Call of the board: South Australia

Yet more intricate detail on the May federal election result – this time from South Australia, where normality was restored after the Nick Xenophon interruption of 2016.

Welcome to another instalment of the now nearly complete Call of the Board series, a seat-by-seat review of the result of the May federal election. Now is the turn of South Australia, previous instalments having dealt with Sydney (here and here), regional New South Wales, Melbourne, regional Victoria, south-east Queensland, regional Queensland and Western Australia.

So far as the two-party swing was concerned, South Australia was largely a microcosm of the national result, with the Coalition picking up a swing of 1.6% (compared with 1.2% nationally) and no seats changing hands. Similarly, Labor did particularly badly in the regions, suffering big swings in Barker and Grey, compared with a highly consistent pattern of small swings in the metropolitan area. Labor won the statewide two-party preferred vote, as they have done at four out of the past five elections, albeit by a modest margin of 50.7-49.3.

As in previous recent instalments, I offer the following image with colour coding of swings at booth level. Compared with other metropolitan capitals, the divide between Labor swings in inner urban areas and Liberal swings further afield is somewhat less clear here, although the Labor swings are a fairly good proxy for general affluence. This would be even more apparent if the map extended further afield to encompass the Adelaide Hills areas covered by Mayo, where, as noted below, the tide seems to be running against the Liberals, and not just in comparison with Rebekha Sharkie.

On the primary vote, comparisons with 2016 are complicated by the Nick Xenophon factor. The Nick Xenophon Team scored 21.3% statewide in 2016, but its Centre Alliance successor fielded candidates only in the non-metropolitan seats of Mayo, Barker and Grey. Rebekha Sharkie was comfortably re-elected in Mayo, but the party’s vote was slashed in Barker and Grey. Primary votes elsewhere followed similar patterns – to save myself repetition in the seat-by-seat account below, the Xenophon absence left between 16.7% and 20.0% up for grabs in Kingston, Makin, Spence and Sturt, which resulted in primary vote gains of 5.1% to 6.2% for the Liberals, 5.2% to 6.6% for Labor and 2.6% to 3.9% for the Greens.

The other factor worth noting in preliminaries is a redistribution that resulted in the abolition of a seat, part of a trend that has reduced the state’s representation from 13 to 10 since 1990. This caused Port Adelaide to be rolled into Hindmarsh, creating one safe Labor seat out of what were formerly one safe Labor and one marginal seat. The eastern parts of Port Adelaide and Hindmarsh were transferred to Adelaide, setting the seal on a seat that has grown increasingly strong for Labor since the Howard years, while the Glenelg end of Hindmarsh went to Boothby, without changing its complexion as a marginal Liberal seat.

The table below compares two-party results with corresponding totals I have derived from Senate ballot papers, the idea being that this gives some sort of idea as to how results may have been affected by candidate and incumbency factors (two-party results for Labor are shown). This shows a clear pattern of Labor doing better in the House than the Senate in the seats than they hold, whereas there is little distinction in Liberal-held seats. My guess would be that there is a general tendency for Labor to score better in the House and the Senate overall, which is boosted further by sitting member effects in Labor-held seats, while being cancelled out by those in Liberal-held seats. Taking that into account, it would seem Labor’s sitting member advantages were relatively weak in Adelaide and Hindmarsh, which stands to reason given the disturbance of the redistribution.

On with the show:

Adelaide (Labor 8.2%; 0.1% swing to Liberal): The Liberal swing in this now safe Labor seat was below the statewide par despite the disappearance of Kate Ellis’s personal vote. In this it reflected the national inner urban trend, and also the long term form of a seat that has drifted from the Liberals’ reach since Ellis gained it in 2004. However, a divide was evident between a Liberal swing at the northern end and a Labor swing in the south, for reasons not immediately obvious. It may be thought to reflect the demographic character of the respective Enfield and Unley ends of the seat, but this doesn’t explain why the Liberals gained in Prospect immediatley north of the city, an area that would seem to refect the inner urban mould. Nor was there any particularly evident effect from the redistribution, which added to the west of the electorate parts of Hindmarsh, formerly held by Adelaide’s new member, Steve Georganas. The Centre Alliance registered a relatively weak 13.7% here in 2016 – the Greens did particularly well in their absence, lifting from 10.0% to 15.7%, although they are still a long way off being competitive.

Barker (Liberal 18.9%; 5.1% swing to Liberal): The Barossa Valley swung to Labor, but the rest of this seat followed the script of regional Australia in going strongly enough to the Liberals to substantially increase Tony Pasin’s already safe margin. A majority of the Centre Alliance collapse (from 27.6% to 2.9%) ended up with the Coalition, although the United Australia Party recorded an above average 5.9%, while the Labor primary vote made a weak gain of 4.7%.

Boothby (Liberal 1.4%; 1.3% swing to Labor): Labor once again failed to realise hopes of reeling in this southern Adelaide seat, despite it reflecting the national trend of affluent suburbia in recording a 1.3% Labor swing that overwhelmed whatever sophomore advantage may have accrued to Liberal member Nicolle Flint. The absence of the Centre Alliance left 18.5% of the vote up for grabs, and the Liberal, Labor and Greens primary votes were respectively up 3.5%, 7.7% and 3.8%.

Grey (Liberal 13.3%; 5.6% swing to Liberal): Another big regional swing to the Liberals, in this case to the advantage of Rowan Ramsey, who came within 2% of losing to the Nick Xenophon Team’s Andrea Broadfoot in 2016. Broadfoot ran again for the Centre Alliance this time and was down from 27.7% to 5.1%, of which a fair bit was accounted for by the entry of One Nation and the United Australia Party, a further fair bit went to the Liberals, while the Labor primary vote hardly budged.

Hindmarsh (Labor 6.5%; 1.9% swing to Liberal): The Liberals recorded a swing perfectly in line with the statewide result in a seat that is effectively a merger of the safe Labor seat of Port Adelaide, whose member Mark Butler now takes the reins in Hindmarsh, and what was previously the highly marginal seat of Hindmarsh, which extended into more Liberal-friendly territory further to the south. The income effect took on a very particular manifestation here in that the booths along the coast swung to Labor while those further inland tended to go the other way. With the Nick Xenophon Team taking its 17.0% vote into retirement, each of the main parties made roughly comparable gains on the primary vote.

Kingston (Labor 11.9%; 1.6% swing to Liberal): For the most part, this once marginal but now safe Labor seat followed the national outer urban trend in swinging to the Liberals, though not be nearly enough to cause serious concern for Labor member Amanda Rishworth. However, separate consideration is demanded of the northern end of the electorate, which is notably more affluent, particularly in comparison with the central part around Morphett Vale. This northern end consists of two parts separated by the Happy Valley Reservoir — the coast at Hallett Cove, and Flagstaff Hill further inland, the latter gained in the redistribution. For whatever reason, the former area behaved as did the rest of the electorate, whereas the latter swung to Labor.

Makin (Labor 9.7%; 1.1% swing to Liberal): So far as the electorate in aggregate is concerned, everything just noted about Kingston equally applies to Makin, which remains secure for Labor member Tony Zappia. There was perhaps a slight tendency for the more affluent parts of the electorate (in the north-east around Golden Grove) to do better for Labor than the low income parts, but not much.

Mayo (Centre Alliance 5.1%; 2.2% swing to Centre Alliance): As the Nick Xenophon/Centre Alliance vote tanked elsewhere, Rebekha Sharkie had no trouble repeating her feat of the 2016 election, when she unseated Liberal member Jamie Briggs, and the July 2018 Section 44 by-election, when she accounted for the now twice-unsuccessful Liberal candidate, Georgina Downer. Downer trod water on the primary vote this time, but nonetheless won the primary vote as Labor recovered market share from Sharkie after a particularly poor showing at the by-election. Sharkie’s winning margin of 5.1% was slightly down on her 7.5% by-election win. The Sharkie factor obscured what may be an ongoing trend to Labor in the seat, with Downer winning the Liberal-versus-Labor vote by a very modest 2.5%. This partly reflected a 2% shift in the redistribution, but there was also a 0.7% swing to Labor that bucked the statewide trend.

Spence (Labor 14.1%; 3.0% swing to Liberal): As well as changing its name from Wakefield, the redistribution removed the rural territory that formerly leavened the Labor margin in a seat that now encompasses Adelaide’s low-rent north, up to and including Gawler. For those with a long enough memory, it more resembles the long lost seat of Bonython, a Labor stronghold through a history from 1955 to 2004, than Wakefield, which was a safe Liberal seat until Bonython’s abolition drew it into the suburbs. Consistent with the national trend of low-income and outer urban seats, Labor member Nick Champion emerged with a dent in his still considerable margin.

Sturt (Liberal 6.9%; 1.5% swing to Liberal): In the seat vacated upon Christopher Pyne’s retirement, swing results neatly reflected the distribution of income, favouring Labor at the northern end and Liberal in the south. Whatever the impact of the loss of Pyne’s personal vote, it didn’t stop Liberal debutante James Stevens scoring a primary vote majority and 1.5% two-party swing.

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.

498 comments on “Call of the board: South Australia”

Comments Page 4 of 10
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  1. @bukunin:

    “ After the second defeat Labor had two choices to get the CPRS done: negotiate a deal that satisfied the Greens concerns, or call a DD election.

    Remind me again, which path did Labor choose to take?”

    Is it a morn8ng for a fresh round of idiocy, or what?

    I’m sorry, but after the second defeat of the CRPS Labor did not have those two choices, because ‘Negotiate’ a deal with the Greens = defeat on the senate floor because Labor + Greens wasn’t enough to get it done.

    No, the choices Labor faced were:

    1. A DD election on the CRPS (to my dying day, this is what I favoured and would still favour today if we could get inside a political tardis and travel back in time to late January 2010. Sigh);

    2. A normal HR/half senate election with Labor taking effectively Greens policy to the people; and

    3. Kicking the issue into the long grass and hoping no one would notice.

    It is clear that when faced with those 3 choices Labor (Rudd) chose poorly and then over the space of 4.5 months a good government – a very good government – simply blew itself up … and the Labor movement as a whole with it, as we can now see … so, by all means blame labor for THAT, just not your fever dream imagining of history.

  2. bakunin

    “Kevin was crystal clear from the start – the Greens couldn’t be allowed any sort of ownership of the [emissions] trading scheme.”

    Yep, the very same tactic premier Andrews employs against the Greens in Victoria hence his willingness to be seen side by side with the Fiona Patten, Reason Party and not the Greens.

  3. Daley quotes a Labor source saying “Kevin was crystal clear from the start – the Greens couldn’t be allowed any sort of ownership of the [emissions] trading scheme.”

    So, a smart Labor PM who knew that The Greens would try and claim all the credit for making any action, ‘tougher’. Which is exactly what Annabelle Crabbe said was their aim, to make their claim so outrageous that no sane Labor PM would agree. Which then enabled The Greens to be holier-than-thou, to this day, about action to be taken.

  4. Player Onesays:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:19 am

    Barney in the rabbit hole of fuckwittery @ #143 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:14 am

    Is a basic and integral part of Meteorology!

    Sure. As are the terms ‘climate’ and ‘weather’. Perhaps you would like to try and explain the difference? I am sure you must have had time by now to look it up.

    I am probably not the only one here who finds your reluctance to do so just a little puzzling.

    Always deflection from the topic being discussed and as usual you push a boring lie.

    An intelligent person accepts their ignorance and takes in what others know, while you just double down on it.

  5. bakunin says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:16 am

    ….

    Labor playing political games that blew up in its face.
    Who ever would have thought.

    Legislation was put, the greens voted against it, end of story. The Greens need to face up to what they have done.

  6. Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #155 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:28 am

    Player Onesays:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:19 am

    Barney in the rabbit hole of fuckwittery @ #143 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:14 am

    Is a basic and integral part of Meteorology!

    Sure. As are the terms ‘climate’ and ‘weather’. Perhaps you would like to try and explain the difference? I am sure you must have had time by now to look it up.

    I am probably not the only one here who finds your reluctance to do so just a little puzzling.

    Always deflection from the topic being discussed and as usual you push a boring lie.

    An intelligent person accepts their ignorance and takes in what others know, while you just double down on it.

    The Lunar Left are learning a lot from Trumpy. 🙂

  7. SDA and RFFWU

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/wage-theft-inquiry-must-probe-union-deals-retail-workers-warn-20191121-p53cqa.html

    An award-winning investigation by The Age revealed in 2016 that a quarter of a million retail and fast-food workers were underpaid more than $300 million a year over five years by employers including Woolworths, Hungry Jack’s and KFC, on enterprise agreements negotiated by the SDA.

    On the same day that Labor established the wage theft inquiry, its senators moved a motion to acknowledge the SDA for “representing its members in retail and fast food” and blocked a Greens amendment to also recognise the RFFWU.

    The SDA donated more than $1.6 million to the Labor Party over the past four financial years, according to disclosures lodged with the Australian Electoral Commission.

  9. frednk @ #151 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:25 am

    I have pointed out many time this is a demand side problem. Fortunately people a lot smarter than you, me and the Greens are dealing with the demand issue in a realistic fashion by bringing down the cost of renewables.

    And opening new coal mines so that we can continue to employ our coal miners?

    Brilliant strategy! And working so well!


  10. Pegasus says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:25 am
    bakunin

    “Kevin was crystal clear from the start – the Greens couldn’t be allowed any sort of ownership of the [emissions] trading scheme.”

    Yep, the very same tactic premier Andrews employs against the Greens in Victoria hence his willingness to be seen side by side with the Fiona Patten, Reason Party and not the Greens.

    The Greens have done well haven’t they, the party that can’t have serious pissed of the party that can.

    Victorian Labor have dealt with it be sending there preferences to and standing with parties that have a real progressive aim, instead of a central aim of trying to stick it up labor to the detriment of the parties claimed policy.

    By putting there desire to screw labor ahead of environmental policy the Greens have screwed environmental policy in the country.

  12. Who to believe? Maude Lynne, who has worked at the coalface of retail deals between employers and unions, or a self-serving, self-creating union ‘leader’ and The Greens’ fan club here?

    It’s a no-brainer. Maude Lynne

    However, if you have no brain, you believe The Greens and their putative candidate for where, Pegasus? Josh Callinan.

    So, tell me, Pegasus, is Josh Callinan a member of The Greens? Or are you going to pull the nath line and deny open and full transparency, er, tell me I’m not ‘allowed’ to ask you questions?

  13. Greg Jericho on centrists and rips apart Emerson’s specious article on tribalism:

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/24/centrism-is-a-dead-weight-in-australian-politics-and-its-dragging-us-all-down

    Not all extremism is equal and no force of social or economic change happened due to people refusing to make waves. It happened because people were prepared to go to prison, be attacked, and seek to disrupt those who would go about their lives ignoring the issue.

    Centrists love the final vote that sees change occur – where politicians from both sides sit together and agree; they care only in retrospect for the work, suffering and effort over decades that leads to that change.

    And they ignore that throughout those decades, the powerful in the media and politics actively prevented change occurring by spending more time calling for calm and reason than noting reality.

  15. Barney in

    iirc one of the arguments you run….

    He further weakened his cause by suggesting that people were arguing that poorer nations needed to shift immediately to 100% renewable energy.

    No organisation or person of any note is arguing this (although Emerson did find a random person on Twitter).

    But worse, this argument that fossil fuels help poorer nations is a retread of the old argument that “coal is good for humanity” that Tony Abbott was pushing in 2014, and which was easily debunked at the time.

    It was the same argument that saw coal mining companies argue to leaders of the G20 that coal was needed because the WHO had reported that 4 million people die prematurely from household air pollution because “nearly 3 billion people use primitive stoves to burn wood or biomass to cook and heat homes”.

    Except what the WHO actually noted was that “around 3 billion people cook using polluting open fires or simple stoves fuelled by kerosene, biomass and coal”.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/nov/24/centrism-is-a-dead-weight-in-australian-politics-and-its-dragging-us-all-down

  16. Oh gosh, here we go again. When Fiona Patten and the Reason Party do deals with The Greens in Victoria, she is lauded to the heavens by The Greens fan club here, but when she doesn’t, and instead does a deal with the Labor Party in Victoria, she is the devil and we get this:

    Yep, the very same tactic premier Andrews employs against the Greens in Victoria hence his willingness to be seen side by side with the Fiona Patten, Reason Party and not the Greens.

    Poor Fiona’s head must be spinning. Though she would at least be learning the lesson that The Greens are fair weather friends.

    I mean, The Greens are the one true party of ‘governance’ in Victoria and Fiona should just get with The Greens program!

  17. Brian BeutlerVerified account@brianbeutler
    2h2 hours ago
    Just catching up on a few hours worth of news and unless I misread something, it seems like approximately [checks notes] the entire Republican Party joined a [checks notes again] international conspiracy (???) to [checks notes one more time] defraud the United States?

  19. Pegasus @ #159 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:30 am

    SDA and RFFWU

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/wage-theft-inquiry-must-probe-union-deals-retail-workers-warn-20191121-p53cqa.html

    An award-winning investigation by The Age revealed in 2016 that a quarter of a million retail and fast-food workers were underpaid more than $300 million a year over five years by employers including Woolworths, Hungry Jack’s and KFC, on enterprise agreements negotiated by the SDA.

    On the same day that Labor established the wage theft inquiry, its senators moved a motion to acknowledge the SDA for “representing its members in retail and fast food” and blocked a Greens amendment to also recognise the RFFWU.

    The SDA donated more than $1.6 million to the Labor Party over the past four financial years, according to disclosures lodged with the Australian Electoral Commission.

    And? The Greens believe that a union shouldn’t donate to the party of their choice!?! How much have the RFFWA donated to The Greens, Pegasus?

    Cue *crickets*

    The Greens aren’t great on transparency when it comes to The Greens.


  20. Player One says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:34 am

    frednk @ #151 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:25 am

    I have pointed out many time this is a demand side problem. Fortunately people a lot smarter than you, me and the Greens are dealing with the demand issue in a realistic fashion by bringing down the cost of renewables.

    And opening new coal mines so that we can continue to employ our coal miners?

    Brilliant strategy! And working so well!

    Mark Twain is right, I bow to greater experience.

  23. Pegasus says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:45 am

    Cat

    Your verballing and misrepresentation of my view re Andrews and RP is unsurprising. Rant away.

    Cat made the mistake of reading your post? Go back and read what you posted.

  26. Boring, monotoned, Josh needs a caffeine shot or two, and accept the fact that it’s more than a bit rich to blame Labor for the mess this government’s in. Further, it’s not good enough for Westpac executives to be dealt with by shareholders; they should face penal sanctions for failing to adhere to AUSTRAC requirements. In hindsight, I take that back given it’s the parent bank of the bank I hold shares in.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/nov/21/pressure-grows-westpac-chief-brian-hartzer-austrac-child-exploitation-allegations

  27. frednk @ #175 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 10:49 am

    Pegasus says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 10:45 am

    Cat

    Your verballing and misrepresentation of my view re Andrews and RP is unsurprising. Rant away.

    Cat made the mistake of reading your post? Go back and read what you posted.

    Yeah, it was meant to be a slur against Daniel Andrews only but if you read it it casts aspersions about Fiona Patten, as in, she should stand shoulder-to-shoulder WITH The Greens against the Andrews government. How dare they do a deal together!?!

  28. “An overwhelming majority of Australians want political advertising on Facebook and other platforms to be subject to tough new rules, with two thirds in favour of an outright ban on political advertisements on social media.”

    Yes, because then it becomes political/politicised media, not social media.

  29. @Senator_Patrick
    ·
    6m
    In June 2018 the Attorney issued a certificate restraining the Auditor-General from telling the Parliament if the Army’s $2B Hawkei acquisition project is value-for-money … or not. I’m now at the AAT in a #righttoknow fight with @pmc_gov_au
    #auspol #foi

  30. I wonder if Pegasus, or any of the other Greens here, will ever tell us whether Josh Callinan is a member of The Greens and whether his ‘union’ the RFFWA is being bankrolled by The Greens, or contributed to in kind?

  31. “guytaur…..voting for “Gillards Carbon Price” does not exonerate the Greens for kicking off the chain of events that gave us PM Abbott, for who’s perfidy and sheer dickheadedness we are still paying.”

    ***

    The Greens voting against the ineffective Rudd CPRS, then forcing Labor to introduce the Greens’ own far more effective Carbon Price/ETS soon after, was a big win for the environment. Labor can’t stand the reality that the Greens’ decision to vote down the CPRS was entirely vindicated by the fact that they were actually able to successfully implement something far better in the form of the Carbon Price/ETS.

    Lets not forget that Labor were working with the Coalition under Turnbull to try and get their dud CPRS passed. The fact that the Coalition were considering supporting it should tell you just how ineffective it would have been.

    Oh, and what actually kicked off the chain of events that lead to Abbott becoming PM was when Labor decided to knife a popular first term leader in the middle of the night. You Labor lot only have yourselves to blame for that nonsense.

    Labor’s dud CPRS never happened. The Greens’ effective Carbon Price/ETS did happen and was working well. Labor can’t stand that, which is why they keep flogging the dead horse that is the CPRS. They could of course take ownership of the achievements of the Gillard gov, but that would require them to acknowledge the role of the Greens, so they’d rather just dismiss that and defend the CPRS that never happened instead.

  32. lizzie,
    Yet Senator Patrick will still vote for the Morrison government’s ‘Ensuring Integrity Bill’, when the Morrison government itself lacks integrity.

  34. @SisterOMalley
    ·
    Nov 23
    Yes, a young friend of mine, aged 23 with terminal cancer & given 12 months to live has to be on Newstart & submit 20 job applications a month.

    ***

    @BrianLaRoux
    ·
    Nov 23
    Replying to @SisterOMalley

    Business owners should be hounding the Liberal Party and telling Centrelink to stop forcing seriously/terminally ill patients from having to submit job applications that are likely to be unsuccessful – after all, it’s wasting the business’ own HR time/money as well.

    We have truly entered the world of “Computer says no”.

  37. The last Sumatran rhinoceros in Malaysia has died, leaving the smallest species of rhino, which once roamed across Asia, surviving in small numbers mostly in Indonesia.

    The 25-year-old female rhino, named Iman, who had been cared for in a wildlife reserve since her capture in 2014, died of cancer in the state of Sabah on the island of Borneo.

    “Iman’s death came rather sooner than we had expected, but we knew that she was starting to suffer significant pain,” said Augustine Tuuga, director of the Sabah Wildlife Department.

    The Sumatran rhino was declared extinct in the wild in Malaysia in 2015.

    https://www.abc.net.au/news/2019-11-24/malaysias-last-sumatran-rhinoceros-dies/11733056

  38. “ Good Morning

    I see the Centrists are back to blaming the Greens for a failed bill instead of recognising the Greens voted for Gillards Carbon Price.

    What if fantasy never trumps reality.”

    And good morning to you too Guytaur. I see you are back to totally, 100% ignoring the fact that the opinion polls had the Labor + Greens plurality dropping off the proverbial cliff immediately upon the carbon pricing deal being announced in early 2011.

    Also totally ignoring that Labor leadershit wasn’t happening – especially in the public consciousness-when the deal was announced.

    And of course, ignoring the fact that Labor worked its arse off trying to sell this political turd for over two years and not once in that period did the Labor + Greens plurality recover to pre Carbon pricing deal levels. Not once. In fact, the harder labor tried the worst the polling got.

    Despite all that evidence, you peddle the trope that the Carbon Price didn’t kill the political fortunes of the Gillard government stone cold. Instead you push the risible nonesense it was all because Labor didn’t back itself.

    OK – we ‘got’ your point. Us centrists reject that point on the evidence. We are not for turning. So, why not just stop with this nonesense?

  39. What I have said, for the third time at least, is Andrews will do deals with the RP on the same issues the Greens party have been advocating for years for purely political reasons.

    What I have said is, if or when, the RP threatens Labor-held inner city seats as the Greens do Andrews will treat RP with the same contempt and disdain he shows the Greens.

    What I have said is I hope the Greens Party and Reason Party continue to cooperate co-sponsoring bills.

    https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/we-won-t-be-changing-our-policy-daniel-andrews-shrugs-off-pill-testing-20191112-p539oj.html

    Premier Daniel Andrews is unmoved by a push from paramedics to introduce “back of house” pill testing at festivals and raves.
    :::
    Meanwhile, the Victorian Greens and Reason Party will this week co-sponsor a bill to trial pill testing over two years for punters at major festivals.

    The Premier has resisted the drug debate, as it gains momentum ahead of the summer festival season.

    “I would respectfully point out that the government has a policy and we won’t be changing our policy,” Mr Andrews told reporters on Tuesday.
    :::
    A PBO costing obtained by the Greens found it would cost $3.8 million over two years.

    What I have said, is it is highly probable Andrews will come on board with pill-testing closer to the next state election as he did with the safe injecting room in Richmond.

    Politics, pure and simple.

  42. Firefox

    I don’t mind truthful accounts such as yours – that the Greens deliberately voted down the CPRS – rather than the fanciful, untruthful accounts we get here.

    Please feel free to correct the Greens supporting posters when their claims about the CPRS and the Greens’ support for it conflict with reality.

    I have no trouble lauding Gillard’s carbon price but dispute the idea that it was all the Greens’ work, which some posters here continually claim.

  43. lizzie @ #23 Sunday, November 24th, 2019 – 11:05 am

    Scomo is 51 and has difficulty walking up a hill (he admitted it), but expects us all to continue working into old age.

    Quick call the Doctor.

    Since the Earth has tipped over making the hot bit slip around a bit it stands to reason that lots of place will be uphill. Mr. Morrison could be in extreme trouble. 😢

    Oh ❗ The humanity ❗


  44. Pegasus says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 11:05 am
    …

    Politics, pure and simple.

    Yep. The Greens have chosen their path, and to defeat the anti Labor coalition Labor has to chose theirs. It is pity the Greens a have abandoned the environment to push their anti Labor agenda, but that is the way it is.

  45. Greens and union-busting legislation:

    https://www.theage.com.au/politics/federal/greens-in-late-bid-to-delay-morrison-government-s-union-busting-legislation-20191122-p53d5d.html

    Attorney-General Christian Porter appears on the verge of securing the support needed to pass the government’s union-busting legislation before Christmas, but a last-minute intervention may still derail its passage in the year’s final sitting period.

    Mr Porter released the government’s amendments to the Ensuring Integrity Bill on Friday afternoon after negotiations with Centre Alliance and One Nation, which had sought changes to soften the bill’s impact on non-militant unions representing teachers, nurses and firefighters.
    :::
    But the Greens will on Saturday unveil their own amendment to the union bill, seeking to delay it until a federal commission to investigate corruption in the public sector has been established.

    If the Greens secure Labor and crossbench support, it would mean the union bill would not pass the Senate until Mr Porter resolved the debate over the government’s proposed Commonwealth Integrity Commission, which critics say is too limited in scope.

    Greens industrial relations spokesman Adam Bandt said while he did not like the union-busting bill, “if it’s going to pass, it shouldn’t come into effect until Parliament has also established a proper watchdog to oversee politicians and senior public officials”.

    He will appeal to Labor, Centre Alliance and Tasmanian senator Jacqui Lambie, all of whom backed the Greens’ anti-corruption legislation in the Senate in September, to support the amendment.

    “Parliament shouldn’t force workers and their unions to abide by new ‘integrity’ standards while letting politicians continue to escape scrutiny,” Mr Bandt said.
    :::
    Centre Alliance senator Rex Patrick on Friday said: “We negotiated the government amendments so clearly agree with them. We have also agreed to support the One Nation amendments.”

    omg what an anti-worker party the Greens are.

  48. zoomster says:
    Sunday, November 24, 2019 at 11:08 am

    Firefox

    I don’t mind truthful accounts such as yours – that the Greens deliberately voted down the CPRS – rather than the fanciful, untruthful accounts we get here.

    Yes you have to give Firefox credit for being a green and repeating the same arguments seen 10 years ago.

  49. But how realistic is this?

    Greens industrial relations spokesman Adam Bandt said while he did not like the union-busting bill, “if it’s going to pass, it shouldn’t come into effect until Parliament has also established a proper watchdog to oversee politicians and senior public officials”.

  50. Driven by a 2GB shock-jock, it’s this type of issue that gains Morrison’s earnest attention:

    [‘The matter came to public attention on August 29 when Nine News political editor Chris Uhlmann tweeted a photograph of a toilet door sign at the department’s Canberra offices telling staff: “Please use the bathroom that best fits your gender identity.” The tweet was picked up by 2GB radio host Ben Fordham during his afternoon program.’]

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/i-ve-cleared-my-diary-senior-bureaucrats-scrambled-to-act-on-pm-s-toilet-door-demands-20191122-p53d1y.html

    He couldn’t have his flock at Horizon thinking he supports gender diversity. And what’s Uhlmann doing hanging around toilets?

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