Tomorrow’s Courier-Mail carries results of a Galaxy poll of federal voting intention in Queensland, going off the same sample as yesterday’s state poll, and it’s the first of four such polls since the election to show Labor in front. Labor’s 51-49 lead on two-party preferred represents an 8% swing from last year’s federal election, and a three-point shift to Labor from the previous result in February. It also sits well with the current reading from BludgerTrack, suggesting serious problems for the government in what may be the most important state in the country in terms of marginal seats. Primary votes and such to follow shortly. UPDATE: The primary votes are 38% for the Coalition, 36% for Labor, 8% for the Greens and 12% for Palmer United. The poll also finds 36% believe the Abbott government has lived up to expectations, down nine points since February, 56% believe it has performed below them, up nine points, and 4% believe it has been better, down two.
UPDATE (Essential Research): The regular weekly result from Essential Research has both major parties down a point on the primary vote, to 40% for the Coalition and 38% for Labor, and the two main minor parties up one, the Greens to 9% and Palmer United to 6%. Labor gains a point on two-party preferred to lead 52-48. Further questions find a remarkable 43% saying the government should respond to its budget difficulties by calling an election, the breakdowns for party support suggesting this mostly bespeaks a desire to get rid of the government rather than secure the passage of its budget. Thirty-eight per cent say they would rather a new budget be introduced, including a majority among Coalition supporters. I’m not sure if the availability of only two options together with “don’t know” succeeds in capturing the full range of opinion on the subject.
Other questions find opinion on the state of the economy little changed since April, with a good rating of 37% (down one) and a poor rating of 26% (up two), but more thinking it headed in the wrong direction, up seven to 41% with “right direction” down four to 35%. Concern about job losses is up a point to 58%, with the “not at all concerned” response up three to 32%. Twenty-one per cent say the impact of the budget on employment will be good versus 49% for bad. Sixty per cent disapprove of sending troops to Iraq versus 28% who approve, and 36% believe current spending on anti-terrorism measures is about right, compared with 28% who want more and 19% who want less.
Corio@948
I suggest you check both words.
ruawake@950
Does that give it powers equal to ICAC?
What about corruption other than in public office?
bemused #952
You’d expect it to cover all those on the public purse.
Rex Douglas@953
So corruption elsewhere is fine?
http://www.economist.com/blogs/schumpeter/2014/08/australias-media-laws?fsrc=scn/tw/te/bl/ed/themogulisdeadlonglivethemogul
“That may be easier said than done. Tony Abbott, Australia’s prime minister (pictured, left), is a fan of Mr Murdoch, whose newspapers have uniformly supported his government. A recent biography of Joe Hockey, the treasurer, reports that when Mr Abbott was opposition leader, he first “conferred” with Mr Murdoch about his plan to introduce a generous parental leave scheme to be funded by a tax on business. Mr Murdoch apparently heard of the plan before Mr Abbott had discussed it with either his own parliamentary colleagues or other business leaders.”
Oh another email scam.
[Tom Crist Trust Funds
One million Dollar Donation To You In Honor Of My Late Wife who …]
bemused
There are other watchdogs that cover non-public mischief.
[Students around the nation have taken to the streets in a second round of protests against the Abbott government’s plans to deregulate the university sector.
Hundreds of demonstrators converged on city centres in Sydney and Melbourne, where they set alight cardboard effigies of the Education Minister Christopher Pyne and wore red felt squares as signs of protest.]
– See more at: http://www.skynews.com.au/news/top-stories/2014/08/20/students-march-against-higher-uni-fees.html?cid=BP_RSS_SN-TOPSTORIES_1_Studentsmarchagainsthigherunifees_200814#sthash.9I37hZq8.dpuf
Could be one of the mega rich guys Obeid was dealing with who has hurled a legal threat at Random.
Maybe Kinghorn who was found corrupt by ICAC but cleared after McClymont wrote her book.
[ Zoomster is an ALP neophyte who imagines she is all wise and all knowing. ]
Whereas bemused is your typical ALP “crusty”, who sees himself as an authority on many subjects of which he is actually completely ignorant, and who is very typical of so many who infest local ALP branches.
Such people are a positive discouragement for anyone under about 45 from joining the ALP.
[960
Player One
Posted Wednesday, August 20, 2014 at 7:56 pm | PERMALINK
Zoomster is an ALP neophyte who imagines she is all wise and all knowing.
Whereas bemused is your typical ALP “crusty”, who sees himself as an authority on many subjects of which he is actually completely ignorant, and who is very typical of so many who infest local ALP branches.
Such people are a positive discouragement for anyone under about 45 from joining the ALP.]
The quintessential “grumpy old man” syndrome, which infest many political parties, community groups and residents’ associations.
A real turn off.
Didn’t hear the body of newsflash but something about another Newman government man in trouble???
[Clive Palmer’s anti-China tirade has attracted a scathing rebuke from a Chinese newspaper, which says Beijing should consider imposing sanctions on the mining magnate and his companies.]
bemused
As Corio points out, whatever else she is, Zoomster is no ALP neophyte. As far as I can tell, she has been an ALP supporter for a very long time.
Bemused Comrade
I’ve just had a 40 minute or so read of today’s posts.
I was both bemused and amused by the government and contracts discussion. I note that in one post, Zoomster cited as the source of her knowledge “many long conversations with politicians” about matters contractual.
That says it all. Blind leadin the blind.
In summary:
1. Anyone can break any contract, knowing of course that there may be consequences.
2. Persons with plenty of dosh and able to pay for the consequences will not be concerned about the consequences if there is a better pay off by breaking the contract.
3. Governments, using taxpayers money, might well break contracts especially if they think the pay off is worth it ie more votes.
4. Despite some simplistic spin here (GG I think), governments don’t go to an election saying “we’re going to break XYZ contract(s)”. Rather they say that they’re going to change XYZ legislation of the prior government, or that they won’t proceed with XYZ plans of the prior government. That this may involve breaches of contract and consequential payouts is not specified. If raised by opponents, the spin will spew forth.
By and large if the new government thinks the legislation they say they’ll repeal is a vote winner, the implied breaches of contract won’t get a guernsey in the campaign talk. The carbon tax and NBN are recent examples. The Abbotteers never mentioned in the election campaign that breaches of contracts might / would be involved. They believed that the public were not focussed on such trivia and they were probably correct.
Dee@963
Thereby proving themselves to be the totalitarian “bastards” and “mongrels” that he accused them of being?
Bemused Comrade
I forgot to add that since government funding is widely seen as an endless source of potential profits, chasing government contracts will always be popular, regardless of governments occasionally changing the rules mid-contract. Bees and honey pots ……
[Palmer said in 2011 that the Australian government “racially” discriminated against Chinese investment and Chinese people and government should be treated with “the dignity they deserve.”]
http://www.chinadaily.com.cn/china/2014-
NY Times editorial bags Abbott’s climate policy
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/opinion/australias-retreat-on-emissions.html?_r=0
BW
Impressive post & how ironic it is @911.
Abbott will drag us into a war, any war will do. Even an ‘us & them’ war here would do, he’s already laying the groundwork. The death of innocents mean nothing to these guys.
Rex Douglas@957
Name them?
Other than, of course, the police who also cover public wrong doers too.
For GG, about his hero Pell, and Holy Mother Church of Rome.
Victorian Labor MP Frank McGuire made a statement to the Victorian Parliament today, following revelations in last week’s ABC Four Corners program, In the Name of the Law.
Part of his statement follows:
“When I pressed Cardinal Pell on whether he understood how victims regarded what happened as hear no evil, see no evil, say nothing evil about the church, Cardinal Pell responded: ‘I think that is an objectionable suggestion, with no foundation in the truth. No conviction was recorded for Searson on sexual misbehaviour.'”
“In an internal hearing held in 1997, and revealed by Four Corners last week, Mr O’Callaghan recorded a finding that “the parish priest [Searson] had been guilty of sexual abuse” of two girls “and consequently making recommendations to the Archbishop,” then George Pell.
“In consequence the parish priest [Searson] resigned.”
The references are contained in a document entitled “The Principal and the Parish Priest,” marked private, confidential and without prejudice.
It was written by Mr O’Callaghan and featured on Four Corners.
“This paedophile cluster blighted lives and destroyed the career of principal Graeme Sleeman, the whistleblower who exposed the cover up and has been shunned by Catholic Education since 1987 after revealing the truth,” Mr McGuire told the Victorian Parliament.
“The royal commission’s cross-examination of Cardinal Pell may be the last public opportunity to determine the truth concerning who protected children and who protected paedophiles.”
Nothing more to say really. Pell is not only evil, he lies under oath. I suppose he answers to a higher fairy.
Player One@960
So far off the mark it is hilarious.
I live in the present but have knowledge of the past. I also collaborate extensively with younger ALP members.
Still don’t see what the problem was with Palmer’s statement.
The Chinese government ultimately majority-owns Citic. They ARE Communist. The DO shoot people (someone up-thread said 4,000 per year… that we know about) and, one way or another, it’s not too fine a stretch to argue they want to take over Australia (who wouldn’t, with our golden sandy beaches and big juicy steaks? Compared to these crocodiles, Great White sharks, Death Addrers and Funnel Web spiders are a mere distraction).
Any other time – like when Julia Gillard was PM – types like Barnarby Joyce were warning us about the threat to our agricultural land posed by Chinese government-run takeovers of sheep and cattle stations. And let’s not forget everyone whingeing about Chinese buyers forcing up the price of houses in the suburbs.
The furore over Palmer’s remarks is reminiscent of how they heckled Gillard for her clamp-down on 457 visas, saying it was “racist”. No it wasn’t. It was simply preserving Australian jobs for Australians, against the threat of no-Australian, low-paid ring-ins coming here to snaffle them away.
I must say, though, that the Chinese as a foreign threat are nothing right now compared to that other malignant foreigner, Rupert Murdoch, who is steadily buying up, not the farm, but governments wholesale in his quest to make his last redoubt of Australia slightly more comfortable for himself and his extended clan of dopey children.
Fran Barlow@964
It was a little tongue in cheek based on my much longer period of membership. Kinda spoils it when you have to explain the joke. 😛
Mmmmm…interesting
[The issue highlights a disturbing trend of foreign corporations, such as Coty, seeking to acquire well-known Chinese domestic brands only to discontinue them. Why aren’t domestic brands succeeding within multinational firms? And what does the future hold for China’s iconic brands?]
psyclaw@965
Did you enjoy zoomsters backflip with pike and other slippery debating tactics? 😀
You say it a lot better than I and others did and I agree.
I think it is eminently saleable as diverting $8B to public transport infrastructure.
Amanda Vanstone tried to defend Joe Hockey in his attempts to implement the policies of the Audit Commission, of which Vanstone was part. She only demonstrated her own intellectual poverty and that of the politico-media environment which sustained her career.
http://andrewelder.blogspot.com.au/2014/08/dont-blame-amanda-vanstone.html
psyclaw@967
It hasn’t been ‘an endless source of potential profits’ when I have run government projects. 😀
With one memorable case, I got the work done for approx 1/8 of what a large firm quoted to do it. Wasn’t even hard to do. What does that tell you?
Dee
This could be what you heard
[The Queensland premier’s director-general has spent more than $2900 on limos and $14,000 on external catering since the Liberal National Party came to office two years ago.
Jon Grayson has chosen to hire limousines instead of taxis on 16 occasions since mid-2012.
His taxpayer-funded MasterCard paid for the services of Hughes Limousines, based at Fitzroy North in Melbourne, and Driven By Limo, based at Yagoona in Sydney’s west, right-to-information documents obtained by AAP show.]
http://www.theage.com.au/queensland/queensland-premiers-chief-spends-2900-on-limos-20140820-106gps.html
sprocket_@969
Might send that in to a couple of ABC radio producers and see if any want to run with it. 😀
bemused
[It was a little tongue in cheek based on my much longer period of membership. Kinda spoils it when you have to explain the joke. ]
Yes, it does. This medium tends not to do tone very well.
Thanks Vic! 🙂
[NY Times editorial bags Abbott’s climate policy
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/21/opinion/australias-retreat-on-emissions.html?_r=0
Might send that in to a couple of ABC radio producers and see if any want to run with it. ]
Good luck with that!
My understanding is that ABC only takes Newspaper editorial lines from News Ltd, specifically the financially moribund Australian.
[Mr. Abbott seems more concerned with the challenges that a carbon tax would pose for his friends in the coal industry.]
😀
Dee
No worries
Darren Laver@984
Must be a different ABC to the one I listen to.
NY Times warns of impeding military coup in Ahghanistan in the impasse over a disputed election result for the Presidency’
______________________________________
So much for all that bullsh88 we used to get from Psephos(and Abbott too) about the coming wonders of Afghan democracy,and how the loss of young Australian lives was worth it
http://www.nytimes.com/2014/08/19/world/asia/amid-election-impasse-calls-in-afghanistan-for-an-interim-government.html?ref=world&_r=0
Neophyte
Possibly an invasive species of plants? 😀
Tom
Yeah, I don’t think there are many significant Labor voting seats dependent on the future EW link. Maybe if they link the Eastern Freeway with the Greensborough Highway….?
Oh god, if you need a time to do another stunt, here it is:
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/tony-abbott-nominated-in-ice-bucket-challenge-20140820-1069zb.html
Tony Abbott: Your not Australian unless you join it, literately:
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/you-dont-migrate-to-this-country-unless-you-want-to-join-our-team-tony-abbott-renews-push-on-national-security-laws-20140818-3dvbx.html
Does that give it powers equal to ICAC?
What about corruption other than in public office?
That would Abbott’s Royal Commission into Unions. It will expose all the corporate corruption, at least in the building industry
991
You’re, not your.
Anyway, boy, is that a lot of waffling in that, to prove a non-point.
bemused@981
Sent it to Jon Faine and Raff Epstein’s producer.
@Raaraa/993
So i missed a ‘ in word, sue me 🙂
989
I think that some people might argue that there are 2-3 marginal seats out Eastlink way that might be subject to being swayed by it because they are in the commuting to the city via the Eastern Freeway catchment but I do not think there will be much sway there.
Nor do I think that a general roads investment based campaign would swing many votes in many marginal seats.
The Royal Automobile Club of Victoria is calling for the “missing link” between the Ring Road and the Eastern to be built but I do think that that would be a long time off, if it were ever built. No political is currently committed to it and the ALP seem to be seeing the public`s reducing taste for urban motorway construction. It would have potential swing against the party building it factor in Ivanhoe, because of destroyed views, noise pollution and other problems it would cause, and be of benefit to some Voters in Eltham and Yan Yean.
[ I live in the present but have knowledge of the past. I also collaborate extensively with younger ALP members. ]
45 year olds are not “younger” … except relative to you, bemused.
Tom the first and best@996
If they commute to the city, the East-West Link will not attract them as it has no exit to the city. They will still be getting off at Hoddle St or going down Victoria Pde as usual.
The “missing link” makes more sense to me although I would not rush into it.
Player One@997
998
The East-West link would move some of the Hoddle St traffic to its Flemington Rd exit and then via North Melbourne, via Citylink (which has city exits) and via its Citylink duplication. It is road planned for eastern suburbs people to get to the CBD, Docklands, the airport (and surrounding jobs) at Tullamarine and the Calder Freeway.