A sweeping draft redistribution of Queensland’s state electoral boundaries has been published today, giving effect to an increase in parliamentary numbers from 89 to 93. Annastacia Palaszczuk has appeared to suggest the finalisation of the redistribution, which is scheduled for May 2017, may herald an early election. The Electoral Commission of Queensland published the boundaries at the close of business today (apparently in response to a “leak”, ahead of a planned release in the morning) without providing spatial data files, so I can’t offer much insight into what it all means exactly. However, the Courier-Mail offers a well-informed account of how it is perceived by party insiders. Hopefully Antony Green will have estimated margins in reasonably short order. Those with further insights to offer are very welcome to do so in the thread below.
From ABC today
“Premier Anastacia Palaszczuk said the changes may alter the electorate that thousands of Queenslanders belonged to.
She has guaranteed the next election, due in almost 12 months, would be contested along the new boundaries.”
If I’m reading this proposal correctly, they’ve gotten from 89 to 93 by abolishing Indooroopilly and creating five new seats in the Sunshine Coast, Moreton Bay, Ipswich, Logan and the Gold Coast. Additionally, Dalrymple has replaced by a more compact seat based on Innisfail.
This picture is obscured by a whole lot of unnecessary renaming, with some very opaque names chosen for both new and pre-existing seats.
DW, yes, the renaming baffled me as well, why not keep some of the old ones? And, where do they get the names? Does someone have naming rights, is it a committee or do th public get to submit suggestions?
Perhaps the Govt. could sell naming rights to corporations and help fund the QEC in the process!!
I agree on the oddness of the seat renaming. At first I thought this was a joke. It is a sure recipe for confusion and a high informal count. I find it hard to believe the AEC would recommend it.
The extensive renaming is very similar to what the WAEC tried to do at their state redistribution….only to find the AEC wanted to use the same name (Burt) for their new seat. They should probably stick to geographic names.
All in all, it looks reasonable in most parts of the state. I was pleased to see quite a few of my ideas got up. I will be interested to see the new margins; it looks like 4 of the 5 new seats would be fairly safe for Labor, plus one LNP seat abolished….but quite a few of the surrounding seats would probably be made better for the LNP.
>>the Courier-Mail offers a well-informed account
The same cannot be said, for a large part, for the comments left behind by some of the horny handed sons of the cane toad control industry that still read the ‘snail are really vile but don’t have the moderating hand of our own dear Pollbludger to blunt the bile being served up.
It’s another country up there…
According to Mr Green (http://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/qld-redistribution-2017/ ) if you apply the last election’s voting figures to the new boundaries Labor would win 47 out of the 93. Close, but enough.
My full analysis can be found here. http://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/qld-redistribution-2017/
There’s a new pendulum, summaries of changes, some maps of major changes and a link to a report listing polling places for all districts.
Of all the odd renaming decisions, Maiwar is possibly the oddest. The Brisbane (Maiwar) River used to run through the middle of the old Indooroopilly district; it would have been a good name for it then. Now it’s merely the southern border; naming the district after a river on one of its borders seems less appropriate. The suburb Indooroopilly is still well and truly within the district, and would still be a good name for it all. Further, the change to Maiwar does nothing to increase the usage of aboriginal place names, because we already had two of them in Indooroopilly and Mt Coot-tha. Actual boundaries seem to make sense though.
Has this Dutton special come out of left field?
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-26/asylum-seekers-issued-with-new-deadline-for-visa-applications/8304766
PHON attracts some lovely followers!
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2017-02-26/one-nation-candidate-claims-she-was-threatened-after-being-dump/8304726
There are so many examples and classes of worker exploitation that Labor should continue to hammer the government with. For example, franchise wage rorts, 457 visa rorts, lack of support for penalty rates. In almost all cases it is the natural constituency of the Coalition who are the perpetrators.
Add to this the behaviour of the banks, the spiv VET outfits, etc.
Where is everybody? Sulking over the reduction of your penalty rates?
Is there a new thread I missed?
Shit! I’m on the wrong thread!