Essential Research is continuing to provide The Guardian with polling on a fortnightly basis, but is still limiting itself to issue polling in the wake of the great debacle of last month. This week’s poll is concerned with nuclear power, after a push by Queensland MPs James McGrath and Keith Pitt for a parliamentary inquiry into lifting Australia’s nuclear power ban (showing rather unfortunate timing, in view of the runaway success of HBO’s television series Chernobyl). The poll finds a slight majority of 44% to 40% in favour of Australia having nuclear power plants, compared with a 40-40 tie when Essential last posed the question in 2015 – the kicker being that only 28% said they would be comfortable living near one, with 60% disagreeing. Among the other findings, 47% per cent rated that nuclear would be better than coal-fired power for the environment.
In election counting news, the button was pressed yesterday on the New South Wales Senate result, which, foreseeably, produced three seats for the Coalition (Liberals Hollie Hughes and Andrew Bragg, and Perin Davey of the Nationals), two for Labor (Tony Sheldon and Tim Ayres) and one for the Greens (Mehreen Faruqi). Above-the-line votes accounted for 93.1% of the total, which included more than two quotas each for the Coalition and Labor (albeit just barely in the latter case). This meant the top two candidates on the Coalition and Labor tickets were elected immediately, leaving two seats to be determined by the remainder of the preference distribution. The chart below shows how this proceeded as the last eight candidates were excluded, and also shows how the main candidates were placed after the surpluses of the first four elected candidates were distributed (Count 4).
Under the old system, the entirety of the vote was effectively divided between the sixth elected candidates and the unelected seventh, who was left with what is known as the “wastage quotas”. Now that it’s possible for votes to exhaust, it becomes possible for the count to fail to deliver quotas to six candidates, in which case the final seats go to whoever comes nearest at the final count. Such was the case with the last two seats in New South Wales – 0.39 quotas exhausted, and the final three quotas were distributed between three candidates in such a way as to leave all of them short of a full quota. Two of these candidates, Davey of the Nationals and Faruqi of the Greens, finished just short with 0.97 and 0.96 quotas respectively, causing them each to be elected well ahead of Kate McCulloch of One Nation on 0.68.
The chart illustrates exactly how far Jim Molan, shown in blue, fell short of winning the third seat through the strength of his below-the-line support, notwithstanding conservative excitement that he achieved the highest below-the-line vote in Senate history – in terms of aggregate votes, which is naturally a significant qualification when considering a result from New South Wales. Molan’s total share of the first preference vote was 2.92%, some distance behind a number of recent results in Tasmania, where the rate of below-the-line voting is particularly high. His exclusion unlocked a flood of preferences to Davey that closed the gap between her and Faruqi, who were all but level for the remainder of the count.
However, a good many of Molan’s preferences flowed out of the Coalition ticket and further to the right, with 20% going to McCulloch compared with 71.5% for other Coalition candidates. McCulloch also received a strong flow of preferences when Shooters Fishers and Farmers were the last party excluded two counts later. However, this was well short of what she needed to put her in the hunt for the last two seats, for which her share of the total vote would have had to have been about 2% higher. For more details on preferences, Ross Leedham has determined four-party preferred preference flows along the same lines as I provided in yesterday’s post on the Tasmanian result, observing how small party preferences split between the Coalition, Labor, the Greens, One Nation and exhaustion.
To get a sense of how the result might have played out under the old system, I’ve had a play with Antony Green’s Senate calculator from 2013, using the results from this election where possible and judiciously allocating the residue from new parties to old ones. This suggests One Nation would have won the fifth seat at the expense of either the Coalition and the Greens, who would have been in a very tight race for the last seat. One Nation preference feeders would have included not only Shooters and Fishers, Liberal Democrats, Christian Democrats, the Democratic Labour Party and Australian Conservatives (nee Family First), but also leftist concerns such as Animal Justice, thanks to Glenn Druery-inspired preference networks that had nearly every micro-party preferencing each other ahead of the main three.
The button will apparently be pressed on the Western Australian result this morning and Victoria tomorrow, both of which will assuredly produce results of three Liberal, two Labor and one Greens. Not sure when Queensland and South Australia will be done.
‘Bucephalus says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 11:33 am
If you believe that CO2 is driving catastrophic climate change then you are a hypocrite if you oppose Nuclear Power. You should, in fact, be promoting it.
Nuclear Power is extremely safe and far less damaging than coal when total health and air pollution impacts are taken in to account. Saying it is unsafe because Chernobyl and Fukushima is intellectually silly. Neither of those technologies would be used for new builds and the events that caused those incidents are not going to happen here.’
The issue is not relative safety. It is relative cost. Fukushima costs are nudging $300 billion. The cost estimates appear to be doubling every five years or so.
But even without the Fukushimas of the world, nuclear power is more expensive than renewables.
The recent history of nuclear power plant construction is littered with public finance sinkholes. Renewables investment is increasingly 100% private sector investment-driven without need for any subsidies at all.
Apart from all those issues, the world does not have another three-five decades to replace coal-fired with nuclear power. And building nuclear power stations is slow.
Apart from all those issues, global nuclear power construction capacity is quite low compared with the scale of the task.
So, nuclear power is far too expensive, far too slow to get up, and too far reliant on public sector funding.
For the past thirty years the Right has essentially used nuclear power as a policy unicorn that is trotted out as a wedge when required. Taylor and company are talking up uranium because they do NOT want to talk about subsidizing Adani or a coal-fired power station, both of which Taylor would dearly like to achieve. They can safely leave the public hand wring about all of that to the Greens, safe in the knowledge that 90% of all Australians don’t listen to them at all.
We know that the Greens have ideological opposition to nuclear power and want to shut down all of Australia’s uranium mine include Olympic Dam Uranium Mine. Which would leave Labor in the usual wedge position preferred by both the Greens and the Coalition.
Labor should announce straight away that it wants the Switowski Review updated in light of recent technical developments and that it supports the building of nuclear power stations by the private sector as a valid means of fighting global warming. End of story.
That will leave the Greens in their favourite political position: running anti nuclear power station convoys while making fuck all difference in the real world.
It will also leave the Government in the unaccustomed position: put up or shut up.
Player One @ #196 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:39 pm
It’s the Liberal Party template. What else do you expect?
The australian economy (when exports of coal and gas are included) accounts for about 3.5% of global emissions. even not counting exports, we are in the top 15-20 emitting nations and per capita are in the top 3. This “we don’t count” is utter bullshit pushed by bolt and other murdoch flogs. Why am I not suprised to see Bucephalus repeat it here?
australia will be left behind because nobody is going to want/need our coal and our agricultural exports will be farked. We could plan for transition and adaptation, but the right has decided that science and objective reality are leftist plots and therefore must be defeated with deliberate ignorance and denial. It’d be funny of you c@#ts were not going to take all of us with you.
Matt31 says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:40 pm
I am still very much of the view that some are falling in to the trap of over analysing what happened. I think the overwhelming lessons for Labor to come out of the election loss are really not that much different from those the Liberals had to learn post 1993. The unfortunate reality is that elections are not won by oppositions promising significant policy change/reform. That was my fear right through the lead up to the election, but like most of us, I was falsely reassured by the polls. It was much the same for the Coalition in 1993 with fightback; they were ahead in the polls right through the campaign, but in the end, lost.
The reality is, negative fear campaigns work. The other reality is, oppositions don’t win elections when they become the focus. Labor over this next term must have a ruthless focus on the government and not be diverted from it. Exactly what form that takes will naturally be determined by circumstances, the state of the economy etc, but early indications are that our economy is in trouble and therefore Labor will have plenty to work with. Then, as the election comes closer and it comes time to lock down an election policy platform, it will be important to make that platform a small target for a scare campaign, so that the focus can be kept on why the government needs to go. Howard’s “comfortable and relaxed” campaign of 1996 and Labor’s 2007 campaign are the templates for this. In the end, change is only achieved when intrenched in government; it isn’t achieved from opposition.
_______________________________________
Absolutely, completely, totally agree.
All the other gumpf here is rubbish or deliberate misdirection (like the irrelevant Setka debate).
Player One….you entirely miss the more important point. Voters are very deeply alienated. They tune out. Labor’s messages not only fail to resonate. They fail to be heard at all.
The Liberals and the Greens have correctly identified that the dominant sentiments in the community include fear. Labor used fear in 2016 and did reasonably well with it. Turnbull did not have fear in his toolkit. The Greens use fear all the time. The Right are very good at fear. They carry it with them at all times. It’s a staple. The diet of fear has had its inevitable effect on voters, who have become very resistant to adrenaline-rich politics. They have become resistant to politics in general. They have been voting their resentments, their sullen defeatism.
This is the fruit of decades of fear-based politics. It cannot be turned around very easily, if at all. The exponents of fear usually believe in it more than anything else. They will go on, well-springs of misgiving.
We’re fucked.
briefly says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:34 pm
“The Reactionary project is very well thought-through, imo. They keep on winning. The more success they have in accentuating inequality, in fostering poverty, in whittling away at educational other sources of opportunity and mobility, the more political gains they are able to make.”
—————————————
I think this is true, up to the point they can credibly claim to be “managing a sound economy”. 1983 showed that presiding over a recession negates that claim. 2007 showed that them overreaching and so laying bare the true intentions of the business sector to plunder their workforce also negates that claim.
But note that widespread disgruntlement over GST “teething problems” wasn’t enough for Labor to “surf into office” in 2001 (remember that expection in the first half of 2001?). Nor was a cost-of-living “squeeze” enough for Mark Latham’s promised “ease” in 2004. No, voters have tended to wait until they actually felt the Coalition wrecking the joint before throwing them out.
And I particularly agree that the 1993 election is the forerunner to what happened. Hewson was courageous in putting forward his solution in detail because he thought that nothing could save Paul Keating, given his apparent responsibility for the recession we had to have. So he played on the positives (as he saw it) of his policy.
Morrison is no Keating – but a vicious and dishonest negative campaign comes much more easily to his side of politics (as evidenced by Alexander’s Horseshit posting above).
briefly @ #204 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:47 pm
You’re fucked. You have given up.
sustainable future says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:43 pm
The australian economy (when exports of coal and gas are included) accounts for about 3.5% of global emissions. even not counting exports, we are in the top 15-20 emitting nations and per capita are in the top 3. This “we don’t count” is utter bullshit pushed by bolt and other murdoch flogs. Why am I not suprised to see Bucephalus repeat it here?
australia will be left behind because nobody is going to want/need our coal and our agricultural exports will be farked. We could plan for transition and adaptation, but the right has decided that science and objective reality are leftist plots and therefore must be defeated with deliberate ignorance and denial. It’d be funny of you c@#ts were not goign to take all of us with you.
The Right know all this. They are not dummies. The thing is, they don’t care. They are willing to use these dynamics to win elections. This is more important to them than anything. They know how to do this. They are really very very good at it. They sussed it out years ago. It has worked for them in election after election.
The left-of-centre completely underestimate the Right. They over-estimate themselves, their support, their capacity to reach and persuade voters, to capture power and implement their plans.
Until the left-of-centre wise up, put an end to their dysfunction and get real about the politics, they will continue to lose.
Thank goodness global warming is a myth … or we’d really be in trouble …
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-18/abares-commodity-outlook-drought-drags-down-exports/11219206
Player One says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:50 pm
briefly @ #204 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:47 pm
We’re fucked.
You’re fucked. You have given up.
No I haven’t. I think it’s very helpful to begin with what we have and from we are. We have very little. We are in serious trouble. We have been losing. Unless we first change ourselves, we will have no hope of changing the country. I’m for change. I think it’s almost insurmountably difficult. But I have not given up.
SA Senate – 3 Libs, 2 ALP and 1 Green
WA Senate – 3 Libs, 2 ALP and 1 Green
QLD Senate – 3 LNP, 1 ALP, 1 PHON, 1 Green
Labor just woeful in QLD.
Bucephalus (nuclear reactors)
Unfortunately when Labor’s Mr. Weatherill had the termerity to raise nuclear in SA he was immediately opposed by the Liberals Mr. Mashalll the than LOTO (and now premier), using the usual scare tactics. That alone means it’s a dead duck; even waste handling (where there is a strong moral argument in favour), which was raised by both Messrs Wetherill and (the late) Hawke will confront a massive scare campaign with the media providing an accelerant (see “I’m with Ivy” for example) and no prospect of rational debate.
If one where to get past that then there is a huge issue related to the header to shut each reactor down for three months every three years. This implies that one needs at least twelve (and ideally rather more) stations to maintain constant output and is the reason why nuclear power works only in large grids (i.e. Europe, North America, China, Russia) and will be challenging in Australia. It is possible that nuclear powered desalination (with plants also providing backfill electricity generation and/or dispatchable load) can be used to address this problem. This could be interesting in Australia given we are short of water.
The “new” technologies are unlikely ever to be be ready; the impetus was always powering nuclear submarines and whilst the new technologies have advantages for power stations they aren’t applicable for submarines and are hence non-starters.
Player One says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:55 pm
Thank goodness global warming is a myth … or we’d really be in trouble …
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-06-18/abares-commodity-outlook-drought-drags-down-exports/11219206
You’d think that the drought would have cost the Right votes. But it didn’t. Their support increased.
briefly @ #210 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:56 pm
Albanese is providing that change by starting with the removal of a well known barnacle.
Unfortunately the dinosaurs of party may try to tear him down for doing so.
Of course, the Queensland results show that the strength of the Right has not caused the Irregulars to relent in their campaign against Labor. On the contrary, they have intensified it. They are determined to destroy the only political force that can deliver any kind of meaningful response to climate change. They are winning. Action in the environment is riskier for Labor than ever. The Lib-kin wage their guerrilla strategies against Labor all the time, hoping to destroy the only available voice for social justice, social democracy and the protection of the environment.
The Liblings foment more trouble for Labor….they delight in it.
briefly says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:59 pm
“You’d think that the drought would have cost the Right votes. But it didn’t. Their support increased.”
—————————————
Rural communities continue to mentally inhabit a life that is dying out because of changes to the environment they physically inhabit. Likening their grief over their loss of their long-accustomed life to that experienced by someone diagnosed with a terminal illness, many may still be in the “denial” stage, while others have moved to “anger”. “Bargaining” seems a ways off yet.
briefly @ #213 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:59 pm
Labor got creamed on this issue because they were gutless. Instead of acknowledging the problem and announcing they will work towards a long-term fix, including sorting out the water rorts and providing as much support as was needed for any farmers whose farms had genuinely became non-viable, they tried the old “we will provide the same level of drought funding, only slightly differently” line.
Why would anyone change their vote on that basis?
It would be very interesting to compare the name or names of those who briefed the Age newspaper about the alleged Batty statements by Setka with the name or names of those Albanese consulted to “ confirm “ the accuracy of the Age story.
I am sure any overlap of name or names would be nothing more than coincidence. Here is hoping Albanese has been squeaky clean in his hunt for a union offical trophy.
Just musing nothing more.
global warming to make Siberia more habitable. I assume the same thing will be happening to Canada.
https://www.sciencedaily.com/releases/2019/06/190606223509.htm
Doyley, to change the subject completely: would you mind sharing with us your order of preference among these four possibilities?
A) Albo stays, Setka goes
B) Albo goes, Setka stays
C) Albo stays, Setka stays
D) Albo goes, Setka goes.
I think that covers it. Answering this may save a lot of discussion in these threads in future.
Bucephalus @ #167 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 12:24 pm
Or you just haven’t made a strong enouch case for nuclear in Australia.
Why would going hard on a domestic nuclear industry be better than going hard on a domestic renewables industry?
Why would paying the US (or Canada, or UK) for SMRs be better than spending the same money on renewable energy projects, incentives, and subsidies?
Renewables have obvious benefits:
– No ongoing fuel source required
– No waste to manage
– No applicability to weapons development
– Catastrophic equipment failure can’t trigger anything worse than a blackout
So why is nuclear a better policy vision for Australia?
There’s something to be said for generational change. So how about D?
Realistically, C is probably what happens.
nat
Shame about what the gigatons of methane released by the melting permafrost will do.
Player One says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 2:10 pm
briefly @ #213 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 1:59 pm
The discount applied by voters in rural areas to Labor commitments is huge. Labor promises will not register with them. This is a consequence of several generations of anti-Labor electioneering. So the Labor vote is not really a measure of disaffection with the LNP in the drought-hit parts of Eastern Australia. Rather, it is the ability of Indies to attract support that is relevant. Indy campaigns failed nearly everywhere. Even in a very serious drought, even with spectacular examples of incompetence and corruption, rural voters identify their economic chances with the LNP. This is the ongoing basis of their electoral success. Working people are being recruited to the same blocs.
Michael
A better interpretation of those results:
Queenslanders just woeful in QLD.
a r, I’m A myself, but really, distinguishing between A & C is NOMFB, since I’m not a member of the CFMMEU. And they’re the ones taking the fight up to criminally negligent companies.
I wonder if the French said to was too hard and would take too long to build all their nuclear power?
No wonder they are building our subs.
E. wgaf
hmmmmmm, love the smell of melting permafrost in the morning.
From Getup.
“You can’t tell from reading the headlines, but there’s still a heap standing in Adani’s way.
Adani can’t find a contractor willing to actually dig the mine. They haven’t secured insurance. They still need two more Federal approvals. They don’t have consent from the Wangan and Jagalingou Traditional Owners, who continue to fight them in court. And Adani International still needs to take the enormous risk of sending $2 billion dollars to Adani Australia, despite the precarious economics.
In Adani’s best-case scenario, they won’t be extracting coal from the Galilee for another two years. “
doyley @ #219 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 2:10 pm
Is that a threat from the Setka camp ?
Gonna tear down Albanese for not towing the line ?
Player One says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 1:37 pm
“And FFS, what have they got to lose?”
The next election – just like the last 4.
Simon² Katich®
It will provide fun for the whole family.
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=FM0hczFNDZI
In case anyone cares.
Bucephalus @ #228 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 2:30 pm
Yeah, with diesel engines somehow crammed in because we have no capacity to support/service a proper nuclear submarine.
Buchephalus re Nuclear (powered) Submarines
Note the US wants AU to have conventional subs, not nucleear, because only the former is capable of complete “light’s out” operation, which is relevant in the South China Sea (one can’t “switch off” the nuclear power plant in a sub to the extent necessary to lurk silently)
That said, until recently the path for the RAN to acquire nuclear powered attack (and SASR transport) subs (should AU wish to do so) is to join the RN programme. This would greatly improve economies of scale within that programme (to the benefit of the RN) and even with the usual nonsense is likely to provide better value for money than US Virginia programme (which seems to be completely out of control).
Unfortunately (for reasons that that have never been explained, or perhaps have no explanation), the Cameron and May governments have more or less destroyed the RN (Britain’s only long term asset) and one would question whether they are capable of a new series.
Nuclear armed makes no sense for AU
‘I wonder if the French said to was too hard and would take too long to build all their nuclear power?’
Irrelevant now, unless you have access to a time machine.
What might have been a good idea several decades ago may not be a good one now!
What I find most interesting about the nuclear power debate is that none of the organisations which actually have anything to do with providing energy in Australia seem interested in it at all.
So even if it did get the go ahead, it doesn’t look like anyone actually wants to put their own money into it.
How about e) – regardless of who goes and stays, has the issue been well managed?
Shame about what the gigatons of methane released by the melting permafrost will do.
_____________________
I’m going to purchase a few acres on the northern shore of Siberia. The Arctic circle will be the new Riviera!
Rex,
Are you serious ?
My last post was nothing more than some random musings of a observer from afar.
I am sure your hero “ Albo the union buster ‘ will come through for you.
Anyway, the stupidity of your post did make me reflect and I have spent enough time posting on Setka. So thank you for the wake up call. It will all unfold over the next 10 days so I hope Albanese makes you proud.
Time to go back into hibernation.
Actually Baffin Island might be the go.
zoomster,
Last quick post on this matter from me.
Your post goes to the whole core of the matter.
Has the collateral damage that has unfolded and will unfold been worth it ?
It could have been so much easier.
Nuclear power is just another branch of the irrelevant cultural wars.
And as was pointed out by Katharine Murphy t’other day, the only way for nuclear power to be economically viable in Australia is for a “price on pollution” (or carbon tax as the RWNJ denialists like to call it) to be in place.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/commentisfree/2019/jun/15/nothing-new-in-coalitions-nuclear-awakening-no-wait-perhaps-there-is
And also:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jun/04/nuclear-power-doesnt-stack-up-without-a-carbon-price-industry-group-says
So, the next time bucephalus posts on here singing the praises of nuclear power, what he’s really arguing for is a “carbon tax”.
doyley @ #241 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 2:46 pm
It would benefit all if Setka took the hint and conceded defeat by resigning this afternoon to put the matter to rest.
nath
An interesting fact about Svalbard is that it’s a visa free immigration zone. One can simply turn up and stay! Except that one must have a way to support oneself (which is hard to do), otherwise they’ll put you on a plane out to Oslo and mark your card so you can never return
briefly @ #225 Tuesday, June 18th, 2019 – 2:27 pm
You continue to argue like a loser. Waaah! It wasn’t our fault! Waaah!
Next time around, think differently. Think bigger. Announce policies. Make promises. And yes, lie when you need to – just as the other side does. Just promise to make a difference. Even Australians are not so stupid as to believe anything a politician might promise – they will indeed discount most of what you say, but if they don’t hear you say anything, why on earth would they change their vote for you?
Don’t continue to be low profile on the big issues. This is a guaranteed way to lose the next election as well.
lizzie says:
Tuesday, June 18, 2019 at 2:35 pm
Getup are telling Pork Pies there. The Indigenous Land Use Agreement is in place and valid. A minority group is opposed and keeps losing the court challenges it keeps putting up.