It’s been as quiet a week as they come so far as federal polling is concerned, with only the reliable weekly Essential Research to keep us amused. Newspoll and Roy Morgan were both in an off week in their fortnightly cycles, and neither Galaxy nor ReachTEL stepped forward to fill the gap, presumably because their clients at News Corporation and the Seven Network blew their budget on double-up polls during the Liberal leadership excitement in early February. Since the Essential Research result landed well on trend, the BludgerTrack poll aggregate has recorded only the most negligible of changes on voting intention, with the marginal exception of a 0.3% lift for the Greens. Labor also makes a gain on the seat projection, having tipped over the line for a seventh seat in Western Australia (do keep in mind though that the electoral furniture there will shortly be rearranged by the redistribution to accommodate the state’s newly acquired entitlement to sixteenth seat).
If an absence of polling is a problem for you, you can at least enjoy yesterday’s semi-regular state voting intention results from Roy Morgan, based on SMS polling of samples ranging from 432 in Tasmania to 1287 in New South Wales. These have Labor leading 56-44 in Victoria, 50.5-49.5 in Western Australia, 53-47 in South Australia and 55.5-44.5 in Tasmania (not that two-party preferred means anything under Hare-Clark). However, the recently defeated Liberal National Party is credited with an improbable 51-49 lead in Queensland. New South Wales is not included in the mix as the result was published a day before the rest, which you can read all about on my latest state election thread.
In other news, federal preselection action is beginning to warm up, spurred in part by the possibility that Liberal leadership turmoil might cause the election to be held well ahead of schedule. Troy Bramston of The Australian reports that Labor “has ordered its state and territory branches to urgently preselect parliamentary candidates by the end of June”, with exemptions for New South Wales and Western Australia owing to their looming redistributions (the latter process is presently at the stage of receiving public suggestions, which may be submitted by April 10). Some notable happenings on that count:
• Labor has conducted local ballots for preselections in the three Victorian seats it lost to the Liberals in 2013. Darren Cheeseman appears to have failed in his bid for another crack at Corangamite, where the ballot was won by Libby Coker, a Surf Coast councillor and former mayor who ran in Polwarth at the November state election. Also in the field was Tony White, an economic development manager at Colac Otway Shire and former adviser to various ministers and premiers in Bracks-Brumby ogvernment. In La Trobe, former Casey councillor Simon Curtis outpaced the rather higher profile Damien Kingsbury, the director of La Trobe University’s Centre for Citizenship, Development and Human Rights. The vote in Deakin was won by Tony Clarke, of whom I can’t tell you much. It now remains for the state party’s public office selection committee to determine its 50% share of the vote total, but the talk seems to be that Coker in particular is home and hosed.
• Joe Ludwig, who has held a Queensland Senate seat for Labor since 1999, has announced he will not seek another term at the next election. He is set to be succeeded by Anthony Chisholm, the party’s state secretary from 2008 until 2014, when the Left’s unprecedented success in scoring majority control at the party’s state conference caused the position to pass to Evan Moorhead. Chisholm was given the short-term and now-expired role as director of the state election campaign, and also has Left faction support to fill Ludwig’s position, which remains in the hands of the AWU/Labor Forum faction. A potential rival contender was Chisholm’s predecessor as state secretary, Cameron Milner, but AWU support consolidated behind Chisholm in part because he had the backing of Wayne Swan, which reportedly led to a falling out between Swan and Milner. For more on both Swan and Milner, see further below.
• There is also a widely held expectation that Ludwig will shortly be joined in the departure lounge by the Left faction’s Jan McLucas, the other Queensland Labor Senator due to face the voters at the next half-Senate election. The favourite to replace her is Murray Watt, a Bligh government minister who lost his seat of Everton in the 2012 landslide, and more recently a lawyer with Maurice Blackburn. However, Michael McKenna of The Australian reports this could raise affirmative action issues, with Townsville mayor Jenny Hill mooted as an alternative contender if so. Another aspirant mentioned in McKenna’s report is Michael Ravbar, state secretary of the Construction Forestry Mining and Energy Union.
• Michael McKenna of The Australian reports that Wayne Swan and Bernie Ripoll are “being stalked as targets of possible preselection challenges”. In Swan’s inner northern Brisbane seat of Lilley, the aforementioned Cameron Milner is said to be “considering” a challenge to the former Treasurer. On the western side of town in Oxley, Brisbane City Council opposition leader Milton Dick is “preparing to roll Mr Ripoll”, and has “cross-factional support” to do so.
• The Australian reports Sophie Mirabella is keen to run again in Indi, which she famously lost in 2013 to independent Cathy McGowan. However, the report says the party is “deeply pessimistic about the chance of regaining the seat, and the contest is complicated by the Nationals being able to contest it”.
Confessions
Try the old trick
Type west-coast-Eagles-stained-by soap- etc with the dashes into Google and see how you go.
Dubbs
Appreciate you sharing this experience. Unfortunately, Putin is very dangerous. 🙁
GG
On balance it is rather looking as if the players will get pinged.
But if the players get pinged I supposed the appeals will be next.
If that fails there is always a higher court.
If that fails they will do their time.
And they will use it to sue their employers – the AFL and Essendon.
GG
duds is an understatement!
Dubbs
Thanks for interesting post.
I hope Kerr turns it around confessions but it wasn’t that long ago he was running riot around the place too.
Too much money, too young and too much time on their hands (combined with a club that was prepared to turn a blind eye) is a recipe for disaster for these blokes.
GG I’ll stop telling the truth about you if you stop telling lies about me.
ESJ,
Bite me!
Speaking of Joel Fitzgibbon, remember this?
http://www.theage.com.au/national/the-age-abandons-potential-defence-to-helen-liu-defamation-action-to-protect-confidential-sources-20150323-1m5tek.html
Anti Baird anti-CSG rant
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=KYvyJTe8iNM&feature=youtu.be
GG
ESJ is trying SYRIZA-style on you. Be warned.
BW,
The truth will set me free.
On ice, 7.30 tonight ran a segment up front on how it is an increasing cause of road deaths (they were talking about all drugs but they made clear that meth and ice were the worse, especially when used together with other drugs).
There needs to be a lot more reporting of just how incredibly dangerous it is. It certainly freaked me out that there were people driving on our roads who felt invincible and totally aggro at the same time as a result of the drugs.
rossmcg:
That isn’t working either – it just brings up the same ‘sign up’ page as I got before.
But in any case, it would seem as though there really was some serious shit going down at West Coast.
GG’s 5 famous predictions:
1. Rudd was knifed because of the ambition of Shorten(subsequently repudiated) and it was a mistake
2. Gillard would win
3. Australians like the Carbon tax
4. Australians heart the Mining Tax
5. Abbott would never win an election
Sprocket..re Fitzgibbon
__________________
After all the dubious goings on when the was Minister and the wierd stories about his Chinese friends…it suggests that Fitzgibbon place in the shadow cabine shows that the caucus is pretty low on talent or wisdom…Fitzgibbon being pretty much a creep in a NSW Labor kind of way …or something worse..
Please note that ESJ’s comment at 2957 was stolen without attribution from Adlai Stevenson.
What exactly are you suggesting about Fitzgibbon deblonay? Out with it old boy don’t be shy!
confessions@2964
Copy the text as specified.
Open a new private window.
Paste the text into google.
Click on the (probably) first link, et voilà!
Looks like deblonay and GG have got different kinds of yeller in em.
ESJ,
1. Have never repudiated.
2. Gillard won in 2010 and was removed before 2013. Your point?
3. No one likes a tax. However, the carbon price was in place and accepted.
4. The MRRT was a good idea but implementation was cocked up.
5. My opinion on that changed when Rudd resumed the Labor leadership.
Come on deblonay – what’s your accusation about Fitzgibbon ? Or was it made up ?
GG looks like smells like flip flopping on your part friend.
What a pissant little backwater you live in ESJ.
ESJ,
That’s your underpants comrade.
No word from deblonay. – caught out.
Thanks BB – I am sure your rustic idyll has the lovliest Lino.
Thanks don, that worked!
[3. Australians like the Carbon tax
4. Australians heart the Mining Tax]
I don’t think these have ever been properly tested in isolation.
I’m 100% sure the carbon price wasn’t as disliked as the science deniers on the right thought.
The mining tax upset people that don’t like companies paying taxes (a lot of whom are science deniers on the right) and didn’t please anyone who thinks companies should pay their fair share of taxes because it didn’t actually raise tax.
Except that we don’t have any commodities at the moment that would lead to a super profits taxes being paid (easily extracted oil aside) it might not be a sensible time, but equally it might be a good time to redo this properly.
The proposition from the liberals that we should sell our national and state resources for the the lowest possible price shows them for the traitorous fools they are.
TPOF
My late brother was a traffic policeman with specific knowledge of drunk and drug affected driving. He saw ice as a growing problem nearly a decade ago. Problem was back then not much was known about the drug or even to test for it.
It’s a dangerous place out there!
ESJ: Menzies House has asked me to take over now……thanks.
Hi everyone, how are we?
Canned hunting – I can’t imagine the mentality of someone who would want to do that. Are they sadists? Or do they mount trophies and boast to their mates how they risked life and limb to hunt down a ferocious beast across a trackless wilderness?
TPOF
It is a drug that is readily available and highly addictive. I have been fortunate so far that my own children have not gone down that path, but know families that are dealing with this scourge. It is a disaster for them
billie
Enjoyed the anti baird rant!
The right have always supported the PRRT, even supported it when Labor extended it to include onshore projects.
Methinks the hatred by the right of the MRRT was motivated by the donations to the Party more than anything else
This QansA is talking CSG.
Jones did an audience poll on CSG. Two thirds against it.
Labor and Greens looking good.
The Mining tax was an absolute fiasco as I mentioned on the night the details were described to much criticism here. My views were proven right and those claiming to be ‘in-the-know’ were wrong.
Nothing to write home about I guess….
Fiona Nash is in hostile territory.
[The Mining tax was an absolute fiasco]
It was you are correct. However that doesn’t make it a bad tax, it was just technically deficient.
The QandA audience is certainly looking like it aint happy with the Coalition- the question is whether they will vote/preference ALP or not…..if they do, the country folk are often missed in polling (note how low the Nat vote is in polls compared with elections).
Happiness
Palmer is hoping they will vote PUP. However due to Alan Jones going on demos with Bob Brown they may vote Green
You mean like it didn’t actually raise any money wwp?
I should say also that it did have a lot of attention focused on it. It ITAA is also technically deficient and is spread across two two volume acts. Yes we have two income tax assessment acts. The PRRT is very deficient technically. The GST has a lot of technical deficiencies.
What a good government does (and that would exclude the current circus) is fix technical deficiencies.
Mining tax a factor in the decline in employment in the Mining industry. Thanks Labor
I just can’t see Nat voters voting in Green Representatives in strong rural electorates….lets see. The Coalition is on low 50s and have to reach 47 to win so it doesn’t take too many surprise seats to cause a shocker!
Happiness and ESJ
How was the mining tax different from the Petrol and Gas tax?
guytuar
Alan Jones feels very strongly about the CSG issue
ESJ 2993
What a crock of rubbish….Are you Abbott’s speech writer? You display the same low level of intelligence and intellect
Gillard agreed to pay State Royalties, thereby ensuring that the States increased their Royalties.
The tax was drafted by the Mining companies, and they ended up paying bupka.
She’s a schmuck as I said at the time.
[You mean like it didn’t actually raise any money wwp?
Funny you should ask that, I have come slowly to the view that the setting of the cost base was business lying to government (and yes the government was a fool to believe them), but there are others of a view that it not being payable as the price fell was the tax working. We’ll never know if it would have worked if the price had gone the other way.
We do know that the only intelligent way to proceed is to get maximum value for resources you are selling and we know the economic fools and vandals in the liberal party worked hard to minimise the return.
victoria
With his sport interest and wanting to protect water table and farmland and opposing the death penalty Jones proves he is Australian. Even if he is a Right Wing Shock Jock