UPDATE: Essential Research has the Labor lead down from 52-48 to 51-49, with the Coalition up two on the primary vote to 42%, Labor steady on 38% and the Greens steady on 10%. One of many questions on the budget records 20% approval overall and 29% disapproval, with 35% for neither and 15% for don’t know. All the others, together with questions on detention centres, can be seen on the full release. We also have a poll today in The Guardian for Lonergan, conducted Friday to Sunday from a sample of 1841, which reaches 50-50 on two-party preferred from primary votes of Coalition 42%, Labor 35% and Greens 12%.
In response to Radio National Drive host Patricia Karvelas’s desire to refer to yesterday as day one of the election campaign, a listener helpfully offered that the actual day of the announcement, Sunday, might be deemed “day zero”. That works for me, so there’s your headline. However you care to number it, here are some highlights:
• Andrew Probyn of The West Australian reports a Liberal Party internal poll derived from “15-minute interviews with 600 people on April 30 and May 1” recorded a dead heat on two-party preferred in the new electorate of Burt in southern Perth. The report also cites optimism from Liberal insiders about Cowan and Hasluck, where “the advantage of incumbency and strong local campaigns” are expected to make the difference.
• In other internal polling news, Mark Riley of Seven News reported on Thursday that Liberal polling conducted on April 29 showed the party trailing 53.1-46.9 in Eden-Monaro, but leading 50.3-49.7 in Reid, 50.9-49.1 in Banks, 50.2-49.8 in Gilmore, 51.6-48.5 in Bennelong, 51.2-48.8 in Lindsay and 58.8-41.2 in Hughes, with Barnaby Joyce holding a 53.1-46.9 lead over Tony Windsor in New England. The report copped a more than usually vehement response from Liberal pollster Mark Textor, who denied any such polling had been conducted by his own firm, Crosby Textor. Riley said in his report that the polling was “delivered to New South Wales Liberal executives by campaign guru Lynton Crosby yesterday and leaked to Seven News”, to which Textor retorted that Crosby was out of the country. Riley responded that he had “at no stage said it was your polling”, and insisted it had been distributed to prominent members of the party. In his report the following evening, Riley said “Liberal-National director Tony Nutt said it wasn’t commissioned by the party and rejected the numbers”.
• Ellen Whinnett of the Herald Sun reports the Liberals are “on the brink” of a deal in which they will direct preferences to the Greens in Batman and Wills, while the Greens run open tickets in marginal seats in the Melbourne suburbs. The former half of the bargain returns to the Liberals’ usual practice before 2013, but for the Greens to fail to direct preferences in marginal seats is a little more unusual. However, the impact of the former will be far the greater. When the Liberals flipped their preference recommendation in 2013, the Greens’ share of their preferences in the Melbourne electorate slumped from 80.0% to 33.7%. This would have gouged about 10% of Adam Bandt’s two-party vote against Labor, but the improvment of his position on the primary vote was sufficient to exactly cancel it out. In Batman and Wills, the Greens’ share of Liberal preferences in 2013 was 32.6% and 28.7% respectively. If that changed to 80% with no alteration to the primary vote, David Feeney’s 10.6% winning margin over Greens candidate Alex Bhathal, who opposes him again this time, would reduce to zero, while Labor would hold on to a 3.5% margin in Wills. By contrast, the Greens running an open ticket appears to reduce Labor’s share of their preferences by only 3%. The Greens vote in Labor’s Victorian targets of Deakin, La Trobe and Corangamite was in each case a fraction above 10%, so the difference is likely to be 0.3% to 0.4%.
• Crikey founder and shareholder activist Stephen Mayne has announced he is running against Kevin Andrews as “a pro-Turnbull, liberal-minded independent” in the eastern Melbourne seat of Menzies. Andrews is currently embroiled in a branch-stacking scandal that has resulted in the resignation of his electorate officer, Ananija Ananievski, involving elderly Macedonian immigrants who were reportedly unaware of their party membership. In an article in Crikey yesterday (paywalled), Mayne wrote that Georgina Downer, a lawyer, former diplomat and daughter of former Foreign Minister Alexander Downer, was “hoping Kevin Andrews is removed and she can be slotted in as a last-minute replacement before nominations close on June 1”. Downer was an unsuccessful candidate for the recent preselection to succeed Andrew Robb in the seat of Goldstein, which was won by former Human Rights Commissioner Tim Wilson.
• Liberal MP Dennis Jensen, who was disendorsed as the party’s candidate for his Perth seat of Tangney in favour of former party state director Ben Morton, announced yesterday he would run in the seat as an independent. He declined to resign from the Liberal Party in doing so, but state director Andrew Cox said yesterday that he had cancelled his membership in announcing his intention to run against an endorsed candidate of the party. Jensen foreshadowed yesterday’s actions in a speech to parliament last week, in which he called Morton “the Liberal branch stackers’ and powerbrokers’ candidate”, criticised the government’s record on tax reform, called for a royal commission into the banks, and spruiked himself as “a candidate who has deep Liberal values, but who will fight for constituents first and foremost; a free thinker who will be their voice in parliament without fear or favour”. Andrew Probyn of The West Australian noted a fortnight ago that running at the election would mean Jensen continued to draw a salary up until the day before the election, which would earn him around $35,000.
• The state council of the Liberal Party in Western Australia determined the order of the double dissolution Senate ticket on the weekend, and delivered a defeat to former Defence Minister David Johnston by relegating him to the highly loseable sixth position on the ticket. The order of the ticket will run Mathias Cormann, Michaelia Cash, Dean Smith, Linda Reynolds, Chris Back, David Johnston. All are incumbents, reflecting the party’s consistent success in winning three seats at half-Senate elections, and the difficulty it faces accommodating all of them at a double dissolution election that is more likely to net them only five. Many in the party had hoped that Johnston, who was dumped as Defence Minister in December 2014, would lighten the burden by retiring, but he failed to oblige. Johnston was more gracious in the face of disappointment than some, conceding he was “in the twilight of my career”, and telling the ABC: “The Liberal Party has been very, very good to me and I’ve had 14 years in Parliament which has been a fabulous adventure.” The state council’s decision reportedly ran ran contrary to the recommendation of its four-person selection committee, which proposed that Johnston take fourth place and Back take sixth. Joe Spagnolo of the Sunday Times reports one of the members of the selection committee, party state president Norman Moore, stormed out of a state executive meeting last week and threatened to resign as it became apparent the recommendation would not be supported, before apologising for what he conceded was a “dummy spit”.
• Mark Coultan of The Australian (paywalled, I’m guessing) reports that the Liberal member for Barton, Nick Varvaris, has finally decided after much prevarication that he will seek re-election in the seat he won from Labor in 2013. Varvaris has been poleaxed by the latest redistribution, which has turned his 0.3% margin into a notional Labor margin of 5.2% by adding territory around Marrickville. Mark Coultan also reports the Liberals are still yet to endorse candidates in the competitive seats of Paterson and Kingsford Smith, but are likely to do so this weekend.
• Jared Owens of The Australian has a useful article (probably paywalled) on the state of the parties’ double dissolution Senate tickets. While many remain to be finalised, Coalition tickets are now set in Victoria (incumbents Mitch Fifield, Scott Ryan, James Paterson and Bridget McKenzie, followed by newcomer Jane Hume, who recently suffered a surprise defeat to Paterson in her bid to fill Michael Ronaldson’s vacancy), Queensland (Ian Macdonald, George Brandis, Matt Canavan, James McGrath, Barry O’Sullivan and Joanna Lindgren, all of whom are incumbents) and South Australia (Simon Birmingham, Cory Bernardi, Anne Ruston, David Fawcett and Sean Edwards, all incumbents). Labor’s ticket in Queensland will be headed by two newcomers in former state MP Murray Watt and former party state secretary Anthony Chisholm, who are repectively of the Left and the Right. Behind them are incumbents Claire Moore and Chris Ketter, with another newcomer in Jane Casey in fifth place.
Stay tuned for the regular Tuesday poll release early this afternoon from Essential Research, which will probably be followed by a bit of a lull after the weekend storm. A full update of BludgerTrack, incorporating the latest state breakdowns, should follow a few hours after.
Toaster was probably an incorrect description of a complex piece of catering equipment.
Crank
I’ve got lots. 😀
Compact Crank
Yes, but great fun on Twitter.
Re Trolls
(1) Thank you Musrum for STFU.
(2) If you wanted to test various arguments for “believability” (gullibility?) I wonder if you could do worse than trying those arguments on a political blog, and see what gets returned. Recalling another “true blue” poster, I wondered at the time if it was either a group of people having a “bit of fun” or a bunch of students doing a project (and having a laugh).
(3) If true, and if you disagree with said “arguments”, then helping the opposing team hone their points might be a choice ill-made.
(4) Others have commented that “the blue pill” is well-known for helping you to abandon difficult truths for comforting lies, but I’ll add that that blue pills are also known for their support of certain males. Some pseudonyms are just too clever.
The environment editor.
This is the case the channel 7 was talking about Green MP Jeremy Buckingham’s Facebook page
https://www.facebook.com/jeremybuckingham/posts/1181343145218205
So, let me get this straight. For months, the usual suspects here have been fretting about the possibility that the Greens might support an LNP minority government over Labor. Now, the Greens anounce that they would support Labor in the event of a hung parliament, and this is apparently an attempt to bring down… the Labor party? I’m so confused.
As for the open tickets… I agree that its bit of a cynical move and I would have much preferred the Greens preference Labor above the LNP in all seats, but I don’t think it’s that big a deal.
As William points out above:
This is a massive boon for the Greens, with the Coalition getting very slim pickings in return. Were I in the Greens’ position, I doubt I’d be able to resist either. And unless the election is really close, I doubt Labor’s going to exactly be quaking in their boots over that 0.3%.
Though it certainly doesn’t leave the Greens in much of a position to criticize Labor about their own preference deals.
compact crank @ #602 Tuesday, May 10, 2016 at 6:29 pm
…………………………………..
Far too late now.
It was called a toaster last night on Q&A by O’Bigmouth and has been called a toaster all day in the media.
Dave
Journalists have been doing a competition to see who is first to find the $6000 toaster.
One was found apparently I don’t remember which journalist found it.
So its only hearsay on my part.
Ah here it is the lucky winner from Fairfax
http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2016/election-2016-we-found-it-kelly-odwyers-qa-6000-toaster-20160509-goqecm.html
CurtinMedia: White Gum Valley to become the world’s first zero #carbon neighbourhood https://t.co/JJ7gfLvDp4 #solar @msjemmagreen https://t.co/BMvQZv0Ar1
guytaur @ #610 Tuesday, May 10, 2016 at 6:37 pm
Couldn’t resist.
No cranky. It was just a toaster. Not complex. Just a toaster.
Late Riser
Pity you weren’t faster you could have saved me a search 🙂
Ctar1 (winky emoticon)
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/national/public-service/immigration-boss-declares-war-on-poor-writing-with-tips-from-winston-churchill-and-george-orwell-20160510-goqjpx.html
Oops
Sorry Late Riser I put a smiley emoticon on the end of that post. I sometimes forget not all can see
This is so childish.
I saw, Guytaur. (smiley)
Lizzie
Mr Secretary Pezzullo’s a piece of work. I’ve sent it to my nephew.
He’s on Norfolk at the moment.
http://www.crikey.com.au/2016/05/10/angry-anderson-rose-tattoo-jihad/
I thought Angry Anderson once wanted to run for the Nationals.
Hi CC,
I rarely agree with you but always find you an interesting poster. I hope you can ignore the spiteful bloviators and see your way to keep posting.
albericie: Care about negative gearing or think perhaps you should? Watch @lateline tonight for our debate between @SincDavidson & Saul Eslake #auspol
The business may well need the toaster, but with a turnover of more than $2 million it would take one days revenue to purchase this tax write off. Surely not too onerous?
“Gonski funding: let defence try to raise funds with chook raffles, says principal”
http://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/may/10/gonski-funding-let-defence-try-to-raise-funds-with-chook-raffles-says-principal?CMP=share_btn_tw
Doesn’t appear to be much news about the Panama Papers, but what is the chance that the Toowoomba (QLD) LNP Senator Barry James O’Sullivan is the same Barry James O’Sullivan with an office in Toowoomba that gets a mention in the PP ?
Barry is a keen property investor, topping the LNP with around 41 properties.
Good night
Bloody hell,
Bluey’s gone missing! Has Borderfarce got him?
Pezzullo joins a list of departmental heads that have no respect for their staff. Some years ago the secretary of the department where I worked held an annual gathering of staff in a rented theatre space. If things had gone well during the year, it was all due to his fabulous efforts. If things had not gone well, all YOU PEOPLE must do better.
Vogon Poet,
I meant to say to you some time ago, that I think your gravatar witty.
Angry Anderson stood for the Division of Throsby for the National Party in 2013. Throsby is a rural area with some Wollongong suburbs.
He came second.
cc
you are not on my stfu list. i don’t have one at the moment, but if i did, you would not be on it.
Kelly O’Bigmouth did them no favours last night!
https://twitter.com/Ozlandscapes/status/729954983303479296
Thanks Monica. It’s witty ’cause I stole it.
It’s Jimmy Choo, a well known bull terrier, who owns an artist who does whimsical drawings of him. My bully is too lazy to even pose for a photo.
http://jimmythebull.com/
This is the toaster that Kelly O’D doubtless aspires to, especially if it comes with negative gearing.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Bennelong_Apartments
Compact Crank
<blockquote<
Toaster was probably an incorrect description of a complex piece of catering equipment.
Good point. For the born to rule class making toast for themselves would count as complex catering 😉
I had the same thought regarding the name Blue Pill (Viagra) and it’s relation to a sex toy (steelydan).
Tom.
Ruawake
The example has been very carefully chosen so as to sit at the boundary between the respective ALP and LNP plans for corps tax reduction and asset write-off, and in relation to a business that appears to have a genuine capital constraint, and positioned (surprise, surprise) just on the LNP side of the boundary
The business may well be genuine, but the example is so fragile that it makes it look like a “cunning plan”…
John Symonds (Aussie Home Loans) now on 2GB, “discussing” Labor’s Neg Gearing policy:
* House prices will drop 20%,
* Share market will drop 30%,
* Mass unemployment, up to 10%,
* Big-4 banks will go broke,
* National credit rating best at B+ within 12 months,
* Revolution in the streets.
And he, like me, went to a good Lefty school like St. Pat’s, Strathfield.
I thought Blue Pill stood for a blue tie wearing Dill
Re BB @7:17PM
…and a giant wombat will devour Whyalla.
Did he show his workings?
WarrenPeace
Blue Pill chose the Blue Pill in the Matrix. Which if true makes me think they are having a bit of a larf. If it was viagra then that is a bit sad.
I asked before but it got lost in usual red vs green bullshit, what do you guys think of the tv ads so far? I almost never watch TV so just like to see what’s going on in that front.
C’mon BB, how can you criticize John Symons for helping out a neighbour?
Of course, these 2GB listeners, who are older and have been around the block a few times, would surely take Mr Symon’s dire prognostications with a grain if salt. A couple of obvious questions:
1. If the Australian economy is so fragile that it depends upon subsidising real estate speculation, isn’t that a pretty dire situation?
2. Is it possible that Mr Symons might have a personal interest in maintaining negative gearing. Is it possible that this has affected his strong desire to maintain negative gearing?
No doubt there are lots of others. I’m just worried about the wombat.
blue pill has a large history
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Blue_mass
I can really see the asylum seeker debate working in Labor’s favour. Even though the ALP have to play a straight bat and say they support off-shore processing, they have cleverly set themselves apart by condemning “indefinite detention.” In addition to this, the ALP members who have broken ranks criticising ALP policy help to reinforce the opinion that the ALP actually does care about AS, even though this is considered a negative. The LNP try to highlight this as proof that the ALP are soft and only the LNP can be cold and heartless with asylum seekers, all the while not realising that the tide is turning in the electorate and the number of people who not only support a hardline policy, but consider it a vote changing issue, is becoming less significant by the day.
Bluey Bulletin 50 Day 50 of the 103 day Long March
Bluey would like to point out that there is no connection between blue pills and Bluey.
Q&A
Bluey watched Q&A last night and was impressed by the frank brutalism of Willox, the facile ideologisms of O’BigMouf, the verbal diarroeah of Goldie and the higly intelligent interventions of Leigh and Bandt. Bluey admired the way in which Willox, O’BigMouf and Bandt tag-teamed. Bluey was impressed with Bandt’s capacity to steal the show. Bluey reckons that the Liberal/Greens campaign will probably make the difference to ensuring a Liberal Government.
TURNBULL’S BESTIES
Bluey noted that Bandt was talking about what the Greens are going to do. Not what they can’t do because they will not be the government after the elections. Bandt also delighted Liberals everywhere by positing a Greens/Labor Coalition. ‘The Australian’ naturally featured this heavily as has the DT. So did all the sound bites. Bluey reckons that the asylum seeker and the frackers will be delighted with the Green’s performance so far. Bluey wonders whether the Minerals Council is throwing a bit of the ready in the direction of the Greens.
RBA ME NO BIS
Bluey reckons it is a pity that some Labor pollies negative gear because the keystone to the negative gearing policy, the killer fact, is that the Nationals and the Liberals are so heavily into negative gearing as to be hopelessly conflicted in the policy space.
REVERSE SANDBAG
Bluey reckons it is clever of Labor to have done precise seat-by-seat calculations of the difference that their Gonski support will make. It comes to tens of millions per electorate. Bluey reckons the Liberals could brag about the company profits that will be off-shored per electorate but it lacks the same sort of zing.
CANE TOADS AND TOFFS
Bluey notes that outside of Brisbane the Coalition is going to use Joyce as their main front man. Apparently cane toads are not all that fond of city slicker spivs like Toffee Turnbull.
DI NATALE
Having made an ignorant fink of himself in relation to Shorten being in Beaconsfield, Di Natale refuses to apologise.
WHITE ANTS
Some Liberals want Hendy to lose because he is an Abbott supporter. Bluey reckons that the final details of the political murder of Abbott were put together by a cabal of Turnbullites in Hendy’s lair, so this might well be the payback.
Mayne is going to stick it to Andrews. Apparently the latter’s preselection was fervently supported by elderly Macedonians who, according to some, did not even know they were Liberal Party members.
Jensen has been sacked from the Liberal Party and is busy spilling his guts about what a nasty bunch the Liberals are but not himself.
The DT is doing its best to wreck Shorten. But wait there is more. It is also supporting Morrison against Turnbull.
400PPM
Bluey would like to congratulate all those people who have worked so hard for this outcome. Bluey is particularly impressed that Hunt is doing his very best to stop more coal being burned and starting the dismal trek to 500PPM.
Shorten 53/100 v Turnbull 39/100
Yesterday Mr Shorten is judged to have beaten Turnbull in favourable mentions in talkback. Bluey is not convinced that this will make a skerrick of difference but it looks good.
CREDDO & THE MAD MONK
The Mad Monk was a forlorn and lonely figure on the quay to nowhere. Creddo did a nice bit of white-anting of Turnbull on Turnbull’s Great Super Grab. She reckons that retrospectivity of the changes is not fair.
I LOVE TO HAVE A BEER WITH DUNCAN
When Willox started his aggression against Duncan, Bluey thought to himself, ‘Arrogant political idiot!’ Bluey notes that these lords of the universe are seriously out of touch. They have not got a clue what it means to raise kids in a dollar by dollar context. Bluey reckons that Willox probably thinks that the working poor salary package starts at $180,000 a year.
Fort Mcmurray
2400 houses and other structures destroyed. Bluey reckons that that is all very well but there has been a wildlife holocaust of horrendous proportions. Millions of vertebrates alone were either killed directly or will now starve to death.
DUTERTE
Duterte has promised to upscale to the PI what he did in Davao. In Davao he was linked to death squads who extrajudicially murdered around one thousand people. The generally understood reason was that they were petty street dealers and the like. Bluey calculates that if Duterte delivers pro rata on his promise, that would come to around 70,000 extra-judicial murders. The Man is going to be very busy.
POLLS
The Coalition has clawed back some ground. Shorten continues to improve. Turnbull is just about flatlining.
PEFO
Bluey reckons that the next opportunity for a step change in the campaign is going to be PEFO. It is looking ugly for the Liberals with an 18% drop in iron ore prices since the Budget. This will be partly offset by a sharp fall in the dollar. But it should be nice and ugly for Morrison and Turnbull.
NOSTRABLUEY
If the Labor alternative budget delivers a significantly better deficit outcome than the Liberals, Labor will win the election.
Verdict for the day: Liberals. (Gifted by the Greens.)
Cumulative score: Labor 31 Liberals 19
Phillipines’ equivalent of Donald Trump just elected President of that country? http://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/may/10/separated-at-birth-sayings-of-donald-trump-and-rodrigo-the-punisher-duterte
A B
Tuesday, May 10, 2016 at 7:34 pm
‘I can really see the asylum seeker debate working in Labor’s favour.’
Any mention, any discussion, any article, any sound bite about asylum seekers is at best neutral for Labor. Mostly it is bad for Labor. Full stop.
The only winners from the misery of asylum seekers are the Liberals and the Greens who, between them, are cheerfully wedging Labor to the max on this.