Federal election minus six months (probably)

Tales of preselection action from Hughes, Indi, Cowper, Bennelong, Chisholm, Longman and New England.

Roughly six months out from a likely federal election, a gathering storm of preselection action. (Note also the thread below this one on the Victorian election campaign).

• Phillip Coorey of the Australian Financial Review reports Scott Morrison has sought to save Craig Kelly from a preselection defeat in Hughes, but that moderate backers of challenger Kent Johns are not to be deterred. According to a source identified as one of his conservative allies, Kelly “has been remiss in looking after his branches and would be lucky to have 25 per cent of the vote”. Quoth a moderate: “As far as the moderates are concerned, Malcolm Turnbull saved Concetta Fierravanti-Wells and Angus Taylor and Kelly last time, and look what they did to him.” Among the quandaries this raises are that Kelly may react to his defeat by moving to the cross-benches, further weakening the already shaky position of the government.

• There have been a few suggestions that Barnaby Joyce may fall foul of a new candidate-vetting process the Nationals have introduced, ostensibly to prevent further Section 44 mishaps. Figures in the party appear to have been putting it about that Joyce might face trouble due to the fear that even after the events of the past year, there remain “skeletons in the closet”. However, inquiries by Richard Ferguson of The Australian suggest that “a few members on the NSW Nationals’ 84-people-strong central council do plan to refuse to endorse Mr Joyce but they are in the minority”.

• David Johnston of the Border Mail reports nominees for a Liberal preselection vote for Indi, to be held on December 8, include Steve Martin, project manager for the Mars Petcare Wodonga plant expansion and Seeley International’s relocation from Albury to Wodonga, and Stephen Brooks, a local businessman. Another potential nominee is Greg Mirabella, husband of former member Sophie Mirabella. The seat’s independent member, Cathy McGowan, has not yet committed to seeking another term. The report also raises the possibility that Senator Bridget McKenzie, who is preparing to move her electorate office to Wodonga, might run for the Nationals.

• Christian Knight of the Nambucca Guardian reports the Nationals have preselected Patrick Conaghan, a local solicitor who was formerly a police officer and North Sydney councillor, to succeed the retiring Luke Hartsuyker in Cowper. The other candidates were Chris Genders, a newsagent; Jamie Harrison, former Port Macquarie-Hastings councillor and owner of an electrical business; and Judy Plunkett, a Port Macquarie pharmacist. Conaghan appears to have won over half the vote in the first round.

• Labor has recruited Brian Owler, neurosurgeon and former Australian Medical Association president, as its candidate for Bennelong. The party had initially preselected Lyndal Howison, communications manager at the Whitlam Institute and the party’s candidate in 2016, but she agreed to step aside for Owler.

• Gladys Liu, director of Blue Ribbon Consultancy, has been preselected as the Liberal candidate to succeed Julia Banks in Chisholm, having emerged “the clear winner in the field of eight candidates”, according to Liberal sources cited by Benjamin Preiss of The Age. Other candidates included Theo Zographos, a Monash councillor, and Litsa Pillios, an accountant. James Campbell of the Herald Sun reports Liu had backing from party president Michael Kroger and conservative powerbroker Michael Sukkar.

• David Alexander of the Pine Rivers Press reports the Liberal National Party has preselected local small businessman Terry Young as its candidate for Longman. The party recorded a portentously weak showing in the seat at the Super Saturday by-election on July 28, for which Young was an unsuccessful preselection candidate.

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.

1,349 comments on “Federal election minus six months (probably)”

Comments Page 15 of 27
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  1. l
    One of Kennet’s major contributions was to destroy OBP habitat.
    So maybe the Swifties need Kennett to come back and destroy THEIR habitat?

  2. Chuck is 70.
    He has good longevity genes.
    He will be King for the next quarter of a century or so.
    The monarchists are acutely aware that he is not a charismatic mega-vertebrate.
    And neither is Camilla.

  3. ‘Planet America’ made it very clear that the great divide in American politics is between the educated and the uneducated.

    Basically, Trump followers appear to be PHON supporters.

    Given that Republican memes are often imported by the Coalition, this may explain why they campaign as if the average voter was thick — and also why they seem to identify PHON supporters as their base.

  4. z
    The tactical problem is that PHON is bleeding Coalition votes in Queensland and returning them at a variable rate by way of preferences.
    The solution, pretending to be PHON, may work in northern Queensland.
    It would hardly appeal to the other 90% of Australians everywhere else.

  6. zoomster @ #703 Saturday, November 17th, 2018 – 5:27 pm

    ‘Planet America’ made it very clear that the great divide in American politics is between the educated and the uneducated.

    Basically, Trump followers appear to be PHON supporters.

    Given that Republican memes are often imported by the Coalition, this may explain why they campaign as if the average voter was thick — and also why they seem to identify PHON supporters as their base.

    The demographics of the US are like Qld. More people live outside the large population centres than in the major cities.

    So the city versus country voter meme is strong.

    The city folks don’t like being governed by hicks and the country voters don’t like being lectured to by city elites. With voluntary voting, election outcomes are governed by whichever demographic is energised.

    Voters in the rural areas live off the land, have fewer and more expensive costs in accessing services than their city brethren..

  7. Thanks Swamprat for referring me to the June 2018 article by Cameron Archibald about the advantages of Scotland becoming a monetarily sovereign nation.

    I’ve been reading this August 2018 report by a Scottish think tank called Common Weal. The report is entitled How To Launch A Scottish Currency: Preparing Scotland For Monetary Sovereignty From Day One Of Independence.

    http://allofusfirst.org/tasks/render/file/?fileID=D4585A1F-CD21-B22B-C33449D117D4382C

  8. ‘lizzie says:
    Saturday, November 17, 2018 at 5:32 pm

    Boerwar

    Kennett and the “trumped up corella”?’

    Exactly fucking so, lizzie!

  9. ‘Planet America’ made it very clear that the great divide in American politics is between the educated and the uneducated.

    Exactly. That’s the problem with this country also. Its another reason I’m a supporter of high speed rail because physical mobility breaks down these sorts of divide.

  11. Call of duty?

    Fr Rod Bower
    @FrBower
    21h21 hours ago

    So @ScottMorrisonMP is calling on religious leaders to call out members of their community who are doing the wrong thing. OK I’m in. #ScoMo you are doing the wrong thing in #auspol.

  12. Love this!

    C Fierravanti-Wells
    @Senator_CFW

    making social media companies verify the identification of
    their users would moderate debate and result in a greater degree of
    accountability

    @lionheartleojai
    23h23 hours ago

    Which is hilarious considering YOUR Twitter account isn’t verified.
    For all we know you could be some clown impersonating a senator.

    Although that seems to be a prerequisite for the senate these days.

  14. lizzie @ #711 Saturday, November 17th, 2018 – 5:51 pm

    Love this!

    C Fierravanti-Wells
    @Senator_CFW

    making social media companies verify the identification of
    their users would moderate debate and result in a greater degree of
    accountability

    @lionheartleojai
    23h23 hours ago

    Which is hilarious considering YOUR Twitter account isn’t verified.
    For all we know you could be some clown impersonating a senator.

    Although that seems to be a prerequisite for the senate these days.

    Let’s persecute the whistle blowers while we are at it.

  15. I wonder who chose this to illustrate the piece.

    People who have watched Morrison and Turnbull up close say the current Prime Minister does not have the risk-taking gene of his predecessor and would be more inclined to try to throw everything at fixing his government’s appalling standing with voters and hope something turned up.

    Options are starting to tighten around the Prime Minister. (Onions or sausages first?)

    The parliamentary calendar for 2019 – for example – has not yet been published. It’s a month late.

    Publishing would require revealing some of your strategy, for example, for an early budget – if you were hoping to wait until May to go to the polls.

    And a federal integrity commission is just one issue that might entice one or two of your disaffected MPs – who are planning to leave anyway – to cross the floor, or even sit on the crossbench in the dying days of the government

    It is not going to be a pretty end to the year.

    https://www.afr.com/opinion/a-softening-economy-could-only-further-complication-election-timing-20181116-h17zfo

  16. BW
    “Concetta is very busy pissing into the tent:”
    I personally find the mental image of the lady doing this, in any direction, disturbing

  18. Just before I leave for the evening – Mari has told me that she has received thousands of (mostly supportive) Twitter messages as a result of CFW’s madness.

  19. Nicholas wrote this on the previous thread. I’ve only just got to the point of having time to respond.

    Cud Chewer’s story about his sister is poignant and it raises important questions about how big systems should respond to people going through extreme difficulty.

    Perhaps a good policy change would be to empower Centrelink officers to authorize DSP payments on the basis of third party-provided documentation about the person’s life circumstances. Cud Chewer’s sister definitely deserves the DSP (the rejection rate is far too high – I would change that). If her objection is that she doesn’t like the payment being called DSP, there should be discretion on the part of a government officer to enter a different description on the bank statements and other documents that the person receives. For example, perhaps it should just be be called (Living Well Income) in the case of Cud Chewer’s sister. If her family, doctors, and other supporters provide appropriate documentation, then the government should simply start making the payments to her bank account every fortnight. If she wants to pay the money back, she would be free to do so. But I think the obstacle might be that she doesn’t like the name of the payment and doesn’t want to make a formal request. Well, relieve her of those stressful burdens and make it a whole lot easier for her to get the income that she needs and deserves.

    We can and should design more compassionate, creative, and flexible government responses to difficult circumstances.

    Nicholas, I’m sorry but this reveals your blind spots.

    The entire principle on which the present social security system is based is that people will always pursue their own rational self interest.

    You have no idea how much what you propose would only make the problem worse. My sister had to be persuaded, but its her signature on the form. In fact it took two years and quite a few screaming matches. If someone else had the power to just sign her up to a DSP without her involvement, there would have been hell to pay (not to mention the legalities such as access to her bank account details).

    So Nicholas, let me contain myself for a moment.. This is just plain wrong. Its rubbish.

    It doesn’t matter what you call it. A “Living Well Income” would offend my sister just as deeply. I don’t care if you call it a “You’re a special person income”. The reason is because its socially stigmatised and such payments always will be.

    She wants a real job. Nothing but a real job will make her happy. She isn’t capable of holding down a real job. What kind of job are you going to invent for her that she wouldn’t be immediately offended by? She wants to be a high school teacher. Offer her a job minding kids (which she is reasonably good at) and she will be offended.

    There is only kind of payment that would work with my sister and that’s a UBI. One where there is no special test, no forms, no stigma. Its just an accepted part of life. It may not stop her being unhappy at not having a job but at least she won’t be sucking money out of my family to help pay the bills.

    She’s not alone. There are many people who would actually be a benefit to society if they were paid to go to the beach. They’d be healthier and happier and less prone to causing harm to others.

    See Nicholas, what this reveals is your blind spot. The belief you have that everyone can be neatly fitted into a simplistic system. The idea that one tools fixes everything. It doesn’t.

    You’ve also got a hide selling MMT when one of the things you can deduce from MMT is that a UBI is NOT inflationary if implemented in a way that doesn’t lead to excess money exceeding physical capacities. Clever taxation is a part of the solution.

    Now I have no problem with a government creating meaningful and productive jobs but the weakness in that scheme is that to the extent that such jobs are actually productive there is a cost in them being also by their nature temporary. For example if you create a lot of nurses aids and the like, what happens when the private sector expands? Suddenly all the good that came from having more nurses aids has been reduced.

    And the other thing I don’t get about you Nicholas is your blind spot that schemes like a JG are anything other than extraordinarily complex and difficult to implement if they are done properly on a case by case basis. In fact you create a lot of jobs just doing the case work. What you don’t get though is that without cultural change a JG program is just as likely to be treated with contempt by the bureaucracy and have an air of social disapproval just like work for the dole. No amount of economic theory can change that. Only good leadership. And good leadership is part of what it takes to get a UBI.

  23. She wants a real job. Nothing but a real job will make her happy. She isn’t capable of holding down a real job

    Cud, I think you you are probably selling your sister short here.

    A Job Guarantee could be designed with immense flexibility to accommodate the barriers and challenges experienced by people with mental health issues and personality conditions.

    I hear your frustration.

    I think you are too quick to dismiss a policy option that could empower your sister with the measure of autonomy and contribution and belonging that she wants.

    Carer fatigue is a real problem. Sometimes the carers can inadvertently be a source of disability for the person they assist because they are so frustrated, so fatigued, and so overwhelmed by their many years of loving work that they mostly see deficits and problems rather than gifts and assets.

    I see carer fatigue a lot in my work. In some cases, the carer or gatekeeper is the biggest source of disability in the person’s life, not the person who is officially diagnosed with a disability.

    When you describe your sister, I don’t hear her story. I don’t hear her perspective. I don’t hear her desires, gifts, assets, and contributions. All I hear is problems, deficits, barriers, and despair.

    I am confident that with a flexibly designed Job Guarantee and appropriate professional supports, your sister could do a real job and earning a living wage if that is what she wants.

    You would be surprised what people with disabilities can achieve when the environment around them becomes more flexible and supportive.

  24. I have posted before about reading “Utopia for Realists” by Rutger Bregman. Well, I finished it and decided I wanted a personal copy, since the library was demanding their copy back. So I was at my local Dymocks this morning. After several fruitless minutes looking for a copy I finally asked at the counter, showing her the library copy that I would return later. She typed and checked and announced, “Yes. We have one copy.” And off she went. I followed obediently and we ended at the section marked “Religion”. I remarked I that I would never have thought to look for the book here. “Oh yes.”, she said. “We keep them all here.”

    Economics. Religion for the politically inclined. Sigh.

  27. “Given that Republican memes are often imported by the Coalition, this may explain why they campaign as if the average voter was thick — and also why they seem to identify PHON supporters as their base.”

    It’s not that Coalition voters are thick, but the Coalition aims to corner the ‘thick’ vote to make up the numbers together with those who believe (rightly or wrongly) that their interests align with big corporations and those who are culturally right wing (e.g. Churchgoers).

  28. Cud Chewer @ #707 Saturday, November 17th, 2018 – 5:44 pm

    ‘Planet America’ made it very clear that the great divide in American politics is between the educated and the uneducated.

    Exactly. That’s the problem with this country also. Its another reason I’m a supporter of high speed rail because physical mobility breaks down these sorts of divide.

    Not. Going. To. Happen. Forget about it, Cud. I was speaking to someone today who actually knows what they are talking about, wrt the geology and the requirements for putting a HSR line where you want it to go and they said it’s not viable.

    If you want to contact me, I could put you in touch with him, Mr Bowe has me email. It might take a while before I see him again, a few months, but when I do I could pass on your details to him so you could talk to him about it if you want.

  29. Moises Henriques should be recalled to the Test team – the only player from 6 states to score a century this weekend – and 150 at that. And good Portuguese stock via NSW

  30. Heard part of Morrison’s keynote address at APEC. He sounded different. Apart from saying some stuff I agreed with, he spoke in a calm, measured voice, rather than shouting and blustering. He also seemed to have put aside the circular breathing.

  31. Steve777 @ #728 Saturday, November 17th, 2018 – 7:00 pm

    Heard part of Morrison’s keynote address at APEC. He sounded different. Apart from saying some stuff I agreed with, he spoke in a calm, measured voice, rather than shouting and blustering. He also seemed to have put aside the circular breathing.

    Sounds like just another tack he’s trying. Sound like a Prime Minister.

    Honestly, from descriptions I’ve read about him, he sounds like a bit of a chameleon. He assumes a persona like a skin over whoever the real Scott Morrison is.

  32. Who really cares about cricket any more!?! Just another commoditised sport, like all the rest. Played for the revenue stream it creates, rather than the game itself.

  34. From what I could see Scotty was reading from a prepared DFAT script at APEC, rather than his normal ‘off the cuff’ style.

    Trump does the same every so often – when he reads from the script his staff prepare for him and doesnt deviate he sounds almost normal/

  35. C@t “Honestly, from descriptions I’ve read about him, he sounds like a bit of a chameleon. He assumes a persona like a skin over whoever the real Scott Morrison is.”

    I think that Morrison’s overweening characteristic is ambition. To serve that end, his approach is “whatever it takes”. As for politics, he’ll be as right wing or as ‘moderate’ as the occasion calls for. He can even do compassion if needed, although not very convincingly. His religiosity it genuine, but he’s adopted what for him is a very comfortable brand of belief – prosperity theology. The rich deserve their success, the poor and unfortunate deserve their misfortune.

    After he loses the Prime Ministership at a relatively young age, will his ambitition drive him to get back in, or will he use his experience and contacts to make lots of money and join the True Rulers, the plutocrats. Profit in this life and the next.

  36. C@tmomma @ #732 Saturday, November 17th, 2018 – 7:07 pm

    Who really cares about cricket any more!?! Just another commoditised sport, like all the rest. Played for the revenue stream it creates, rather than the game itself.

    Dear 🐈C@tmomma,🐈

    I really like to watch the cricket. Particularly the Womens game. I tend to use the broadcasts as an aid to sleep – as well as simply enjoying the game. The commentators for the womens game are a vast improvement over the now gone Channel Nine mob.

    Your obedient servant

    K……..J……Mc 💋

  37. Boerwar

    Sally McManus might be your kind of lady. The GG’s Weekend Magazine doing quite a puff piece on her. Most unusual. Not a trident or horns in sight.

    Who’s afraid of Sally?

    Sally McManus sits three rows from the try line at Melbourne’s AAMI Park, nursing a beer, talking about the one time she felt compelled to unleash her formidable martial arts skills on a stranger……………On weekends McManus, 47, regularly sets off early for Melbourne’s Western Treatment Plant to pursue her twin hobbies of bird watching and photography. The 10,500ha sewage farm in ­Werribee is an internationally recognised bird habitat for more than 280 species, including shorebirds that travel from Siberia each year. McManus goes in search of raptors and orange-­bellied parrots. “It’s sort of exciting, going out, not knowing what you are going to find,” she says. “The skill of taking the photo. You are living in their world, and they don’t give a shit about ­anything. I find it very relaxing.”
    https://outline.com/tu4BRH

  38. sprocket_

    Glad to see Henriques in the runs again.

    When he made his Test debut in 2013 I think from memory I managed to get the sports editor of a newspaper in Madeira where he was born to put it in their paper.

  39. Steve777,
    Its an interesting scenario you posit. What will Scott do, if and when he loses the election?

    The Liberals don’t like losers. Traditionally they put the MP who loses government out to pasture on the back bench, or they resign from parliament entirely. Could Scott Morrison, and I’m pretty sure he believes in manifest destiny, happily let others take from him that which he strove to attain by various manoeuvres?

    He may want to stay as Opposition Leader but I don’t think anyone on his side of politics will stomach that.

    I also don’t think that he will be welcomed with open arms by the business community, in much the same way that Tony Abbott is recoiled from with horror by them. They had their time in that millieu and it wasn’t a particularly successful one. They, the both of them, had ideas beyond their station, as the saying goes, and their co-workers found it extremely difficult to get along with them.

    I guess his church might accept him as a martyr. 😉

  41. p
    Yes. I have been there a couple of times to do bird photography but have yet to encounter Sally. She must be a good stick with a hobby like that!

  45. KJ
    I was watching the women’s cricket the other day. It was an ODI. And I enjoyed it! They enjoyed it! There were smiles, rueful smiles and pleased smiles!
    There was a personal grace about their movements.
    There was athleticism and there was skill.
    Much funnerer than watching the men, I bethought myself.

  46. Got to laugh at Boerwar and Briefly, the two resident extreme right wing Groupers. Any mention of Corbyn and both wet their pants. Shows that Corbyn and British Labour are doing something right, If this pair of RWNJ’S are in such a state of apoplexy.

  49. clem attlee

    But but but voting for Corbyn risked WWIII……………………..or so some wally General wrote in the ‘Torygraph’ newspaper. In very very tough competition he took out the ‘Hyper Bowl’ award for Corbyn claims during the election campaign.

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