The post below this one features Adrian Beaumont’s latest updates on the polling situation in the United States, the United Kingdom and New Zealand. Back on home turf, I have two updates to relate.
The first involves the calculation of the states’ and territories’ House of Representatives seat entitlements for the next parliament, which will be determined next month on the basis of yet-to-be published quarterly population figures from December. Barring a sudden change in population trends in the last quarter of last year, this will cause Victoria to gain a seat for the second term in a row, boosting it to 39 seats — a return to where it was when the parliament was enlarged in 1984, before a lean period for the state reduced it to 37 in 1996. It is even more clear that Western Australia will lose the sixteenth seat it has had for the past two terms, reflecting the waxing and waning of the mining and resources boom.
Relatedly — and to get to my main point — the Northern Territory is also set to lose a seat, unless something comes of Labor Senator Malarndirri McCarthy’s announcement last week that she will introduce a bill to guarantee the territory its existing two seats. The territory just scraped over the line with 1.502 population quotas at the last determination in 2017, rounding up to an entitlement of two seats, and has since experienced a continuation of relative decline since the resource boom halcyon days of 2009 — and even then its population only amounted to 1.54 quotas.
The Northern Territory was first divided into its current two seats of Solomon and Lingiari in 2001, but its claim to a second seat has been consistently precarious. It would have reverted to one seat in 2004 if not for a legislative fix to change definitions in a way that put it over the threshold, which received bipartisan support partly because both major parties imagined at that time that they could win both seats. This proved a forlorn hope in the Coalition’s case, with Lingiari having remained with Labor at all times and Solomon having fallen their way in both 2016 and 2019.
As a result, Solomon and Lingiari have consistently had the lowest enrolments in the country, at a shade below 70,000 at the time of the 2019 federal election, compared with an average of 110,755 in the mainland states, 98,644 in the Australian Capital Territory (which gained a third seat last year) and 77,215 in Tasmania (which maintains the constitutionally mandated minimum of five seats for the six original states). Conversely, a single Northern Territory seat would have an enrolment far greater than any other, with the unfortunate effect of under-representing its indigenous population, which accounts for more than a quarter of the total.
My other update relates to the July 4 Eden-Monaro by-election, for which nominations close on Tuesday. The Daily Telegraph ($) reports four candidates have nominated for the Nationals’ Eden-Monaro preselection, to be held on Sunday: Trevor Hicks, deputy mayor of Queanbeyan-Palerang; Fleur Flanery, owner of Australian Landscape Conference; Mareeta Grundy, a dietician; and Michael Green, a farmer from Nimmitabel. The Greens announced on the weekend that their candidate will be Cathy Griff, a Bega Valley Shire councillor.
Steve777 @ #40 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 7:04 am
Not allowing electorates to cross State boundaries doesn’t make sense to me, beyond, as I said earlier, maintaining the Constitutional minimum.
The House of Representatives is the people’s house whilst the Senate is the State one.
boerwar
Indeed, i am not up with President Xi’s war on “corruption”.
I think of CCP injustice in terms of Tibet, Uighurs, Falun Gong, and Hong Kong, Taiwan.
I notice the CCP outreach seems well ensconced in the University of Queensland where an Anti-Rightist Campaign is being waged against “wrong thought”.
I don’t know Buce is moaning about. BK posts every single funny Zanetti cartoon, and without fail posts sensible articles written by Miranda Divine or Judith Sloan .
NSW 4 cases, all travellers
Vic 3 cases, 2 travellers and one school kid
This means NSW has had 9 days with no community transmission
“and without fail posts sensible articles written by Miranda Divine or Judith Sloan”
Such a thing exists??
Now, if only that malingerer in Auckland would hurry up and get well 🙂
Bucephalus
Being of advanced age, I hark back to when life in Oz was comfortable for most people, when individual initiative was not bound by too many rules, when people who needed social welfare were left alone to make the best life they could, and not pursued by a range of government instrumentalities and blamed for their inability to get a job.
Perhaps that world didn’t exist, but I’m positive that things have changed for the worse, and as the LNP have been in charge for so many years, logic argues…
Buce drives by, chucks a dead cat on the table, and then gloats at the number of bites he gets.
Some of his comments show perception and an idea worth engaging with.
The other 99% not so much.
lizzie
An event happened recently that reminded me of Ken.
Vale Peter Slater. His massive contribution was to initiate the democratization of Australian ornithology by making accurate bird ID accessible to everyone.
It certainly got me going well beyond casual observations.
Something which you would have a very good grasp of, IMO.
i just gave the SA Liberal Senator’s office a call. I let my opinion of the Homebilder scheme be known in no uncertain terms.
PuffyTMD
Well done.
It is such a stupid policy. I’m almost convinced that it is merely an announceable as a marketimg ploy by the govt.
Show support for the tradies and the building industry. But in reality, The govt know that it is a time consuming and stupid way to provide a grant.
I can recall BK attracting a little fire from Labor stooges for posting some cartoons critical of Shorten by Zanetti.
nath
If Zanetti still had his Twitter account active I would have continued to post his cartoons.
BK @ #82 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 10:55 am
Pausing from weeding and prior to mowing ( I typed “meowing”) – see picture.
I aim to please (taken from sign on toilet wall). If you could advise, at your leisure, your plans regarding resumption of your cricket career. 🏏 I trust you have recovered from your last foray.
Thank you. 😎
Home builder will do next to nothing to stimulate the economy. If the LNP want to give handouts to the already rich, well nothing’s new. Home building is not highly labour intensive. They’ll have to do a lot better than that to reduce unemployment.
“ i just gave the SA Liberal Senator’s office a call. I let my opinion of the Homebilder scheme be known in no uncertain terms.”
If anyone deserved $25,000 to make your home more liveable, its you Puffy.
However, you are not alone. What boon it would be to the lives of many pensioners, Australians living with disabilities and low-medium income people if the grant was extended to small renovation projects.
It would also be stimulatory to the economy. Bigly.
boerwar
Peter Slater.
Yes, the bird book authors were very much in competition through their publishers, but towards the end of his life Ken rang Peter Slater and established some rapport. Slater’s guide moved us on from the habitat-centric format of Cayley, which in some respects I regretted, but then Ken’s artists tried to include hints of habitat in the paintings. Ken couldn’t survive in the digital world.
https://twitter.com/TheKouk/status/1268712737032396801?s=20
The next government package?
To help the restaurant industry, the govt will provide $25 per head towards a meal but only if you spend more than $150 a head…
That should help!
continuo @ #115 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 11:21 am
‘Home builder will do next to nothing to stimulate the economy’
Good.
The sooner they fuck the place the sooner we get rid of them.
The White House is breathtaking in its denial of truths. “I can’t breathe” is a fine metaphor for Trump’s political scene.
https://www.sbs.com.au/news/donald-trump-s-press-secretary-says-police-who-attacked-australian-journalists-had-right-to-defend-themselves
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2020/jun/04/virginia-governor-confederate-statue-removal-robert-e-lee
In Virginia – monument celebrating Robert E Lee to be removed….hallelujah.
Muskiemp @ #118 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 9:31 am
That shows where their daily allowance has left them.
I can safely say I have never spent that much on a meal in my life.
These days $10 is extravagant, but that’s one of the nice things about where I live. 🙂
Should be a crime for public officeholders, candidates for public office, and their nominated spokespeople to lie to the public. But it never will be.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/abcmyphoto/2020-06-05/your-best-photos-for-the-week-ending-june-5-2020/12322252
I had thought to post instructions regarding the stripping of the Bren Gun. (Piston, Barrel, But,Body, Bipod). The above posted picture of dangerous creature of Australia will have to suffice.
a r @ #123 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 9:42 am
These conspiracy theories are getting out of hand.
The haze was obviously from vehicle emissions and any sounds that resembled gun fire were clearly those vehicles back firing. 🙂
“Never shall an enemy set foot upon the soil of this country without having at once arrayed against it the whole of the manhood of this nation with such strength and quality that this nation will remain forever the home of sons of Britishers who came here in peace in order to establish in the South Seas an outpost of the British race. Our laws have proclaimed the standard of a White Australia. We did not intend that to be and it never was an affront to other races. It was devised for economic and sound humane reasons. It was not challenged for 40 years. We intend to keep it, because we know it to be desirable.”
John Curtin, 16 December 1941
LAPD officers seen striking protesters with batons in Fairfax district confrontation captured on video
Disturbing videos appear to show Los Angeles Police Department officers striking protesters with batons during what had seemed to be a peaceful demonstration.
https://abc7.com/lapd-video-batons-protest/6231194/
LOS ANGELES (KABC) — Disturbing videos appear to show Los Angeles Police Department officers striking protesters with batons in the Fairfax district during what had seemed to be a peaceful demonstration.
in ago
Retired Marine Gen. John Allen says Trump should not treat “American people as a potential enemy”
From CNN’s Colin McCullough
Gen. John Allen, the former commander of American forces in Afghanistan and former special presidential envoy for the Global Coalition to Counter ISIS under the Obama administration, added to his criticism of President Trump’s handling of the unrest and protests across the country.
“Instead of debating whether to commit federal troops against American citizens, let’s debate how we can pursue real reform,” Allen told CNN Thursday night.
Allen said Washington should “partner with governors and with mayors rather than upbraid them, to see how we can take this moment and rather than treat the American people as a potential enemy, treat the American people as a population with guaranteed rights under the Constitution who are in enormous pain right now, pain from the pandemic and pain from the realities of what was ultimately at the heart of the death of George Floyd.”
Some context: On Wednesday, Allen joined former Defense Secretary James Mattis and a chorus of other former military leaders in condemning the President.
He penned a blistering op-ed in Foreign Policy writing that change will “have to come from the bottom up. For at the White House, there is no one home.”
Allen told CNN the American people are looking for “leadership at the most senior level and this is a chance for the president to truly unite the country.”
“It’s a moment, an incredible moment for us in a context of we can take this as an opportunity to look at those factors that have brought hundreds of thousands of Americans into the streets to protest massive social injustice, centuries of racism and discrimination. Or we can make this a security problem and ultimately treat those individuals as a security problem themselves as they are seeking to exercise their first amendment rights, of freedom of speech and freedom of assembly,” Allen said.
https://edition.cnn.com/us/live-news/george-floyd-protests-06-04-20/index.html
Twitter is full of pics of police attacking, or shooting, protesters who are often just standing still or walking past. I’m not interested in looking at them all, but the force in USA must be full of scared, weird little guys frightened of their own shadows, and very badly trained to deal with situations of civil unrest.
https://edition.cnn.com/2020/06/04/politics/trump-letter-protesters/index.html
Trump disgraces himself again
lizzie says:
Friday, June 5, 2020 at 11:52 am
Twitter is full of pics of police attacking, or shooting, protesters who are often just standing still or walking past. I’m not interested in looking at them all, but the force in USA must be full of scared, weird little guys frightened of their own shadows, and very badly trained to deal with situations of civil unrest.
Violence/non-violence are deeply political choices. The violence used by the police has a political purpose. If it can be used to arouse rioting then it will help Trump. If the protests can be sustained without becoming violent then they will become a force for change…for the removal of Trump and for renovation in America.
The courage shown by the protesters is really very remarkable. And it’s working. We’ve seen images of National Guards and Police taking the knee together with protesters; and images of protesters standing with police to protect them from agitators.
This is direct action politics on the streets and via social media. It’s quite beyond the control of the Republicans. The challenge will be to sustain it and prevent it decaying into violence.
You know things are going pear-shaped when the local redneck, talk-back radio in Perth 6PR is giving Renorort a real pasting. The best comment was from a local reno bloke who claimed the deal was “only helping the Big End of Town”………….Scotty from Marketing…………..Come on down!
lizzie @ #39 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 11:52 am
From a recent novel – sounds about right and would include paramilitary forces
And so to lunch and afternoon nap. Toodles.
lizzie @ #134 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 10:04 am
That seems to be an admission of major systemic problems in the current force.
Edit: added “major”
For Buce:
Menzies white Australia comment!
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=JhvmsV9bnxQ
Re: scared white guys.
A brief history of the USA (from “Bowling for Columbine”):
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=58BDrZH7SX8
One of the calmer parts of An Taoiseach Edmund DeValera’s reply to Churchill’s statement at the end of the war that he had made the decision to invade Éire
Mr. Churchill makes it clear that, in certain circumstances, he would have violated our neutrality and that he would justify his action by Britain’s necessity. It seems strange to me that Mr. Churchill does not see that this, if accepted, would mean Britain’s necessity would become a moral code and that when this necessity became sufficiently great, other people’s rights were not to count. It is quite true that other great Powers believe in this same code-in their own regard-and have behaved in accordance with it. That is precisely why we have the disastrous succession of wars
https://reneweconomy.com.au/arena-flooded-with-applications-for-green-hydrogen-project-funding-72828/
It seems designed to be as far removed from the ALP Home Insulation scheme as possible. Hence aiming it at those well enough off that dont need it.
I wonder how many people are still receiving the benefits of that scheme through lower electricity usage?
The only way this new scheme will increase building activity is convincing people who were going to spend over $125K to now increase the amount of work (or the expense of the work). IMO, it wont be nearly enough to stop a significant downturn in the sector – so all that money will be for what? Has a journo pinned the Coalition yet on what end result would be considered a success and what would be considered a waste of public money?
The 1940s were known for their woke leaders, especially in Australia.
The Adelaide ABC radio presenter yesterday morning was positively excited about it. He kept interrupting the Coalition MP to help explain in more concise terms how good it will be with wtte….
‘So, it will do this and this and this so it is a win win win’.
I am of advanced aged also lizzie and it is clear to me also that the social fabric that we once had has been degraded. It’s the direct result I think of neo-liberal economic policies and the social engineering of human behaviours that go with neo-liberal ‘philosophy’.
One of the things I have noticed is how people that back in the day we called Money grubbers became Aspirationals and were to be admired and emulated. There was no longer any respect for choosing to be a good person who didn’t want to climb the ladder. This became leaning and one was lazy and stupid for not getting ahead.
Labor was part of it but never as bad as the LNP and I like to think that for many of the party like Doug Cameron it was because they had to or leave.
I remember the amazement I felt when I heard Latham on radio national explaining why it was a good thing for workers to aspire to have a swimming pool of their own. I really believed that it was so obvious that the best way to maintain a cohesive society to contribute toward the council pool where everyone could get together and build social fabric.
I think there is a Simpsons episode that shows what happens to the social fabric when one of a formerly cohesive group of kids gets their own swimming pool.
What about the way that ad’s began to use all the 7 deadly sins and the latest psychological knowledge to motivate people and manipulate them. We bought stuff we didn’t need because it would make other people envious; conspicuous greed became okay and people who got rich quick by taking advantage of those less able than themselves were not called money-grubbers; selfishness was self-interest was natural and a good thing and would lead to the best of all possible worlds.
I could go on but Mavis doesn’t like essays.
Just a couple more small things that I remember being different back in the day when we had our famous Aussie way of life that so many right wing people are mourning.
Suburbs were not segregated so much. My family were working class or even worse at times with mental health problems isolating us and making things difficult, but in our neighbourhood there were rich kids or I thought they were rich that I visited. I learned a lot by seeing how and understanding why they did things like keeping the yard tidy and growing gardens and how some families talk to each other rather than just yelling and other of the life lessons that help people pull themselves up with their bootstraps.
As I remember it even in the 80’s social security did not just leave people alone, they actually positively helped. I became a single parent then and was actually encouraged and helped to go to uni by the social worker located at the Social Security office. There was a programe that provided single parents with extra money – $30 a week if they undertook full time study.
I also lucked out that around that time I was able to buy a house under the Qld Housing Commission scheme that meant I only paid 25% of my income. There is nothing like that now and yet it was the security of having a house that I knew I wouldn’t have to leave that made life so much easier and I’d say meant that I was able to be a much better parent than I would have been living on the edge as one does with renting.
But you know it is also true that some things have improved for women and children as the power of the patriachy has declined and some of the more dubious conservative ideas about human nature are pretty much gone except in the dark places that the rwnj’s congregate to mourn the loss of their western civ and blame women for everything they don’t like.
Bucephalus @11:50.
Of course that quote comprised a bunch of motherhood statements at the time and John Curtin was a man of his time. Robert Menzies, Aurthur Calwell and any other prominent or powerful man (they were nearly all men) of the time would have agreed. Curtin thought that the British Empire would last forever, just as I thought in 1985 that the Cold War would go on forever.
I do find it a bit odd that Curtin thought that Australia was the home of the sons (and presumably daughters) of “Britishers”, given that he himself was the son of Irish Catholic immigrants, but of course maybe many Australians of Irish decent did think so at the time. I don’t think my grandparents did.
Of course Arthur Calwall went on to establish Australia’s post-war immigration program, continued by Menzies. Both remained staunch supporters of White Australia.
Ok it’s time for 2 choruses of Lunchtime in Morristan;
I-it’s Lunchtime in Morristan,
It’s Lunchtime in Morristan,
It’s Lunchtime in Morristan
We’re all hungry as can be!
For Buce:
Howard and white Australia.
https://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/One_Australia
Great post, Tripitaka.
Interesting post over at the SMH to the Crowe piece on Homebuilder…
‘I’d also posit that Morrison tested ‘The recession is all Labor’s fault’ in internal Liberal Party focus groups – let’s see whether he uses this….
Oh he’ll use it if he can get away with it.
Poor Labor, who’d be a little puppy with sad big eyes.
tripitaka:
Friday, June 5, 2020 at 12:18 pm
[‘I could go on but Mavis doesn’t like essays.’]
Please don’t let a personal preference of mine hold you back. As a matter of fact, I enjoyed reading your post and concur with most of it.
Hello
Not only have the police in the US behaved disgracefully as we have all seen by now. They are also governed at local council level. Trump has made Austerity the name of the gems for the states with cuts.
The LAPD looks like getting its Budget cut in half.
Not only are the police bad at PR and crowd control. They can’t think in political strategic terms