the system. Yet I did want to resist in a modest way feeling as if I was simply following orders. I wanted to be able to say to others — these are not orders you need to follow. You can choose not to. The only way for me to be able to make that claim in good conscience was to demonstrate it in practice.
If an election is not a time to speak your mind, make your protest and assert your humanity and autonomy, when would be apt? If my actions can be criticised on that day, it is precisely that hardly anyone else chooses to do the same and the probability that the kind of goods I’d like to see will flow is remote. Yet if that’s so, it’s hard to say that I am free riding. I am in my own way, contributing to discussion, by speaking of this with those who know me. Eccentric behaviour does start discussions — such as ther one I’m having here. That was purchased at the lowest of costs — one missing ballot in one election. That’s very cheap.
MattyD @ 753
That would have to be one of the most stupid comments I have ever seen on a psephology site.
fess,
A prism does funny things to reality.
g
good point, if hypothetical
Matty
“1934pc – yet you responded to it. I will laugh at all of you come September.”
Your TOO young to have a serious opinion, grow up first!.
[This is my view as well.]
And mine.
adrian
[The simple reality is that Kevin Rudd’s political communication skills are greater than the entire Labor front bench combined.
As Feeney said, he would wipe the floor with Abbott as he has done in the past.]
Absolutly agree!
lizzie
Maybe he has been recruited by the Guardian? 😉
“@vanOnselenP: Best thing about my column today on TA’s small target silliness is emails from industry sources with follow up complaints #morecolumncontent”
absolutely
guytaur @860
In my best Mr Montgomery Burns voice “Excellent”.
Remember the disrespectful Scott Stephens tweet re Julia Gillards droning voice sent out on the ABC Religion Report moniker
Scott Stephens is on ABC 24 arguing against euthanasia he is north american CONSERVATIVE concerned with social obligation
Why is he employed by the ABC
bllie
Very good question
[The simple reality is that Kevin Rudd’s political communication skills are greater than the entire Labor front bench combined.]
I suggest you find a way to watch some Question Times from 2010. Rudd’s performances were utterly appalling. You could see Labor members trying to pretend they were somewhere else while Rudd droned on and on, losing his way in his own convoluted sentences. He was OK while the going was good, although his jargon and his faux-ockerisms were always annoying. But as soon as things got tough, he totally lost his ability to speak plain English. This played a major part in his downfall.
markjs@733
Ahem… may I point out that you have just raised it?
As you Rudd haters and whingers against “Ruddstoration” usually do.
Haha. PvO finally cottoning on that Abbott is a pathetic squib playing the smallest target in Australian political history?
It’s been obvious for years.
Joe Hockey on Kevin Rudd on MTP: ‘Rudd will spend 3 days attacking us, and the other 2 days attacking his own party’.
Joe Hockey thinks Abbott doesn ‘t need to do ‘hard’ interviews for as long as he continues to walk through shopping malls and connect with people.
This seems to me to be the way the coalition will handle the criticism of Abbott’s avoiding media scrutiny.
confessions
Thanks for that bit of “intel” from MTP.
Remember Howard? Waving at non-existent people as he wandered the crowds? 🙂
fran
but you haven’t started any discussion about the issue you say you’re highlighting. The discussion is purely about the ethics of your behaviour.
We’re getting to the ‘made you look you dirty chook’ level of argument here!
lizzie:
I most certainly do!
[Rudd doesn’t want top job ]
And you seriously believe that, do you, Bemused? Rudd has “wanted top job” every day of his adult life. All he has ever done is plot and scheme to get the top job. (And then fuck it up when he’s got it.) Do you really think he has changed his spots now? He “wants top job” more than ever. He wants it so badly he’s willing to grovel to the very people at The Australian who revealed his psychopathic nature in the first place, in order to get them to back him. And if he can’t have it, then he’ll make damn sure that those who fucked him over can’t have it either, by doing so much damage to Labor that Abbott is assured of winning. And if you really can’t see that, you’re delusional. But I think you can see it, and you’re just telling the same lies he is.
‘This seems to me to be the way the coalition will handle the criticism of Abbott’s avoiding media scrutiny.’
It’s called clever politics.
You know, thing the ALP gave up for lent.
Question: why can’t the ALP explain in simple blunt terms that the coalition when last in office were a much higher taxing administration. And here are the figures. And every time Abbott mentions tax we’re going to trot this EVIDENCE that he’s bullshitting out until the penny drops with the punters.
Second question:
Why doesn’t the government challenge every bullshit statement Abbott makes every single time he makes one.
Anyone who steps in front of a microphone every single time.
Why.
Joe Hockey asked whether Rudd is happy being a backbencher. ‘Of course he is, he’s very happy serving as a backbencher under a Gillard govt, and has no ambitions to ever lead the ALP again.’
Raucous laughter follows.
Zoomster:
[The discussion is purely about the ethics of your behaviour.]
In other words — we’re discussing why it was reasonable. QED.
Now Joe Hockey telling us that the Liberals govern for the whole country and don’t ‘sandbag’ or focus on specific seats.
Sure, sure. Naturally the dumbed-down panel of Murdoch hacks don’t question him about this.
Sorry, can’t watch this crap anymore. It’s tabloid TV.
Rummel
[your back Mysay!]
Are you suggesting that she should watch it?
@Rosemour or Less/874
It was never about using the KISS principle Rosemour.
Media never supported Labor even when Kevin Rudd was Leader.
Take the issue of the NBN as the prime example, it was still being attacked even under Rudd.
It’s because Old Media don’t scrutinize the Coalition.
The Abbott-led Coalition aren’t scrutinized by the MSM because they offer status quo. No change. Just stay where things are.
fran
no, we’re discussing why it’s not.
There has been no discussion as to whether or not the reasoning behind your actions were valid.
Your actions on the day were totally pointless, yet they caused inconvenience for others.
If anything, you’re undermining your own cause – your refusal to accept that your behaviour had consequences for others, and thus does not meet the tests you say you set for your behaviour, and the clear self centredness and moral blindness your attitude reveals, makes people less likely to value your contributions in future.
[Your actions on the day were totally pointless, yet they caused inconvenience for others.]
Gosh, what did Fran do – split an infinitive?
“Neddy…your back! Your front! You brought them both with you!”
A lot of use of “sociopath/psychopath”to describe Rudd so taking up an earlier Boerwar suggesion I’ve looked up Wikipedia to see the relevant checklist (Dr Robert Hare), and found this –
“Because an individual’s scores may have important consequences for his or her future, the potential for harm if the test is used or administered incorrectly is considerable. The test can only be considered valid if administered by a suitably qualified and experienced clinician under controlled conditions.”
And
“Hare’s concept and checklist have also been criticized. In 2010 there was controversy after it emerged Hare had threatened legal action that stopped publication of a peer-reviewed article on the PCL-R. Hare alleged the article quoted or paraphrased him incorrectly. The article eventually appeared three years later. It alleged that the checklist is wrongly viewed by many as the basic definition of psychopathy, yet it leaves out key factors, while also making criminality too central to the concept. The authors claimed this leads to problems in overdiagnosis and in the use of the checklist to secure convictions.
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Psychopathy#Psychopathy_vs._sociopathy
And by the way would Rudd have been more believable if he had said –
“There’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the Dogs than there is any change in the Labor Party [leadership],”
Fil
Pseph
No, not that bad.
But — as always — it’s the cover up which is creating the issue….
TV Networks and the likes of FOXTEL will be history soon …
http://www.guardian.co.uk/tv-and-radio/2013/feb/16/stream-tv-online-house-cards-portlandia
will news ltd allow Peter van onselen the freedom to expose Abbott ?
I also note some suggestion we should take Latham as an oracle – is this the same Latham that said Gillard couldn’t empathise with ordinary people because of her childlessness, and that Whitlam was trying to rort his entitlements? The same Latham that tried to set Gillard up by media ambush in 2010?
Fil
Zoomster:
[Your actions on the day were totally pointless,]
They had a point. They didn’t achieve much, which is a slightly different claim.
[yet they caused inconvenience for others.]
I find that implausible. People are employed to conduct ballots. Whatever trivial service was rendered to me falls easily within “a ballot-related service”. So while they might have been asked to perform slightly more service than if I’d simply stuck a spoiled ballot in the box, I would no more call this an inconvenience than someone saying they don’t like the pencils and could they be supplied with another.
Whether and how much others value my contributions in the future is entirely a matter for them. I speak my mind and leave it to others to make their minds up about the usefulness of my insights. Trying to win Ms Congeniality of PB has never been high on my list of things to achieve.
I enjoy setting out my ideas and exchanging views with others. I regard that as useful and stimulating. That’s a good enough reason to post, IMO.
Psephos
Something about leaving a polling booth with the ballot paper as a protest.
[is this the same Latham that said Gillard couldn’t empathise with ordinary people because of her childlessness, and that Whitlam was trying to rort his entitlements? The same Latham that tried to set Gillard up by media ambush in 2010?]
Yes, the Latham from 2010.
The Latham from 2012-present however is back inside the tent and defending the achievements of the govt, and its current leadership.
If only Rudd could move on from 2010 himself….
[And by the way would Rudd have been more believable if he had said –
“There’s more chance of me becoming the full forward for the Dogs than there is any change in the Labor Party [leadership],” ]
That’s a fair question, and the answer to it is that at the time she said that, Gillard had no intention of challenging for the leadership, and was atempting as a loyal deputy to hose the issue down. Gillard only decided to stand on the morning of the spill, when the faction heads went to her office to persuade her to do so. Now you can believe that or not as you choose, but I know it to be true because I was there. Rudd, on the other hand, has already challeged Gillard once and is quite plainly waiting for a chance to do so again. Why wouldn’t he?
It’s unclear whether she sold the ballot paper to the highest bidder or not. We ate still looking in to it. 😉
[@SimonBanksHB
On 29/08/11 @tonyabbottmhr launched industry policy review to report by Xmas. 14 months late, we are still waiting http://tiny.cc/c0jmsw ]
Paul Keating’s first QT as PM, and perhaps some lessons for how Swan should handle questions about the MRRT and the revenue raised so far….
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=memRdMdxR4c
fran
so we get back to spilling water on the table at the restaurant.
The waiter’s paid to clear it up, so why not?
(I actually had that happen to me once. I paid my college fees by waitressing in the dining room.
One day, one of the private school boys picked up an apple, dipped it in the honeypot, and rolled it along the table, saying to me, “You get paid to clean that up.”
At the time, I merely thought what a douche he was…..)
Darren Laver@755
Excellent!
I have been waiting for about two years for Rudd to finally do a Shermanesque statement and this is as close as he’ll ever get to one, I think!
http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shermanesque_statement
That Wiki entry also contains the following –
[ In June 2004, the Scottish National Party leader Alex Salmond said that “if nominated I’ll decline.
If drafted I’ll defer. And if elected I’ll resign,” in response to questions about whether he would seek the leadership.
A month later, he changed his mind and stood for the leadership, later becoming the First Minister of Scotland. ]
Psephos@873
Sharpen up your reading and comprehension skills.
I quoted markjs who was quoting a press report.
Fran Barlow I hope the Australian Electoral Commission fine you for interfering with the voting process. God forbid you incite your students to such pointless acts of civil disobedience, it would be more productive to spend their English class making up slogan to deface their ballot papers
Fran Barlow@877
I don’t know why zoomster, or anyone else, bothers. It just provokes you into unleashing torrents of sophistry.