Results from Newspoll and Essential Research have elicited next to no change on BludgerTrack, at least so far as the results are concerned – negligible movement all round on voting intention, although what’s there is enough for the Coalition to claw back a seat in Queensland on the projection. Newspoll provides a set of leadership numbers as always, and here too their effect is negligible.
What is new on BludgerTrack is that it’s now tracking One Nation, although the only hard data here is that Essential Research has been providing since the start of September. Polls that don’t report One Nation still have some influence on them through their “others” results, and the estimated results for them show up as data points on the chart. I’ve implemented a bit of a cheat to get the One Nation trendline started from the beginning by using their national Senate vote of 4.3% as a post-election starting point. However, the “since election” reading on the tables goes off the national House of Representatives result of 1.3%, which is unflattering to them as they only fielded 15 candidates.
Two bits of electoral boundaries news to relate:
• The redistribution of the two federal seats in the Northern Territory has been finalised, with no changes made to September’s draft proposal. Three thousand voters have been transferred from growing Solomon (covering Darwin and Palmerston) to stagnant Lingiari (covering the remainder of the territory), in an area encompassing Yarrawonga, Farrar, Johnston and Zuccoli at the eastern edge of Palmerston, together with the Litchfield Shire areas around Knuckey Lagoon east of Darwin. To the very limited extent that this will have an electoral effect, it will be to strengthen Labor in Solomon and weaken them in Lingiari, the area transferred being conservative-leaning.
• The South Australian state redistribution has been finalised, with a large number of changes made to the draft published in August. These are largely to the benefit of the Liberals, who stand aggrieved by their failure to win government in 2014 despite winning the two-party vote by 53-47. The draft redrew the Labor marginals of Elder and Mawson to make them notionally Liberal. However, they did the opposite in Fisher, a normally conservative-leaning seat that Labor managed to win at a by-election in December 2014 after the death of independent member Bob Such. This seat has been renamed Hurtle Vale, and pushed southwards into the Labor-voting Morphett Vale area.
The new set of changes adds a further two seats to the Liberal column, most notably Colton, where Labor cops a transfer of 8000 voters from Glenelg North and West Beach (currently in Morphett), turning the Labor margin of 2% into a Liberal margin of 3.7%. The other seat is Newland, where there was so little in it that a further 200 voters in Humbug Scrub have been enough to nudge it to the Liberal side of the pendulum. There has also been a further boost to the Liberal margin in Elder, where gains around Lower Mitcham in the east (currently in Waite) push the margin out from 1.1% to 4.3%.
The Liberals has also benefited in Adelaide, where the reversal of a proposal to move Walkerville out of the electorate leaves the margin at 2.0%, compared with 2.5% at the election and 0.6% in the draft; and in the Labor-held seat of Lee, where an extra 4000 voters from Colton reduce the Labor margin from 4.6% to 2.6%.
Boerwar
Are you referring to the construction period? Last time I drove along Northbourne the traffic moved pretty slowly in peak even without the LRT.
Two emails this morning with sure fire methods of making huge profits on the stock exchange.
Problem. Which method to choose.
I have just weighted my wallet, purely in the interest of science. I may email Mr. Cormann the results so that he can help fine tune cuts to pensions.
Wallet with cash 184 gm
Wallet without cash 182 gm
Of course, the astute punter will know that a couple of grams of $100 notes may be concealed in this test.
I swear, on my fealty to His Most Excellent His Honor Malcolm B. Turnbull that I have not even seen a $100 note for years. Should I get one I will guard is night and day.
I don’t know if I have previously recommended the following song for our leader, so here goes.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=4zy3NQEEoD8
😎
Trog,
Dick Smith has probably reached desperation point re Aus population growth. It’s worth reading his population website introduction
http://dicksmithpopulation.com/2016/11/29/letter-of-introduction-by-dick-smith/#more-690
to get a feel for how committed he is.
Supporting Hanson’s calls to reduce population rate of increase may hurt his cause, but it should not.
The issue is far too important to us all, and our children’s futures.
I even support the occasional Judith Sloan article in The Oz criticising our unrestrained immigration rates, and I hate most things about The Oz, and Murdoch in general. It’s that important.
It’s a waste of time asking Fairfax to debate it fairly. They are owned by the property developers.
‘Fraudband’: Humiliating NBN failure
Labor reminds Australia of Turnbull’s broken NBN promise in lead up to 2013 election
SHADOW communications spokesperson Michelle Rowland has lashed out at Malcolm Turnbull for letting down Australians in need of a faster internet connection.
With the end of 2016 fast approaching, the federal government has just 19 days to get fast broadband to seven million premises to fulfil a three-year-old promise made by Mr Turnbull.
To date, 1,570,721 premises nationally have activated the NBN, representing less than half of the 3.5 million premises that are NBN ready.
http://www.news.com.au/technology/online/nbn/labor-reminds-australia-of-turnbulls-broken-nbn-promise-in-lead-up-to-2013-election/news-story/1b2695b8b60f0ff1d4b691e3d8edc72d
lizzie Monday, December 12, 2016 at 9:19 am
“Trump’s favorite word, however, is “I.” His fourth-favorite word is “Trump.” Eight out of his 13 favorite words are one syllable, and the two syllable words are simple — “very,” “China,” and “money.” His only three-syllable favorite word is “Mexico.””
*************************************************
“There is not just smoke here. There is a blazing 10-alarm fire, the sirens are wailing, the Russians provided the lighter fluid, and Trump is standing half-burnt and holding a match,” said Glenn Carle, a retired CIA officer and interrogator.
“The facts hurt, Trump won’t like the truth, and he will without question seek to destroy those individuals or organizations that say or do anything that he thinks harm his precious grandiosity.”
Carle, the retired CIA officer, said Trump’s temperament had played into Russia’s hands and put the president-elect on a collision course with the CIA.
He said: “Look, in my professional assessment as an intelligence officer, Trump has a reflexive, defensive, monumentally narcissistic personality, for whom the facts and national interest are irrelevant, and the only thing that counts is whatever gives personal advantage and directs attention to himself.
“He is about the juiciest intelligence target an intelligence office could imagine. He groans with vulnerabilities. He will only work with individuals or entities that agree with him and build him up, and he is a shockingly easy intelligence ‘target’ to manipulate.”
Were Trump an intelligence officer himself, Carle said, “he would be removed and possibly charged with having accepted the clandestine support of a hostile power to the harm of the United States”.
FROM : https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2016/dec/11/intelligence-agencies-cia-donald-trump-russia
‘Dick Smith has probably reached desperation point re Aus population growth.’
The room is currently full of elephants, and this is one of the biggest.
PhoenixRED
According to Twitter, Trump has said wtte
Why do I need a daily Intelligence report? I’m intelligent enough already.
It’s getting so we really can’t tell truth from fiction.
Adrian
We desperately need infrastructure and services, and what do we get? A railway to nowhere and a Plan.
ML
I agree that the world needs to cut its population growth, but I would argue that Australia accepting more migrants helps with this.
The stats show us that someone who migrates to Australia is likely to have a smaller family than their peers who stayed put.
Australia has plenty of food (we exported 66% of it, even at the height of the great drought) and an abundance of water (seriously. We do. It’s just that we keep looking at the continent as a whole, rather than where people actually live and farm).
We can take more people AND cut world population growth at the same time.
In fairness to Trump, what he said was that he didn’t need to be told the same thing over and over again. Which probably means he didn’t understand what he was being told.
The wonders of the NBN.
A few years ago Telstra whilst it replaced most of the copper in the village it pulled in the fibre at the same time. As a result of this within one step over my boundary I have fibre that goes all the way back to the exchange, most of the village is the same. In the NBN of the future, I am going to have a wireless connection. I say in the future as no firm date has been made for commencement. The problem that the copper cable has had is the very low conductibility of the rock/ground; every lightning strike burns the copper’s insulation.
The Telstra workers inform us that as soon as the NBN is sold off a new telephone exchange will be put in and everyone will get fibre. The limitation within the exchange is the problem. The timber building was built in the 1950s and cannot be expanded due to block size. NBN will not upgrade. Once owned Telstra will.
Zoomster
Was it Katter or someone else who recently said we are now a net importer of fruit? I was surprised, until I remembered the out-of-season fruit in supermarkets (which I refuse to buy).
lizzie @ #63 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 10:39 am
How depressing. I suppose there is no room for agility and innovation in agriculture.
I think Katter is something else!
Anybody happen to have Barnaby’s phone number. No – not the one from Midsomer Murders.
On the other hand (2 so far) maybe Midsomer Murders Barnaby plus Sykes the dog may be able to sort something out.
Back to the mowing. 😎
‘Adrian
We desperately need infrastructure and services, and what do we get? A railway to nowhere and a Plan.’
Meanwhile Sydney’s light rail project suffers a major cost blowout.
Totally ignored by the ABC if course.
Imagine if it were Labor. #78,654 in a series.
lizzie @ #63 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 10:39 am
It was Katter in one of his rants.
If the places I shop are at all representative then he is way off beam as the overwhelming majority of fruit and vegetables is Australian and of that, much is produced local to Melbourne and surrounds.
I do worry that suburbia is moving into rich produce growing areas, forcing our supplies to be grown further away and removing good land from productive use.
Tingle’s article is the classic case of false equivalence. Absolutely no reason to mention Rudd (whatever your view of him) but to make it look like she is being evenhanded, when she bags a Liberal PM she thinks she has to bag a Labor PM, even if he hasn’t been on the scene for yonks. Really, Laura, who cares. Turnbull is the idiot we have to deal with right now.
guytaur @ #41 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 9:19 am
Thanks Guytaur
Bemused and Lizzie
Katter could be right if you go beyond fresh fruit. My impression is that most fruit that goes into juice, tins and freezer bags is imported.
AB2 @ 10.56
Totally agree. Like Walid Aly’s article the other day, the irrelevant reference reflects poorly on the writer.
Tingle’s article in the AFR is pretty good, but still…
She concludes with :
“A week ago, it seemed that success in the parliament – and the effective functioning of his ministers in dealing with the Senate – held some promise that the Prime Minister could finish the year rebuilding his authority.
Instead, he finishes without a climate change policy, or even a proper energy security policy, and is now facing demands that Australia should abandon its emissions reductions target altogether.
I suppose by this government’s standards the last week of parliament could be seen in a positive light,but really?
Read more: http://www.afr.com/opinion/columnists/just-to-be-clear-there-is-no-alternative-climate-plan-20161211-gt8p0u#ixzz4SZp5288G
The above quote is from Ian Dunlop’s article in the SMH this morning. Can someone please explain to me how climate change is driving the refugee crisis? I thought it was a result of people fleeing from war zones.
antonbruckner11 @ #67 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 10:56 am
But the PB ‘peanut gallery’ loved it of course.
TPOF
Good odds that orange juice you see in the shop is made from Brazilian Valencia orange concentrate.
.
tpof @ #69 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 10:58 am
Of those, I only ever buy canned fruit and I take particular care to buy the Australian product. I do note that whereas it was once almost entirely Australian, the compradores running our major supermarkets now have substantial quantities of imports.
lizzie
The only reference to this I can find is from 2009 (which was at the end of the big drought). But it’s not my point.
We’re importing fruit and vegetables because it’s cheaper to do so, not because we can’t grow enough fruit and vegetables, which is the important consideration when we’re discussing whether or not Australia can support a larger population.
Darn
The long term winter rainfall in the Mediterranean littoral is trending down.
This is when the wheat crops in those areas started to fail. In dictatorships hunger is usually when folk arc up. This turned into the Arab Spring which turned into the general Middle East War.
I have grossly, grossly oversimplified here but if you are interested in seeking out more information on how global warming is already connected to mass human movements winter rain trends in the Mediterranean is a handy place to start.
Zoomster
I get your point.
From the Ag Dept website —
‘The overwhelming majority of food sold in Australia is grown and supplied by Australian farmers. We are able to export more than half of our agricultural produce, while more than 90 per cent of fresh fruit and vegetables, meat, milk and eggs sold in supermarkets are domestically produced. Of the foods imported into Australia, a substantial proportion comprised highly processed foods not produced in Australia, speciality branded spirits, seafood and processed fruit and vegetables.’
http://www.agriculture.gov.au/ag-farm-food/food
Lizzie, from yesterday….
Yes, I won v council. But I did agree to cover one portion of dirt with bark chips.
Di Natale is defending Triggs against criticisms by the RW.
Ctar1 – from yesterday.
I had the cat stumped. Until this morning. His loss. He stays inside or its a leash. The girl cat is smarter. She is allowed out into the run.
Thanks BW
The government has ruled out stimulus-style spending.
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/federal-politics/political-news/government-rules-out-socalled-stimulus-spending-to-boost-economy-20161211-gt8ioq.html
The existing deficit clearly constitutes stimulus spending. Fiscal policy is expansionary. It has been in most of the years since 2008/9.
So the Liberals are stimulating the economy against their own claimed policy agenda. Normal confusion and lies.
DTT “A quick look at the CPI shows an increase in 44% since 2001 while BEEF prices have gone up 400%.”
Where does that 400% figure come from DTT? The figures I got for Australian retail meat prices supplied by the MLA show beef increased by about 57% (2001 to Sep 2016), Lamb 87% & Chicken 8%.
Darn
Monday, December 12, 2016 at 11:02 am
The refugee crisis engulfing Europe, emanating from Syria and North Africa, is fundamentally climate change driven and a precursor of greater conflict ahead.
The above quote is from Ian Dunlop’s article in the SMH this morning. Can someone please explain to me how climate change is driving the refugee crisis? I thought it was a result of people fleeing from war zones.
It will be very interesting to see what happens when European agricultural fails due to climate change. Where will the Europeans go? Who will take them?
The government’s only real strategy is to lie as required. No lie is too big or too small, too obvious or too devious.
Maybe they have learnt from Trump, or more likely it’s in their DNA.
One thing’s for sure – they know that they can get away with it with relative impunity.
After all it’s not like they’re the Labour Party or anything.
kevjohnno @ #86 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 11:30 am
As usual, DTT destroys an argument that has a degree of validity by resorting to gross exaggeration and hyperbole.
Republicans to launch wide-ranging probe of Russia election hacking, despite Trump’s stance
http://www.abc.net.au/radionational/programs/breakfast/republicans-to-launch-wide-ranging-probe/8111086
@ Whoever it was that was claiming that the Canberra light rail would be a failure because too much of the route was grassland and who didn’t pay attention when I pointed out the obvious fact that the development of the LR would lead to an increased sale price for the ACT government when they sold that land for development, and thus at, or shortly after the LR begins operations, there would be a much higher number of people along the line.
It has begun.
http://www.allhomes.com.au/news/gungahlin-town-centre-to-expand-east-with-estate-development-plan-lodged-20161209-gt4p6u/
Zoomster,
Food production is only one of many things we should consider before deciding to import very large numbers of people every year.
The effect it has had (and continues to have) on our house prices, and hence our children’s lives, has never been properly debated.
The property ‘haves’ end up having even more, whilst the ‘have nots’ remain frozen out. Is that fair?
Importing people costs money for infrastructure, for schools, hospitals, access to government services, public transport, airports. Who pays for these things? Is Baird’s solution of selling off everything owned or run by the government the way to go? What happens when there is nothing left to sell?
The current unstated policy of refusing to discuss the optimum population size is typical of our current political poltroons, but is not an answer to a crisis created by Howard, and maintained by his successors.
I don’t understand the Bill Leak cartoon from BK’s links this morning.
Is anyone able to enlighten me?
‘I don’t understand the Bill Leak cartoon from BK’s links this morning.
Is anyone able to enlighten me?’
You obviously don’t understand it because I assume that you are a normal person.
Maybe a psychiatrist could explain it to us?
There will never be a decrease in our rate of population growth for as long as politicians are judged in the media for GDP growth, instead of some more sensible measure.
‘Importing’ a large (what constitutes ‘large’, anyway?) number of people would not be an issue if we had the right policy settings in place.
Just because Baird sells off everything to provide completely inadequate infrastructure, doesn’t mean that this is the only way to go.
Just because house prices are ridiculously high, doesn’t mean that it’s the fault of immigrants, or that the govt can do nothing, policy wise to change this situation.
The problem isn’t immigrants, it’s our politicians.
Another thing that may have began – the Federal Government campaign to hound the Chief Scientist from office:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2016/dec/11/mathias-cormann-refuses-to-express-confidence-in-alan-finkel-after-climate-criticism#comments
ML
So we’re not worried about global population growth, just letting in them damn foreignors. Fair enough.
Australia does have boundless plains to share. You can pick up a very nice house in country Victoria for less than $200k. (It’s very hard to rent in our town; everyone buys).
‘The effect it has had (and continues to have) on our house prices, and hence our children’s lives, has never been properly debated.
The property ‘haves’ end up having even more, whilst the ‘have nots’ remain frozen out. Is that fair?’
No. So let’s change the rules around negative gearing, and encourage decentralisation (a good NBN would help with that, as might a VFT service on the east coast).
‘Importing people costs money for infrastructure, for schools, hospitals, access to government services, public transport, airports. Who pays for these things?’
Our (natural) population is ageing. This means we won’t have enough working aged people in the future to pay for these things (due to the shrinking tax base). So importing young people helps solve these problems.
Of course, we could also tax international entities more, and make sure they pay up. That would help, too.
Good compromise by Turnbull.
He gave up on his 36 hour dream of giving a shit about the environment.
And in return, the RW were kind enough to agree to take over managing his dinner schedule.
“He also warned [Turnbull eating dinner] could lead to a split within the Liberal party, describing the republican issue as a “catalyst” for defections from the parliamentary party.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-12-12/malcolm-turnbull-gives-keynote-address-at-republican-dinner/8112058
How can so much weakness be contained within just one man?
steve777 @ #97 Monday, December 12, 2016 at 12:47 pm
The one they appointed???
They may find there are no credible takers to be his replacement.