By-elections, preselections and Section 44

A round-up of the latest news on by-election and related fronts.

A little extra polling:

• The Australian on Tuesday provided an extra finding from the weekend Newspoll: that opposition to reforming Section 44 has hardened since August, when Barnaby Joyce’s difficulty first emerged. Fifty-one per cent now believe dual citizens should be disqualified from parliament, up seven, with 38% opposed, down five. Forty-six per cent opposed a referendum being held on the matter, with 43% in support.

By-election latest:

• Western Australia’s Darling Range state by-election will be held on June 23. Nathan Hondros of Fairfax reports the Liberal preselection, which will be determined by the party’s state council on Saturday, will be contested by Alyssa Hayden, who unexpectedly lost her upper house seat for East Metropolitan region to One Nation in 2017, and Rob Coales, a police sergeant and Serpentine-Jarrahdale councillor. The early mail was that Coales was favourite, but according to Hondros, it is “understood party powerbrokers are supporting Ms Hayden”.

• David Crowe of Fairfax reports the date for the Super Saturday by-elections could be pushed back to July 7, as the government looks at an Australian Electoral Commission recommendation to implement an online tool for candidates to lodge declarations and supporting documentation, so as to avoid further issues arising from Section 44. This had caused initial plans for a date of June 16 to be scotched, although concerns linger about the electoral impact of an eight-week campaign.

• Speaking of, Michael McKenna of The Australian reports the Liberal National Party preselection for Longman is being held off until next Tuesday to ensure frontrunner Trevor Ruthenberg was able to clear up his own Section 44 issue, arising from his being born in Papua New Guinea.

• Georgia Downer has emerged unopposed for Liberal preselection in Mayo. The Australian reports “ambitious conservative” Michael van Dissel was another potential nominee, but withdrew as it became clear the Right was solid behind Downer. In contrast to the Liberals in WA, Labor will be contested Mayo, despite never having held hte saet before. A Labor source quoted by Philip Coorey said the party believed its preferences could assist Rebekha Sharkie, and that failing to run would suppress the party’s Senate vote at the next election.

• Braddon will again be contested for the Liberals by Brett Whiteley, who held the seat from 2013 until his defeat by Labor’s Justine Keay in 2016, and served in the state seat of Braddon from 2002 until his defeat in 2010. The Burnie Advocate reports former McDonald’s licensee Craig Brakey and Wynyard RSL president Gavin Pearce also contested the state executive vote, but Whiteley was chosen unanimously.

• The Western Australian Liberals’ decision to forfeit the Perth by-election, said to have been instigated by Matthias Cormann, has been widely criticised in the party. Following Tim Hammond’s resignation announcement on May 1, Christian Porter told Sky News Australia the party would “undoubtedly” run, and state Opposition Leader Mike Nahan, who had mocked Labor’s unsurprising decision not to field a candidate in the recent by-election for Colin Barnett’s old seat of Cottesloe, said the by-election was “one we need to contest”.

• The Western Australian Greens have announced their by-elections candidates: Caroline Perks, senior sustainability officer at the City of Perth, in Perth; and Dorinda Cox, domestic violence campaigner and former police officer, in Fremantle.

Other preselection news:

• Jane Prentice’s preselection defeat in her Brisbane seat of Ryan has roused controversy over the lack of gender balance in the Coalition. The winner was Julian Simmonds, a Brisbane councillor who once worked on Prentice’s staff when she herself was on council. Simmons, who is identified with the Right, won a local party ballot by 256 votes to 103 over Prentice, a moderate and early backer of Malcolm Turnbull. Charlie Peel of The Australian reports the vote was “roughly split along traditional party lines, with Nationals backing Ms Prentice”. Critics of the decision include Campbell Newman, Leichhardt MP Warren Entsch and Capricornia MP Michelle Landry.

• Jared Owens of The Australian reports Ian Macdonald and Barry O’Sullivan, who respectively hold Queensland Senate seats for the Liberals and the Nationals, face preselection challenges from Scott Emerson, the former state Shadow Treasurer who lost his seat of Maiwar to the Greens last November, and Susan McDonald, managing director of a chain of butcher’s shops and a member of “one of Queensland’s grazing families”.

• Michael Owen of The Australian reports on a “strong challenge” for Liberal Senate preselection in South Australia from Alex Antic, an Adelaide councillor. This apparently poses a threat to another female Liberal MP, Anne Ruston, who might otherwise be expected to lead the ticket, but not to the mooted number two candidate, David Fawcett. It might also endanger Lucy Gichuhi’s hold on number three, long shot proposition though that may be.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,071 comments on “By-elections, preselections and Section 44”

Comments Page 17 of 22
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  2. Barney in Go Dau says:

    kevjohnno @ #738 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 8:20 am

    It’s more than just a question of access to guns though. Why are so many US students homicidal?

    It’s become part of their culture!

    Sure is. citizen posted the following link to show gun deaths. Check out sorting it by guns per 100 people. The top 10 guns per 100 people are dominated by countries with low murder rates and who also score well in life quality surveys.

    The secret to not being shot seems to be keep a long way from America. The top 20 countries for gun deaths has about 16 entries from the New World.

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/List_of_countries_by_firearm-related_death_rate

  3. Bushfire Bills words on America and death by gun is the best – the most compelling -analysis I have ever read about this fact of life.
    It should be sent to the MSM in New York, Washington and every other major city.

  4. Undiagnosed mental illness. Clearly he had been going down hill for some time, sought no treatment and no-one sought intervention.

    Yeah. Nah. I am not comfortable with the mental illness explanation.

    Evidence is clear that the large majority of people with mental disorders do not engage in violence against others, and that most violent behavior is due to factors other than mental illness

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4211925/

    Vanessa Badham also had some interesting things to say on this in a recent article.

  5. I hope everyone is excited as I am over the wedding of Prince Harry and Angela Merkel.

    I know there’s a big age difference between the two, but hey, if it’s good enough for the President of France, it’s good enough for a member of the British Royal Family and the German Chancellor.

  6. FFS we are talking about kids being murdered. In what way in hell are they responsible for the deranged culture of their elders?

  7. On the relationship between mental illness and mass shootings —

    https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2017/11/9/16618472/mental-illness-gun-homicide-mass-shootings

    ‘ If you were to suddenly cure schizophrenia, bipolar, and depression overnight, violent crime in the US would fall by only 4 percent…’

    ‘… mentally ill people who didn’t have substance abuse issues, who weren’t maltreated as children, and who didn’t live in adverse environments have a lower risk of violence than the general population.’

    The article concludes with a suggestion that the problem is angry people having access to guns.

    Angry people aren’t necessarily mentally ill.

    And the article handily linked to this one :

    http://www.slate.com/articles/health_and_science/medical_examiner/2014/04/anger_causes_violence_treat_it_rather_than_mental_illness_to_stop_mass_murder.html

    ‘Violent crimes are committed by people who lack the skills to modulate anger, express it constructively, and move beyond it.’

  19. It’s hard to get excited, or downcast, about something you can do absolutely nothing about.

    If the US chooses to value guns above children’s lives, that is something only they can fix. Which is never going to happen.

    So thoughts and prayers and warm fuzzy feelings about the children killed are going to do sfa about the situation.

    Take what you want, and pay for it.

    They have taken what they wanted, now they are paying for it.

  20. Gun control? We need bullet control! I think every bullet should cost 5,000 dollars. Because if a bullet cost five thousand dollar, we wouldn’t have any innocent bystanders.

    Chris Rock

  22. Dan G:

    Markle’s father is descended from royalty, if wiki is accurate. I don’t get the German Chancellor reference to her though. Her mother is African American.

    Among her father’s ancestors are Captain Christopher Hussey, King Robert I of Scotland, Sir Philip Wentworth and his wife, Mary Clifford, a descendant of King Edward III of England

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meghan_Markle

  23. It’s sad when someone gets killed in a car accident.

    It’s an unfortunate part of our Society and any rational Society takes measures to minimise these numbers.

    It’s equally sad when someone gets killed by gun violence.

    It’s an unfortunate part of our Society and any rational Society takes measures to minimise these numbers.

    Unfortunately the USA is not rational in this matter, so the deaths while sad are the direct result and consequence of the Society they have created.

    There is nothing random or unusual about this latest shooting in Texas as they have become a part of the landscape of living in the USA. 🙁

  24. phoenixRed:

    According to the Texas Lt Governor, what’s needed in schools is door control to stop mass shootings.

  28. poroti:

    Expressing regret infers an intent to prevent the same thing happening in the future. Well at least it does to me.

    Several thousand Palestinians? Is that what ‘Israeli restraint’ looks like then?

  33. Dan G:

    I get it now. We will be watching catch up eps of the Handmaid Tale. I have no interest in the royal wedding either.

  34. Confessions @ #822 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 1:52 pm

    Dan G:

    Markle’s father is descended from royalty, if wiki is accurate. I don’t get the German Chancellor reference to her though. Her mother is African American.

    Among her father’s ancestors are Captain Christopher Hussey, King Robert I of Scotland, Sir Philip Wentworth and his wife, Mary Clifford, a descendant of King Edward III of England

    https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Meghan_Markle

    Analysis of the likelihood of descending from King Edward III:
    https://community.dur.ac.uk/a.r.millard/genealogy/EdwardIIIDescent.php

  37. don @ #819 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 3:50 pm

    It’s hard to get excited, or downcast, about something you can do absolutely nothing about.

    If the US chooses to value guns above children’s lives, that is something only they can fix. Which is never going to happen.

    So thoughts and prayers and warm fuzzy feelings about the children killed are going to do sfa about the situation.

    Take what you want, and pay for it.

    They have taken what they wanted, now they are paying for it.

    Why am I not surprised that yet another male cares sfa about loss of life?

    don, it’s not a ‘warm and fuzzy feeling about the children killed’, it’s abject horror at the senseless loss of life in a society which is ruled by men with attitudes wrt human life horrifyingly similar to those which have been expressed here. I have already thought that, if our gun laws were as lax in Australia as they are in the US, those same people would also be shrugging their shoulders.

  38. I don’t understand how the whole world, including Israel knew this protest was coming, had months to prepare a response that would protect their illegitimate border and maintain their evil apartheid and massive abuse of Palestinians, but they didn’t prepare for anything but mass murder of innocent people.

    When you are up against a terrorist organisation and you are the evil ones, as Israel and its criminal murdering soldiers are, you have real real problems.

  39. Of course the Israeli action was completely justified and proportionate.

    Until this week, no Israeli had been harmed since protests began on 30 March. An IDF spokesman, Lt Col Jonathan Conricus, said one soldier had been “slightly wounded by shrapnel” on Monday but he did not have details on the source of the injury.

    No one had crossed the fence despite several attempts, Conricus said. “Our troops have not taken any sustained direct fire,” he added.

    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2018/may/19/australia-and-us-oppose-un-move-for-independent-inquiry-into-gaza-violence

  40. Confessions @ #836 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 4:11 pm

    C@t:

    Texas’ Lt Governor needs to be seen to be believed. You can catch a grab of his press conference here:

    https://www.vox.com/policy-and-politics/2018/5/18/17369832/santa-fe-high-texas-shooting-dan-patrick

    Thanks, fess. What do you expect from the State that elected the semi-intelligent clown, Rick Perry, as it’s Governor?

    It’s worth quoting this from the article too:

    The lieutenant governor, a social conservative firebrand who recently pushed to allow concealed carry in churches, listed off a series of what he called “outside the box” ideas for stopping school shootings. These included having students enter schools at different times (so there’d be fewer crowds to shoot at), parents doing a better job locking up their guns, and, most remarkably, limiting the number of doorways into schools.

    “There are too many entrances and too many exits to our over 8,000 campuses,” Patrick said. “There aren’t enough people to put a guard at every entry and exit.”

    TX Lt Gov Dan Patrick, a fierce opponent of gun control, says today’s shooting may have been caused by Texas schools having “too many entrances and too many exits.” pic.twitter.com/tLByRqL6oX

    — David Mack (@davidmackau) May 18, 2018
    There are a number of practical problems with this idea. If you have a mass shooter in the building, you don’t want to trap people in the building. It’s not obvious that security guards would be able to spot someone concealing a weapon even if they were at every door; in fact, there were two armed guards at Santa Fe on Friday. And closing most of the entryways to a school would create a serious fire hazard.

    More fundamentally, this all feels like an absurd kind of deflection. As my colleague German Lopez writes, the solutions to gun violence “aren’t a big mystery”: they’re gun control measures, like universal background checks and mandatory buybacks. There is a mountain of evidence that the best way to stop people from killing with guns is to stop them from getting guns in the first place.

    A 2016 paper examined 130 different studies that spanned 10 different countries, including the United States. They found a clear pattern: When governments restrict access to firearms, the number of homicides and suicides declined. The community of credible experts on guns aren’t really in disagreement on this point.

    But people like Patrick believe that people ought to have nearly unlimited rights to own guns and are unwilling to consider any restrictions on access. For that reason, he needs to find out some way to propose some kind of response to an obvious and horrific tragedy that doesn’t involve gun control.

    Hence Patrick’s proposal to replace gun control with door control — as if a door was just used to kill 10 people in the state he leads.

  41. WWP:

    There was speculation on Real Time today that Netyanahu deliberately orchestrated the embassy opening to coincide with planned Palestinian protests to ensure there were those contrasting pics of he, Ivanka and co taking selfies as if they were on holidays with the violence and bloodshed around them. I didn’t get the supposition of the discussion, but it was something along the lines of Bibi showing his country he can pull the strings of the Potus.

  42. C@t:

    Why am I not surprised that yet another male cares sfa about loss of life?

    don, it’s not a ‘warm and fuzzy feeling about the children killed’, it’s abject horror at the senseless loss of life in a society which is ruled by men with attitudes wrt human life horrifyingly similar to those which have been expressed here.

    Geez, bloody gender wars again. Do you ever give it a rest?

    Should we live in a perpetual state of anger and resentment and grief about needless loss of life?

    There are millions killed around the world every year. It is pointless to be grieving for them every moment of your life. You don’t, nobody can. The scale is too large.

    You may choose to do so, I and the rest of the world, both men and women, don’t. We get on with our lives as best we can.

    There will be another senseless school shooting in the US within the next few weeks. Will there be sackcloth and ashes prescribed for everyone again?

  44. C@t:

    I posted this earlier that (if true) indicates Texas essentially has no gun laws at all. No wonder it’s often referred to as the outlaw state!

    Mikel JollettVerified account@Mikel_Jollett
    11h11 hours ago
    Texas gun laws:

    ▪️No background checks.
    ▪️No registration.
    ▪️No license required.
    ▪️No assault weapon ban.
    ▪️No magazine capacity restriction.
    ▪️No law requiring stolen guns to be reported.

    These kids are sitting ducks.

  45. “There was speculation on Real Time today that Netyanahu deliberately orchestrated the embassy opening to coincide with planned Palestinian protests to ensure there were those contrasting pics of he, Ivanka and co taking selfies as if they were on holidays with the violence and bloodshed around them. I didn’t get the supposition of the discussion, but it was something along the lines of Bibi showing his country he can pull the strings of the Potus.”

    The date wasn’t an accident, but it was a poor choice by all involved, and a huge victory for Hamas, as has been the cold blooded slaughter. Hamas, wanted bloodshed, had explicitly said that, and Israel delivered exactly what they asked for, stupid and evil.

  46. bemused says: Saturday, May 19, 2018 at 4:22 pm

    Victoria @ #746 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 11:53 am

    And everytime I hear how great Finland Norway Denmark and Sweden are, I get annoyed. Cos all their combined population is barely that of Australia.
    It doesn’t come close to running a place the size and population of the USA

    So what?
    This is totally irrelevant.

    ******************************************************************

    Does every country have the same % ‘lunatic fringe’ ??????? – more people, more nutters ???

  47. The date wasn’t an accident

    I wouldn’t know, so can’t comment.

    I did find panel comments interesting that the change in embassy location had always been held back by previous US presidents, in favour of keeping it as a bargaining chip in peace negotiations. If that’s the case then Trump has given that away for absolutely nothing, except to appease Bibi while extracting nothing from Israel in return.

    #artofthedeal #ETTD

  48. Roger Miller @ #800 Saturday, May 19th, 2018 – 2:39 pm

    Bemused, your comment about the Margaret River murderer is absolutely sickening. Blame the victims, anything to absolve toxic masculinity. The comments of the daughters estranged husband are equally as sickening.

    If you draw that conclusion from my comment then you are clearly an idiot.
    I am not blaming or absolving anyone. We know the fact as to who did the shooting.
    The issues now are why and what can be done to prevent similar occurrences?
    How do you propose to punish the perpetrator?

  49. https://www.pollbludger.net/2018/05/18/elections-preselections-section-44/comment-page-17/#comment-2798494

    The protests in Gaza are at the Gaza Strip-Israel border, which is the 1948 border and generally considered legitimate in International Law. Since the withdrawal of settlers in the Gaza Strip over a decade ago, the territorial disputes between Israel and Palestine are in the West Bank, where there are settlers and border walls beyond the 1948 borders and thus where the International Law issues arise in relation to the borders.

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