We are having one of the poll-free weeks that have occasionally bedevilled us since Essential Research moved from weekly to fortnightly, with Newspoll having one of its occasional three-week gaps so its next poll coincides with the resumption of parliament. So here’s some random bits of electoral news:
• A polling nugget I forgot to relate a fortnight ago: according to a report by Nick Butterly of The West Australian, a Labor internal poll recorded a neck-and-neck result in the Perth seat of Stirling, which Michael Keenan holds for the Liberals by a margin of 6.1%. After excluding the 10.8% undecided, the primary votes were Liberal 40.2% (49.5% in 2016), Labor 37.6% (32.2%), Greens 9.0% (11.7%) and One Nation 5.3%. The poll was conducted by Community Engagement from a large sample of 1735.
• Gareth Parker in the Sunday Times reports that Matt O’Sullivan, who ran unsuccessfully in the lower house seat of Burt at the 2016 election, has narrowly won preselection for the third position on the Liberals’ Western Australian Senate ticket, behind incumbents Linda Reynolds and Slade Brockman. O’Sullivan emerged with 56 votes to 54 for Trish Botha, co-founder with her husband of an evangelical church in Perth’s northern suburbs. The closeness of the result surprised party observers, especially given Christian conservative numbers man Nick Goiran backed O’Sullivan. As Gareth Parker noted in his weekly column, Botha appears to have attracted support from “non God-botherers” opposed to Goiran’s alliance with Mathias Cormann and Peter Collier, who may not have been aware of the messianic language employed by Botha’s church.
• Katy Gallagher has announced she will seek preselection to recover the Australian Capital Territory Senate seat from which she was disqualified last month over Section 44 complications, after speculation she might instead seek the territory’s newly created third lower house seat. However, it appears she will face opposition from the newly anointed successor to her Senate seat, David Smith, former local director of Professionals Australia.
• As for the lower house situation in the Australian Capital Territory, Andrew Leigh will remain in Fenner and Gai Brodtmann will go from Canberra to the nominally new seat of Bean, leaving a vacancy available in Canberra. Smith appears set to run if he loses the Senate preselection to Gallagher; Sally Whyte of Fairfax reports he will be opposed by Kel Watt, a lobbyist who has lately made a name for himself campaigning against the territory Labor government’s ban on greyhound racing. Other potential starters include John Falzon, chief executive of the St Vincent de Paul Society; Jacob Ingram, a staffer to Chief Minister Andrew Barr; and Jacob White, a staffer to Andrew Leigh.
• Occasional Poll Bludger contributor Adrian Beaumont has launched his own website of local and international election and polling news.
it doesn’t seem sooo long ago mal was professing his full support for ABC
and advocating a vote on republic – same queen as now – no problem with elizabthenism then
has someone produced a list of his contradictions and also stupidities (‘trump is a deal maker’), as done with trump
guytaur says:
Sunday, June 17, 2018 at 11:37 am
briefly
Thanks for confirming you don’t understand sarcasm.
Edit: Also for confirming you don’t understand that voters see you. What was Batman may have a different result as Green predictions of Kearney being shafted by the party have come to pass.
Thats Labor action. By Labor. Recognise the facts.
Ho-hum, g. The Gs lost in Batman precisely because Labor appealed for support on the broad range of issues that resonate with voters, and did not fall for G distraction.
The Gs really struggle to elevate their profile and resonance with voters. There is a legacy cohort that have favoured them, but this cohort is not growing. It is slowly petrifying.
Player One @ #1441 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 11:38 am
They were seeking your vote.
I assume it is now secured given your long term support for getting rid of the ABC.
Cat
Your spin is confusing you. The Greens policy was openly publicly stated. You can come up with all the excuses in the world you like.
It was not the Greens that voted against their own policy. It was the Liberals that did that.
Thats what I mean by you blaming the Greens for Liberals actions.
Late Riser:
LOL! All Clive needs is the long red tie and dead ferret arranged on his head and his Trump transformation will be complete!
How’s Mrs grimace today, Mr g?
Winter babies are hard. All that getting up in the cold in the middle of the night when you would rather be in your warm bed asleep. Then standing there changing a dirty nappy, or feeding the bub, or both! It’s enough to get anyone down! That’s why I always made sure that if I didn’t have to do both then my husband always got up to do the next change.
Oh, and put the heater on whenever you get up and worry about the electricity bill down the track. 🙂
guytaur says:
Sunday, June 17, 2018 at 11:42 am
Cat
Yes, the Greens standing by their members openly publicly stated policy is all a shifty backroom deal.
Anything to blame the Greens rather than the LNP
Green/Lib…same/same.
Labor mp’s such as Ged will politically live or die on issues such as the Lib-Lab offshore torture/death camps.
guytaur,
The Greens voted with the Coalition to deep six Regional Resettlement of Asylum Seekers, mainly so they had something to campaign against Labor with. And because. Principles. By doing so they got 100% of nothing as regards their principles. And hundreds more asylum seekers drowned at sea on the way to Australia. Some principles.
bemused @ #1450 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 11:46 am
Guytaur, how about you answer my simple question?
hungry jack @ #1451 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 11:46 am
The media over here doesn’t do that kind of thing.
Zoomster
It makes sense but NOT the idea that anyone would sleep much past dawn. Let us say that the normal adult needs 9 hours sleep. If Dawn is at 6 AM then bed time at 9 PM would be usual. It makes a lot of sense for the older children/young teens to stay awake an extra hour or two so say 11 to sleep and 8 am to wake. It would be too hot and noisy for then to be able to sleep much past this time in a usual village environment. That leaves 7 hours.
Perhaps the nearly adult teens stay awake an hour or two longer – carousing and playing, but perhaps do not need as much sleep anyway – height of fitness etc. I can believe they stay awake until midnight or later but cannot seriously believe that they will be curled up in the village hut while mum cooks breakfast, babies cream and little kids run around. These are single roomed huts. There is hunting to be done, crops to tend etc. Mind you perhaps when the young boys were separated from the main tribe (as in Africa etc) then these lads- 13-16 or so may well have stayed up later and been able to sleep until 9 or 10.
If we agree that the early to bed oldies wake at 4 or 5 we still have the period say 1 am to 4 am to address. I guess older guys going for a midnight leak and nursing mothers may fill that gap. Some children in that 5-9 age group also are very early risers.
briefly
You can spin all you like. Kearney was open in her campaign, What Labor did was predicted would happen by the Greens. Lo and behold it has. Victorian Labor did exactly what was predicted because of the fear of losing marginal voters due to the LNP racist appeal to voters in those electorates.
Thats the bottom line.
This while our immigration policy is directly causing death.
As I said see the way the media is reporting the issue in the US compared to hear. Of course the US has Bill of Rights so its a lot harder for Trump’s team to keep things secret unlike what Abbott set up and Turnbull has continued.
As I said I don’t blame Labor for doing what it is doing. I am just saying recognise they are doing what they are doing.
They have made a political calculation of what will cause them most damage. I don’t agree with it but I understand and accept why they are doing it.
Bemused
See Kearney Batman campaign speeches. See Victorian Labor Conference vote.
‘Fess
Palmer will have a looooong yellow tie. 🙂
However, what is interesting about Palmer’s political dinosaur attempted ressurrection is that he will basically be competing for Pauline Hanson’s voters. Such splintering of the vote will likely benefit neither of them. 🙂
Bill Shorten presser now.
guytaur,
And on Insiders today they said Ged Kearney’s position would be unlikely to be successful because the Industrial Left and the votes that the CFMMEU will bring to the National Conference will defeat any motion from the rest of the Left.
Good point C@t. I hadn’t thought of that.
adrian @ #1461 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 11:55 am
No answer to my question at 11:33am?
Hypocrite.
Cat
As the Greens predicted in the Batman campaign.
Thats the political damage Labor has calculated.
Thats how big their fear of the appeal to racists in marginal seats is.
Thats how much the LNP have wedged Labor on this issue.
I understand why Labor is doing this. I don’t have to like or excuse it or say its anything other than fact.
Its Labor’s political calculation. One I hope works.
I am just not blinding myself to the facts.
guytaur @ #1464 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 11:59 am
So all your huffing and puffing is because Ged was on the losing side of a vote at conference?
You really have no idea.
Bemused
Nope. I am stating facts.
You are the one huffing and puffing saying its something its not.
guytaur @ #1472 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:08 pm
No sunshine, I am stating facts.
You are putting your Green spin on it.
Members of serious political parties are accustomed to not always being on the winning side when it comes to a vote. Ged well knows that, even if you don’t.
Late Riser
I am very reliably informed that Palmer while odd is very far from being stupid.
He has won some and lost some legal cases. He is highly litigious and seems to have about 100 cases going of various types.
I really doubt that Palmer will be able to resurrect his outfit. That takes money, recruits and volunteers, policies and campaign opportunities. He has next to none of any of these. What is far more likely to happen is that desire for change will coalesce in support – directly and indirectly- for Labor, as can be seen in BludgerTrack.
Bemused
You are so far in the bubble you can’t state a fact. The Greens predicted Kearney would get nowhere and that has happened.
Thats not Green spin thats fact and voters see it.
guytaur @ #1476 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:11 pm
Kearney has got somewhere, she is now the member for Batman. The Greens however…
So she holds a minority position in the party? WOW!
Voters will not be taken in by Greens hype and bullshit.
Thats was a good strong press conference by Bill Shorten
Its is very true he is in control of his party unlike Mr Turnbull.
I am just not blinding myself to the facts.
You can have your own facts, guytaur. And believe them strongly. However, what you can’t do is ignore the fact that, due to the behaviour of The Greens wrt asylum seekers, when Labor were in power federally, when they decided to vote with the Coalition to sink Regional Resettlement of refugees, hundreds more died and drowned at sea because of that decision. If I were The Greens at that time, I would have bent my principles to reality and pragmatism. Not political opportunism.
C@tmomma @ #1479 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:13 pm
Guytaur is in full Greentaur mode today.
Bemused
See there you go. More spin. You can’t even take someone stating a fact. Its all I did. I did not say it was a losing strategy. Its a fact that Kearney campaigned well and won the seat.
Thats not in dispute.
‘Fess,
Not to mention the fact that Palmer couldn’t be arsed turning up to parliament when he WAS elected. Why vote for someone like that as your elected representative? Again.
guytaur @ #1478 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:13 pm
Labor leaders don’t ‘control’ the party, they lead it. There is a difference.
Dictators control parties and nations.
Bill is a democratic leader who leads by the trust placed in him.
guytaur
‘The difference is the Greens have stuck to their policy. Not said one thing in a conference to members and voted the opposite in parliament.’
Er, how do we know this? As Greens conferences are closed to outsiders, we have no idea what is said to members or what the results of debates are.
Cat
Nice spin. Totally ignoring the Greens policy as publicly stated before the vote even happened.
Guilty conscience on your part perhaps. This blindness to the Greens policy position from before the Tampa to today is Labor’s failing.
Its blame the Greens for sticking to their policy and come up with all excuses in the world not to blame the LNP.
Thats the facts much as you may hate it. The Greens have stayed true to their policy position. They have not backtracked at all.
Its the LNP to blame for voting against Malaysia and its the LNP in Government to blame for the torture and death camps offshore detention has become.
Not the Greens. Not Labor.
Stop spinning it as the Greens fault for sticking with their policy. Blame the LNP for their actions. Stop giving them excuses.
Bemused
You might do well to watch the press conference before you comment
Edit: The two statements are not a contradiction.
guytaur
‘The Greens predicted Kearney would get nowhere and that has happened.’
Whoa! She’s been in parliament about five minutes, and we haven’t had the National Conference yet.
…and she’ll still have made more impact on the issue than any Green has in the last decade.
Zoomster
Ah yes another excuse.
The LNP have successfully wedged Labor on this you are more concerned at blaming the Greens than concentrating on the Liberals Conference and the selling of the ABC as a policy to talk about.
adrian
it seems this government has gagged media more effectively than trump – where is the hard satire, the biting columns and cross examination – something we should not be proud of
just think without turnbull’s lies the liberals would be in a failed pile long ago
Milne
Meant well. Did nothing- except to lock in the environment vote to the pinkoes, with the ongoing result that the environment is suffering horribly.
zoomster @ #1487 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:23 pm
Greens are like 2 year olds. They want instant gratification.
Kearney’s success in Batman also suggests that G polemics are wearing thin with their own erstwhile voters. G fixations only get them so far. Voters actually want more than reruns of the politics of 2001 – even G voters.
That said, there is a xenophobic undercurrent in Australian nationalism. It’s readily invoked and exploited. This is not new and it gives rise to some very murky impulses. These impulses are authoritarian, intransigent and malicious. They are shamelessly sponsored by the LNP, who also pay nothing but lip-service to the available counter narratives, impulses and values. In this, the LNP are, as usual, way behind the people more broadly.
If the Gs had found a way to re-form Australian nationalism we would know by now. They have not done it and their tactics have basically failed.
I think there is a lot of #mefirst in Australian national expression these days. This is not the only or even the primary value in the culture, but it certainly exists.
Katherine Murpy tweets
The standard you walk past is the standard you accept. https://twitter.com/InsidersABC/status/1008138823795073030
After 26-year-old Iranian asylum seeker Fariborz K died on Nauru on Friday, @murpharoo asks:
“How long are we going to put up with this system?”
#Insiders #auspol https://twitter.com/InsidersABC/status/1008138823795073030/video/1
hungry jack @ #1489 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:25 pm
Very true. I was in the states a few weeks ago and was able to watch MSNBC for a few hours.
We have unfortunately nothing even approaching the level of detail, the forensic reporting, the fearless criticism that they display on an almost daily basis.
As Jon Faine remarked, the ABC has allowed itself to become a laughing stock among those in power.
And for ‘satire’ we have Charlie Pickering FFS.
daretotread. @ #1474 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:10 pm
He is a well-known local in my area and generally thought of with faint praise. His kids went to school here and other parents know him personally. Local boy does good, sort of, maybe. Bit of an ego. I’ve run into stories of him paying for entire school trips. I can’t see him winning a seat in the HoR or Senate.
Being litigious seems to be another thing he has in common with Trump. He’s used to legal battles.
Palmer is an escapist.
A reminder of another fact.
The drownings at sea were not the fault of the Rudd Labor government. The only fault was the navy was not quick enough to get to the rescue of the people that drowned just off the coast.
Unlike the LNP directly responsible for deaths and injury due to their indefinite detention policy.
Note I am putting blame squarely where it belongs. With the LNP.
LNP policies are NOT the fault of Labor. They are not the fault of the Greens.
They are LNP policies.
@briefly….” there is a xenophobic undercurrent in Australian nationalism. It’s readily invoked and exploited. This is not new and it gives rise to some very murky impulses. These impulses are authoritarian, intransigent and malicious. They are shamelessly sponsored by the LNP, who also pay nothing but lip-service to the available counter narratives, impulses and values. In this, the LNP are, as usual, way behind the people more broadly.”….
Yep. Absolutely correct………and I might add also expertly exploited by One Nation as well. ….(sigh)
guytaur @ #1497 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 12:38 pm
But guytaur remember, everything is either the fault of Labor or politics in general.
Late Riser @ #1416 Sunday, June 17th, 2018 – 9:19 am
I’ve seen a few of them start to pop up in Perth suburbs as well.