This week’s Essential Research finds the Coalition down a point on the primary vote to 37%, Labor steady on 37%, the Greens steady on 10%, One Nation up one to 6% and the Nick Xenophon Team steady on 4%, with two-party preferred unchanged at 52-48 in favour of Labor. The poll also finds 53% favouring a vote by parliament on same-sex marriage in the event that the Senate blocks a plebiscite, with only 29% opposed. Support for the proposed plebiscite question, “should the law be changed to allow same-sex couples to marry?”, is at 60% with 30% opposed, compared with results of 57% and 28% when the same question was posed a month ago. Only 22% of respondents supported the goverment’s plan for $7.5 million of advertising to be provided for both sides of the argument, with 68% opposed. When asked about the biggest threats to job security in Australia, 31% nominated “free trade deals that allow foreign workers into the Australian market”, 23% companies using labour hire and contracting out, 18% the impact of technological change, and high wages in last place on 11%.
In other news, I mean to start shaking myself out of a spell of post-election laziness, so I’ll have BludgerTrack back in one form or another next week. In the meantime, I have the following to relate:
• The Australian reports that factional arrangements ensure that Stephen Conroy’s own sub-faction of the Victorian Right will decide his successor when he vacates his Senate seat on September 30. That seems to bode well for his ally Mehmet Tillem, who previously served in the Senate from late 2013 until mid-2014, when he served out David Feeney’s term after he moved to the lower house seat of Batman at the September 2013 election. However, some in the party are said to be arguing that the position should go to a woman, specifically to Stefanie Perri, the former Monash mayor who ran unsuccessfully in Chisholm at the recent election.
• A draft redistribution proposal has been published for the Northern Territory’s two electorates, in which early 3000 voters are to be transferred from growing Solomon (covering Darwin and Palmerston) to stagnant Lingiari (covering the remainder of the territory). The transfer encompasses Yarrawonga, Farrar, Johnston and Zuccoli at the eastern edge of Palmerston, together with the Litchfield Shire areas around Knuckey Lagoon immediately east of Darwin. This is a conservative area, so the change would strengthen Labor in Solomon and weaken them in Lingiari.
• A redistribution for the five electorates in Tasmania is in its earliest stages, with a period for preliminary public suggestions to run from November 2 to December 5.
• The Liberal National Party announced last week it would not challenge its 37 vote defeat in the Townsville-based seat of Herbert, despite complaints from Senator Ian Macdonald that the Australian Eleectoral Commission had promised hospital patients it would take their votes on polling day without delivering, and that students outside the electorate were denied absent votes because the required envelopes were not available. The 40-day deadline for lodgement of a challenge closed on Saturday.
lizzie @ #99 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 5:24 pm
Apparently the CFA volunteers who actually work with UFU members are quite OK with the agreement and don’t support the protests or the volunteers leadership.
I suspect a lot of Lib & Nat stooges involved stirring up trouble.
There was this photo from earlier in the year I think of GW Bush and Clinton….
Hmmmmm.
‘I do not understand all this. The msm (ABC etc) are not explaining that the new conditions only apply to some outer suburban stations.
Someone needs to bang a few heads together, 7.30 included.’
The ABC yet again obeying the orders of their sponsors.
When you’ve got a mortgage to pay you can’t afford to rebel.
CTar1/SK
It will be interesting to see what impact Bush Senior’s decision has on the electorate
Guess who’s going to discuss the new Welfare plan on The Drum? Judith Sloannnnnnn.
The Drum
Judith Sloan is impervious to shouted rude words and the affects of my very best cap gun. What’s to be done? Could somebody muss her hair?
lizzie @ #105 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 5:32 pm
You are very fast on the draw pardna! 🙂
Lizzie
The CFA matter is listed for trial in the Supreme court to commence in two days time. Surely these firies culd wait to see what transpires before switching states. Seems contrived
Barney in Saigon
I think your posts come pretty close.
Victoria, I cant see enough Texan registered repugs voting dem. But I can see less of them turning out and more of them voting Libertarian. It should sway some independent voters.
SurveyMonkey had Texas as Trump +2 (538 adjusted) only a few weeks ago.
Adrian
“The ABC yet again obeying the orders of their sponsors.”
Tell me who their sponsors are?
Barney in Saigon
Finally! Now you’re getting somewhere!
KayJay,
Great News. I am so pleased to know you intend to stick around for a good while. Much love to you and your favourite daughters and of course your dog too. They must be very pleased too. ❤️
It’s the difference between equivalence and equality. Apartheid, for example, offered equivalence – separate but equal. Equality cannot have multiple parallel streams.
http://kevinbonham.blogspot.com.au/2016/09/proposed-anti-discrimination-changes.html
Proposed Anti-Discrimination Changes and “Don’t Mess With Marriage”
My comments on proposed changes to Tasmania’s anti-discrimination act and the Catholic Bishops anti-SSM booklet that set it all off.
http://kevinbonham.blogspot.com.au/2016/09/2016-house-of-reps-results-finalised.html
2016 House Of Reps Figures Finalised
‘“The ABC yet again obeying the orders of their sponsors.”
Tell me who their sponsors are?’
Surely you jest?
Hint: It is not those who pay their wages.
Adrian
Not jesting at all name them!
Don’t watch The Drum but it’s always good to see their ABC balancing those from the extreme left that they always have on, with the occasional extreme right wing nut job.
Is this for real?
The census is not even over yet and they are doing follow-up surveys? This surely has to be an abuse of the normal post-census survey process. Here, they seem to be doing it early, with the clear and deliberate intention to intimidate.
So now, not only will the census itself be borked, but they are also ruining the normal process for establishing the undercount!
Have the ABS lost the plot, or what?
I cannot believe that Sloan has a position of any editorial responsibility. She makes a series of disconnected statements and then in effect says therefore … I know what I’m talking about.
She’s hopeless.
nicole @ #113 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 5:42 pm
The daughters are pleased.
The dog (Abbee) has some friends next door. She spends hours at the fence looking to see what they are doing.
Never mind. She (Abbee) always knows who provides the tucker. Be kind to yourself. 😉
Adrian
So are you saying that the ABC is biased ?
MTBW
That’s the first time I’ve found you funny. I understand that you don’t follow all the ppsts, but to ask that of Adrian is really humorous.
Lizzie
Whatever takes your fancy Lizzie!
mtbw @ #122 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 5:51 pm
This is the funniest post I’ve seen here in weeks! : )
Oops! I see lizzie has already made that point!
http://www.theage.com.au/victoria/victoria-is-being-dudded-by-malcolm-turnbull-over-sale-of-port-of-melbourne-lease-20160920-grkix4.html
https://www.theguardian.com/world/2016/sep/20/fears-for-antarctic-penguins-as-new-bird-flu-strain-reaches-frozen-continent?CMP=share_btn_tw
Player One
We are not all clones we have differing opinions whether some like it or not.
I need a good laugh on the train from work.
ABC bias isn’t an opinion these days, more a fact.
Personally, I’m just grateful that Kimberley Kitching’s name hasn’t come up.
Legislating marriage equality is an important correction to an anomaly in the Marriage Act. If mixed-sex couples are entitled to have their relationships recognized by the state in this way, there is no good reason to withhold the same from gay couples.
At the same time I think it’s important to stop framing marriage equality as a grand progressive reform. Marriage is an intrinsically conservative institution. Marriage is society’s way of privileging a certain kind of relationship – long-term romantic relationships – above other kinds of relationship (friendship, carer-caregiver, filial, more fluid and complex sexual relationships, etc). That’s a conservative thing to do – trying to encourage people to conform to a certain ideal and implicitly downgrading relationships that are outside this ideal. Marriage equality is really about extending a conservative institution to more people. I support it because it would fix an unjustified anomaly in the law. But let’s not pretend that there’s anything particularly progressive about reinforcing the normative dominance that marriage has in our society’s hierarchy of relationships.
player one @ #112 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 5:41 pm
How has this any relevance in the issue of SSM.
I only raised to highlight that religions don’t own or control marriage.
Nicholas
Strangely, I find myself in agreement with you.
mtbw @ #129 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:06 pm
Sorry, MTBW – we’re not laughing at your opinion. It’s just that asking if Adrian thinks the ABC is biased is a bit like asking me whether I thought the census went well! : )
NICHOLAS – Actually, marriage is today a very progressive institution because it gives women a lot more power when it comes to divorce. That’s why we should do away with it and let the men keep all the swag.
Player One
Speaking of the census, there was a roar of laughter from the audience when it was mentioned on QandA.
KB – What’s a “religious opinion” anyway. I intend to create my own religion (the bible will be quite short) and insult the hell out of people.
lizzie @ #137 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:33 pm
I didn’t realize David Kalisch was even in the audience!
kevin-one-seven @ #136 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:29 pm
Excellent. I plan to leave the much loved children all my debts to make sure they remember me! 😀
a r
Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 3:28 pm
Regarding the train construction, as with submarines, it will only survive if there is a steady supply of work.
You can’t solve unemployment by having the government(s) build things nyways. You need industries that allow people to earn incomes consisting primarily of dollars that aren’t sourced from government coffers. Keeping military and civil projects local is good pork-barreling, but not a sustainable long-term solution to any problem.
Why is building a train not a legitimate contribution to GDP; the well being of our society and a worth while thing for those doing it, to do? I am truly confused as to why people think and write such stuff.
So Barnett survives. Honestly I’d forgotten all about the leadership spill motion.
kevin-one-seven @ #138 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:34 pm
Any work of fiction that you believe is true and then base your view of the world on such fiction.
kayjay @ #140 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:38 pm
Hopefully you also leave some of your words of wisdom to help them get through their financial troubles.
Our society has become somewhat more progressive on gender relations in the past sixty years, and marriage has caught up with that development, but marriage itself is a conservative institution because it encourages, rewards, and perpetuates the dominance of a particular form of relationship. Other forms of relationship – the relationship between intimate friends, the relationship between a long-term caregiver and the person receiving care, for example – add just as much value to our society but do not get the same recognition and status as the relationship between a married couple.
I understand the appeal of marriage, the comfort of observing a tradition and fitting into the mainstream. My point is that extending a conservative institution to more people, which is what same-sex marriage amounts to, is not a progressive change. A worthy change in some ways, but not progressive.
Barney in Saigon
#144 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:46 pm
You do make me laugh! The much loved ones have mastered the art of pretending to listen to me in much the same fashion as I pretend to give them words of wisdom based on my much screwed up early life. 😎
player one @ #54 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 3:55 pm
You said you were disengaging with discussing this issue with me. You then made another post engaging with me to again claim you were disengaging, and now you engage again – if only to accuse me of misrepresenting your position without providing a shred of evidence that I have done so. Your so-called disengagement even extends to dragging me back in on a different thread!
If you’re really disengaging then have the guts to do it properly – do not reply to this post and do not mention my position or me in connection with this debate ever again. Otherwise your so-called disengagement is clearly gutless and fake and can only be assumed to represent mock outrage on your part. If you’re not disengaging then don’t pretend.
As long as we have people wanting a wedding and wanting to be married, SSM is a relevant issue. Although I am not one, there are plenty of people wanting to get married. Discussion about changing ‘marriage’ per say is just a distraction at this point in time.
Kevin Bonham
My post was not directed at you. If I happen to mention you in passing, feel free to ignore it.
kevin-one-seven @ #138 Tuesday, September 20, 2016 at 6:34 pm
Yes this is one of the problems I have with the proposed change. Someone will be able to claim an exemption provided they claim to believe in a religion that teaches whatever kind of hate they want to preach, but the same hate unsupported by a claimed religious belief would not be allowed.