As related by The Guardian, Essential Research’s fortnight rolling average result for this week has Labor’s two-party lead at 53-47, down from 54-46 last week. As usual we will have to wait until Essential releases the full report later today for the primary votes.
On the same sex marriage survey, an excessive 86% report having voted, of whom 64% say they voted yes, 31% no, and the rest declining to answer. On the question of support for “an indigenous voice to parliament”, 45% expressed support with 16% opposed, while 47% expressed support for an indigenous treaty, with 16% opposed.
Also featured is the latest in the pollster’s semi-regular series on party attributes, with results similar to those from the previous outing in March. Even the Liberal Party’s rating as “divided” is unchanged at 68%, although it is down six points on being “too close to the big corporate and financial interests”, now at 65%. Labor’s biggest change looks to be a six point drop for “moderate”, to 52%. If I understand the report correctly, the Liberal Party is up six on this measure to 53%.
JR
I think on morning TV this morning while he was going troppo he confirmed that was what he meant.
I think he said it was their ‘constitutional duty’.
FMD
CTar1 @ #1698 Thursday, November 9th, 2017 – 10:31 pm
You mean the ‘<code>’ HTML tag? It seems to work, but not necessarily well in terms of preserving the formatting of its contents (which makes it kind of useless for actual code, but possibly okay for other things).
zeroSpaces
fourSpaces
eightSpaces
nonBreakingSpaces
A R
That would be misleading since you can be entitled to British citizenship without the UK ever knowing , like Nash who was born here and was unlikely ever registered in the UK in anyway but who was still legally a UK Citizen.
It was suggested by a commentor earlier that Indians were surprised by restrictions in Australia about becoming Parliamentary representatives.
They have these two restrictions in India as well as the usual ones related to convicted people and in addition these age restrictions.
* Lok Sabha = ‘House of the People’ i.e. Our House of Reps.
** Rayja Sabha = ‘House of the States’ i.e. Our Senate.
Most people born in Australia are entitled to Australian citizenship but most don’t have to apply for it. The Australian Government, as far as I know, does not keep a register of citizens from birth. People who believe they are Australian Citizens just apply for entitlements as they need/want them and supply the relevant documents requested. I assume that would be the same in the UK.
I’ve been following a discussion about s.44 on the WA ALP Facebook page and put together a list of HoR L/NP MP’s where doubts have been raised about their s.44 status:
– John Alexander
– Josh Fridenberg
– Alex Hawke
– Julia Banks
– Bert van Manen
– Luke Hartsuyker
– Jason Falinski
– Ann Sudmalis
In addition, David Gillespie is currently before the HC regarding an indirect pecuniary interest in the Commonwealth.
Have I missed anyone or does anyone need to come off that list (L/NP members only)?
ar
The US Constitution is a conservative document….a very conservative arrangement indeed.
In Australia, the founding intention was that any eligible voter would be qualified to stand for election:
COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA CONSTITUTION ACT – SECT 34 Qualifications of members
COMMONWEALTH OF AUSTRALIA CONSTITUTION ACT – SECT 34
Qualifications of members
Until the Parliament otherwise provides, the qualifications of a member of the House of Representatives shall be as follows:
(i) he must be of the full age of twenty-one years, and must be an elector entitled to vote at the election of members of the House of Representatives, or a person qualified to become such elector, and must have been for three years at the least a resident within the limits of the Commonwealth as existing at the time when he is chosen;
(ii) he must be a subject of the Queen, either natural-born or for at least five years naturalized under a law of the United Kingdom, or of a Colony which has become or becomes a State, or of the Commonwealth, or of a State.
The Parliament then provided:
COMMONWEALTH ELECTORAL ACT 1918 – SECT 163
Qualifications for nomination
(1) A person who:
(a) has reached the age of 18 years;
(b) is an Australian citizen; and
(c) is either:
(i) an elector entitled to vote at a House of Representatives election; or
(ii) a person qualified to become such an elector;
is qualified to be elected as a Senator or a member of the House of Representatives.
(2) A person is not entitled to be nominated for election as a Senator or a member of the House of Representatives unless the person is qualified under subsection (1).
So the promise was that anyone eligible to vote – really, any citizen – would be eligible to run for election to the Commonwealth Parliament. This gives life to the oft-made claim that the Parliament belongs to the people.
S44 annuls that which has been granted in S34 and, in respect of dual citizens, does so in a completely arbitrary fashion. The impairment of the political rights of dual citizens is, as I’ve said often enough, “phobic, jingoist and archaic”. If there was ever a case for the exclusion of dual citizens from the Parliament, the case no longer exists. The only argument in favour of their disqualification is that dual citizens must be counted as inherently disloyal and, moreover, incapable of discerning their interests as Australian citizens or of representing their electors. This is plainly false. It is not the Australia we all know and share.
I should add that the basis for objecting to this is not only because it asks more (or less) of some politicians. It is because it says that some voters are worth less than other voters; that not all voters can be taken to be equally-valued; that, in fact, citizens do not meet on equal terms.
I think most Australians would be in favour of repealing s44(i) if considered in this way.
a r – I see now that it was Zeh who commented on this rather than you. You rated a mention in his comment.
Yes, I was thinking of the ‘
' HTML tag and in particular the preserving of multiple spaces. That in combination with use of a fixed space/non-kerning font such as standard 'Courier' provides a decent layout for tables with correctly lined up columns.Breaking: The Australian reports that John Alexander is a Brittish dual citizen and will resign this weekend.
Malcolm Turnbull has set up a clash with Bill Shorten over four Labor MPs who face growing questions about their right to sit in federal parliament, clearing the ground for an extraordinary round of by-elections to decide the government’s fate early next year.
The Prime Minister spurned the Opposition Leader’s call to shield the MPs from a Coalition vote to refer them to the High Court over their citizenship, in a dramatic expansion of the number of MPs who risk being disqualified from parliament.
There was mounting internal speculation last night that Liberal MP John Alexander has realised he has a problem with dual citizenship and is planning to announce his resignation as early as the weekend, paving the way for a by-election. Sources told The Australian last night Mr Alexander had considered resigning earlier in the week but had been talked out of it.
Thanks Grimace! I was wondering when he would find out – it seemed unlikely that his father has rescinded British citizenship.
Also, while Labor’s vetting processes have been far better than those of the coalition (in that they exist), I think that the Labor MPs who did not get confirmation of their renunciation of British citizenship before they they nominated need to refer themselves to the High Court, because I think a ruling is needed for this particular circumstance. On the other hand, I do not think they need to resign from Parliament while the matter is decided.
Douglas and Milko says:
Friday, November 10, 2017 at 12:34 am
Thanks Grimace! I was wondering when he would find out – it seemed unlikely that his father has rescinded British citizenship.
Of course, Gilbert Alexander would never have renounced anything. While he was alive and in Australia, he was never regarded under Australian law as “foreign”. He only posthumously became a foreigner. While he lived, he could have stood for election and not been disqualified by 44(i).
Section 34 is a spent provisional section (as shown by the “until Parliament otherwise provides” and was otherwise provided in 1902 in legislation replaced in 1918, which has then been amended many times). It did not provide for women to stand in the states they had yet to win the vote in (which was all 4 eastern states), did not provide for people barred from voting based on race to stand, did not provide for people barred from voting for being on welfare, in prison, etc to stand.
Sections 44 and 45, which can only be amended by referendum, was clearly intended to be above section 34. They were designed to keep out undue influences (crown dependent people (under government influence), bribe takers, people under control of foreign government (employees of foreign government, nationals of foreign powers, etc), bankrupts, etc) and undesirables (bankrupts, criminals serving or about to serve time, bribe takers, etc) from Parliament. Section 44i`s ban on dual nationals is just a reflection of the prejudices of the majority of our constitution`s authors.
It should go but is was not out of step with the rest of the constitution when it was drawn up.
Douglas and Milko @ #1711 Thursday, November 9th, 2017 – 11:34 pm
Exactly so.
Maybe. They certainly have a better argument for doing so than Joyce and Nash ever did. But it still has the potential to backfire (though not nearly as spectacularly as with Joyce/Nash).
I think they at least need advice (which is to say, competent advice, like perhaps from Gleeson) saying they’re probably okay. If they can’t get any, then they should stand aside pending a ruling from the HC. And so should any other MP under the same cloud.
Tom
That looked like Turnbull’s attempted tactic but Grimace says a couple of comments above that the Australian says Alexander a Pom and will resign this weekend.
Turnbull will be saying ‘Drat, foiled again’ or doing a ‘Roadrunner impersonation of his flight out of here. Leaving the country and pretending this renders him unable to take part in domestic politics seems to be a favourite ‘thing’ for him at the moment.
The GG going to Beersheba would have been quite appropriate and this 6 days away is justified on a meeting with Trump. He doesn’t seem to rate ‘video conferencing’ as adequate but this is ‘standard’ for politicians who nevertheless keep insisting that government employees should use it rather than travel for important meetings.
(I’d have to say my own experiences of using video conferencing is that it’s very inferior when there are multiple participants and you can’t see all the faces and their body language during the discussion.
Really?
From what I have heard of Gilbert Alexander (came where as a small child and lived the rest of his life here), he would seem to have gained Australian Citizenship upon the introduction thereof by being a British Subject resident in Australia for the 5 years preceding the introduction of the act. British Citizens became citizens of a foreign power when the UK became a foreign power, which was (according to the High Court in Sue versus Hill) at the latest 1986 with the passage of the Australia Acts (although they were not definitive on it not being earlier).
grimace says:
Friday, November 10, 2017 at 12:28 am
Malcolm Turnbull has set up a clash with Bill Shorten over four Labor MPs who face growing questions about their right to sit in federal parliament, clearing the ground for an extraordinary round of by-elections to decide the government’s fate early next year.
There must be a very high chance that a House election will be called in the New Year.
The HC is scheduled to be on leave from 15 December and does not return to sit until 5 Feb. It will then be in session until 17 Feb. Presumably, it will take until around that day to arrange, hear and determine the many cases to be referred to it, and, most likely a large number of by-elections will be ordered. Would Turnbull chose to fight a host of unwanted by-elections? Will he still be PM by then? Will the pressure for a general election prove irresistible?
If an election were called over the weekend following the end of the HC sitting, the first date for an election would be 33 days later, on 22 March.
John Alexander surprised me as member of parliament. I expected the ‘celebrity Liberal candidate’ that knocked off the previous ‘celebrity Labor candidate’ in North Sydney would sit on his ar#e and do nothing.
Instead he made a real ‘nuisance’ of himself for his own party re’ domestic housing policy. His advocacy of accessing superannuation to buy housing was, I think, misguided but, still, he had a ‘go’ so good on him for that.
Tom the first and best says:
….Section 44(i)’s ban on dual nationals is just a reflection of the prejudices of the majority of our constitution`s authors.
It should go but is was not out of step with the rest of the constitution when it was drawn up.
I agree, of course. It follows that those who would oppose its repeal reflect the same prejudices as the authors showed in 1898.
Section 44 is the appendix of the Australian constitution. It’s original purpose has long since disappeared. It usually does no harm if ignored. Once inflamed it could burst and be extremely dangerous.
It still puzzles me why anyone who wants to represent the nation at its highest level would want to be the citizen of another country? I hear the argument that the constitution is wrong and out of date, but I still can’t understand why it is so important to some that a national politician would want to retain foreign national status.
Douglas and Milko @ #1711 Thursday, November 9th, 2017 – 8:34 pm
They definitely don’t need to resign.
They took steps to resolve their citizenship issues, the only question is, were those steps sufficient to meet the requirements of s44(i).
The BBC is reporting that a nurse in Germany has been arresting for the alleged murder of two patients and is being investigated in regard to up to one hundred others.
I’m in favour of voluntary euthanasia when patients have incurable painful diseases and have received very adequate assessments and that it is very sure that this is their wish.
But medical staff making this decision without this happening is simple murder.
The authors of the Constitution did not however have a prejudice against the white people from other parts of the British Empire, especially as many of them were from the UK, those who are mainly on the receiving end of section 44 at the moment. They were in fact trying to favour them.
Judicious use required!
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-cyber-mobile-vulnerability/mobile-app-errors-expose-data-on-180-million-phones-security-firm-idUSKBN1D91ZA?il=0
grimace @ #1709 Thursday, November 9th, 2017 – 9:26 pm
Apparently he was going to resign earlier but was talked out of it.
By whom? And why?
Briefly
Most of the people you seem to be claiming are prejudiced because they don’t immediately jump in saying something needs to be done about s. 44 are a) thinking it’s not that onerous a requirement for those who want to be paid representatives of Australian voters, and b) think there are many other thing that require fixing before this makes its way to the top of the list of things to do.
I think in regard to parliamentary representation in the Senate the unequal representation of voters and the number overall of senators is well in front on the list of things to do. We could half the number of senators without any detriment to democracy.
Putin on the Russian presidential election –
ww.reuters.com/article/us-russia-putin-us/putin-says-u-s-looking-to-stir-trouble-at-upcoming-russian-presidential-vote-ria-idUSKBN1D91WS?il=0
Nothing new to this. The US has been well known for interfering/trying to influence the outcome of elections in other countries elections for almost 70 years. Some off their efforts so blatant that they couldn’t fail to be noticed.
It’s a standard thing to do for countries who want to be ‘world powers’ and, of course, Russia and now China are right into doing it.
It is easiest to fix issues with the constitution when they are relatively fresh in voters minds, for section 44, that likely means soon.
The number of Senators from the states could be legislatively halved (the minimum is 6 per state) but that would significantly reduce the proportionality and the access of all but the biggest 2-3 parties to the Senate, dramatically reducing its wide representative nature, unless the Senators were all elected at once and that requires a referendum (and was put in 1988 and failed by a wide margin).
The malapportionment of the Senate not only requires a referendum to pass, it requires one that passes in every state that is proportionately loosing representation and that just is no going to happen.
It’s possible al-Hariri could actually be in voluntary protective custody. After all his father was assassinated using a car bomb not very many years ago.
(AJ reporting right now as I write this that Harari has been holding meetings with representatives of foreign countries, that Saudi Arabia have recommended that their citizens leave Lebanon immediately and also that the whole imbroglio is about Qutar holding the ‘World Cup'(!). AJ reporting on the Gulf States and their immediate neighbours should be treated with caution.)
http://www.reuters.com/article/us-lebanon-politics/exclusive-lebanon-believes-hariri-held-in-saudi-wants-foreign-pressure-top-officials-idUSKBN1D914F?il=0
Tom the first and best Friday, November 10th, 2017 – 1:58 am Comment #1730
Yes, that’s for sure, but it’s a bit of theatre that’s attracted the attention of National Party supporters on a ‘Poor Barnaby is being picked on by city people’ basis.
There’s been nothing from Barnaby to suggest that maybe he should not have ticked the ‘box’ until he saw to remedying his situation in regard to British citizenship. The suggestion today that his paternal grandmother was a Pom just adds to the theatre! And both situations easy to discover and easy to remedy.
Most voters are still disengaged and wont even have clocked this bit of action.
I think that having to go out to vote on changing this would pi## many voters off as for most the idea that our federal politicians should have only Australian citizenship is simple and seems sensible. It would take a very skillful campaign to win a referendum on changing this.
CTar1 @ #1729 Friday, November 10th, 2017 – 12:52 am
I wouldn’t dispute that in a great many cases. But U.S. interference in Russia itself? I don’t think so.
If that’s what the U.S. has been doing, then they’re either hopelessly incompetent at it or secretly in love with Putin and United Russia. He and/or his party wins in a massive landslide every single time since 2000.
When Russia ends up with a Trump-level trainwreck as president, then maybe I’ll credit their claims of U.S. interference. And tell them that karma’s a bitch.
Correction …
“There’s been nothing from Barnaby to suggest that maybe he should not have ticked the ‘box’ until he saw to remedying his situation in regard to
BritishNew Zealand citizenship. The suggestion today that his paternal grandmother was a Pom just adds to the theatre! And both situations easy to discover and easy to remedy.”a r
They did cop Gorby at one point but that was a result of the inevitable collapse of the USSR. Maybe that taught them a lesion.
There’s no doubting that despite the fairly rough handling of his opposition that Putin is very popular domestically.
He’s an interesting character in that he and Medevev appeared to start out with the right idea – that too much had been given away to to few for too little during the Soviet implosion.
But the seductiveness of ‘maybe a little for themselves along the way’ looks to have set in fairly quickly.
Medevev’s Tuscan Estate, in particular, looks to have gone down like the proverbial lead balloon.
There’s also the other Lib Alexander, what’s his role in all of this? And what’s he thinking?
Alexander Downer, Australian High Commissioner to the United Kingdom.
Australian Internet speeds according to Ookla, which operates speedtest.net, one of the internet’s most popular speed testing tools. A table showing relative speeds in cities across the country is included in the article.
http://www.canberratimes.com.au/technology/technology-news/revealed-the-fastest-telcos-and-cities-in-australia-for-broadband-20171108-gzhmyb.html
Last week, former Senate president Stephen Parry announced he was a dual citizen by descent and resigned.
Mr Turnbull said others should do the same if they knew they had dual citizenship.
“Obviously if a member believes that they are a dual citizen now and are ineligible to sit in the Parliament, then they should resign,” he said.
If John Alexander comes to the conclusion he is a dual citizen he will resign and won’t be referred to HC. I’m still waiting for confirmation that S Parry will be referred and replaced by a recount.
JW
Are you wondering if Alexander will wait as Turnbull wants him to or announce what the UK Home Office tells him when he gets his answer immediately?
If I was Alexander and marked as ‘out’ I’d not compromise myself any more to try to prop up a failing government.
JW – Perry being a senator would indicate that the ruling will be a simple recount but we could be surprised as the HC looks to be on ‘open ground’ on much of this.
Trying as much as they can, it seems, to set some solid precedent while doing it in as small steps so they have space to do move as they have a plethora of matters ahead to deal with and many having some variation to them.
Barnaby on 7:30 blaming ‘staffers sneaking around in NZ’ for his problems and everyone else … nothing to do with own either his own disregard for the law or failure to read or understand what he was signing.
Centrelink clients get no such leniency for signing statutory declarations that prove to be untrue. They have to pay the money back.
This could all probably be drawn to an end by the Special Minister of State announcing that those who are in breech of the legal requirements and don’t own up by 1 December will face debt recovery proceedings.
I’m trying to say that the HC won’t be involved if an MP resigns and are not referred. That is the option Turnbull is pushing/threatening. Jacqui Lambie is saying she will resign if she finds she has dual citizenship. I’m not convinced she would be referred against her wishes. I appreciate that the Greens were referred after resigning but they were part of a package and Waters not clear cut.
There’s been no announcement that S Parry will be referred. It’s not automatic.
J Alexander will do what’s in the interest of his party, seems a loyal sort. If he does go then the timing will be important to Turnbull. I don’t think he will be referred.
New thread.