Call of the board: Sydney (part two)

A second, even closer look at the electoral lay of the land in the Sydney region at the May 18 federal election.

On reflection, my previous post, intended as the first in a series of “Call of the Board” posts reviewing in detail the result of the May 18 election, was deficient in two aspects. The first is that patterns in the results estimated by my demographic model were said to be “difficult to discern”, which can only have been because I didn’t look hard enough. In fact, the results provide evidence for remarkably strong incumbency effects. Of the 12 Liberals defending their seats in the Sydney area, all but Tony Abbott outperformed the modelled estimate of the Liberal two-party vote, by an average of 4.0%. Of the 15 Labor members, all but two (Julie Owens in Parramatta and Anne Stanley in Werriwa) outperformed the model, the average being 3.4%.

The other shortcoming of the post was that it did not, indeed, call the board – a now-abandoned ritual of election night broadcasting in which the results for each electorate were quickly reviewed in alphabetical order at the end of the night, so that nobody at home would feel left out. You can find this done for the Sydney seats over the fold, and it will be a feature of the Call of the Board series going forward.

Banks (Liberal 6.3%; 4.8% swing to Liberal): After winning the seat for the Liberals in 2013 for the first time since its creation in 1949, David Coleman has now scored three wins on the trot, the latest by comfortably his biggest margin to date: 6.3%, compared with 2.8% in 2013 and 1.4% in 2016. In a post-election account for the Age/Herald, Michael Koziol reported that Labor’s national secretariat and state branch were at loggerheads over the seat late in the campaign, with the former wishing to devote resources to the seat, and the latter recognising that they “didn’t stand a chance”.

Barton (Labor 9.4%; 1.1% swing to Labor): Located around the crossover point where the inner urban swing to Labor gave way to the outer urban swing to Liberal, Barton recorded a slight swing to Labor that was perhaps boosted by a sophomore effect for incumbent Linda Burney.

Bennelong (Liberal 6.9%; 2.8% swing to Labor): A fair bit has been written lately about Labor’s struggles with the Chinese community, particularly in New South Wales, but that did not stop the nation’s most Chinese electorate recording a reasonably solid swing to Labor. This perhaps reflected the quality of Labor’s candidate, neurosurgeon Brian Owler, but was also typical of a seat where Malcolm Turnbull had played well in 2016, when it swung 2.8% to the Liberals.

Berowra (Liberal 15.6%; 0.8% swing to Labor): Most of this outer northern Sydney seat is in the outer part of the zone that swung to Labor, barring a few lightly populated regions out north and west. However, Liberal member Julian Leeser is what I will call a half-sophomore – a first-term incumbent, but one who succeeded a member of the same party (in this case Philip Ruddock), so there was no reversal of the sitting member advantage. So the 0.8% swing to Labor is about par for the course.

Blaxland (Labor 14.7%; 4.8% swing to Liberal): The anti-Labor swing suffered by Jason Clare was fairly typical for Sydney’s south-west.

Bradfield (Liberal 16.6%; 4.5% swing to Labor): Apart from the exceptional cases of Warringah and Wentworth, this was the biggest swing against the Liberals in New South Wales. However, given it was only fractionally lower in neighbouring North Sydney, that’s unlikely to be a reflection on sitting member Paul Fletcher, instead reflecting the electorate’s affluence and proximity to the city. The seat also recorded the state’s biggest swing to the Greens, at 2.0%.

Chifley (Labor 12.4%; 6.8% swing to Liberal): Ed Husic suffered Labor’s biggest unfavourable swing in Sydney (and the second biggest in the state after Hunter), after enjoying the second biggest favourable swing in 2016 (after Macarthur).

Cook (Liberal 19.0%; 3.6% swing to Liberal): As noted in the previous post, Scott Morrison enjoys the biggest Liberal margin in New South Wales relative to what might be expected from the electorate’s demographic composition. Only part of this can be explained by a prime ministership effect, as his 3.6% swing ranked only twelfth out of the 47 seats in New South Wales.

Dobell (Labor 1.5%; 3.3% swing to Liberal): The two seats on the Central Coast behaved similarly to most of suburban Sydney in swinging solidly to the Liberals, but there was enough padding on the Labor margin to save Emma McBride in Dobell, a marginal seat that lands Labor’s way more often than not.

Fowler (Labor 14.0%; 3.5% swing to Liberal): Labor’s Chris Hayes suffered a swing unremarkable by the standards of western Sydney, or perhaps slightly at the low end of average.

Grayndler (Labor 16.3% versus Greens; 0.5% swing to Labor): As illustrated in the previous post, Anthony Albanese’s personal popularity continues to define results in Grayndler, where the Labor margin is well out of proportion to demographic indicators. Whereas the Greens hold the largely corresponding state seats of Balmain and Newtown, in Grayndler they struggle to harness enough of the left-of-centre vote to finish ahead of the Liberals. They just managed it on this occasion, as they had previously in 2010 and 2016, outpolling the Liberals 22.6% to 21.8% on the primary vote, narrowing to 24.2% to 23.8% after the exclusion of three other candidates. Albanese cleared 50% of the primary vote for the first time since 2007, helped by a smaller field of candidates than last time, and had a locally typical 1.5% two-party swing against the Liberals.

Greenway (Labor 2.8%; 3.5% swing to Liberal): The swing against Labor’s Michelle Rowland was typical for middle suburbia, and roughly reversed the swing in her favour in 2016.

Hughes (Liberal 9.8%; 0.5% swing to Liberal): Craig Kelly did rather poorly to gain a swing of only 0.5% – as a careful look at the results map shows, the boundary between Hughes and Cook marks a distinct point where Labor swings turn to Liberal ones. The demographic model suggests Kelly to be the third most poorly performing Liberal incumbent out of the 13 in the Sydney area, ahead of Tony Abbott (Warringah) and Lucy Wicks (Robertson).

Kingsford Smith (Labor 8.8%; 0.2% swing to Labor): It was noted here previously that Matt Thistlethwaite strongly outperforms the demographic model, but the near status quo result on this occsion did little to contribute to that. This seat was roughly on the geographic crossover point between the Labor swings of the city and the Liberal swings of the suburbs.

Lindsay (LIBERAL GAIN 5.0%; 6.2% swing to Liberal): One of five seats lost by Labor at the election, and the only one in Sydney. Like the others, Lindsay was gained by Labor in 2016, with Emma Husar scoring a 1.1% margin from a 4.1% swing. This was more than reversed in Husar’s absence, with Liberal candidate Melissa McIntosh prevailing by 5.0%. The 6.2% swing against Labor was the biggest in the Sydney area, and produced a Liberal margin comparable to Jackie Kelly’s strongest.

Macarthur (Labor 8.4%; 0.1% swing to Labor): To repeat what was said in the previous post: Labor strongly outpolled the demographic model in Macarthur, a seat the Liberals held from 1996 until 2016, when Russell Matheson suffered first an 8.3% reduction in his margin at a redistribution, and then an 11.7% swing to Labor’s Michael Freelander, a local paediatrician. The swing to Labor, tiny though it was, ran heavily against the trend of urban fringe seats across the country. In addition to Freelander’s apparent popularity, this probably reflected a lack of effort put into the Liberal campaign compared with last time, as the party narrowly focused on its offensive moves in Lindsay and Macquarie and defensive ones in Gilmore and Reid. Macarthur was one of six seats in New South Wales contested by One Nation, whose 8.6% seemed to be drawn equally from Labor and Liberal.

Mackellar (Liberal 13.2%; 2.5% swing to Labor): Jason Falinski’s northern beaches seat participated in the swing to Labor in inner and northern Sydney, though in this case it was a fairly modest 2.5%, perhaps reflecting Falinski’s half-sophomore effect. A 12.2% vote for independent Alice Thompson caught most of the combined 14.9% for three independents in 2016, leaving the large parties’ vote shares little changed.

Macquarie (Labor 0.2%; 2.0% swing to Liberal): A sophomore surge for Labor member Susan Templeman surely made the difference here, with the 2.0% swing to the Liberals being below the outer urban norm, and just short of what was required to take the seat.

McMahon (Labor 6.6%; 5.5% swing to Liberal): The swing against Chris Bowen was well at the higher end of the scale and, typically for such a result, followed a strong swing the other way in 2016, in this case of 7.5%. This was among the six seats in New South Wales contested by One Nation, whose 8.3% contributed to a 7.4% primary vote swing against Bowen, and perhaps also to the size of the two-party swing.

Mitchell (Liberal 18.6%; 0.8% swing to Liberal): Where most safe Liberal seats in Sydney were in the zone of inner and northern Sydney that swung to Labor, Mitchell is far enough west to encompass the crossover point where Labor swings gave way to Liberal ones. This translated into a modest 0.8% swing to Liberal member Alex Hawke, and very little change on the primary vote.

North Sydney (Liberal 9.3%; 4.3% swing to Labor): Trent Zimmerman’s seat caught the brunt of the inner urban swing to Labor, the 4.3% swing to Labor being the state’s fourth highest after Warringah, Wentworth and Bradfield, the latter of which just shaded it. Labor managed a hefty 8.3% gain on the primary vote, largely thanks to the absence of Stephen Ruff, who polled 12.8% as an independent in 2016. The one independent on this occasion was serial candidate Arthur Chesterfield-Evans, a former Democrats member of the state upper house, who managed only 4.4%.

Parramatta (Labor 3.5%; 4.2% swing to Liberal): Parramatta marks the crossover point where the Liberal swing in western Sydney begins, producing a 4.2% swing against Labor’s Julie Owens that only partly unwound the 6.4% swing she picked up in 2016.

Reid (Liberal 3.2%; 1.5% swing to Labor): The Liberals maintained their remarkable record in this seat going back to 2013, when they won it for the first time in the seat’s history, by limiting the swing to Labor to a manageable 1.5%. While the 3.2% margin is only modestly higher than that predicted by the demographic model, it was achieved despite the departure of two-term sitting member Craig Laundy, who is succeeded by Fiona Martin.

Robertson (Liberal 4.2%; 3.1% swing to Liberal): Similarly to neighbouring Dobell, the Central Coast seat of Robertson swung 3.1% to the Liberals, in this case boosting the margin of Lucy Wicks.

Sydney (Labor 18.7%; 3.4% swing to Labor): The inner urban swing to Labor added further padding to Tanya Plibersek’s margin. The Greens continue to run third behind the Liberals, who outpolled them by 26.6% to 18.1%. As is the case in Grayndler, this presumably reflects local left-wing voters’ satisfaction with the incumbent.

Warringah (INDEPENDENT GAIN 7.2% versus Liberal): Zali Steggall took a big chunk out of the big party contenders in recording 43.5% of the primary vote, but the largest of course came from Tony Abbott, down from 51.6% to 39.0%. Abbott won four booths around Forestville at the northern end of the electorate, but it was otherwise a clean sweep for Steggall. She particularly dominated on the coast around Manly, by margins ranging from 10% to 18%.

Watson (Labor 13.5%; 4.1% swing to Liberal): In a familiar suburban Sydney pattern, Tony Burke had an 8.8% swing in his favour from 2016 unwound by a 4.1% swing to the Liberals this time.

Wentworth (Liberal 1.3% versus Independent): Listed as a Liberal retain in a spirit of consistently comparing results from the 2016 election, this was of course a Liberal gain to the extent that it reversed their defeat at the hands of independent Kerryn Phelps at last October’s by-election. There was an unblemished divide between the northern end of the electorate, encompassing the coast north of Bondi and all but the westernmost part of the harbourside, where the Liberals won the two-candidate vote, and the southern end of the electorate, where Phelps did. As noted in the previous post, there was a swing to Labor of 7.9% on the two-party preferred count, but this was testament more than anything to Malcolm Turnbull’s local support.

Werriwa (Labor 5.5%; 2.7% swing to Liberal): A half-sophomore effect for Labor’s Anne Watson may have helped limit the swing here in this outer suburban seat.

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.

1,936 comments on “Call of the board: Sydney (part two)”

Comments Page 2 of 39
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  1. C@t:

    You got it.

    Insiders ABCVerified account@InsidersABC
    3m3 minutes ago
    “You don’t beat the Conservatives by adopting their policies,” @RichardDiNatale says of Labor #insiders #auspol

    The empty suit doesn’t get it. You certainly don’t beat the coalition by adopting Greens policies!

  2. I think that people who are too ill or injured to work, or who have a disability that prevents them from working, should receive a Basic Income that is fixed at the full-time minimum wage. I would set the minimum wage today at $25 per hour to reflect average labour productivity growth since 1970. Therefore the weekly minimum wage would be $25 * 38 = $950 per week.

    The Age Pension should be at the same level.

    Anybody who wanted a job would be entitled to a job under a federally funded, locally administered Job Guarantee.

    The employers in the program would be local governments, state governments, NGOs, not for profit social enterprises, cooperatives… anyone except for-profit firms (it is important that it doesn’t degenerate into a wage subsidy scheme).

    It is a good idea to be very creative and imaginative when we think of what counts as a valid job.

    The JG could validate and affirm caring work that is currently hidden and underappreciated.

    Caring for children, elderly relatives, and relatives with disabilities could be a paid Job Guarantee job if a person wanted.

    Participating in education and training could be a paid Job Guarantee job if a person wanted it to.

    Planning, launching and consolidating a small enterprise could be a paid Job Guarantee job if a person wanted it to.

    There would be a panoply of Job Guarantee jobs related to social and community services, environmental services, artistic and cultural services, and small-scale public works.

    The employer and the jobseeker would design a role around the jobseeker’s interests, preferences, and abilities.

    For the vast majority of people, a Job Guarantee job would be a transition job – a stepping stone to a higher paid job in the private sector or in the regular public sector.

    But there would be no obligation to move on. If a person wanted to do a Job Guarantee job on a long term basis there would be nothing stopping them.

    A Job Guarantee would make it easy for people to create a role that is rich in meaning and purpose, that serves an obvious public good, that has positive social interactions, and that has relevant and rewarding opportunities for learning and development.

    Macroeconomically the Job Guarantee would have one purpose: to be an automatic stabiliser that ensures that the federal government is automatically doing precisely the correct amount of spending to achieve full employment with stable prices.

    When the private sector is recovering, federal government spending would automatically fall as people leave the Job Guarantee for higher paid jobs elsewhere.

    When the private sector is declining, federal government spending would automatically rise as people take up jobs in the Job Guarantee.

  3. Nicholas

    That puts us on the same page. Progress of incrementalism I can accept.

    I do like however that it is a complete rejection of the empathy deficit policies of the LNP punish the poor for being poor even though we know there are not enough jobs to employ people which is why we have an official unemployment rate.

  4. A very strong performance by RDN on Insiders batting away Crabbe’s gotchas one after the other with clear and simple messaging.

  5. Zoom,

    I’ve contacted Burney’s office a couple of times over concerns with Centrelink and mygov, stressing that I was doing so to highlight a policy issue. In each case, the advisor I was dealing with told me to get in contact with Centrelink about my complaint. Didn’t seem to get the point that it wasn’t about getting the complaint resolved, it was about highlighting a problem with the system.

    Hmmmm. We should keep in touch about this. It tallies with some of my experiences, and this sort of inability to integrate feedback from members into political understanding is hurting the ALP.

    I also notice you are unaligned, as is my branch, proudly.

  6. A reminder to Labor people Empty Suit was the GOP phrase to describe President Obama.
    Using this phrase suggests you might be getting your attack lines from the right wing empathy deficit lot.

  7. C@t,

    Your right, it’s unclear what his situation is, but more than $1 million in dividends would have him above the thresholds, so if he is receiving credits for tax he hasn’t paid then he is minimising his his tax liability hugely in other ways.

    If that’s the case, then surely that minimisation is the issue, not franking credits as such.

  8. Thankyou William for your post.

    The two most interesting seat results for me were McMahon and Lindsay.

    It’s quite clear that Chris Bowen was punished for the woeful job of selling old Labors economic message. Quite incredible he’s still on their front bench after that performance.

    Emma should have run as an independent progressive in Lindsay. With the right guidance she would have retained the seat.

  9. @BB, from the previous thread:

    “While some whinge on blogs about “Green Valley” (so clever), “Libkins” (oh right, I get it), Greens (ad nauseam), and moan that “We’re fucked” time after boring time (and amazingy achieve some kind of twisted Labor “guru” status for it), this guy has a bit of a go.

    He literally puts out a shingle, and takes on the enemy. Not much despair or misery about him either.

    I didn’t find the video. My 20 year old grandson was watching it on his phone and sent me the link. He tells me that his friends are all fans. They spread the word. Not a hint of “We’re fucked” out of any of them, either. None are party members, none are “insiders” who get the good goss (or the dirt) on Albo. They’re just kids. Certainly more attractive than some of Les Miserables misery gutsers here, at least.

    https://m.youtube.com/watch?feature=youtu.be&v=aEHTiVmBC6g”

    __________________

    I dunno. Jordon sounds a lot like briefly. Check this out:

    https://youtu.be/DEUnTPMmixE

  10. Barney in Makassar @ #51 Sunday, July 21st, 2019 – 9:27 am

    C@t,

    Your right, it’s unclear what his situation is, but more than $1 million in dividends would have him above the thresholds, so if he is receiving credits for tax he hasn’t paid then he is minimising his his tax liability hugely in other ways.

    If that’s the case, then surely that minimisation is the issue, not franking credits as such.

    Quite sad really that a simple car radio installer has become so memory and mental deficient that he essentially knows bugger all about his affairs but can recall that he is a jolly fine fellow who is able to give lotsa loot to charity because someone arranges his affairs for him (secretly) so that he apparently pays no tax.☕

  11. D&M

    To be fair, it’s a common problem with MPs – they can be terrific at fixing an individual problem, but they don’t see the overall pattern, even when they fix the same problem on a weekly basis.

  12. lizzie says:

    Douglas and Milko

    I’m shocked. I confess I had no idea that such unfair policies existed, and I can’t see that they have anything to do with terrorism or a threat to Australia’s so-called security

    It ALWAYS happens like that. It is why I hold the “if you have nothing to hide…blah blah” people in contempt when they use it to justify ignoring objections people may have. The legislation is introduced with screams of TERRORISTS!!! to justify it but in reality it ends heading towards this gold standard set by the Poms….

    Half of councils use anti-terror laws to spy on ‘bin crimes’

    More than half of councils are using anti-terror laws to spy on families suspected of “bin crimes”, it has emerged.Their surveillance tactics include hiding secret cameras on streets and even in neighbouring homes to catch householders putting their rubbish out on the wrong day.

    Seventy-seven of the 151 councils who responded to a Freedom of Information request admitted using the Regulation of Investigatory Powers Act (Ripa) to crack down on “domestic waste, littering or fly-tipping offences” in the last three years

    https://www.telegraph.co.uk/news/uknews/3333366/Half-of-councils-use-anti-terror-laws-to-spy-on-bin-crimes.html

  13. I wonder if this might start getting some traction and increase pressure on the govt.

    Insiders ABCVerified account@InsidersABC
    2m2 minutes ago
    “Newstart is so far behind where it should be,” @vanOnselenP says #insiders #auspol

  14. @CJHarvey tweets

    #Insiders @RichardDiNatale one would have to say spoke sensibly, logically and coherently of what is wrong with this @ScottMorrisonMP Government. Decent Australians would agree with all he said. Something wrong if ALP and Greens can’t work together to hold Govt. to account.

  15. Am I allowed to confess that I was concentrating so hard on Natale’s words that I fell asleep halfway through?

  16. The level of welfare payments in general highlights that linking increases to some economic measure like the CPI does not fully reflect the changing economy.

    In the short term it is a convenient way to give some relief against inflation, but as Newstart demonstrates over longer periods serious disparities can occur.

    There needs to be a review built into these systems, say every 5 years, to bring them back to the level they initially and still should represent.

  17. lizzie says:
    Sunday, July 21, 2019 at 9:56 am

    Am I allowed to confess that I was concentrating so hard on Natale’s words that I fell asleep halfway through?

    Surely you jest? 😆

  18. Barney

    First is eliminating Neo Liberal Economic Culture from politics.
    The whole demonise the “dole bludger” thing. Labor under Hawke stood up against this demonisation even as it introduced measures that brought about structural blame measures.

    Howard then took this to the fun level bringing in Centrelink provided by the wedge of efficiency mantra.

    Labor fought against the political tide but be in no doubt it was a political tide and Labor had its part in putting some of those structures in place.

    Edit: NB Labor ACT has started to do this.

  19. I am astonished how oblivious most Bludgers are to the real political bottom dollar on Newstart.

    Let’s put it this way: if a Liberal Government promised to hold public burnings of Newstart recipients in the electorates where the low interest, low information hi-vis voters dominate, it would win said electorates in a landslide, even though (and probably because) there are a lot of Newstart recipients that live there alongside ScoMo’s heroes.

    Scomo’s heroes have been conditioned to hate Dole-Bludgers for more than two decades now. Labor knows it, the liberals exploit it. Worse, the Greens know this to.

    There are no votes for Labor sticking up for the unemployed whilst in opposition. Only votes to be lost where they count most. The Greens on the other hand see the issue solely in terms of an opportunity to attack labor from the left: to shave off support and muddy the water, despite that being EXACTLY what the liberal government wants. For the Greens, fortifying Brandt, the 10% senate vote, and hopefully stealing Sydney and Grayndler off Labor (and looking fabulous in the process) is far far more important than allowing Labor some latitude to pitch to the lost voters in the centre.

    In short, the Greens prefer their own political advancement than a real hope of achieving real political advancement for the people they bleat most about. That’s why ScoMo loves the Greens.

  20. Emma Husar should never have been disendorsed from Lindsay in the first place.
    If anything she was guilty of being a rookie politician who had no experience in managing an office. Labor HQ abandoned her on some flimsy hearsay, instead of backing her and assisting her with office management. She probably would have won the seat, given her relative personal popularity.

  21. Henry @ #75 Sunday, July 21st, 2019 – 10:06 am

    Emma Husar should never have been disendorsed from Lindsay in the first place.
    If anything she was guilty of being a rookie politician who had no experience in managing an office. Labor HQ abandoned her on some flimsy hearsay, instead of backing her and assisting her with office management. She probably would have won the seat, given her relative personal popularity.

    ‘Labor! Labor! Labor! Labor! Labor! Labor!’

    🙄

  22. Henry @ #75 Sunday, July 21st, 2019 – 10:06 am

    Emma Husar should never have been disendorsed from Lindsay in the first place.
    If anything she was guilty of being a rookie politician who had no experience in managing an office. Labor HQ abandoned her on some flimsy hearsay, instead of backing her and assisting her with office management. She probably would have won the seat, given her relative personal popularity.

    Labor managed her out. She was seen by them as a liability to Bill Shortens strategy of trying to minimize bad publicity.

    I think the voters of Lindsay would’ve related to the human side of Emma and given her a second chance as an independent seperate from Shorten and Labor.

  23. Henry

    She wasn’t disendorsed. She decided not to stand, then changed her mind after the preselection process had already been completed.

    From the sounds of it, part of the problem was that she wouldn’t accept guidance.

  24. If this is true, and Marles has also cheered for coal, he’s a liability.

    @indica2007

    @AustralianLabor don’t care about the poor look at who represents the ple of Norlane and Corio our country’s highest unemployment suburbs
    @RichardMarlesMP in cabinet told senate to vote against rate in Newstart

  25. Rex

    Nonsense. I ARGUED with you that Husar had the right to have her side of the story heard when you started insisting that Labor get rid of her. It was only after she decided to resign that suddenly she became your heroine.

    It’s the old thing with you – you’re only interested in beating up on Labor, and you don’t care how inconsistent and hypocritical it makes you.

  26. “If this is true, and Marles has also cheered for coal, he’s a liability.

    @indica2007

    @AustralianLabor don’t care about the poor look at who represents the ple of Norlane and Corio our country’s highest unemployment suburbs
    @RichardMarlesMP in cabinet told senate to vote against rate in Newstart”

    Marles was a member of Cabinet for all of 10 weeks in 2013. So, let’s start with factoid first.

    Then, consider the context (assuming the allegations are true). Those 10 weeks would have been effectively in full election campaign mode. There are no votes for labor in boosting Newstart during an election campaign. Only votes to be lost.

    Furthermore, parliament sat for exactly one day during the period that Marles was a cabinet minister.

    I call BS.

  27. Lizzie

    The reference is to voting against the Greens stunt for a Senate motion to raise Newstart. Apart from being unconstitutional in its effect, has no bearing whatsoever on government policy controlled by the Coalition.

    Being conflated by Greens keyboard warriors now to “Labor is against Newstart” plays well to their 10%, but is disengenious in the extreme.

  28. Yes, Rex – I don’t have any firm evidence that way, so I’m not going to pretend I’m going on anything other than an impression. That’s a perfectly reasonable thing to do.

  29. Rex Douglas says:
    Sunday, July 21, 2019 at 10:17 am
    zoomster @ #81 Sunday, July 21st, 2019 – 10:14 am

    Rex

    But you SAID Labor should get rid of her!

    There you go again with the mistruths and misrepresentations. You still haven’t apologised for the last time you did this. No shame.

    Zoomster’s recollection certainly matches mine!

  30. zoomster @ #84 Sunday, July 21st, 2019 – 10:20 am

    Rex

    Nonsense. I ARGUED with you that Husar had the right to have her side of the story heard when you started insisting that Labor get rid of her. It was only after she decided to resign that suddenly she became your heroine.

    It’s the old thing with you – you’re only interested in beating up on Labor, and you don’t care how inconsistent and hypocritical it makes you.

    You have no shame.

  31. A_E

    Yes – because policies are decided well in advance of elections, it’s only timing that matters in the election proper. Some tweaking may go on, but cabinet decisions have already been made. You don’t want your Shadows tied up in internal party meetings during the campaign proper, you want them out there campaigning.

    Labor usually cancels all internal party committee meetings (for example) in the lead up to a campaign.

  32. Zoomster’s recollection certainly matches mine!

    And mine. Rex spent weeks if not months insisting Husar should go.

  33. AE, you are right about the dying days of Rudd in 2013 – not sure if there was a Greens stunt motion at the time, the Senate Journals would confirm.

  34. “Former leader gets it half right by criticising the way society is moving,– but reckons Morrison will cut the mustard.

    Mr Anderson, who resigned as Nationals leader in 2005 citing personal and health reasons, said the “washing out” of character had led to a trust deficit in politics that was undermining democracy itself.

    “As somebody who loves Australia, I don’t want to see a Brexit or a Trump moment in Australia but both of those came about because of the breakdown in trust in the system, the name-calling, the disparaging of opponents,” he said.

    Asked if he thought Australia was heading for its own Brexit or Trump moment, Mr Anderson said: “Oh, I do.

    “I think they [voters] hit the pause button. I think they took a punt that [Prime Minister] Scott Morrison, to his great credit, might be the man who can give us the pause we want.”

    https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/former-nationals-leader-urges-voters-to-get-tough-with-badly-behaving-mps-20190717-p527v0.html

  35. On Insiders, it was the first time I had seen any grabs of the Dubbo ‘Drought Summit’.

    The most galling image was the Morrison and Albo standing in front of a banner with Daily ToiletPaper prominently displayed – I assume it was somehow sponsored by Murdoch’s climate science denying gutter press. The probably had Grahame Lloyd as a keynote.

  36. Zoomster @ 10.13am

    re Emma Husar deciding not to run.

    You are quite correct It may have been her naivety, or stressed mental state at the time, but it was her decision not to run. As to her reversing the decision after preselection of another person it’s a matter of “you snooze; you loose”. She was too late.

    Whether or not she got good support from the party during the time she was smeared is another matter, about which I have no knowledge.

    I am pleased that like me, you would prefer discussions to be fact based.

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