Kicking off a federal election year with an overdue accumulation of preselection news, going back to late November:
• Liberal Party conservative Craig Kelly was last month saved from factional moderate Kent Johns’ preselection challenge in his southern Sydney seat of Hughes, which was widely reported as having decisive support in local party branches. This followed the state executive’s acquiescence to Scott Morrison’s demand that it rubber-stamp preselections for all sitting members of the House of Representatives, also confirming the positions of Jason Falinski in Mackellar, John Alexander in Bennelong and Lucy Wicks in Robertson. Kelly had threatened a week earlier to move to the cross bench if dumped, presumably with a view to contesting the seat as an independent. Malcolm Turnbull stirred the pot by calling on the executive to defy Morrison, noting there had been “such a long debate in the New South Wales Liberal Party about the importance of grass roots membership involvement”. This referred to preselection reforms that had given Johns the edge over Kelly, which had been championed by conservatives and resisted by moderates. Turnbull’s critics noted he raised no concerns when the executive of the Victorian branch guaranteed sitting members’ preselections shortly before he was dumped as Prime Minister.
• The intervention that saved Craig Kelly applied only to lower house members, and was thus of no use to another beleaguered conservative, Senator Jim Molan, who had been relegated a week earlier to the unwinnable fourth position on the Coalition’s ticket. Hollie Hughes and Andrew Bragg were chosen for the top two positions, with the third reserved to the Nationals (who have chosen Perin Davey, owner of a communications consultancy, to succeed retiring incumbent John “Wacka” Williams). Despite anger at the outcome from conservatives in the party and the media, Scott Morrison declined to intervene. Morrison told 2GB that conservatives themselves were to blame for Molan’s defeat in the preselection ballot, as there was “a whole bunch of people in the very conservative part of our party who didn’t show up”.
• Labor’s national executive has chosen Diane Beamer, a former state government minister who held the seats of Badgerys Creek and Mulgoa from 1995 to 2011, to replace Emma Husar in Lindsay. The move scotched Husar’s effort to recant her earlier decision to vacate the seat, after she became embroiled in accusations of bullying and sexual harassment in August. Husar is now suing Buzzfeed over its reporting of the allegations, and is reportedly considering running as an independent. The Liberals have preselected Melissa McIntosh, communications manager for the not-for-profit Wentworth Community Housing.
• The misadventures of Nationals MP Andrew Broad have created an opening in his seat of Mallee, which has been in National/Country Party hands since its creation in 1949, although the Liberals have been competitive when past vacancies have given them the opportunity to contest it. The present status on suggestions the seat will be contested for the Liberals by Peta Credlin, who was raised locally in Wycheproof, is that she is “being encouraged”. There appears to be a view in the Nationals that the position should go to a woman, with Rachel Baxendale of The Australian identifying three potential nominees – Anne Mansell, chief executive of Dried Fruits Australia; Caroline Welsh, chair of the Birchip Cropping Group; and Tanya Chapman, former chair of Citrus Australia – in addition to confirmed starter Anne Warner, a social worker.
• Nationals Senator Bridget McKenzie yesterday scotched suggestions that she might run in Mallee. The view is that she is positioning herself to succeeding Cathy McGowan in Indi if she decides not to recontest, having recently relocated her electorate office from Bendigo to one of Indi’s main population centres, Wodonga. The Liberals last month preselected Steven Martin, a Wodonga-based engineer.
• Grant Schultz, Milton real estate agent and son of former Hume MP Alby Schultz, has been preselected as Liberal candidate for Gilmore on New South Wales’ south coast, which the party holds on a delicate margin of 0.7%. The seat is to be vacated by Ann Sudmalis, whose preselection Schultz was preparing to challenge when she announced her retirement in September. It was reported in the South Coast Register that Joanna Gash, who held the seat from 1996 to 2013 and is now the mayor of Shoalhaven (UPDATE: Turns out Gash ceased to be so as of the 2016 election, and is now merely a councillor), declared herself “pissed off” at the local party’s endorsement of Schultz, which passed by forty votes to nine.
• Hawkesbury councillor Sarah Richards has been preselected as the Liberal candidate in Macquarie, where Labor’s Susan Templeman unseated Liberal member Louise Markus in 2016.
Barney in Go Dau @ #1944 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:03 pm
Because you asked nicely,
Blair Cottrell
In October 2015, Blair Cottrell replaced Burgess as chairman of the United Patriots Front. Cottrell has stirred controversy over his criminal convictions (which include arson, stalking, making threats to kill, inciting contempt against Muslims and breaching intervention orders), and for several of his public statements, including a desire to see a portrait of Adolf Hitler hung in Australian classrooms and for copies of Mein Kampf to be “issued annually” to students. Cottrell has denied supporting Nazism.[10]
In 2012, Cottrell served four months in Port Phillip Prison after being convicted of stalking his ex-girlfriend and her new partner, and of arson after attempting to burn down the man’s house. In December 2013 he was fined $1,000 and sentenced to seven days in jail by a County Court judge for aggravated burglary, property damage, arson, trafficking testosterone, possessing a controlled weapon and breaching court orders.[11][12]
In September 2017, Cottrell, together with Erikson and Shortis, were found guilty by a magistrate of inciting contempt against Muslims, and each was fined $2,000.[4]
Neil Erikson
One of the founding members of the group, Erikson came to national prominence for attacking former Labor senator Sam Dastyari in a Melbourne bar, launching a verbal attack in which he called Dastyari, who is Iranian-born, a “terrorist” and a “little monkey” and telling him to “go back home”.
Erikson is a former neo-Nazi and convicted criminal, whose convictions include assault, inciting contempt against Muslims, stalking, affray and riotous behavior. Along with Cottrell and Shortis, he is associated with the secretive far-right fight club, Lads Society.
Erikson is most notable for a number of public stunts including beheading a dummy outside a Bendigo council office in protest over plans to build a mosque and interrupting a church service at the Gosford Anglican Church, by marching into the church dressed as Jesus Christ, holding a whip.
Confessions @ #1956 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:06 pm
It’s the holidays. What else were they going to talk about? The cricket!?! 😆
sprocket_ @ #1945 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:03 pm
Cotterill said the supporting crowd was 500. Looks more like 100-150.
I know he’s totally irrelevant to anything, but one must be fair —
‘We’ve seen Fraser Anning say appalling things in Parliament, now he’s endorsing far-right bullies who peddling fear and hatred to try divide our community – and he’s charging taxpayers for it.
The Australian community will not tolerate or accept this racism and hate-speech.’
https://www.facebook.com/senatordinatale/
GG
Are you counting the coppers in their hi viz?
C@tmomma @ #1956 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 2:07 pm
At least the cricket is relevant. And more interesting. 😀
Thanks zoomster
I would just say I think Di Natale is more relevant especially after the next election than Hanson or Fraser Anning
DTT on the role of C’Wealth MPs: “2. Selecting the PM and cabinet – important role but not a full time job”
How 20th Century!
Quoll
‘Actually it seems if the polling keeps up as it is going that any party of government after the next election will have to listen too, deal with and accept that the Greens and other independents or minor parties are part of the political landscape in modern Australia and that it is the rare exception that the party with a HR majority will have a majority in the senate.’
If the polling keeps up as it is going, no.
As for the Senate, that’s been the case for decades. Nothing to do with current polling.
I guess the cricket is more relevant. In a perverse sort of way. 😆
@ Sprocket
Them Nats do seem to take a shine to their staff. I remember some years ago during the Borbidge Government a Nats QLD Minister was outed by his then wife in a front page spread in the Sunday Mail.
Like the Aristocracy in Britain the “ruling class squatocracy” in Australia think its acceptable for “them” to take a mistress – especially at taxpayers expense.
Aren’t The Greens on track to lose about half their Senators at the next federal election? Having to get full quotas and all this time. 🙂
When does Fraser Anning cease to be a Senator?
zoomster says:
Sunday, January 6, 2019 at 5:09 pm
I know he’s totally irrelevant to anything, but one must be fair —
‘We’ve seen Fraser Anning say appalling things in Parliament, now he’s endorsing far-right bullies who peddling fear and hatred to try divide our community – and he’s charging taxpayers for it.
The Australian community will not tolerate or accept this racism and hate-speech.’
_____________________________________________
Thanks zoomster.
As I said in one of my subsequent posts, my ‘demand’ for di Natale to say something was a tongue in cheek response to the plethora of demands that X or Y or Z say something, rather than having a go at RDN himself. As another poster pointed out, it was probably the case that whatever RDN said was not reported (as insufficiently newsworthy) rather than he did not actually say anything.
I still haven’t seen a photo of George Christensen’s supposed fiance yet. You’d think there’d be at least one, which he would keep in his wallet and show everyone like a proud husband-to-be.
Greensborough Growler @ #1953 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 1:09 pm
Doesn’t “supporting crowd” mean police and security?
There is more coppers than ‘Nazi protesters’at this ‘rally’ yesterday – it must be a real slow news day for this to be getting any traction from any angle whatsoever!
sprocket_ @ #1955 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:11 pm
I wasn’t. But Cotterill may have.
Dan Tehan wants students to cover the costs of security for student protests, so I assume he’ll be asking Anning to stump up for yesterday. You know, consistency.
Ah yes the Nats and their staff….
November 1, 2014 7:00pm
A SALACIOUS scandal that ended a minister’s career has risen again, with the former mistress of retiring MP Howard Hobbs being preselected to take his seat.
Mr Hobbs’ electorate officer, Ann Leahy, was yesterday endorsed by the local Liberal National Party branch to run for Warrego at next year’s election, beating Maranoa Council Mayor Robert Loughnan and agricultural equipment supplier John Travers.
Mr Hobbs’ former wife, Marilyn, made front-page news in 1998 when she published a letter alleging “taxpayers were funding illicit love affairs between ministers and their staff”.
At the time, she said her husband, then natural resources minister in the Borbidge Government, was travelling with a young female staff member with whom he was having an “intimate and unprofessional relationship’’.
The scandal brought Mr Hobbs’ ministerial career to an end, but he had already been separated from his wife and was divorcing.
Mrs Hobbs yesterday said Ms Leahy was the woman she was referring to at the time.
“That was the person, but I don’t have any further comment, as you can understand,” she said.
It is understood the affair ended 16 years ago when Mrs Hobbs went public.
Ms Leahy could not be reached for comment yesterday, but an LNP spokesman said she thoroughly deserved the opportunity.
Neil Eriksen and Blair Cottrell should also be made to pay for the security for their rally.
don @ #1918 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 4:41 pm
It is not true to imply that this was either unexpected, or unplanned. The Chinese fertility rate has been quite low and fairly stable for nearly 20 years now (1.72 in 2000 declining slowly and steadily to 1.62 in 2018).
By comparison, Australia’s fertility rate is quite erratic. It was was 1.76 in 2000 rising to as high as 1.98 in 2008, and is currently 1.83 in 2018.
China has known for decades it will have to deal with a declining population, and it will do so with characteristic foresight and determination. Because the consequences of not doing so are too awful to contemplate.
Australia, on the other hand, is still foolishly pretending we can just grow forever 🙁
What’s the most a Senator has increased their personal vote by and yet lost their seat?
I reckon Anning will be in line for a new record. 🙂
When does Fraser Anning cease to be a Senator?
3o June.
Unless reelected which is unlikely in a half senate election as he needs 16% of the vote.
Most of the loony toons will be gone with him.
Spotted the reason for the high count of the ” supporting crowd “. The eejit thought there was support from a contingent of ‘gilet jaunes’ protesters .
Here is a handy list of which Senators term expires on June 30 2019, and which in 2022
https://www.aph.gov.au/Senators_and_Members/Senators/Senators_by_service_expiry_date
5 of 8 0f the Greens are up for election – likely to lose some if its a BillSlide 🙂
And the minors of Anning, Lleyohnolm, Burston, Storer and Georgio- and the Rat Martin in tassie, are likely goners in a few months time
And if Scotty does call a March 2 election on Australia Day – the current group of loons get to grace the red leather till 30 June 2019, even if they lose their seats
sprocket_ @ #1976 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:28 pm
175 days to go!
Shame about Storer. I heard a rumour that he has a working brain. 😉
Upnorth @ #1970 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:20 pm
The more things change, the more they stay the same.
C@tmomma says: Sunday, January 6, 2019 at 5:18 pm
I still haven’t seen a photo of George Christensen’s supposed fiance yet. You’d think there’d be at least one, which he would keep in his wallet and show everyone like a proud husband-to-be.
***************************************************
She looks quite an attractive young lady ……
C@tmomma says:
Careful what you wish for. Charging or threatening to charge for ‘security’ could easily be turned into a weapon to suppress protests.
phoenixRED @ #1987 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:32 pm
She does! Thanks for that. 🙂
Reminds me of the two Phillipina women who come into the Op Shop all year to pick up children’s clothes and toys and then, just before Xmas they go back home and distribute them all to the needy children. 🙂
poroti @ #1988 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 5:33 pm
You do have a point there.
That Echidna is too gorgeous!
Don, what’s the point of posting when you get a rebuke like that? Maybe I should decend into the trolling game myself? But what would be the point? Just in closing I’d reckon there are more people that drop in,check out what’s going on without leaving a comment and depart than seemingly spend every waking moment on here. I agree I don’t post very often, mainly about the infantile stuff that goes on, so if you want to go down the name calling rabbit hole,knock yourself out. Shite, I fed a troll. Naughty Bert, must get a slap on the wrist.
Mmmmmmm, gorgeous
HedgehogEchidna.The best way to enjoy red meat is to not eat it for a few weeks. Or even a few months. Then eating a steak takes on orgasmic proportions.
Simon² Katich® @ #1988 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 6:02 pm
We do that all the time. It’s called “a freezer”. Haven’t noticed any “orgasmic” side effects 🙂
Grrrrrr.
No grilled lamb and freekeh salad for you!
Talking about steak, my personal favorite is a thick porterhouse with a firey pepper rub, char grilled medium rare served with penne pasta and a mix of vegatables in an Alfredo sauce. Calorie counters beware. Don’t know why but the sauce tames the heat of the rub and enhances the steak. Any chefs out there have an idea as to why?
Bert @ #1631 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 6:16 pm
steak. Any chefs out there have an idea as to why?
Are you taking bookings ❓ Sounds wonderful ❗ 🥔 🥩
Bert
The ‘heat’ is from capsaicin. It is fat/oil soluble so perhaps the sauce helps shift the ‘heat’ away from your mouth. Milk ‘tames’ the heat this way.
Bert said:
Don, what’s the point of posting when you get a rebuke like that? Maybe I should decend into the trolling game myself? But what would be the point? Just in closing I’d reckon there are more people that drop in,check out what’s going on without leaving a comment and depart than seemingly spend every waking moment on here. I agree I don’t post very often, mainly about the infantile stuff that goes on, so if you want to go down the name calling rabbit hole,knock yourself out. Shite, I fed a troll. Naughty Bert, must get a slap on the wrist.
You have every right to post here, drive by style or not. I concur with your sentiments. I read all of PB every day, admittedly I scroll by an awful lot but I’m after distilled Federal political info and not cricket (all day ffs) or anything else. Some posters should post a lot less & people like you should post a lot more.
Back to lurking.
Greensborough Growler @ #1890 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 12:55 pm
Not one, but thee GG. You’ll have to look to Twitter to find the identities of them. One of the politicians allegedly involved has made a threat of legal action.
Thanks for the comments about the recipe. Give your taste buds a thrill, a word of warning tho, your cholesterol levels go off the chart just reading the ingredients for an Alfredo sauce. I’ll write out my quail recipe and whack it on here if anyone expresses an interest, I know it has nothing to do with politics but you can’t live on politics alone.
Just back from my grandson’s 5th birthday party. We had thinly sliced smoked spiced brisket in fresh bread rolls. Simply magnificent.
Keeping the cooking theme going, you lucky ba… man BK. If you ever have the chance to try a smoked, slow cooked Boston butt burrito take it. You won’t be disappointed.
Bert @ #1636 Sunday, January 6th, 2019 – 6:40 pm
Put up your recipe. Them that don’t like it can discuss the cricket. 🏏
Just another little thing that has absolutely nothing much to do with anything else. —-My eldest favourite daughter still gives us a laugh many years later with the word — repice
Although not as good a laugh as the tale (pun) about the grandson whose underpants rode up his crunch. 👠 I couldn’t find an underpants emoji so a nice high heeled shoe will have to do just in case Ms. Julie checks in. ☮✌☕