Poll positioning

Fraught preselections aplenty as the major parties get their houses in order ahead of a looming federal election.

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.

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.

3,175 comments on “Poll positioning”

Comments Page 47 of 64
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  1. Simon² Katich® @ #2237 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 8:11 am

    One thing travelling and living abroad has done is almost completely remove me from popular western culture.

    Try becoming a parent. My music tastes now seem to mostly include Taylor Swift and TV is Lady Bug and Cat Noir and Survivor.

    I miss Ben and Holly’s little Kingdom, but the kids wont let me watch that anymore.

    We all have to live with choices we make!

    As for Taylor Swift, it is your house! 😆

  2. SK

    If Romney and Biden are as right as each other that rules out Biden as winning the Democratic primary.

    No wonder they are talking about a seperate party. The Nader Jill Stein strategy?

  5. C@tmomma:

    If Joe stands and wins, he’ll be 82 going into his second term. He can then hand it onto another. The Dems over the years have put up candidates who haven’t cut the mustard – eg, McGovern, Dukakis, Mondale, Kerry. Biden, on the other hand, has charisma, served in the Senate and as vice president, gaining a buckload of experience. I’ve watched quite a number of his speeches, and he’s very impressive.
    Here’s an example:

    https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=mK0MltvFFdE

  6. Bloody excellent from Senator Wong is all I can say.

    Yes the LNP have done overreach and Labor is putting the boot in as I hoped. 🙂

  7. Simon² Katich® @ #2300 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 2:17 pm

    Some have called for a Biden led third party ticket with a senior well known Republican (Romney, Kasich…). Where he promises to only serve as President for 4 years and then support his running mate.

    Sounds cray cray to me but it comes from some respected peeps.

    Who needs a third party ticket? The Democrats should run Biden for President with Warren as his VP. Then Biden retires. This may be the best way for America to get a female president 🙂

  9. Simon² Katich® @ #2298 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 11:17 am

    Some have called for a Biden led third party ticket with a senior well known Republican (Romney, Kasich…). Where he promises to only serve as President for 4 years and then support his running mate.

    Sounds cray cray to me but it comes from some respected peeps.

    I cannot see it happening. Biden and Romney are diametrically opposed on many key policy issues.

    However, I do want Romney to run as a conservative independent candidate for president in 2020 if Trump is still the GOP candidate.

  10. Simon² Katich® @ #2251 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 8:29 am

    The issue of responsibility and accountability when it comes to past atrocities is complicated. It can not be boiled down to ‘I didnt do the crime so I am not accountable’. These are not one off crimes, they are a series of horrific events over a long period that have led to large groups of people being disadvantaged long after the ‘crimes’ took place. Furthermore, these people often have to deal with sections of the community who deny/ignore the crimes happened, dismiss the repercussions, blame the victims descendents for not getting their act together and continue to discriminate against them.

    On top of that, there are people and corporations to this day who are benefiting from those crimes. Almost all of us live on and own land that was aboriginal land.

    So, no, we white fellas are not to blame for the crimes of the past. But I do believe we are all responsible to actively pursue means to right those wrongs, to recognises the crimes and embrace ideas from the aboriginal community in ways to improve their well-being and standing in the community.

    Yep, and I would add that we have benefited from these past crimes, so if our privileged position is challenged we should not fight the challenge, but accept it as part of correcting past wrongs.

    The problem I see here is the people who think their privilege is right and acceptable.

  12. P1

    Who needs a third party ticket? The Democrats should run Biden for President with Warren as his VP. Then Biden retires.

    It is the retire after 4 years thing that bugs me most about it. It will bite them on the rear either at the first election or at the next.

    It is one of those ‘out there’ ideas journos and talking heads come up with to get air time.

  15. Diplomats falling ill, accusations of dastardly russkiy ‘sonic weapons’ . Or was it ? ;lol:
    .
    .
    The US embassy in Havana more than halved its staff in 2017 when diplomats complained of headaches, nausea and other ailments after hearing penetrating noises in their homes and nearby hotels.

    The mysterious wave of illness fuelled speculation that the staff had been targeted by an acoustic weapon.

    But a fresh analysis of the audio recording has revealed what scientists in the UK and the US now believe is the true source of the piercing din: it is the song of the Indies short-tailed cricket, known formally as Anurogryllus celerinictus.
    https://www.theguardian.com/world/2019/jan/06/sonic-attack-on-us-embassy-in-havana-could-have-been-crickets-say-scientists

  17. Greensborough Growler says: Monday, January 7, 2019 at 2:07 pm

    How to deal with people who use Nazism as a prop for attention.

    https://www.brisbanetimes.com.au/national/queensland/band-kicked-off-brisbane-stage-for-unveiling-swastika-flags-20190106-p50pvh.html

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

    I often wonder if there is a direct connection between the fading of memories of the Holocaust and the rise in the US and Australia – and in some parts of Europe – of these Nazi hate groups and their use of Nazi symbols …..

    A few days of burying bodies at Belsen and Dachau may have cured their fascination with Nazi ….

    Holocaust Is Fading From Memory, Survey Finds

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/04/12/us/holocaust-education.html

    Neo-Nazi and white supremacist groups have multiplied under Trump, report finds

    https://www.independent.co.uk/news/world/americas/us-politics/trump-neo-nazi-white-supremacist-hate-groups-southern-poverty-law-centre-a8222351.html

  19. DaretoTread:

    I’m unaware of the “Uncle Joe” meme you refer to. I would want to see probative evidence thereof before hanging him out to dry. Do you have any?

  23. I would want to see probative evidence thereof before hanging him out to dry. Do you have any?

    Here we go……

  25. No but it does seem a ‘crime’ now to be old,white and ,oh the horror, white.
    On this blog, and in the opinion of one or two posters here, certainly.

  27. I’m with this guy:

    You’d agree, wouldn’t you, that Consideration No. 1 in choosing a Democratic nominee in 2020 is making sure that he or she is the person best positioned to defeat Donald Trump? That nothing else comes close?

    Then what would you say if I told you that we should put our chips on a man who failed miserably at two previous campaigns for the nomination, the first one all the way back in 1988, a year before Alexandria Ocasio-Cortez was born? And that when he applied the lessons from that debacle to his second bid two decades later, he did no better, placing fifth in the Iowa caucuses, getting fewer than 1 percent of the state’s delegates and folding his tent before even the New Hampshire primary?

    And that he spent nearly 45 years in Washington, a proper noun that’s a dirty word in presidential politics? And that his record includes laws and episodes that are reviled — rightly — by the female and black voters so integral to the Democratic Party? And that, on Election Day, he would be 77, which is 31 years older than Bill Clinton was in 1992, 30 years older than Barack Obama was in 2008 and a complete contradiction of the party’s success over the last half-century with relatively youthful candidates?

    You’d tell me that I was of unsound mind.

    Well, Joe Biden’s boosters are.

    Right now there’s a swell of talk about, and interest in, a Biden candidacy. Last Monday he told an audience in Montana that none of the other Democrats eyeing the White House were as qualified as he is, and it sounded like the beginnings of a stump speech.

    A terrible stump speech at that. If what Biden took away from the 2016 election was that qualifications rule the day, I’d urge him to ask Hillary Clinton how consoling her impeccable credentials are and then to educate me on the gold-plated wonders of Trump’s C.V.

    https://www.nytimes.com/2018/12/08/opinion/sunday/biden-2020-dont-run.html

  28. Rex Douglas:

    [‘Joe Biden – the establishments darling.

    That’s the last thing that country needs.’]

    What I think the Dems need, Rex, is someone who won’t be intimidated by Trump, Biden’s vast experience in public office being a distinct advantage.

  29. SCG Test abandoned as a draw. India win Series 2-1. Cheteshwar Pujara is the player of the series.

    Congratulations to the first Indian team to win a series in Australia.

    India were unlucky not to win in 1977/78 and 1985/86, but they have finally done it.

  31. Rex
    “Joe Biden – the establishments darling.

    That’s the last thing that country needs.”

    Correction: The last thing America needs is what it already has – an anti-establishment buffoon named Trump.

    The second-last thing it needs is Sanders. You Bernie-or-bust types helped us get into this mess in the first place.

  33. Cat

    You’d agree, wouldn’t you, that Consideration No. 1 in choosing a Democratic nominee in 2020 is making sure that he or she is the person best positioned to defeat Donald Trump?

    The Democratic Party is, I am sure, also ready for Plan B – that is, Trump does not have to be defeated because he is not on the ballot.

  34. Cat

    I thought Stein was Putin’s choice.

    Remember Putin was driving division. Not unity.

    Anyone that pumps up someone has to be ruled out as a candidate before the primaries have even started is helping Putin foment division within the Democratic party.

    I think there are several front runners and thats as certain as we are going to get until the primaries happen.

  36. I am no longer on the Biden train like I was in 2016 (I am on the Amy starship). One reason people talk up a unity ticket led by him is that he has many friends in senior positions in the GOP. Some may see this as a weakness or a reason to avoid his candidacy. I dont.

  37. Kakuru @ #2333 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 3:09 pm

    Rex
    “Joe Biden – the establishments darling.

    That’s the last thing that country needs.”

    Correction: The last thing America needs is what it already has – an anti-establishment buffoon named Trump.

    The second-last thing it needs is Sanders. You Bernie-or-bust types helped us get into this mess in the first place.

    What got them in the mess was the Dems backing the establishment nominee Hillary.

  40. Rex Douglas says: Monday, January 7, 2019 at 3:17 pm

    What got them in the mess was the Dems backing the establishment nominee Hillary.

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

    I am waiting patiently to see what Robert Mueller has to say on the legitimacy of the presidency …..

  42. What got them in the mess was the Dems backing the establishment nominee Hillary.

    Saying there’s only one thing that got the Dems U.S. into its current mess can only be a gross oversimplification.

  44. Rex Douglas @ #2320 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 10:52 am

    guytaur @ #2316 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 2:36 pm

    @SkyNewsAust tweets

    .@SenatorWong: If @ScottMorrisonMP is serious about standing up to these sorts of extremist views that Fraser Anning is supporting, then he should be making it clear he is not going to be doing deals with him.

    MORE: https://bit.ly/2GYvCVC #newday https://twitter.com/SkyNewsAust/status/1082116286379773952/video/1

    Using the nazi’s to score political points… ?

    Standards you walk past, blah, blah, blah.

    But we wouldn’t want you to be consistent! 🙂

  45. Mavis Smith @ #1459 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 1:51 pm

    DaretoTread:

    I’m unaware of the “Uncle Joe” meme you refer to. I would want to see probative evidence thereof before hanging him out to dry. Do you have any?

    Mavis
    Yes if you google images Biden and girls or women. Also in Hillary’s book “hard choices’ there are several photos which show him crossing the polite line re personal space. That was where I first noticed it and then i found the images of him on line put up by detractors.Now it was all probably very innocent but you can still see the republicans making a meal of it.

  47. The less attention the nazi fascists get the better.

    All these grandstanding statements only serve to create interest in them.

  50. Barney in Go Dau @ #2346 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 3:28 pm

    Rex Douglas @ #2320 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 10:52 am

    guytaur @ #2316 Monday, January 7th, 2019 – 2:36 pm

    @SkyNewsAust tweets

    .@SenatorWong: If @ScottMorrisonMP is serious about standing up to these sorts of extremist views that Fraser Anning is supporting, then he should be making it clear he is not going to be doing deals with him.

    MORE: https://bit.ly/2GYvCVC #newday https://twitter.com/SkyNewsAust/status/1082116286379773952/video/1

    Using the nazi’s to score political points… ?

    Standards you walk past, blah, blah, blah.

    But we wouldn’t want you to be consistent! 🙂

    I won’t be voting 1 for nazi fascists or to politicians who allow torture in offshore camps.

    You on the other hand….

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