Two days out from the Batman by-election, a dedicated thread for discussion. The campaign has been dominated by the disunity of the local Greens, with Alex Bhathal’s opponents characterised by Noel Towell of The Age as “long-term party stalwarts … aghast at some of the people surrounding the candidate, who they say are newcomers to the party with a ‘whatever-it-takes’ approach to their politics”. The Financial Review reports that the Greens’ infighting has given Labor some hope in what is generally acknowledged to be an uphill struggle, with Ladbrokes presently offering $1.45 on the Greens and $2.50 on Labor. However, former Labor Senator Stephen Conroy offered a pessimistic view on Sky News yesterday.
Good luck to Alex Bhathal and the Greens on Saturday! Watch out for the Labor dirty tricks which have already started.
Ha, ha, ha…. My dear Edwina, tell Turnbull that, this time around, the Greens are not in the position to save him…. The only “dirty trick” was to make Adani, an irrelevant issue in Batman and Victoria, the centre and only topic for this by-election, as if the local 7+% “official” unemployment was something completely secondary… if not irrelevant. The voters are now ready to tell the Greens what they think about their priorities…..
After that…. consecutive negative Newspoll N. 30 will be approaching for the Waffler from Wentworth…. 🙂
Michelle Grattan has a 50 minute podcast discussing Batman at The Conversation today.
https://theconversation.com/politics-podcast-the-batman-byelection-battleground-93310
I usually don’t attack the greens on this blog. But what a disgrace DiNatale is attacking labor over the tax changes. Slimey as …
I would expect Labor wants to be the underdog in this by-election to stifle the protest vote against the Opposition. You know it makes sense.
Two good candidates and Labor have definitely been playing to win. I don’t have a horse in the race but I live nearby. I predict a Greens win but my predictions are almost always wrong (GW Bush in 2004 wat???)
I am still predicting a close result regardless if Labor or the Greens win. Although a Greens win is going to terrify the federal members for Wills and Melbourne Ports, not to mention the state member for Richmond. The state seat of Brunswick will be won by the Greens in November since the current Labor member is retiring.
I do believe the Greens will hold the balance of power with between 4 and 5 MP’s in the Victoria Legislative Assembly come November.
Labor gave the Greens the opening.
50 minutes of Michelle Grattain?
I’ll save the link for a night when I can’t get to sleep.
It’s surprising that the Greens are still a chance after all the infighting. I have to say that the Greens need to do a comprehensive internal review and expel a fair few members.
I know nothing about the rights and wrongs of the fight between Alex Bhathal and her opponents: I’m assuming from some of the language of her opponents that Bhathal might be more of a “social green”(ie, some variety of red) and they are from the more environment-focused wing of the party. Does anyone actually know? I’d be interested.
But, whatever are the rights and wrongs of the situation, the behaviour of the so-called “long-term party stalwarts” should see them marched out the door. Probably won’t happen though: the Greens are an odd bunch.
Alpo
Although I totally agree with your sentiments in relation to election campaign being derailed with issues less relevant to the electorate (or state), I totally disagree with your comment….”The only “dirty trick” was to make Adani, an irrelevant issue in Batman and Victoria”
Having just endured an entire state campaign based on pokies and false accusations of a greens/labor alliance I share your frustration.
However to say Adani is irrelevant to Batman is false, just as it was not unfair of Hawke to make saving the Franklin river a national issue that swept him to power (although I think its fair to say he was headed in that direction anyway).
It is widely accepted amongst climate scientists that if the coal contained within the Galilee is burnt for energy consumption that this alone will be more than enough to smash our carbon budget remaining to keep temperatures below 2C of warming on a global level (its not difficult science). The effects of this will be felt in Batman as much as it will in Queensland. Unless of course you are arguing for example that if there are massive price rises to food due to effects of climate change such as prolonged heatwaves, storm damage , drought, flood etc. The residents of Batman will be immune from those costs??
‘meher baba says:
Thursday, March 15, 2018 at 10:55 am
It’s surprising that the Greens are still a chance after all the infighting. I have to say that the Greens need to do a comprehensive internal review and expel a fair few members.
I know nothing about the rights and wrongs of the fight between Alex Bhathal and her opponents: I’m assuming from some of the language of her opponents that Bhathal might be more of a “social green”(ie, some variety of red) and they are from the more environment-focused wing of the party. Does anyone actually know? I’d be interested. ‘
It has been clear for some time to disinterested observers that the the environmentalists are waking up to the revolutionaries. Some environmentalists are sticking around for the good fight, for example Brown/Buckingham v Rhiannon. But many, many others have figured out that the ideologues do not give a rat’s about either the workers or the environment. The previously tight discipline which kept the shitfights in-house has broken down. This is not helping.
The environmentalists are also finally waking up to the fact that the Greens are effectively a parking station for environmentalist votes but deliver nothing at all for the environment. The Greens are always ‘stating’, ‘protesting’, ‘proposing’, ‘preventing’, ‘having conversations about’ – that is to say, The Greens verbalize but do not do stuff.
So, many environmentalists are jumping ship. How many of the latter? My guess (sic!) is that the Greens national polling which has slipped from the 15-19% range to the 9-11% range gives us a bit of an insight. At around 160,000 voters per per cent that gives a very rough figure of around 800,000 disenchanted Greens.
MB
I would add that Di Natale has been particularly cack-handed when it comes to picking his agenda. The bullshit about a Massive National Campaign to Change the Date jumped the shark, for example.
Di Natale also appears to lack the authority of Brown and Milne – both of whom – whatever else you might think of them – had earned their laurels the hard way.
Matt,
This is a by-election that will not change a thing regarding Adani even if the Greens win. So, the Greens are saying: Vote for us because of Adani…. but we promise that we won’t be able to change anything about Adani if we win!…. And in any event, the ALP position on Adani is clear: No Federal or State Government money for Adani; No permission to ignore environmental protection laws; No easy taxpayers’ money for Adani because a future ALP Federal Government won’t rescind the contract, rather they will allow the Carmichael project to die a natural death.
As far as the broader issues of climate change, anthropogenic global warming, renewables and environmental policies, the ALP doesn’t need any lecture from the Greens. But the Greens do need lectures from the ALP about the economy, jobs, living standards, local services, etc.
Ultimately, politically, a vote for the Greens in Batman is a vote of support for Malcolm Turnbull and the Liberals. The Libs are the only political beneficiaries (or at least they will desperately try to spin it that way) of a potential loss for the ALP in Batman.
It’s by-elections like this that show why we need to move to a PR electoral system like Germany and NZ.
Greens and ALP pandering to rich inner city properties interests and just writing off the rest of Australia, Turnbull handing out defence contracts based upon marginal electorates and the National Party pork barrelling ludicrous infrastructure projects shows how distorted the system.
Helen Clark got it right in 1998 when she pushed through MMP and you can see the benefits NZ have in the form of better and stable government ever since.
Boerwar – “Di Natale also appears to lack the authority of Brown and Milne – both of whom – whatever else you might think of them – had earned their laurels the hard way.”
oh you mean like Shorten, Gillard and Rudd when compared to Hawke and Keating! and I don’t mean this in a sarcastic way. I think this is why the electorate is getting so apathetic of current politics… Leaders who have no character or personal beliefs, say what they are told to, not what they want to.
Gillard was a classic example… when she wasn’t PM she was articulate, passionate. the moment she becomes PM….. drivel, appeasing (with the exception of the Misogamy speech of course – which showed it was there still)
Tassie is a classic example with the greens – they are struggling because the passionate members that represented the electorate are gone (the likes of Kim Booth, Tim Morris, McKim, yes Milne and Putt) the members they went to the last election with where ghosts. Don’t fool yourself though, Labor was as bad and that’s why they faired not much better…..
Alpo
“As far as the broader issues of climate change, anthropogenic global warming, renewables and environmental policies, the ALP doesn’t need any lecture from the Greens”
Really – think you need to remove those rose coloured glasses there Alpo……
Greens vs Labor for lower house seats is a big waste of time for both.
Greens get a big strategic advantage in having 1 lower house seat, they can introduce legislation, getting a 2nd lower house seat is pretty much irrelevant, even if greens had the balance of power i doubt Labor would want anything more than guarantee of support in any no-confidence vote.
Greens have a much greater change of maintaining balance of power in the upper house, and that requires a statewide or national campaign. Targeting narrower geographies is more expensive, so the lower house campaigns reduce there chances in the upper house.
It doesnt hurt Labor to lose seats to the extreme left because it makes them look more sensible to the center, and thats where elections are won. In the long term Labor can just tweak the policies and push a little further left and win back the ‘moderate green voters’
Libs think supporting greens is a good idea because it might cost Labor a seat, but it just promotes their opposite extreme.
From a local perspective the Left collectively (Labor+Greens) are both losers if the Greens win, Ged Kearney would be a fantastic addition to the parliament, even greens voters should admit that.
Matt
I mean that Di Natale does not have the personal stature of Brown or Milne, that he is unable to stop the infighting from becoming public, that he shows significant political misjudgements, and that this is hurting the Greens vote.
All sorts of other leadership assessments and comparisons are possible but I was restricting my comments to the Greens.
Bug 1
I think they both would make a fantastic addition to parliament. Far better than Feeney.
I would have preferred them putting a witches hat in the Batman seat than having him in parliament. Just the kind of hack that Labor needed gone. so they have won already IMHO no matter the result.
bug1
Labor gets hurt by the Greens because:
1. There are a stack of soft votes to Labor’s right who will never vote for Labor because they think Labor will join with the Greens in hung parliaments or where the Greens have the BOP.
2. The Greens attack Labor four times more often than they attack the Coalition.
3. In practice, the Greens consistently seek to wedge Labor.
4. The Greens force Labor to divert scarce resources to electoral fights. These scarce resources necessarily are no longer available to fight the Tories.
5. The Greens undermine Labor in government eg Malaysian Solution.
6. The Greens routinely misrepresent Labor and the Coalition as being the same.
I could go on.
The fact is that the revolutionaries in the Greens will never change either their minds or anybody ele’s minds either. In their own right, their electoral prospects are zero and we know that their abuse of the Greens is standard revolutionary front organization stuff.
What we are also seeing is that real environmentalists are waking up to this.
Boerwar
Probably true, could make a good essay, I think its more to do with the party becoming older, and with that you get more internal issues, lets face it they are nothing compared with the Labor/Libs factional infighting amongst their respective parties. I think it may have just been blown up a teeeeennnnnnyyyyy bit by the media to serve their anti-green agenda me thinks.
Matt
I accept what you are saying about the MSM.
OTOH, the NSW infighting in particular is existential for the revolutionaries and the environmentalists, IMO.
The other thing is that many of the older Greens were sort of nice to each other and sort of nice mostly to others.
Some of the folk surrounding Bhathal are saying ‘screw that’ to being nice.
The result is that the Greens are starting to look like just another bunch of political hacks.
ESJ is on here just to stir the pot. If Labor win Batman you won’t see Edwina for dust.
Your probably correct Boerwar, I am not close enough to the campaign to know.
suppose that is the unfortunate reality of broadening the base? the same thing I see so many here bemoaning the fact that labor has to account for?
Yes The NSW infighting I agree with. The Greens were never founded as a party to “revolutionise” the political system “soviet socialist style” unfortunately I think these are some of the former Socialist Alliance that have come on board thinking they can do just that.
This is why Brown and Milne came down so hard on them, because this is not the values of the party. They were founded based on Buddhist principles (and not the F**Ked up pretend Myanmar types), not socialist ones!
Boewar;
1. The soft votes on Labors right, you mean conservatives that go PHON, happy to lose them, they are probably to right of moderate Liberals as well.
2. Yea Greens attack Labors, because we are ideologically closer to them than Liberals, not suggesting we should be allies.
3. I agree that Greens seek to wedge Labor, but they are dreaming, for it to happen they would have to adopt moderate policies and then they lose their support base, we have already seen the difficulty that causes them last year with factionalism. Labor can easily counter the greens by adopting moderate progressive polices
4. Its a choice to both parties as to how much money they spend, i agree money should be spend fighting to our right.
5. The greens try and undermine us with the Malaysia Solution, and CPRS, but in the long term it backfires. If they can undermine us with sensible policies then we should be ashamed of ourselves and we need to work harder.
There is a saying, “Any man who is not a socialist at age 20 has no heart. Any man who is still a socialist at age 40 has no head”, which pretty much insults most people… The point is that their will always be young angry group on the hard left and old angry people on the hard right.
If the greens wernt there it would be a strong faction in the Labor party pushing that way, and that could be much more damaging to Labor, if we maintain sensible policies and appeal to the centre a lot of Greens voters (as opposed to the party) will grow out of it, and move towards the center.
I believe that the House of Representatives should be elected using proportional representation, I propose the party-list system using either a D’Hondt or Sainte-Laguë method. The number of MP’s would remain the same, however they would be representing the whole state for a particular party instead of just a single electorate. You would need a minimum percentage of the vote to be elected say 5% to filter out the micro-parties, especially in the states with the most MP’s namely Queensland, Victoria and New South Wales.
Multi-member electorates elected using the Hare-Clark system is another option. However the electorates would be pretty big at least 400,000 people if not more. Tasmania for example would be one electorate with five members, instead of having five MP’s in the House of Representatives currently.
However back to the Batman by-election, strategically Labor should allow the Greens to win electorates such as Batman and focus it’s efforts on winning marginal electorates in the outer suburbs of the major cities and the provincial cities. Because there is no chance at the moment that the Greens would not support Labor at least on confidence and supply if they govern in a minority position.
Difficult choice for me as a former Democrat, in Reservoir.
Ged Kearney is a genuine person who’ll fight for a fairer Australia within the pragmatic Shorten Government. To me, she seems the quintessential principled politician Australians are longing for. I’ve watched Ged Kearney at various Batman election forums and she’s clearly a decent, progressive, gentle, and yet, determined person. I have heard her speak with heart about many issues including issues I care deeply about such as health, disability, overseas aid and poverty.
Alex Bathal impresses too. She has withstood the attacks from a splinter faction in her own party with dignity, after being attacked despite doing the hard yards for years (at the forefront of the greening of the north of the electorate). Alex has great local support, with her posters seemingly on every second shop and fence. However I have found her answers to questions always revert to climate change and refugees, irrespective of the issues raised, suggesting to me that her policy focus is narrow.
My preference is for Ged Kearney with her wider experience in health, the economy and her international experience. I think her election would be more effective in achieving a progressive Australia.
Batman aside, Tasmanian election results are slowly being released today. Final result 13-10-2. All seats declared except final seat in Denison and last 4 positions in Lyon’s. ALP defeated Greens in Bass, but Greens retain final seat in Franklin against Libs.
If, as seems likely, the ALP has a working majority after the next election then voters in Batman must choose between:
Ged Kearney, who will be a strong voice opposed to the Adani mine, working within an ALP government.
Alex Bathal, who will be one of a few lonely voices on the cross-benches with no influence on the future of Adani .
On that basis, anyone rational who is keen to stop the Adani mine will vote for Ged.
There are a few reports on Twitter of ReachTel SMS polling in Batman today.
wonderful propaganda by ALP members for not voting Green and what can’t be done if you are outside the ALP. Long history of Australian parliaments independents & minority parties suggests that is just plain wrong. Lots of ALP members are secretly delighted that the Greens exist
oh you mean like Shorten
The idea that Shorten doesn’t have as much authority in the ALP than pretty much any leader in it’s history is just nonsense. He might use his authority very subtly, but no one can point to an internal battle he hasn’t won.
A leader without authority would not be out spruiking a ‘courageous’ policy like Labor’s Imputation Credit changes from opposition possibly up to 14 months out from an election. It’s just ridiculous to imaging somehow Bowen has bullied him into this. The fact Shorten encourages his ministers to get brave and bring on and lead on policy both demonstrates and enhances his authority. It is in stark contrast to how quickly Rudd lost his authority for allegedly doing the opposite.
Lots of people have underestimated Shorten. Not many have profited from it.
Kearney and Shorten are ex ACTU. They will forever and a day keep propping up our large scale mining and manufacturing at the expense of our growth industries- small scale non unionised technology firms and creative start ups. Really the ALP need to get past the glory days of large scale organised capitalism.
Oh great another Green seat in federal parliament by the looks of it.
The greens are as useless as tits on a bull.
Their policies are fairy land stuff that can never be implemented in government.
If these electorates go on voting green labor governments shoukd just build huge freeways through them. Make it easier for residents of labor electorates to get to work, shops, sporting events etc.
Good luck to the Greens! The Greens don’t offer my ideal policy platform; they deserve the moniker “neoliberals on bicycles”. On the other hand, more Greens MPs open the Overton Window of policy options in a favourable (i.e. more progressive) direction. Another Labor MP would add zero value to the Parliament. In order for Greens voters to have a fair level of representation in the House, there would need to be 15 Greens MHRs. It seems more than a little snowflakey of Labor partisans to be screeching about the prospect of a second Greens MP in the House.
Bit rich for labor to be claiming a Greens MP would be a waste of space after they foisted Feeney and Ferguson upon the people of Batman for all that time. More ex ACTU careerists. Thanks a lot guys.
The question for many must be. … which of these is the least hypocritical? Would I have most effect by making a protest and voting informal.
Bob.
It took a lot of pressure, largely orchestrated by Rod Donald (RIP) from the NZ Greens to get MMP.
Good on Labour and the Nationals for finally coming to that position, but due credit to the NZ Greens.
Isn’t there a Cottesloe bi election on Saturday too, in WA?
Gotta love the disinformation from Labor fans on here. No wonder you are labelled Liberal Lite – lies, lies, lies.
As Peter Van Onselen wrote last month the Greens are labelled loonies, yet Labor & Liberal constantly pilfer their policies.
The Greens are labelled loonies because their policies, like the electric car one of a couple of days ago, are too forward thinking for the Lib/Lab supporter to grasp. No wonder research shows Greens voters have, on average, higher education & also said education is more likely to be in the sciences.
Greens have ideas that are good in theory, but often not practical, and sometimes even go against their own principles to be vengeful. eg CPRS
Bug1
I have no idea why ALP supporters think the Greens should have voted for the Continue Polluting Regardless Scheme cooked up by the ALP and LNP to appease the right of the LNP simply because the attempted wedge blew up in Rudds face? It was a dog turd of a policy and would have been electoral suicide for the Greens if they have supported.
I remember listening to Sabra Lane back in the Howard era when Trioli was doing the Sydney morning show.
Lane was a shill for the Liberals then, just as she is now.
Like her colleague Sales, she is little more than an unashamed spruiker for the conservatives.
“Gotta love the disinformation from Labor fans on here. No wonder you are labelled Liberal Lite – lies, lies, lies.
As Peter Van Onselen wrote last month the Greens are labelled loonies, yet Labor & Liberal constantly pilfer their policies.
The Greens are labelled loonies because their policies, like the electric car one of a couple of days ago, are too forward thinking for the Lib/Lab supporter to grasp. No wonder research shows Greens voters have, on average, higher education & also said education is more likely to be in the sciences.”
Or the Greens can adopt “forward looking” policies first because they whole political project nowadays is to convince post materialist voters who cluster in gentrified inner city seats. They can also adopt all of them at once because they won’t ever need to do the hard work of actually implementing them.
That’s why you are called Green Tories.
Wrong thread…
“I know nothing about the rights and wrongs of the fight between Alex Bhathal and her opponents: I’m assuming from some of the language of her opponents that Bhathal might be more of a “social green”(ie, some variety of red) and they are from the more environment-focused wing of the party. Does anyone actually know? I’d be interested.”
I’ve been following the infighting closely, but reliable information is hard to come by. There have been a couple of ‘new’ articles in recent days but there’s no new information in them.
From what I’ve gathered, one of the Greens councillors who planned an ascent to the state seat of Northcote in last year’s by-election was miffed when he missed out. Apparently Bhathal backed Lidia Thorpe and, with her support in the branch, swayed the vote and the councillor missed out. By how much I don’t know. But in hindsight it was the right move, Thorpe won in a landslide after all. That’s reportedly when the knives came out, with the anti-Bhthal camp lodging bullying and branch stacking allegations against Bhathal.
So I think it’s more personal than ideological. When all of it broke I was astounded at the combination of bravery and spinelessness in the complaints against her. Bhathal continued to attract big swings to the Greens at previous elections in Batman yet for unknown, anonymously-made reasons, a small group seemed hell bent on doing whatever it takes to get her thrown out. It smacks of deep divisions and appallingly opportunistic timing on her detractors’ part. She’s always increased their vote and she is backed by her branch, what were they thinking?!
It’s been reported that Bhathal has unassailable levels of support in her branch, which, being a party that prides itself on being grassroots, makes the accusations against her and their timing all the more puzzling.
Like you say, the ‘long term party stalwarts’ participating in such tactics would be kicked out of other parties for such behaviour. It’s incredibly damaging, more so to a party like the Greens who paint themselves as paradigms of virtue. Still, if Bhathal wins and her enemies are identified, they will have the sword of Damocles hanging over their heads.
bakunin
As far as i remember the Greens opposed CPRS on economic rather than environmental grounds (Christine Milnes famous speech about compensation), and as you say, it would have been political suicide for them to fix the problem they are famously there to fix.
It exposed their hypocrisy.
“From what I’ve gathered, one of the Greens councillors who planned an ascent to the state seat of Northcote in last year’s by-election was miffed when he missed out. Apparently Bhathal backed Lidia Thorpe and, with her support in the branch, swayed the vote and the councillor missed out. By how much I don’t know. But in hindsight it was the right move, Thorpe won in a landslide after all. That’s reportedly when the knives came out, with the anti-Bhthal camp lodging bullying and branch stacking allegations against Bhathal.”
I’ve done a fair bit of online sleuthing since I wrote my earlier comment. There seems to be a hotbed of anti-Bhathal feeling focused on the Darebin area. The (Darebin) councillor to whom I think you were referring appears to have done precisely zero campaigning on behalf of Bhathal or the Greens, apart from a single Facebook posting which calls on Shorten to “Stop Adani” (surely a rather difficult feat given that Shorten is not in government) but says nothing whatsoever along the lines of “vote 1 Bhathal” or “vote 1 Greens”.
My sense is that these disgruntled people come more from the environmental side of the Greens, whereas Bhathal is more from the “social Greens” side and Thorpe is a relative newcomer to the party who was backed by Bhathal.
FWIW.
I should of course add the disclaimer that trawling through online sites is not the gleaning of genuine information and I could have the wrong end of the stick entirely.
Anyway, we’re not far off finding whether or not the backbiting against Bhathal – whoever was behind it – is going to have affected the result.
Roll on super Saturday!
If labor manage win this, then also scrape through in SA, at least that might get the MSM off Shorten’s back. But gee whiz, I can only imagine how hysterical will the chorus promising his demise be if be loses both.