We’re in an off-week for federal opinion polling, although we may get geographic and demographic breakdowns from Newspoll – the leadership change had broken up their usual schedule of quarterly publication, and they have already published the results from the end of the Turnbull epoch. So here’s a summary of preselection news. Note the post below on the Wentworth by-election, and the one below that on the US mid-terms, courtesy of Adrian Beaumont.
• After successful lobbying from Scott Morrison, Peter Dutton and Mathias Cormann, Richard Colbeck will head the Tasmanian Liberal Senate ticket. Earlier reports indicated he would again be dumped, as he was in 2016 – initially costing him his seat, before he won it back on the countback that resulted from Stephen Parry’s Section 44-related disqualification. Claire Chandler, a conservative backed by Eric Abetz, is number two, with Hobart councillor Tanya Denison number three. The presence of two women on the ticket makes a change from the usual form of the state party, which last had a woman in federal parliament in 2002. Those who missed out included Brett Whiteley, who held Braddon from 2013 to 2016 and failed to win it back in the Super Saturday by-election, and Wendy Summers, political staffer and the sister of David Bushby.
• Tasmanian Labor, on the other hand, has persisted in dumping Senator Lisa Singh to number four, despite her historic success in having below-the-line voters overturn her demotion in 2016. This reflects the party’s persistence in favouring the claim of John Short, state secretary of the Australian Manufacturing Workers Union, who will be number three. The top two positions go to incumbents of the Left and Right, Carol Brown and Catryna Bilyk.
• Ann Sudmalis’s retirement in the dicey New South Wales seat of Gilmore leaves in the field her prospective preselection challenger, Grant Schultz, a real estate agent and the son of former Hume MP Alby Schultz. However, Mark Kenny of Fairfax reports “the moderate faction of the Liberal Party believes it can retain its hold on the seat and find a replacement for Ms Sudmalis”.
• Chris O’Keefe of Nine News reports Hughes MP Craig Kelly has been approached to run in the marginal state seat of East Hills, to smooth over his likely preselection defeat in his existing seat at the hands of Kent Johns. Kelly appeared to scupper his chances when he suggested forgiving Russia for the MH17 disaster was “the price we have to pay” for “good relations going forward”.
• Perin Davey, a Riverina water policy specialist, has won preselection to succeed the retiring John “Wacka” Williams as the Nationals’ New South Wales Senate candidate. The existing coalition agreement gives the Nationals the difficult third position on the ticket, but Joe Kelly of The Australian reports the party is considering breaking away to run its own ticket. To this end it has chosen a full slate of four candidates, rounded out by “small business owner Sam Farraway, Gunnedah Mayor Jamie Chaffey and Wagga-based farmer Paul Cocking”.
• Skye Kakoschke-Moore has been confirmed as the lead South Australian Senate candidate for the Centre Alliance, confirming that Nick Xenophon will stand by the pledge he made at the time of his failed run for state parliament that he would not run at the federal election.
Confessions
Part of the Capt. Cook series or is he doing his wine series ?
Labor has the right policy on boats. Ignore the crap.
nath:
[‘I would have thought that his audience would have died off by now….’]
How dare you suggest that I’m close to the Grim Reaper! Shocking, just shocking, but not that far from the truth.
poroti:
No they are filming a movie about two farming brothers who haven’t spoken to each other in years, but farm neighbouring properties. Not sure where/how Asher Keddie fits in. But all three of them are staying at a local Albany motel that has an attached restaurant. Very tempted to take my friends along for dinner there one night!
An overcast day in Melbourne today, with a tiny amount of drizzle, but temperate overall.
“Stop the boats” is still crapola no matter how you frame it.”
Lol. Go ask Bill Shorten if he thinks that. He wants to lead Labor to government.
frednk
What is their policy ? Srsly.
I spent a few billion dollars and stopped a few fishing boats; that is my glorious claim to fame. Pffft.
frednk @ #1951 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:13 pm
Arthur Caldwell was right on Vietnam in 1966 and got smashed for his forthrightness.
Labor has to take the community with them rather than be self indulgently smug.
The alternative is the way of the Greens. A group of ever dissatisfied cadres basking in their own self righteousness.
Nah!
poroti says:
Thursday, October 4, 2018 at 8:15 pm
frednk
What is their policy ? Srsly.
The greens on one side full of crap.
Morrison on the other full of crap.
Best thing to do; stay away from it. Even gold fish tire in the end.
Moi- next poll 54 – 46 to the good guys.
I just got polled by Reachtell. The usual start up questions i.e. who would receive my first pref vote etc.
Got down to a multiple choice of what will effect my vote the most, education, health, cost of living, job security, enviroment.
I chose the enviroment and was then lead down a path of numerous multiple choice answers about questions re coal mining in Qld. A lot of the questions appeared to be seeking the answer the mining industry were after.
for example.
Did you know that coal mining royalties were worth 4.? billion dollars to the Qld Govt. Yes or No.
(Not word perfect but something along these lines)
Do you support the coal mining industry which supports towns in Queensland?
There were about 4 quick questions more on coal mining in general and then four or five on Adani.
i.e. (went something like this) Would you support the Adani mine near Clermont going ahead if it met with all the necessary Enviromental – requirements? Choice offered was strongly support – just support – strongly oppose or just oppose.
The wording of the questions left a lot to be desired.
Was an interesting poll, I wonder what the questions would of been like if i had selected another option say Education or Health.
Ross
That is true. After a summer or two, it is not worth remarking on until it is over 45. I only commented on the 40 because I thought it was overdue.
Brian
Stay cool
C@tmomma @ #1927 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 7:44 pm
One fall of rain does not a drought break!
We should have had about 400mm of rain here over the last 4 months. Even with the current (very welcome!) rainfall, we will have had only about 1/10th of that – perhaps 40mm.
Tomorrow, the sun will again be shining, the ground will again be desperately dry, and our rivers will still not be flowing 🙁
Player One @ #1963 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:28 pm
We love our sun burnt country……
Puffytmd @ #1942 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:03 pm
54/46?
Just once I’d love to be polled. Just once!
GG:
[‘Arthur Caldwell was right on Vietnam in 1966 and got smashed for his forthrightness.’]
Yes, and history shows he was right, though for the times he got it politically wrong, the prevailing view was the “Yellow Peril”, the “Domino Theory”, costing some 520 Australian lives, countless others who were so untowardly affected by the conflict.
Confessions @ #1966 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:31 pm
What do you think, fess?
Confessions @ #1967 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:31 pm
If you do get polled, tell them you’re going to vote Liberal. That way, you’ll keep getting polled 🙂
Aunt Mavis @ #1967 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:32 pm
Hi mavis,
Not sure if we have linked before.
The prevailing view is that Border protection is paramount. Not a large jump from “Yellow peril”.
Was it in 1966 that Arthur promised three new aircraft carriers in his launch speech?
My memory of the details are hazy but I think I heard the speech live on the wireless.
I suspect that there is robopolling pushpolling going on. I have been robopolled several times in the past month and I usually end up hanging up half way through when I get irritated by the herding and shepherding.
Boerwar @ #1971 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:39 pm
My recollection is of Arthur declaring he’d rather be right on Vietnam than PM.
GG
The ‘Yellow Peril’ aka ‘Asiatic Hordes’ never went away. I was truly amazed when Howie ramped it up to hear on shout back radio and read in letters to the editor fears of “invasion” in words that sounded straight out of the White Australia era. Western Australia was ahead of the curve in that regard.
GG
‘My recollection is of Arthur declaring he’d rather be right on Vietnam than PM.’
I am not sure how he went on the first part. He achieved 100% of part the second.
Boerwar @ #1975 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:42 pm
Our Bill is boxing clever to avoid the same fate.
Have i said “Fuck” the Greens today?
Greensborough Growler says:
Thursday, October 4, 2018 at 8:18 pm
…..
Labor has to take the community with them rather than be self indulgently smug.
…
The alternative is the way of the Greens. A group of ever dissatisfied cadres basking in their own self righteousness.
Exactly. Fraser did the right thing because Whitlam did the right thing. While the Greens and the Liberals see the issue as something to bash labor with there is no solution. The best Labor policy is to refuse to be bashed and hope the goldfish lose interest.
‘Greensborough Growler says:
Thursday, October 4, 2018 at 8:46 pm
Boerwar @ #1975 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:42 pm
GG
‘My recollection is of Arthur declaring he’d rather be right on Vietnam than PM.’
I am not sure how he went on the first part. He achieved 100% of part the second.
Our Bill is boxing clever to avoid the same fate.
Have i said “Fuck” the Greens today?’
I had to revise several of my earlier posts to maintain a modicum of decorum!
Boerwar @ #1978 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:47 pm
A first.
The prevailing view is that Border protection is paramount. Not a large jump from “Yellow peril”.
There would have been no problem if the boats were full of white Rhodesians and South Africans.
GG:
[‘The prevailing view is that Border protection is paramount. Not a large jump from “Yellow peril”]
I will not take issue with you on that point.
Player One @ #2064 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:28 pm
It is likely to last a week here, with quite high daily averages. Though we shall see.
GG
‘A first.’
Nah.
See Greens, bite tongue.
Yikes! It isn’t just movie stars heading over our way, but Michaelia Cash was strutting around town today meeting local business owners.
https://www.facebook.com/SenatorCash/photos/pcb.2706991992659820/2706991589326527/?type=3&theater
C
Some people have the best fun.
frednk @ #1977 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:46 pm
Same page, comrade.
Boerwar:
Nigel Scullion was here yesterday and Greg Hunt earlier in the week. If I didn’t know any better I’d be inclined to suspect Rick Wilson was worried about holding onto O’Connor!
The word Liberal is synonymous with the word bullshit.
Make a list of the bullshit pontificated from a succession of Liberal leaders and no other explanation is needed.
Boats and refugees
Balanced budgets
Responsible economic management
*
*
*
And the list goes on
It’s become the party of spivs and carpetbaggers
“Think I may head north ”
davidwh, hit Dales Gorge campsite in Karajini. Luverly spot. Great skies at night.
If you are in Margaret River down south, make sure you do lunch at the Berry Farm.
Player One:
[‘If you do get polled, tell them you’re going to vote Liberal. That way, you’ll keep getting polled ‘]
Surely you’re not suggesting polling’s skewed?
I’ve said it before, I’ll say it again:
If you think ‘stop the boats’ is an issue solely about racism, I think you’re mistaken. IMO it’s primarily about control – that when there were 20000 people a year arriving in daily boats under Labor that things were out of control, and that that control has been restored by the coalition.
Sure, there are Hansonites and other reactionary xenophobes who are firmly on the no-boats bandwagon due to racism, but I am firmly of the view that most of the support in the Australian community for ‘stop the boats’ is about gaining and maintaining a sense of control, and I would ignore that at my political peril if I were aiming to be PM.
yeah, ALP 54, CoAl 46
Late Riser @ #1966 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 8:00 pm
Jackol
Nope. It was racism. All harking back to the days of White Australia. It was “Asiatic Hordes” full of disease,criminals, muslim terrorists and ‘swamping’, that was the language used. Self proclaimed Labor die hards today have rolled out the “swamping” and “criminals’ , if only they had of mentioned ‘disease carrying’, they would have had the 2GB trifecta.
Aunt Mavis @ #1991 Thursday, October 4th, 2018 – 9:01 pm
I would never suggest such any such thing on a psephology website. I’d get lynched! 🙂
poroti – if you think Australians support ‘stop the boats’ because of ‘Asiatic Hordes’ etc etc, all I can say is you’re wrong.
Fishing bodies out of the Indian Ocean off of Christmas Island demanded that control be established, and it has been, and Australians will not stand for reestablishment of the conditions that led to that happening.
Jackol:
You appear to have got on the wrong site. May I direct you to the Oz. Sometimes when I have too many reds, I must admit I make a similar mistake. As a matter of fact, I sometimes don’t know whether I’m Arthur…but you don’t seem to the share the same propensity? I take it all back?
AM –
No mistake on my part.
I agree with Jackol. There were quite a few posters on this site who were taking the ‘let them come’ line before Christmas Island — and changed that to ‘no one should die trying to get here’ afterwards.
For the life of me, I cannot see how not wanting people to die is racist, but there we go.
I agree with Jackol. The stop the boats thing started off as a racist Howardism to conflate boat arrivals with terrorists, but what really arked people up was boat after boat after boat arriving in our territories after the Rudd govt relaxed the Howard rules.
It is totally about control and authority, mitigating pull factors, and getting those numerous boat arrivals off the front pages. The shit going down on Nauru and in PNG OTOH is another matter. Ironically Rudd is to blame for that as well by warehousing AS in those locations as a result of declaring all boat arrivals would be denied a visa. Whoever it was who said tow-backs were arguably more humane was right, with the benefit of hindsight.