The public release of Craig Emerson and Jay Weatherill’s report into Labor’s federal election campaign has inspired a run of commentary about the way ahead for the party after its third successive defeat, to which nothing need be added here. From the perspective of this website, the following details are of specific interest:
• Labor’s own efforts to use area-based regression modelling to identify demographic characteristics associated with swings against Labor identifies five problem areas: voters aged 25-34 in outer urban or regional areas; Christians; coal mining communities; Chinese Australians; and the state of Queensland. The variable that best explained swings in favour of Labor was higher education. However, as has been discussed here previously, this sort of analysis is prey to the ecological fallacy. On this basis, I am particularly dubious about the report’s suggestion that Labor did not lose votes from beneficiaries of franking credits and negative gearing, based on the fact that affluent areas swung to Labor. There is perhaps more to the corresponding assertion that the Liberals were able to persuade low-income non-beneficiaries that Labor’s policies would “crash the economy and risk their jobs”.
• Among Labor’s campaign research tools was a multi-level regression and post-stratification analysis, such as YouGov used with notable success to predict seat outcomes at the 2017 election in the UK. Presumably the results were less spectacular on this occasion, as the report says it is “arguable that this simply added another data point to a messy picture”. The tracking polling conducted for Labor by YouGov showed a favourable swing of between 0.5% and 1.5% for most of the campaign, and finally proved about three points off the mark. YouGov suggested to Labor the problem may have been in its use of respondents’ reported vote at the 2016 election as a weighting factor, but the error was in line with that of the published polling, which to the best of my knowledge isn’t typically weighted for past vote in Australia.
• An analysis of Clive Palmer’s advertising found that 40% was expressly anti-Labor in the hectic final week, compared with only 10% in the earlier part of the campaign. The report notes that the Palmer onslaught caused Labor’s “share of voice” out of the sum of all campaign advertising fell from around 40% in 2016 to 25%, and fell as low as 10% in “some regional markets such as Townsville and Rockhampton”, which respectively delivered disastrous results for Labor in the seats of Herbert and Capricornia.
• It is noted that the gap between Labor’s House and Senate votes, which has progressively swollen from 1% to 4.6% since 1990, is most pronounced in areas where Labor is particularly strong.
Other news:
• The challenge against the election results in Chisholm and Kooyong has been heard in the Federal Court this week. The highlight of proceedings has been an admission from Simon Frost, acting director of the Liberal Party in Victoria at the time of the election, that the polling booth advertising at the centre of the dispute was “intended to convey the impression” that they were Australian Electoral Commission signage. The Australian Electoral Commission has weighed in against the challenge with surprising vehemence, telling the court that voters clearly understood that anything importuning for a particular party would not be its own work.
• The ABC reports there is a move in the Tasmanian Liberal Party to drop Eric Abetz from his accustomed position at the top of the Senate ticket at the next election to make way for rising youngester Jonathan Duniam. The Liberals won four seats at the 2016 double dissolution, which initially resulted in six-year terms being granted to Eric Abetz and Stephen Parry, and three-year terms to Duniam and David Bushby. However, the recount that followed the dual disqualifications of Jacqui Lambie and Stephen Parry in November 2017 resulted in the party gaining three rather than two six-year terms, leaving one each for Abetz, Duniam and Bushby. Bushby resigned in January and was replaced by his sister, Wendy Askew, who appears likely only to secure third place on the ticket, which has not been a winning proposition for the Liberals at a half-Senate election since 2004.
• Andrew Clennell of The Australian ($) reports that Jim Molan is likely to win a Liberal preselection vote on Saturday to fill Arthur Sinodinos’s New South Wales Senate vacancy. The decisive factor would appear to be support from Scott Morrison and centre right faction powerbroker Alex Hawke, overcoming lingering hostility towards Molan over his campaign to win re-election by exhorting Liberal supporters to vote for him below the line, in defiance of a party ticket that had placed him in the unwinnable fourth position. He is nonetheless facing determined opposition from Richard Shields, Woollahra deputy mayor and Insurance Council of Australia executive, who was runner-up to Dave Sharma in the party’s hotly contested preselection for Wentworth last year.
RI
No matter what you say. You can’t get away from the fact that coal has emissions even so called “clean” thermal coal.
Opening new coal mines is the last thing the human species needs in its fight for survival
guytaursays:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 1:24 pm
Not at all.
If Adani is being built to service Indian power stations, then that coal would need to be purchased elsewhere if Adani doesn’t proceed.
This would mean that mines elsewhere would need to expand there production.
I know I know. It’s that tedious “I am a Labor Party insider who’s friends with party figures because I am the queen of a small sandpit in rural Victoria and some politicians are polite to me at Labor Party functions.” shtick.
Pegasus says:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 1:28 pm
Re arms trading – (Unsaid) We know we are exporting death but we don’t care the use to which they will be put (as they rub their hands togther with glee at the obscene amounts of money they are making).
This is another disgraceful imputation by the Greens. It is no wonder at all that Queensland voted 3:1 against the Green line on coal.
Barney
Yes thats exactly the argument arms manufacturers have used to such success.
The NRA uses it to oppose gun control. We can’t do that because others (criminals) will get the guns anyway.
Its pretty bad when you are left with the tobacco industry talking points. While ignoring Dheli
https://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/energy/power/indians-are-addicted-to-cheap-coal-power-and-its-killing-them/articleshow/69244869.cms?from=mdrhttps://economictimes.indiatimes.com/industry/energy/power/indians-are-addicted-to-cheap-coal-power-and-its-killing-them/articleshow/69244869.cms?from=mdr
https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2019/november/1572526800/lech-blaine/how-good-queensland?utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=Sunday%20Reads%20-%2010%20November%202019&utm_content=Sunday%20Reads%20-%2010%20November%202019+CID_edbb13c1a0910d5d011ef11925476eea&utm_source=EDM&utm_term=How%20good%20is%20Queensland
Adani to help triple coal exports to India
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/6345523/adani-to-help-triple-coal-exports-to-india/
Profiting in environmental death
P1
Morals? Ethics? Get real!
Pragmatic politics where the only objective is to gain power for power’s sake, these quaint constructs really don’t matter in the context of international or global relations and leadership.
Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #1552 Sunday, November 10th, 2019 – 1:33 pm
Perhaps you should ask yourself why Adani is their preferred option?
AE
‘ Even the ‘fertive emissions’ associated with mining coal will come from somewhere’
I think you mean fugitive emissions.
And on the general question of coal, I thought Albo is on the money framing coal – espcially metallurgical coal used in steel making – as a component of the unlimited renewable energy driven future for Australia. It may take a while to sink in to the thick skulls of the Adani earring wearers, but harnessing the resources below the ground with the wind and sun we have in abundance is the coming narrative.
Ross Garnaut in his new book Superpower- yes that is Australia as a Superpower – argues Australia has more sunshine and west facing cliffs and ridges – lowly populated, than any OECD country. Cheap energy can lead to cheap secondary treatment of our abundant mineral resources. Albo gets this.
guytaur says:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 1:32 pm
RI
No matter what you say. You can’t get away from the fact that coal has emissions even so called “clean” thermal coal.
Opening new coal mines is the last thing the human species needs in its fight for survival
A boycott on Adani will achieve exactly nothing other than procuring the defeat of Labor. That is, it will have political results but will make no difference whatsoever to the global energy system. None. Zero. Nil. SFA.
It is a Green Herring, a Green windmill, a delusion, a mirage, a trick, a decoy, a sortie into eventual self-ridicule.
It is, above all, one of those things. It is an example of our dilemma. The harder we think we might be trying, the worse things are getting. The Greens should focus on goals that are not only achievable but that will actually make a difference. This is clearly beyond them.
sprocket
Well, that excludes me then as I don’t wear earrings of any sort. So thanks for the compliment of not being thick.
And it seems that all this shade descending on Albo is coming from the southern states.
Get over it comrades. You have had more than your fair share of the turn; time to give the Premier State a turn.
The sanctimony of the Greens is in over-supply, much like the market for thermal coal. There is too much of it and the appetite for it is falling.
sprocket_ @ #1561 Sunday, November 10th, 2019 – 1:38 pm
*groan*
As I have pointed out many times, Australia’s only “Superpower” is in denying reality. To the rest of the world, we are an open-cut mine that happens to also have a ready supply of cheap labour, and also be willing to shit in our own nests.
Nothing more 🙁
Nooooooo, my head hurts if I do that.
“ Thus opening new coal mines is expanding the coal industry. Thus its helping to expand the burning of coal and yes that does mean more coal burning and releases into the atmosphere though at a lower rate.”
Erm. No. Utter comprehension failure right there.
The decision to built a coal fired power station is a multimillion dollar proposition. There is a glut of sources for coal worldwide. The supply, or lack thereof, of thermal coal does not feed into the equation as to whether to build that station. The spot price of coal might, but given that glut it matters not whether Australia builds another 10 coal mines or indeed shuts down all of its existing mines within sau 5 years.
The decision to build new coal fired power stations is largely one of national actors in the third world. Their focus is the energy needs of their population. With time and advances in technology and the application of economies of scale those decisions will start to swing away from coal to renewables. This is good. Unfortunetly for your positioning Guytaur – and the risible P1 – the question of ‘where’ these government’s will source their coal in the meantime do not figure into the equation. I repeat – Modi gives zero fucks one way or the other for Galilee coal – Adani’s coal fired power stations will proceed with or without Galilee coal. That is the bottom line politically and economically.
In short: it simply does not matter whether Adani goes ahead tomorrow or at the other extreme end Australia announced tomorrow that it would stoop exporting coal within 5 years. Other suppliers would simply pick up the slack. Just like that.
RI @ #1565 Sunday, November 10th, 2019 – 1:43 pm
You don’t do “reality”, do you?
RI
Yes you argued this for years. Guess what. Labor lost the election.
So yes your attacks on those opposing Adani have resulted in division and Labor losing.
So go ahead keep doing it. Keep ignoring the review. The basic truth is there are for more voters outside the few seats in FNQ who are being influenced by the climate emergency they see destroying lives and homes.
They know the personal cost is too high. The survivors have told us so.
Be on the wrong side of that along with the PM and NSW Premier and suffer the consequences
And if you are still around LVT (the poster formerly known as ESJ-allegedly), with your 8 out of 9 NSW General Secretaries being anti-party suggestion, are you counting John DellaBosca in the 8? Or Matt Thislethwaite?
“ I think you mean fugitive emissions.”
Hola Sprocket. OK. I always thought the term was fertive emissions. There you go.
@PeterGleick tweets
Scientists:
1960-70s: Hey, this #climatechange thing could be a problem.
1980s: Climate change IS coming.
1990s: Seriously, humans are changing the climate.
2000s: Why aren’t you taking action?
2010s: HELLO?
2019 Op-ed: Why didn’t you scientists warn us?
https://www.nytimes.com/2019/11/08/opinion/sunday/science-climate-change.html#click=https://t.co/hsV5J7w1Op
And that much thrashed fall-back ‘debating’ rationalisation “sanctimony” aka “holier-than-thou” is trotted out.
The bullshit is really wall-to-wall here today. What has happened?
Is it that the reality of global warming currently being broadcast 24-7 on our news media has finally become just a little too “real” for the Labor pro-coal faction?
Or is it that Albanese has just mad an utter ass of himself by spruiking coal in the face of actual deaths that can be attributed to it?
Or is there some other reason?
Anyhow. I’m off to my mate Willie the Boatman’s for a glass or three of The Albo. Then afternoon jazz at Marrickville golf club. Huzzah.
guytaursays:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 1:36 pm
Yeah, don’t worry about the impact access to electricity has on reducing poverty.
Just sit comfortably in your home in all your wokeness.
If the Greens did not exist, the Liberals would invent them.
If the Greens did not exist, Labor would have to cast around to find another scapegoat.
I wonder whether the lynch-mob descending on Modi’s residence in New Delhi will change his mind on new coal fired power stations?
For the residents there, the carbon pollution is literally killing people, with a pollution index of 2,000 in a blanket of smog (a safe level is 50).
Barney
Wow you really are a coal booster. Straight out of the Abbott talking points.
We know thats a lie. Labor’s Gillard Government policies reduced power prices and emissions.
IF Labor had stuck to them it could have been reelected and have business shut down the polluters for commercial reasons.
Thats what happens when you blame the Greens instead of promoting good Labor government policy
Barney
Wow you really are a coal booster. Straight out of the Abbott talking points.
We know thats a lie. Labor’s Gillard Government policies reduced power prices and emissions.
IF Labor had stuck to them it could have been reelected and have business shut down the polluters for commercial reasons.
Thats what happens when you blame the Greens instead of promoting good Labor government policy
@guytaur
Actually Labor did not do badly in Far-North Queensland,which the electorate of Leichhardt covers, because the swing to the LNP in Leichhardt was 0.2%. On the other hand North and Central Queensland was where the huge swings against Labor occurred, that is reflective of the importance of mining, especially that of Coal has for the economies in these regions.
“ The basic truth is there are for more voters outside the few seats in FNQ who are being influenced by the climate emergency they see destroying lives and homes.”
There you go again, basic comprehension failure.
You frame the issues by reference to FNQ. In reality the issue is much broader than FNQ, or even Adani as a totem issue.
You and your ilk’s ‘climate emergency’ fandango is repellant to not just FNQ people, but central Queensland and the outer rim around Brisbane. The left & centre-left plurality currently holds 6 out of 30 MHR seats and 4 out of 12 senate seats. That is a loss of government and also control of the senate right there.
It is a very similar problem in WA and also to a lesser extend in NSW.
Your climate emergency is seen as a left wing attack on the lifes of the very people ‘we’ need to embrace.
Tristo
U R right of course. Thats where I meant. My point is still valid though.
They do make for a handy fig leaf. Press the issue for long enough, and it soon becomes apparent that the target of their rage is actually the Left faction of their own party!
guytaursays:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 1:53 pm
You are thick, aren’t you?
I’m talking about poverty in India and other developing Countries.
AE
Thats because idiots like you run the LNP Right wing narrative in defiance of the facts.
The whole we must be “bipartisan” thing.
Thats just accepting the right wing narrative of fantasy instead of accepting and understanding the science and knowing you might lose a battle but will win the war
Edit: The US equivalent would be the Democrats accepting Trump is a King and above the law.
Let’s sell more thermal coal …?
Barney
Renewables are cheaper for those living in poverty and have less cost long term as less grid and less pollution goes along with it.
The poverty argument is specious.
Labor just has to bite the bullet. Australia needs to find alternative export revenue.
We shut down asbestos over people dying we can do no less with coal.
https://www.independent.co.uk/news/uk/politics/luciana-berger-labour-antisemitism-jeremy-corbyn-election-latest-liberal-democrats-finchley-a9196696.html
RI
I See you are revelling in the Tories attack lines on Labour.
Even though Bercow made it clear what he as a Jewish person thought.
https://www.gq-magazine.co.uk/politics/article/john-bercow-interview
guytaursays:
Sunday, November 10, 2019 at 2:03 pm
Tell that to the about 400 million Indians without electricity.
@noplaceforsheep tweets
From June 2019: “NSW LNP govt cut capital budget of Fire & Resource NSW by 34.5 per cent”
https://fbeu.net/2019/06/21/sitrep-10-2019/
Me, reads Guytaur’s last post, shakes my head.
Comprehension. Not a strong suite for you is it mate.
The way to abort Adani was to simply use existing environmental protections and approvals processes and allow it to die on economic grounds. That will never happen now. I cant wait for Anastasia to open the Larissa Walters Mine and ride on the Bob Brown coal rail line. Thanks a bunch guys.
Gluing yourselves to the road in peak hour traffic simply makes folk want to go out and murder an engendered species somewhere in frustration. Thanks a bunch again.
Neither of these stunts brings people together, like you said the ALP Election review prescribed. It’s simply more of ‘the woke’ repelling of people that the woke look down on. These verboten scum are now conditioned to vote against progress, even progress that will directly benefit them, as a response action. Thanks a bunch.
Barney
You are determined to boost coal I see.
I disagree its good to kill poor people because its good for our export market.
I think we should just look at different export markets. Like starting to manufacture batteries for renewable energy sources.
Luciana Berger has a personal account as a Jewish woman threatened with violence. She has fled for safety and respite. The description of this as “Tory” is not merely unworthy. It is in itself anti-Semitic.
AE
Your argument would have merit if Queensland Labor had done that instead of ignoring the experts and watering down laws.
That includes attacking the rights of Indigenous people with extinguishing links to traditional lands via legislation.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2019/aug/31/queensland-extinguishes-native-title-over-indigenous-land-to-make-way-for-adani-coalmine
RI
Nope. You are using a red herring to pretend its not a right wing talking point.
Edit: Which you would know if you watched the Bercow interview.
itsthevibe @ #1586 Sunday, November 10th, 2019 – 1:56 pm
And the proof you have for making such an inane statement is?
‘It’s the vibe’. 🙄