Northern exposure

A by-election looms in the Northern Territory, plus not much else of psephological interest going on right now.

With the excitement of the British election over and done with, now begins the extended nothingness of the silly season. A few points worth noting to keep things ticking over:

• A by-election looms in the Northern Territory for the Darwin seat of Johnston, not far out from a territory election scheduled for August 22. This follows the retirement of Ken Vowles, who has held the seat since 2012. Vowles served as a minister after Labor came to power in 2016, but was one of three members expelled from the party caucus in December 2018 over a feud with Chief Minister Michael Gunner. Labor held the seat with a 14.7% margin in 2016, an election at which it won the two-party vote 58.5-41.5. A heavy swing at the by-election seems inevitable, but the Country Liberal Party to this point appears to be dragging its heels on naming a candidate. Labor has chosen Unions NT general secretary Joel Bowden, a former Richmond AFL player who says he’ll be putting in a 100% team effort. Former Chief Minister Terry Mills’ CLP breakaway party, Territory Alliance, is running Steven Klose, who according to the Northern Territory News held the curious position of “political adviser at the Northern Territory Electoral Commission”. Also in the field will be Braedon Earley of the Ban Fracking Fix Crime Protect Water Party.

• In other by-election news, there isn’t any. Confident speculation a month or so ago that Eden-Monaro MP Mike Kelly would be gone by Christmas has less than a fortnight to bear fruit, and there also are no visible signs of progress on suggestions that Mark Dreyfus and Brendan O’Connor would be pulling the plug in Isaacs and Gorton.

• Michael Koziol of the Sydney Morning Herald reports on jockeying for the Liberal preselection in Warringah, where the party faces the difficulty of its branches being dominated by conservatives in a seat whose voters gave Tony Abbott the flick in favour of independent Zali Steggall. Included on the watch list are “NSW upper house member Natalie Ward, Menzies Research Centre manager Tim James, Downer EDI executive and former Scott Morrison staffer Sasha Grebe, as well as management consultant and NSW Liberal Party state executive member Alex Dore”, along with Manly barrister Jane Buncle. Mike Baird, former Premier and now senior executive at NAB, set the hares running when he declined on opportunity to seek the position of chief executive at the bank, but “several Liberal sources doubted Mr Baird would want to take the pay cut to go to Canberra”.

• A number of victims of the Liberals’ 2018 Victorian election disaster are identified in The Age as potential successors for Mary Wooldridge’s Eastern Metropolitan seat in the Victorian Legislative Council, following her retirement announcement last week: John Pesutto, Heidi Victoria and Michael Gidley, respectively the former members for Hawthorn, Bayswater and Mount Waverley.

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.

5,091 comments on “Northern exposure”

Comments Page 95 of 102
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  1. Caltex expects its entire fuel retail network will complete the transition to revive its old brand – Ampol – within the next three years.

  2. Lizzie

    I don’t think that Morrison is expecting the Rapture at any minute.
    I think his god will allow him to enjoy his Miracle for a period while the White Righteous gain more power in the world until they dominate.
    But I know nozzing.
    ————————
    The Pentecostal God that Morrison follows is a USA God. It may be necessary to be on US soil when the rapture occurs.

    Morrison should move to Hawaii permanently just to be on the safe side. 🙂

  3. guytaur says:
    Monday, December 23, 2019 at 12:18 pm

    …”In the meantime the reality is progressives have one hand tied behind their back because the entire system is set up to prevent too much change by excluding progressive voices in those rural and regional areas. I say exclude because we have only seen progressive issues raised out of those areas after years of neglect by the Nationals”…

    I’ve often thought that country people would be better off voting Green rather than National and Barnaby doesn’t seem to have much of a future where he is, maybe Di Natale should offer him a job.

  4. Holden Hillbilly

    “ Caltex expects its entire fuel retail network will complete the transition to revive its old brand – Ampol – within the next three years.”
    —————
    They should revive Golden Fleece with the Merino ram on the pump.

  6. And BK, what is your assessment on how mopping up will go for the Cudlee Ck fire (not to mention the remaining active fires). I am stressed about that 30km flank of burnt ground only 10km to my N and NE should the wind turn unfavourable.
    SK
    Mopping up could take weeks. Tree exposed and underground roots can smoulder for a long time and cause trouble. With all those hectares affected this will require a protracted effort.
    Looking at the latest incident controller’s report they have some concern that the north-western area of the fire and along the western side may continue to spread further given the amount of fire activity picked up overnight.
    So all I can say is for you to keep listening to the ABC and your Alert SA phone app which seems to be working quite well.

  7. guytaur,

    There is an excellent book on the history of Climate Change debate in Australia, that was published by ANU Press in 2014. The full text is online.

    Global Warming and Climate Change: what Australia knew and buried

    https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p303951/html/cover.xhtml?referer=&page=0#toc_marker-1

    Chapter Four is titled “What Australians knew 25 years ago”, and provides some insight into public opinion towards climate change action during the 1980s:

    https://press-files.anu.edu.au/downloads/press/p303951/html/Chapt04.xhtml?referer=&page=9#toc_marker-10

    Australia’s early good knowledge of climate change was documented in a well-credentialed 1989 book that came to a startling conclusion. Following two national greenhouse effect science and public knowledge events staged in 1987 and 1988 by the national science agency the CSIRO and the federal Commission for the Future, earth scientist Ann Henderson-Sellers and her co-author Russell Blong reported on the outcomes of a two-year media and public awareness campaign. They felt able to claim that ‘the awareness of the greenhouse issue is probably greater amongst the general public in Australia than in any other country in the world’ (Henderson-Sellers & Blong 1989: 155).

    Public knowledge was also borne out in opinion polls. A September 1988 poll reported in The Sydney Morning Herald began with the following headline and lead: ‘Most want action over the greenhouse effect. Three-quarters of Australians are troubled by the environment-threatening greenhouse effect and believe something must be done to halt it, the latest Saulwick Herald Poll shows’ (Carney 1988: 5). This was just one of hundreds of articles from that period examining science and policy on the greenhouse effect.

    :::

    The following points, extracted from a lengthy article by Sydney Morning Herald reporter Paul Cleary, show the extent of knowledge in 1990 reported in the media, in this case with the headline ‘It’s the end of the world as we know it’. This article also shows the beginning of government and industry economic modelling on cost that came to dominate the discussion in later years.

    • Australia’s economy is carbon intensive.
    • Our output of greenhouse gases is rising at double the world average and our per capita emissions are among the highest.
    • The federal government (under Hawke) wrote Cleary, ‘has quite clearly embraced the concept of global warming and is keen to put in place a range of policies’.
    • The first IPCC report (1990) ‘provides virtually irrefutable evidence of global warming’.
    • The world was heading toward a climate convention (to become the Framework Convention on Climate Change, 1992), which in turn, should lead to binding emission control protocols.
    • It was thought at the time that there would be general agreement on cutting greenhouse gas emissions; the target was the Toronto goal of 20% below 1988 levels by 2005, which should be adopted by governments. The Toronto meeting of scientists and governments had agreed that significant global warming was a near certainty.
    • A carbon tax on wealthy nations was seriously being considered.
    • The 1988 Toronto conference coincided with a severe drought in North America and elsewhere, which ignited the media’s attention.
    • The government was being urged at the time to become a ‘fast follower’ of technological opportunities for business development related to lowering emissions.
    • Substantial government ‘intervention’ in the economy would be required.
    • Cleary accepted that ‘There is little doubt that the cost of achieving such a target, both in terms of resources and standard of living, will be huge’. Examples given by Cleary show that Australian resource industries were starting to do their own figures; e.g., coalminer CRA was warning that cutting emission by 20 per cent would hike power charges by 40 per cent; raise car prices by 25 per cent and petrol by 120 per cent—much later shown to be serious overstatements or ambit figures—e.g., by the 2006 Stern Report and the 2007 IPCC report.
    • Policy responses considered included ‘ironing out inefficiencies that had long been a way of life’ such as:
    • state government subsidies for electric power generation that kept prices low
    • state electricity authorities should stop increasing capacity and focus on helping consumers conserve (demand management).
    • Other detailed proposals worked out how much CO2 emissions could be avoided if solar hot water were promoted to a reasonable level—8 megatonnes (MT) a year. There are similar figures for energy efficiency of appliances and refrigerators; switching to natural gas; retrofitting homes and calling for energy-efficient design of new homes as part of the building code; as well as developing energy audits—it was all there and could be achieved within 15 years (i.e., by 2005), saving about half of the 40 MT of CO2 then emitted by households annually.
    • This article does not mention fuel efficiencies and the auto industry, but those were other areas discussed at the time where efficiencies could be made, and involved federal rather than state government regulations.
    • Energy-intensive industries, such as aluminium, could make process adjustments to save on electricity and low-energy intensive industries could make savings by redesigning new buildings and retrofitting old ones e.g., estimates that aluminium could cut its emissions by one third (32 MT) annually by changing process from electrolysis to direct reduction.
    • Cogeneration (electricity) with natural gas could cut emissions by 10 per cent or 25 MT.
    • Some cleaner coal burning options at the time, such as gasification, could achieve savings up to 25 per cent or 50 MT.
    • One easy, positive outcome would be the elimination of another greenhouse gas — chloroflurocarbon emissions (18 per cent of the total)—by 1995, thanks to the global treaty to ban these gases to protect the shielding ozone layer.

    Taken together, the options documented by Cleary posed a challenge to the status quo, but not a ‘freeze in the dark’ proposition (Cleary 1990). As government analyses commissioned at the time pointed out (e.g., Greene 1990a) there were plenty of dollar savings and job creation possibilities to make it a potential ‘win-win’ scenario. In the event, almost none were put into effect.

  9. John Cain is a case of a politician that stayed one term too long because after two good terms his government lost the plot in its third term with policies that did more harm than good but that was offset by his first two terms in office.

  12. Whether it’s on a Friday afternoon and you decide to take that extra plumbing contract and you said you were going to pick up the kids, or something at my level, these are things you juggle as parents.

    The problem for Morrison is the photos. He wasn’t juggling family commitments. He was stunned. Incapable of moving. Thinking about himself. For hours. He just didn’t know what to do. And of course he’s not so different than a plumber. Lovely bit of humble aspiration there.

    As previously commented on, actions and inactions reveal character. We’ll be paying a bit more attention now.

  13. Bakunin

    Yes. Its always been argued the Greens are extreme for listening to experts. Same narrative for Labor for listening to economists on act now stop astronomical costs later.

  16. ScumMo the plumber: ”

    “Whether it’s on a Friday afternoon and you decide to take that extra plumbing contract and you said you were going to pick up the kids, or something at my level, these are things you juggle as parents.”

    I presume he’s referring to Nixon’s Plumbers . ScumMo’s Pseudo-Tradie talk grates all the more because we all know it was written by a bunch of pathetic wannabe marketing spivs (like ScumMo) who make up the bulk of the LNP and the Hillsong Scam.

    Bludgertrack will be interesting when they resume polling. I do not think ScumMo can talk or spend his way past the images.

  17. lizzie @ #4694 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 12:13 pm

    @MagikMilly
    ·
    18h
    The RWNJs have decided that it would be absolutely hilarious if they all put a in front of their Twitter names, just to “piss off the Left”

    At a time when Oz is crippled by drought, unprecented bushfires and corruption-driven water shortages, that’s their priority

    How’s that going to upset people?

  18. C@tmomma
    says:
    Yeah, words, not skanky gestures at Labor leaders.
    ___________________________________
    C@tmomma
    says:
    Monday, April 23, 2018 at 4:04 pm
    Rex Douglas,
    Take it from me, Albo as leader of the FPLP would be a disaster.

    C@tmomma
    says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2019 at 8:27 am
    Yes, Anthony Albanese is not the messiah for Labor. He will never be Prime Minister. Maybe use him as a burner leader. That’s all I’d ever consider.

  21. nath
    says:

    C@tmomma
    says:
    Monday, April 23, 2018 at 4:04 pm
    Rex Douglas,
    Take it from me, Albo as leader of the FPLP would be a disaster.
    C@tmomma
    says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2019 at 8:27 am
    Yes, Anthony Albanese is not the messiah for Labor. He will never be Prime Minister. Maybe use him as a burner leader. That’s all I’d ever consider.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    That is pretty damning. Any explanation C@t?

  22. I was impressed with Albanese’s most recent appearance which I partly observed on ABC. It gave me some cause to think Albanese may be on track to lift the fortunes of Labor and appeal to the disengaged.

  24. So all I can say is for you to keep listening to the ABC and your Alert SA phone app which seems to be working quite well.

    Thanks BK. Still many active fires. I wonder just how much mopping up is possible.

    I use SA fires App atm as the cfs site can be difficult. Mrs Katich uses Alert SA and AdelHills facebook site as well (can be very useful – or misleading).

    The proximity of so many potential ignition points so close will make me rethink my plans. Having kids makes it complicated enough. And I have always been concerned what would happen in this area should panic set in for the tens of thousands of residents. One accident on the freeway down track….

  25. Michael @ #4721 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 1:06 pm

    nath
    says:

    C@tmomma
    says:
    Monday, April 23, 2018 at 4:04 pm
    Rex Douglas,
    Take it from me, Albo as leader of the FPLP would be a disaster.
    C@tmomma
    says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2019 at 8:27 am
    Yes, Anthony Albanese is not the messiah for Labor. He will never be Prime Minister. Maybe use him as a burner leader. That’s all I’d ever consider.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    That is pretty damning. Any explanation C@t?

    Zero context. 😐

    Oh, and that guy you are quoting, he’s an obsessive psycho.

  26. The “Deliberately Lit” trope is common up here too.

    I fell for it a bit too, at first. There seemed to be too many flash points, too close together for it to be accidental. Believing the fires, or at least some of them, to have been the works of arsonists, was an easy explanation.

    However, from talking to the local RFS fire captain, it appears that out of the literally dozens of fires we’ve had here, in this district, only one was deliberately lit, and that by kids playing with a lighter. It was put out within 2 hours and did little damage.

    For the rest, we’ve had careless use of a grinder, spontaneous combustion of a manure pile, several lightning strikes, a motor vehicle accident, a shorting transformer, fallen power lines, careless rubbish burnoffs and one instance of a suspected broken glass acting as a lens. As to spreading once ignited, that has been via the usual methods: heat, wind and ember attacks and consequent sheer lack of fire-fighting resources.

    In any case it’s not what STARTS a fire. It’s what maintains it.

  29. Would tradies really talk in terms of ‘taking that extra plumbing contract’, or would real people talk about ‘taking an extra plumbing job‘? Or am I just out of touch in my insert-place-name-here bubble?

  30. C@tmomma
    says:
    Zero context.
    Oh, and that guy you are quoting, he’s an obsessive psycho.
    _________________________________
    Perhaps, but I’m betting Head Office might want to have a word. Your membership number please?

  32. Morrison with verbal diarrhoea again.

    It’s All Positive in ScottyWorld.

    Mudgee’s fantastic. The people are fantastic. The resources are fantastic. The Army is fantastic. The government’s policies are fantastic. There’s nothing that doesn’t have a smiley face stuck on it.

    The only frowny face is on those negative people who criticise him. Scotty’s been talking to the Fire Chiefs and they haven’t.

    And they’ll all have a grand gabfest in 3 months’ time.

  33. Boerwar

    Thanks for the link. Of course, the real problem isn’t who lights the fires (are motor accidents deliberate or accidental?) but the existing weather conditions. Fires are now harder to stop.

  34. Can you have a same old same old epiphany?

    Morrison intends to reduce fuel loads in national parks. On the mainland, Environment Minister Ley controls three jointly managed national parks. All already have detailed fuel reduction plans.

    99% of national parks are state-managed national parks.

    That, plus the old ‘Hang arsonists from the nearest light pole popular lynching program’ plus the old ‘no change to Australia’s energy and emissions policies’ tells us everything that we need to know about ‘same old same old’ and why the Far Lefties who enjoyed Killing Bill and sinking Labor have got exactly what they deserve.

    https://www.theaustralian.com.au/subscribe/news/1/?sourceCode=TAWEB_WRE170_a&dest=https%3A%2F%2Fwww.theaustralian.com.au%2Fnation%2Fpolitics%2Faction-to-be-taken-on-managing-fuel-loads-scott-morrison%2Fnews-story%2Fe848c570b8c7dbccc2c4f46a25210ac2&memtype=anonymous&mode=premium

  35. C@tmomma @ #4711 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 1:16 pm

    Michael @ #4721 Monday, December 23rd, 2019 – 1:06 pm

    nath
    says:

    C@tmomma
    says:
    Monday, April 23, 2018 at 4:04 pm
    Rex Douglas,
    Take it from me, Albo as leader of the FPLP would be a disaster.
    C@tmomma
    says:
    Wednesday, May 22, 2019 at 8:27 am
    Yes, Anthony Albanese is not the messiah for Labor. He will never be Prime Minister. Maybe use him as a burner leader. That’s all I’d ever consider.
    ++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++++
    That is pretty damning. Any explanation C@t?

    Zero context. 😐

    Oh, and that guy you are quoting, he’s an obsessive psycho.

    Don’t understate the situation. Tell it like it is!

  36. “I think Australians take some comfort in the certainty and consistency of our views particularly now.”
    Scott Morrison on climate change, Dec 10

  37. BW

    No matter how you deny it the left of any stripe was in no way involved with the LNP party room electing Tony Abbott as leader and doing the environmental vandalism of repealing Labor’s Carbon Price.

  38. BW

    No matter how you deny it the left of any stripe was in no way involved with the LNP party room electing Tony Abbott as leader and doing the environmental vandalism of repealing Labor’s Carbon Price.

  41. @Shoebridge tweets

    Watch this to the end, it shows what @ScottMorrisonMP said at the bar in Hawaii when there were no press around. In summary, that the fires were someone-else’s problem #ClimateEmergency https://twitter.com/10newsfirst/status/1208634391519531008

    By @ScottMorrisonMP’s own admission, it took the deaths of two firefighters to convince him to come home from his Hawaiian holiday. | @vanOnselenP https://twitter.com/10NewsFirst/status/1208634391519531008/video/1

  42. On a more whimsical note, I see the comment numbers on this thread ticking up towards 5000. Is that a record? Is there a prize for comment #5000?

  46. Trump still says Obama spied on his campaign — even after extensive investigation disproved it

    President Donald Trump ranted Sunday about being spied on during his 2016 campaign, an unsubstantiated conspiracy theory that was discounted in an investigation by his own government.

    — Donald J. Trump (@realDonaldTrump) December 22, 2019

    The Democrats and Crooked Hillary paid for & provided a Fake Dossier, with phony information gotten from foreign sources, pushed it to the corrupt media & Dirty Cops, & have now been caught. They spied on my campaign, then tried to cover it up – Just Like Watergate, but bigger!

  48. “I think Australians take some comfort in the certainty and consistency of our views particularly now.”

    We have certainty that the Morrison Government will consistently support, protect and boost Coal. We can also be certain that it will be consistent in taking no effective climate mitigation action.

  49. First he says we shouldn’t rush decisions. Not making hurried decisions is how good government works.

    Then he says “We make decisions every single day.” This is ALSO how good government works.

    Both statements uttered as though the journalist asking the question is an idiot for asking it.

    All the positives are here, straight from Marketing #101: “strong Australia”, “wonderful volunteers”, “mateship”, “best in the world”, “beautiful country”, “hardworking”, “leadership”.

    I’m surprised he hasn’t brought the word “Motherhood” into it.

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