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| Blue and red numbers respectively indicate booths with two-party majorities for Liberal and Labor. Click for larger image. Map boundaries courtesy of Ben Raue at The Tally Room. |
Barker encompasses South Australia along the Victorian border from Mount Gambier north to the Riverland and its population centres of Renmark, Loxton, Berri and Waikerie, extending westwards to the mouth of the Murray River and the towns of Angaston and Murray Bridge 75 kilometres to the east of Adelaide. It has existed since South Australia was first divided into single-member electorates in 1903, at all times encompassing the state’s south-eastern corner including Mount Gambier, Bordertown and Keith. From there it has generally extended either westwards to the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island or, as at present, northwards to the Riverland. The former territories were lost when Mayo was created with the expansion of parliament in 1984, but recovered from 1993 to 2004 as Mayo was drawn into Adelaide’s outskirts. The Riverland was accommodated by Angas prior to its abolition in 1977, and by Wakefield from 1993 to 2004. Barker’s present dimensions were established when South Australia’s representation was cut from twelve seats to eleven at the 2004 election, causing Barker to take back the Riverland from a radically redrawn Wakefield, while Mayo recovered the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island.
The areas covered by Barker presently and in the past have long been safe for the conservatives, the Riverland last having had Labor representation when Albert Smith held Wakefield for a term after the 1943 landslide. Barker has never been in Labor hands, nor come close to doing so since territory in southern Adelaide was ceded to the new seat of Kingston in 1949. Archie Cameron held the seat for the Country Party from 1934 to 1940, having been effectively granted it after helping facilitate a merger of the state’s conservative forces as the Liberal Country League while serving as the Country Party’s state parliamentary leader. Cameron succeeded Earle Page as federal parliamentary leader in 1939 but was deposed after the election the following year, causing him to quit the party and align himself with the United Australia Party and then the Liberal Party, which has held Barker ever since. He was succeeded in Barker on his retirement in 1956 by Jim Forbes, who was in turn succeeded in 1975 by James Porter.
Porter was defeated for preselection in 1990 by Ian McLachlan, a former high-profile National Farmers Federation president whom some were touting as a future prime minister. He would instead serve only a single term as a cabinet minister, holding the defence portfolio in the first term of the Howard government, before retiring at the 1998 election. McLachlan’s successor was Patrick Secker, who led a generally low-profile parliamentary career before being unseated for preselection before the 2013 election. Despite endorsement from Tony Abbott and moderate factional powerbroker Christopher Pyne, Secker reportedly lost a local ballot to Mount Gambier lawyer Tony Pasin by 164 votes to 78, with a further 40 recorded for Millicent real estate agent and Wattle Range councillor Ben Treloar. Pasin picked up a 3.5% swing at the election and holds the seat with a margin of 16.5%.
Bugler
[(though from Poland)).]
The borders kept moving.
However, General Sir John Monash is an Australian icon.
[zoomster
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 12:11 pm | PERMALINK
Bet if the Greens had supported the Malaysian solution, and it was now working as expected, posters like fran would be talking about the Greens ‘forcing” Labor to come up with it.]
But the point is that the Greens WOULDN’T support rendition, whereas the ALP WILL.
Get the difference?
What has whether or not a piece of paper was signed got to do with confessions being all over the place on asylum seeker policy?
Everything,
[Hey! Well done zoidlord….no apostrophe in sight in that post 🙂 *
*I am just joshing with these comments, please don’t take offence]
Be careful.
You might be re-incarnated as an alienated apostrophe.
I think I am pretty much alienated here already! :devil:
@Mod Lib/3152
So how is not support rendition going to fix things? Or is it just going to screw up more?
Everything
yes, I support the Malaysian solution (or something approximating it) and have never said otherwise. I’m surprised if you’re surprised – I’ve never been a shrinking violet on this.
CTar1,
I was going to write “ethnic German”, though I guess that wouldn’t be correct. German speaking Jews? What does it matter anyway…?
I would certainly agree with your point though. Particularly in Victoria. His legacy shaped the state in a way. My Grandma still tells me stories of when they donated a shilling each to construct the Shrine of Remembrance.
[zoidlord
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 12:15 pm | PERMALINK
@Mod Lib/3152
So how is not support rendition going to fix things?]
For some of us, whether or not the boats stop, Australia must act ethically.
If you do something unethical and it has a favourable result (fewer drownings), that does not wash away the unethical results (rendition).
That has been my consistent view since Keating started locking up children.
All I am pointing out here is the abject hypocrisy of those who argued rendition, and the Pacific solution were all fine and dandy because they were going to have the effect of stopping the boats, hence stopping the drownings, and that was the outcome that mattered.
Suddenly, it isn’t the outcome that matters anymore, when it is a LNP Govt stopping the boats….
[zoomster
….yes, I support the Malaysian solution (or something approximating it) and have never said otherwise. I’m surprised if you’re surprised – I’ve never been a shrinking violet on this.]
Fair enough. My memory was that you were tacitly against it (but couldn’t say much as you were “active” in the party as it were.
If you are openly saying you support it then, fair enough!
We can agree to disagree again, eh? :devil:
zoid
a bandaid solution is one which deals with a problem in the short term.
The Malaysian solution is part of a long term approach, which sees refugees arriving in the region as the responsibility of several countries, rather than just in transit to Australia.
A bit like climate change – a 5% reduction in emissions isn’t enough, but I support it, because it’s a start, and longer term allows for the reduction to be ramped up.
Getting one country on board, and thus being able to demonstrate to other countries how it would work in practice, is the best way to arrive at a regional approach.
A truly regional approach would automatically mean that refugees ‘self selected’ – that is, those who are purely looking for an improved lifestyle (rather than facing genuine persecution or fear of death) will go elsewhere.
@Mod Lib/3159
Oh dear, the drownings did not stop.
The TAMPA is such one situation, and for you to continue to defend COALITION PARTY approach/policy even though you have claimed that you did not vote for Abbott.
The Coalition Party as it stands is not different to when Keating started to lock up children, you should be reading the stories of what is happening now under current leadership of COALITION PARTY.
And yet here you are still supporting the COALITION PARTY blindly every day.
Defend, Defend, that is what you are doing.
Oh dear, the fanatics in the liberal party are getting their voice heard:
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-01-11/curriculum-critic-wants-more-religion-to-be-taught-in-schools/5195410
Religion should stay in church’s.
Yes, ModLib, I understand the difference.
The Greens position is essentially selfish – they want to maintain a feeling of moral superiority and they don’t really care how many refugees suffer in the meantime.
We’ve tried the humane approach – taking anyone who rocks up – and what it saw was an increase of deaths at sea, which really isn’t humane.
There isn’t anything particularly inhumane about the Malaysian solution, given the agreements reached between the respective countries, other than that refugees don’t necessarily end up where they wanted to be.
The Greens approach has lead to AS being detained at Manus and Nauru. It’s as simple fact that this wouldn’t have happened if the law had been changed to allow Malaysia (just as it’s a simple fact that, had the Greens passed the original CPRS scheme when they had the chance in the Senate — or not obstructed the passage of the bills so that the vote could have been taken under Turnbull’s leadership — there would be no questions now as to whether carbon pricing could be repealed).
I’m for increasing the number of refugees coming to Australia and decreasing the number who die to get here. Sorry, but that seems a supremely moral stance to me.
[zoidlord
….And yet here you are still supporting the COALITION PARTY blindly every day.
Defend, Defend, that is what you are doing.]
….care to provide a single post where I support the Coalition party on this issue since I started posting here (under either Mod Lib or Everything)?
ML
no, that conversation was about Manus & Nauru – it happened during the election campaign, and as a campaign manager I couldn’t reject the teachings of the Glorious Leader.
[zoomster
….I’m for increasing the number of refugees coming to Australia and decreasing the number who die to get here. Sorry, but that seems a supremely moral stance to me.]
Gee, it sounds so good doesn’t it? …..increasing the numbers of refugees and decreasing the drownings.
What about sending women and children to Malaysia where we are handing them over to Malaysia to do as they please?
How can Australia ensure the protection of these women and children while they are in Malaysia?
Do you support other rendition policies (e.g., George W Bush) or were you against those?
I don’t think “stopping the boats” means allowing them to get almost to Christmas Island and then towing them all the way back to Indonesia. Surely it means stopping the incentive to use profit-making people smugglers to get people on to unsafe boats in the first place.
@Mod Lib/3165
By attacking the ALP Policy, but yet not the same brush to the Coalition Party..
That is what I read in your posts.
[zoomster
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 12:31 pm | PERMALINK
ML
no, that conversation was about Manus & Nauru]
Yes, that does ring a bell! Fair enough.
I am just a little surprised as I saw you as someone on the left of the ALP…..then again, the left don’t think the way they used to think on these issues, which just proves how desperately Australia needs moderate Liberals.
No-one else is going to be able to turn the Australian ship around on this, certainly not the ALP left.
ModLib
[What about sending women and children to Malaysia where we are handing them over to Malaysia to do as they please?]
Not what was going to happen. Australia committed to providing accommodation, health services and education.
[How can Australia ensure the protection of these women and children while they are in Malaysia?]
That’s why there was an agreement. Given that Australia was going to be actively involved in providing services to these refugees, there would be plenty of opportunities to monitor the situation.
The UNHCR certainly saw it as an opportunity to improve conditions for ALL refugees in Malaysia, so I assume that they would have been actively monitoring events as well.
[Do you support other rendition policies (e.g., George W Bush) or were you against those?]
Of course not. That was an illegal action, designed to circumvent America’s own laws, in order to torture people.
Just because a false label has been applied to one action to make it sound like it’s equivalent to another, does not make it the same thing.
That whole post of yours is incredibly simplistic. It would be good if you based your arguments on actual evidence, rather than empty rhetoric.
ModLib
I’m usually described as a Labor moderate (by the various factions and by vex news!)
http://kevinbonham.blogspot.com.au/2014/01/wrong-in-both-directions-richo-on.html
Wrong In Both Directions: Richo On Labor’s Chances
In which I investigate some claims about Labor’s chances by G. Richardson in the Australian (he reckons ALP has virtually no chance of winning next election) and find that in parts his argument is much too harsh and in others a bit too soft.
[zoomster
….That’s why there was an agreement. Given that Australia was going to be actively involved in providing services to these refugees, there would be plenty of opportunities to monitor the situation.]
If a Malaysian policy officer beat a Malaysian Rendition AS child with a rattan, what would Australia do?
I’ve always thought (admittedly everyone has an opinion, so my thoughts don’t necessarily matter) the logical thing to do is to make waiting in UNHCR camps more cost-effective and beneficial than coming by boats. I think only focusing on making it difficult to come by boat (what we’re doing, effectively), rather than fixing things at the other end, increasing the efficiency and speed of the processes in the camps is the wrong approach, both on moral and policy terms. I mean, we don’t even deal with people who come by plane. It’s absurd, a study in how to make things much worse than they need to be.
I think the Malaysia solution was the only approach that addressed the issues at the other end, though there needed to be more (there may have been more that wasn’t discussed, admittedly. No-one’s interested in my approach). The Coalition has, it seems, made it worse by decreasing the refugee intake. I would think that due to this the issue of “the boats” becomes an issue again, even if they “stop” for a while. Or, in a hypothetical universe where they were stopped permanently/long-term, who’s to say the visa over-stayers won’t become the new issue?
Demonise the Malaysia strategy, which would have led to a higher intake of refugees, then isolate refugees on Nauru with no future and no hope of family reunion. Can’t see how this is an improvement.
Zoomster
[Bet if the Greens had supported the Malaysian solution, and it was now working as expected, posters like fran would be talking about the Greens ‘forcing” Labor to come up with it.]
If my party had done this I’d be amongst those seeking to throw out those responsible for such a fundamental breach of our mission, and to give a candid explanation on how this outrage could have occurred. I can’t imagine how it could have occurred but if those of our number in the senate had gone completely mad there is simply no way they could have remained in our party as there was no sentiment in the ranks for this at all.
So in short, in the fantasy counterfactual you adduce, you’d lose that bet.
ModLib
exactly the same as if a Malaysian officer beat a visiting Australian child with a rattan, I assume.
The idea that Malaysian police officers go around willy nilly assaulting people with rattans is ignorance verging on racism.
..and, of course, being beaten with a rattan doesn’t seem quite comparable with drowning at sea (and the chances of the former are much smaller).
fran
whew! You missed a bullet, then, when S H-Y’s agreement with Morrison was rolled. I hope you’re now actively working to have S H-Y thrown out of the party, to be consistent with the views you’ve expressed.
[zoomster
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 12:48 pm | PERMALINK
ModLib
exactly the same as if a Malaysian officer beat a visiting Australian child with a rattan, I assume.]
I am glad your conscience is thus assuaged!
[The idea that Malaysian police officers go around willy nilly assaulting people with rattans is ignorance verging on racism.]
Has anyone said that any Malaysian police officer has done anything? I was merely asking a hypothetical question to see how you would respond.
The way in which you have responded speaks volumes to me. I think your subconscious has got it, although your conscious might take a bit longer! :devil:
Zoomster and Mod Lib competing for the worst solution possible.
[zoomster
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 12:51 pm | PERMALINK
fran
whew! You missed a bullet, then, when S H-Y’s agreement with Morrison was rolled. I hope you’re now actively working to have S H-Y thrown out of the party, to be consistent with the views you’ve expressed.]
Is that what you recommended happen to Doug Cameron when he came out against Malaysian rendition?
ModLib
the way I responded was to use common sense.
1. The UNHCR recognised that the agreement with Malaysia increased protection for all refugees. That’s because it addressed issues like the one you raise.
2. Bad things happen in foreign countries, to citizens and non citizens alike. For that matter, bad things happen in Australia (and particularly to refugees). It doesn’t matter what laws or precautions you put in place, there’s always a slim chance that the Bad Thing will happen (it will surprise you to know that, although we have some stringent rules about rape, it still happens).
So when looking at Bad Things, the question is – have steps been taken to stop them happening? (the answer is ‘yes’) and – is there likely to be a reaction if, despite these steps, the bad thing still happens? (the answer is still ‘yes’).
Refugees are subject to Bad Things in Australia at the moment, despite all the possibilities we have to oversee their treatment. Of course no one can therefore guarantee that Bad Things won’t happen to refugees elsewhere.
It seems, in the light of your thinking, that I shouldn’t take that overseas trip I’m planning. Something Bad might happen to me. This clearly shows that the Australian government doesn’t care about its citizens, because if it did it could guarantee that anyone travelling overseas would never have anything Bad happen to them.
Everything,
I wasn’t aware Labor pretended not to be conflicted on the issue. I experience has told Labor requiring it’s parliamentary members to shush on any issue is bad for the party. I like that Labor is allowed to discuss these things in the open (though more than one observer sees this as the reason Labor is better in opposition, debating amongst themselves, rather than in Government. Personally, if Labor wasn’t that way to contrast the top-down leadership-based approach of the Liberal Party there’s little point for it existing).
Labor members are allowed to vent their conscience, so long as they don’t vote with it, I guess. Liberals used to be able to do both, but appear to not be allowed to do either now.
Question from Twitter.
[@Tim_Beshara 22m
Can someone with educational cred please identify in the curriculum where climate change is taught so we can know if it has been removed?]
ML
no, because I accept that there’s a diversity of views within the Labor party, and that part of a healthy party (and a healthy democracy) is that these views are aired.
fran made it clear that she only accepts One View on this topic for The Greens, and that she would actively work against anyone diverging from this view. In which case, to be consistent, she should be actively working to expel S H-Y.
[ Labor members are allowed to vent their conscience, so long as they don’t vote with it, I guess. Liberals used to be able to do both, but appear to not be allowed to do either now. ]
I thought Liberal members had to agree to have their consciences chemically suppressed as a condition of joining the party?
http://www.foxnews.com/politics/2014/01/04/nc-councilman-authors-resignation-letter-in-klingon/
We need more people like him.
““They value integrity, honor and duty,” he says, “and that’s something that’s lacking in government.””
Same thing said about this country.
[zoomster
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 1:00 pm | PERMALINK
ModLib]
Well this post really proves the point I was making in my preceding post!
So if Australian authorities hand over a vulnerable person to another country (i.e. rendition) and something happens to them “Oh well, **** happens”, eh?
Somehow that is morally equivalent to a tourist being pick-pocketed in Spain or something is it?
By your very own logic, why are you so against George W Bush sending detainees to Egypt?
I guess you would say: “If things happened to the detainees in Egypt, well, isn’t that just like any other visitor to Egypt being at risk of being mugges”…..wouldn’t you?
No?
Curious……..isn’t it?
[Bugler
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 1:00 pm | PERMALINK
…..Labor members are allowed to vent their conscience, so long as they don’t vote with it, I guess.]
Thanks! This is just a classic line…..do you mind if I use it in the future?
What’s “doing my head in” are Mod Lib’s permanent attempts to win non-existent arguments.
lizzie@3186
Climate change is not taught per se. However, the Scientific Method is taught, and the conclusions drawn from that are inescapable.
So I presume the governments intend to suppress the teaching of science instead.
This has all sorts of other advantages from a Liberal perspective – there is now no proof of evolution, no evidence that cigarettes cause cancer, or that alcohol causes violence. No evidence that asbestos is bad for you, or that the resources of the planet are finite, or that condoms prevent HIV.
A Liberal Paradise awaits us all!
Everything,
Go ahead. I personally don’t disagree with Cameron’s three-tier whip idea.
Player One,
It seems so. Some members of the Coalition want the credit for not supporting something then vote for it when, technically, nothings stopping them for voting against their party’s position.
[lizzie
Posted Saturday, January 11, 2014 at 1:09 pm | PERMALINK
What’s “doing my head in” are Mod Lib’s permanent attempts to win non-existent arguments.]
….just imagine what must be going on in zoomster’s head?????
Zoomster
[The Greens position is essentially selfish – they want to maintain a feeling of moral superiority and they don’t really care how many refugees suffer in the meantime.]
On the contrary, we count suffering more broadly than simply counting those who drown. We count suffering in transit camps in the mix. We also keep in mind that drownings are predisposed by current policy, which is to scuttle boats captured meaning that the least seaworthy craft are selected and crewed by juveniles since they won’t be locked up if caught. We don’t want to feel “morally superior” but that is a consequence of our more ethically wholistic and robust grasp of the issues.
[We’ve tried the humane approach – taking anyone who rocks up – and what it saw was an increase of deaths at sea, which really isn’t humane.]
Humane is not merely an absolute, but in sub-optimal conditions, also a relative descriptor. In ideal conditions, there would be no displaced persons, or people being persecuted. In non-ideal but better conditions, humane jurisdictions would predominate and share the burden of supporting displaced persons equitably, while isolating malign jurisdictions and/or working with incompetent ones to implement humane and just dealing. Australia could have behaved in an exemplary fashion, working closely with organisations such as the UNHCR or the IOM to ensure speedy resettlement of refugees and other forcibly displaced persons and in the interim ensured that the camps were places that were respectful of the dignity of people traumatised by their displacement. TjoSuch policies would have radically reduced IMPs from our region to here.
That of course might not in the short run have played all that well to the ratbag fringe and “neutralised” the issue for the ALP and so a bidding war arose on how tough each party was on “border security”. This was a war the ALP couldn’t win, but in their folly, tried anyway, despite having to appeal to large numbers of people who felt, quite rightly, conflicted at adopting policies they saw as cruel. The ALP’s answer to this was to assert either that one had to be cruel to be kind, and in its more candid moments, admit that they’d lost this issue and hope that the compensations of office could allow them to forget how horribly they’d treated people who wanted only to live in dignity, as do most of us. Either way, their defence, like yours here, falls on a line with cognitive dissonance and self-delusion at one end and cant at the other.
ModLib
[So if Australian authorities hand over a vulnerable person to another country (i.e. rendition) and something happens to them “Oh well, **** happens”, eh?]
Where did I say that? I said we would react in the same way we would if something similar happened to an Australian child.
I’m not sure that we can go further than that.
[By your very own logic, why are you so against George W Bush sending detainees to Egypt?
I guess you would say: “If things happened to the detainees in Egypt, well, isn’t that just like any other visitor to Egypt being at risk of being mugges”…..wouldn’t you?]
Seriously, logic is deserting you now.
Firstly, I made it clear that calling the Malaysian agreement ‘rendition’ is purely a rhetorical device, designed to pretend that two things which aren’t the same, are.
The American actions were aimed at getting around American law. People in that situation did not have recourse to American protection.
In this case, there was a signed treaty between the two countries, dictating the treatment of these refugees. Both the UNHCR and Australia were to maintain oversight of their treatment. It was in Australia’s best interests that refugees were treated humanely, because that way further agreements to create a true regional solution were more likely to eventuate.
No, the Australian government couldn’t guarantee that no refugee sent to Malaysia would have an adverse outcome. They can’t guarantee that any refugee settled here won’t experience adverse outcomes, either.
I am still waiting to see you using evidence — or even logic – in this discussion, instead of over fertilising strawmen for the sake of rhetorical flourishes.
The absolute vacuousness of your arguments demonstrates the lack of real impediments to the Malaysian solution.
As you virtually admitted, it would decrease death by drownings….which would be a good thing.
Player One
Quite so.
zoomster’s head is fine, thank you …I am quietly amused at how silly ModLib is being.
So far ML has sent nothing my way which causes me even a twinge. The lack of real argument ML has put forward is a strong indicator that there WAS very little to object to about the Malaysian solution.
It just didn’t involve unicorns and rainbows, which I agree would have made it a lot prettier to look at.
Towback of boats to Indonesia. Frank Brennan SJ
[Mr Abbott and Mr Morrison, we need to know what’s changed. This is not war. This is the rule of law on the high seas during peacetime. This is Australia.]
http://johnmenadue.com/blog/?p=1129