Two polls from Bennelong:
• The Daily Telegraph has a Galaxy poll that has nothing separating John Alexander and Kristina Keneally on two-party preferred. The only primary vote numbers provided are 42% for Alexander and 39% for Keneally. Despite Keneally’s strong showing, only 37% rated that Keneally had done a good job as Premier, compared with 42% for bad job. The poll of 579 respondents was conducted on Wednesday evening, following the announcement of Keneally’s candidacy on Monday.
• A slightly less dramatic result from ReachTEL for the Sydney Morning Herald, with John Alexander leading 53-47 on two-party preferred – which nonetheless indicates a swing of over 6%. The primary votes seem to be a shade under 36% for Alexander and around 29% for Keneally. The poll of 864 respondents was conducted on Thursday evening. Alexander’s personal ratings (51.2% favourable versus 15% unfavourable) are rather stronger than Keneally’s (41.6% to 28.1%), and Malcolm Turnbull records a 59.7-40.3 lead as preferred prime minister.
ratsak:
Agreed re Latham. He’s a husked out shell these days.
WWP
“Clearly a terrible partisan breach of Westminister Parliamentary tradition, for a speaker who is supposed to be the impartial guardian of the Parliament to use the rules and his power to delay sitting to protect a Government without the numbers. He is supposed to work impartially for the Parliament not partisanly against it. Absolute bloody disgrace.”
Agreed. We are not blessed with a credible speaker. Does he take any sort of oath of office to which he can be held to account?
“Won’t there be an absolute majority to suspend standing orders for a royal commission into the banks?”
Yes, although there could be aways around the absolute majority requirement should they present themselves. For instance if the Government ever needs to move a motion to rearrange business that can be amended by simple majority.
Bill Shorten Presser now
No there’s no oath of office for the presiding officers.
They could vote to remove him, but then they’d need a replacement.
MattDoran91: Opposition leader Bill Shorten says Turnbull’s decision to change the sitting calendar is an “assault on democracy”. #auspol @politicsabc
For those asking about some reversal of the week cancellation.
Won’t happen. Can’t happen without an actual majority of 76 votes, which would mean defections from the Government, and even this would need to be in writing with evidence and agreed to by the Speaker.
This often happens in the Senate, where a majority of party leaders/indies (whose members total more than 38) write to the President saying they insist on whatever. This most recently happened last month when they extended Estimates to grill the AWU raid.
Ides,
The speaker doing the rescheduling is clearly kosher under the standing orders.
The question becomes a political one. It would take all the x-bench, and probably a rogue Nat or two to come down to PH and demand entry to the chamber, but if there were 76 of them? Can they be prevented from declaring a session? If there was an absolute majority it would be a real proper constitutional crisis and the GG would probably have to get his hands dirty. But until the likes of McGowan and Christensen come out and clearly say they’re angry enough to want to blow Trumble up it’s not going anywhere as an idea.
What’s more likely I reckon is that enough political opprobrium is heaped on Trumble that caving in and reinstating the week will be the easier option for him than holding out. (that’s what he’s good at too) It just looks so terrible on top of all the other crap. I reckon his internal enemies are right onto the job of using this as another example of why he needs to go asap. It’s a long long shot, but we could also have a challenge called that would require the Libs to head back to Canberra that week anyway.
Trumble is a master at when presented with two unsavoury choices going for the disastrous option C.
It seems like the only real limit on the ability for the Executive, through the Speaker, to change the sitting dates when the House isn’t sitting is that you can’t go 12 months without the House meeting.
Jonthan Pie makes a fair point,but it doesn’t get around the fact that a survey was unnecessary when it came to changing the law.
We already have a definition of democracy here: Parliamentary representative government. The validity of the survey should be judged not by the subject it canvassed, but by the subjects it did notcanvass.
Parliament has a job to do. It should do it.
michaelkoziol: Bill Shorten: “This bloke, he’s lost the plot. This is extraordinary and chaotic decision-making from a government that is absolutely drowning.” #auspol
What should not be forgotten in this latest debacle is labor and the government had a agreement regarding the citizenship issue and a firm agreed date of December 1 for documentation to be presented. A agreement that was negotiated between Coreman, Wong and Shorten.
Pyne and co have today ripped up that negotiated agreement and thrown it in the bin. As such , labor would be on the side of the angles if it prosecuted its own timeframe and refuse to deal at all with the government on this issue in the future. In simple terms, all bets off.
Cheers.
“The speaker doing the rescheduling is clearly kosher under the standing orders.”
It is allowed under the standing orders, it is clearly a very fundamental breach of Westminister Parliamentary government for a supposedly impartial speaker to defer the sitting of Parliament to shield the Government from the Parliament. He should clearly resign in disgrace.
sprocket_ @ #2194 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 9:58 am
But Parry ensures citizenship will drag on with the possibility of more and if they lose Bennelong KK’s appearance will not be a good optic at the start of next year.
I can’t see much clear air.
It’s more like a stew!
Anyone?
“It seems like the only real limit on the ability for the Executive, through the Speaker, to change the sitting dates when the House isn’t sitting is that you can’t go 12 months without the House meeting.”
It is an extraordinarily badly drafted standing order. An it is an extraordinary breach of his duty for the speaker to exercise this power to protect the Government from the Parliament.
I think it’s fair to say that, had parliament had a vote on marriage equality rather than this survey happening, the result, if yes, may not have been as resounding as it’s likely to be following the survey, as our current lot of politicians appear to be more conservative as a whole than the electorate is. But still, it was a waste, and the money could have been much better spent on other things.
Also, the speaker maybe acting quite properly in most circumstances in response to a request of a Government comprised of a majority of members entitled to sit in the Parliament under the Constitution, but it is a power of the speaker, not the executive. In these circumstances, only a partisan hack would exercise the power.
Shorten says they’ll turn up “as usual”.
That’s a bit far WWP, we don’t really have independent speakers.
In the end this is a purely political move from Trumble. That’s why it will blow up in his stupid face.
RichardDiNatale: The government is running scared. Scared that their right-wing agenda doesn’t have the support of the parliament, nor of the people. Bring on an election!
Doyley
Pyne yapped and the Speaker ran away.
I’m surprised that the Black Wiggle didn’t guarantee the numbers for Turnbull in the Reps revolt – might get him more preference deals in the inner city seats.
WeWantPaul @ #2212 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 10:14 am
Like it or not Turnbull leads the Government and there has been no question of that on the floor of the Reps.
As such there is no reason for the Speaker to not allow the Governments request.
The optics of this are not good for Turnbull and I don’t think anyone would have suggested they would be otherwise.
This suggests the alternative is much worse and that alternative arises from things within his own Government.
sarahinthesen8: When kids all over the country tomorrow tell their parents they don’t want to go to school because there’s a maths test I blame the Prime Minister.
Absolutely craven conduct by Turnbull. He has declared to everyone that he’s lost control of the numbers in the house; that he fears the combined strength of his own backbench and the Labor Opposition. Turnbull has run away – again – from a political contest. He deserves – amply deserves – to be dumped by voters in both New England and Bennelong.
He has run out of the Parliament and run away from democracy. What a coward he is.
Absolutely, but seeing as Trumble had crumbled and given Shorten everything he asked it’s a bit hard to see what more Labor could demand.
Shorten will win the politics on it though. (fuck me LOTO Downer could probably have won the politics on it) Shorten saying Labor will turn up “as usual” and the very strong language across the board from Labor indicates Katter won’t be sitting on the lawn all alone. The Greens will be in and you’d expect Wilkie would too. If Sharkie and McGowan come out saying they’re angry about it and expect the previous agreement to be honoured and everything sorted by Dec 1, then you’ll know Trumble has lost everything.
BiGD
Yep, trouble inside the good ship Coalition is the key reason they don’t want to have the Reps sit next week.
“That’s a bit far WWP, we don’t really have independent speakers.”
The Government has been deliberately subverting the constitution for months, the speaker is now an active accomplice in that conspiracy. That none of the pillars of our democracy, the Opposition Leader, the Queen, the GG or the media have stood up in any meaningful way to defend our Constitution and Parliamentary democracy is a very significant concern. So no I don’t think it is a bit far, I don’t think it is being taken seriously enough by anyone.
Worst PM Eva:
1. Trumble
2. Daylight
3. Abbott
Katters idea may end up being a stunt but what a media circus.
Fantasy Parliament. Where the LNP lose lose lose because they don’t turn up. Labor Katter Greens and anyone else can come and join in the fantasy alternative sitting.
Hell why you are at it. Select a good tv presenter for your speaker to guarantee live coverage on a news network
🙂
It is staggering that someone who is paid to write about Federal Politics could be staggered by anything this mob and in particular it’s imbecile of a ‘leader’ does.
guytaur @ #1587 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 2:21 pm
YES …ELECTION NOW !
ratsak @ #1872 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 8:02 am
Interesting stuff!
You sent me diving for my birth certificate to check my exact place of birth as it wasn’t Auburn District Hospital. I can remember when that was being built! It just records ‘Auburn’ as the place of birth. My memory of that occasion is a bit hazy, but I am pretty sure it was a small private hospital around about where St Josephs is now. Maybe it was St Josephs and grew or maybe St Josephs took over the site.
I was looking on google maps and a few places ring a bell. I have vague recollections of my father attending night classes at Auburn Public School to get his Intermediate Certificate. I started primary school diagonally opposite but it looks like the old school that was there has gone.
My paternal grandparents were married at St Thomas’s Anglican Church in Provincial St which, since Grandpa was a Catholic, incurred the wrath of Father O’Buggery from the local Catholic Church.
I attended kindergarten at the Baptist Church in Harrow Rd which is where some of my earliest memories are from.
The place was very whitebread then (early ’50s) and the family moved down to Unanderra near Woollongong where there were lots of European migrants from UK, Germany Austria, Italy etc.
From there we relocated to Bega on the South Coast with very few migrants but I do remember on rather striking young lady from Yugoslavia.
From there we moved back to Sydney, staying with my grandparents on mothers side while my parents built a house at Revesby.
During this second stint at Auburn it was still pretty whitebread with any migrants coming from Europe or being of European ancestry. I recall being at School with a couple of ‘White Russian’ kids and not having the least clue what that meant. They had come from China. That school was Granville Boys High which was the roughest I ever attended.
My rare visits to Auburn since those days have revealed a place transformed both in terms of demographics and housing, with a lot of old homes gone and replaced with McMansions and the like.
Similarly, closer to where I lived with my parents at Revesby, the population has changed dramatically and the whole built environment is changing, particularly in Bankstown and immediately adjacent suburbs.
“As such there is no reason for the Speaker to not allow the Governments request.”
that the speaker is being asked to use his power under the standing orders of the House of Representatives to counter a decision of the House of Representatives to sit on a date, for the purpose of protecting the ‘Government’ from the House of Representatives is just so explicitly wrong that even the ABC should be able to see it, it is 1+1 = 2, stuff
ratsak @ #2230 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 10:30 am
That’s a bit harsh.
Abbott was able to escape early because they had an alternative, Turnbull has no such luxury! 🙂
The Senate could agree to sit for the remainder of this week and pass the SSM bill, removing the purported reason to cancel next week’s sittings.
guytaur @ #2232 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 10:32 am
Maybe they could take over the Reps Chamber in the old Parliament House. 🙂
Abbott was able to escape early because they wrongly assumed they had an alternative
BIGD
Yeah I don’t think the LNP would hold out for long.
A whole four days of parliament with a Labor agenda as a direct contrast while elections are happening. Making a joke of the LNP every evening on the News.
Hell it could get so ridiculous it could push Queensland Labor into a landslide win.
WeWantPaul @ #2236 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 10:33 am
The Government decides the sitting agenda, it was only last week that it tabled the dates for next year.
ratsak @ #2241 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 10:38 am
Maybe this is better;
Abbott was able to escape early because they perceived they had an alternative, Turnbull has no such luxury!
Turnbull on Radio Brisbane:
jamesmassola: And Labor too, apparently! twitter.com/jamesmassola/s…
jamesmassola: Adam Bandt says he will be turn up for work next week. Can you imagine what we and BobKat could get legislated?
I think I can honestly say that I can’t imagine.
dtt – One more thought from me, that I think you’ll agree with on Zimbabwe, is that I’d be a lot more re-assured if the incoming people were saying that as part of removing Mugabe, the holder of the Office of President will be limited to two terms (in a lifetime – No ‘Putin smart arsing’).
ratsak
The mind does boggle. I can see Labor Greens and Katter voting for renewable energy for one.
Katter wants his biofuel.
jenauthor @ #1909 Monday, November 20th, 2017 – 8:49 am
The one that spawned Mark Latham? Yeah, ’nuff said. 😛