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.
It seems apparent that the vast majority of new home builds and major renos in the pipeline and with contracts soon to be signed will get a $25k bonus … good for them. It may give some who are doubtful, the nudge to get them over the line but is more likely to simply mean opting for the triple garage instead of a double.
Any genuine stimulus effect is likely to be marginal and come at a huge cost of donations to those who can afford to have gone ahead anyway.
Simply stupid!
See the difference?
..
continuo says:
Friday, June 5, 2020 at 11:21 am
‘Home builder will do next to nothing to stimulate the economy.’
In fact it may have the reverse effect.
Just spoke to an Architect and I asked if he is seeing any extra activity since the announcement. He said yes, one client rang to say redo the design but this time without the top storey. The owner wanted to get the cost below the threshold to claim the $25k.
Re Tripitaka @12:18
:+1: (like button)
Kirky @ #1656 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 8:29 am
You’re the last person I expect then to be whining if restrictions return because of a spike in transmission
Tripitaka
Thanks for your reply – much more lucid than mine. 🙂
” I wonder why the cops didn’t go to the Supreme Court to stop that one?“
Maybe because that one only attracted the proverbial two men and a dog.
This will be long. Soz peeps….
I did this course about 15 years ago…..
POLIS 2107 – Passions and Interests: The History of Greed
Lisa was a hard arsed marker, didnt tolerate my hopeless writing skills and wasnt overly impressed to have a cranky mature aged student in her class of pretty, brainiac young things. But she is lovely and a world recognised expert on Ferguson.
You could try to find a more detailed course outline online or direct from Lisa if you ask nicely. It would be a great starting point for understanding the cultural change in Western society that isnt simplistically blaming ‘capitalism’ as many do (myself included).
The irony for Labor (Labour in UK too) is that while, historically, working towards the broad prospect of improving the living standards of the lowest paid and worst off in society, once this starts to work, this self-same group becomes “middle class”.
It goes something like this (simplistically) ………my grandfather dug ditches with a shovel….my dad drove and excavator…………..I own an earth-moving business.
The last group votes Labor no more.
Meanwhile in the 42% plus who vote for the LNP (setting side the 3-4% vote for the Nationals) some in the well-healed middle to upper classes, paradoxically, are going the other way.
No wonder Labor has trouble sorting itself out…..
John Pilger on the coup. It has relevance in the current demand for the Palace letters.
I’ve never read this version before, although of course I knew that the CIA was rumoured to be involved in the Whitlam coup.
http://johnpilger.com/articles/the-cia-coup-against-the-most-loyal-ally-is-history-s-warning-in-2020
A half decent opposition would have the government running for cover by now over the Homebuilder fiasco.
Pilger? CIA? Really?
briefly: “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.”
Yep, by good old Governor Ralph Northam, one of several left politicians in North America with a penchant for wearing blackface way past when it was at all acceptable (in Northam’s case the 1980s, in Jussie Trudeau’s case, once in the 1990s and once in the 2000s FFS!). For Northam, the embarrassing disclosure of his past behaviour prompted him to commit to removing this statue, and potentially others. And now he’s done it.
Personally, I’m extremely uncomfortable with attempts to eliminate people from history whom modern people judge to have been on the wrong side. I would prefer to see statues of such figures left in place and interpretative signs erected which present the case against them.
Obviously there are limits to this: nobody wants to see statues of the Nazis go up anywhere. But Robert E Lee was an interesting and complex person who is worthy of being remembered. He was certainly a million miles away from the sort of comic book white supremacist that some of his modern fans and detractors attempt to portray.
Obliterating any knowledge of the past was a major strategy of Ingsoc in 1984.
guytaursays: Friday, June 5, 2020 at 12:39 pm
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.
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There is a particularly vile video showing an elderly man being pushed backwards , he falls and is left bleeding from the head/ear
‘Outrageous and criminal behavior’: Internet blows up at graphic video of Buffalo Police pushing over an elderly man
On Thursday, footage emerged of police in Buffalo, New York pushing an elderly man to the ground, and refusing to help him as he lay bleeding profusely from a head injury.
https://www.rawstory.com/2020/06/outrageous-and-criminal-behavior-internet-blows-up-at-graphic-video-of-buffalo-police-pushing-over-an-elderly-man/
Bucephalus
I have never taken much notice of Pilger as I know he is not respected by a certain section, but I also know that the Americans did not appreciate Whitlam’s desire for independence.
Now they have put a wall around the Whitehouse. How ironic.
Trumps fake presidency looks like entering the end game.
2020 has been like watching a dystopian movie.
Maybe the end of the movie will be Trump being led away for treason and being an illegitimate president.
That would be quite fitting.
Interesting times……..
A coal mine expansion in Qld Darling Downs is going to the HC on appeal. The mine is asking for a State approval in the mean time, further to the water approval that was granted by the Paluszczuk government back in 2017.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2020-06-05/high-court-to-decide-fate-of-new-acland-coal-mine/12311734
This would be a great opportunity for Qld Labor to make clear its concern for climate change action by refusing the mine approval before the State election due on 31 October. Or they could hide and deny.
New Hope is a thermal coal mine of exactly the type that needs to be stopped if we are to achieve Paris targets. New Hope donated $650,000 to the Campbell Newman government back when it got an earlier approval. And they were reported as paying zero tax in 2018. Not exactly a natural target for Labor support. We shall see.
Emma Dawson, from the Per Capita think tank, makes a point that has been overlooked in the analysis of HomeBuilder:
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2020/jun/04/the-homebuilder-scheme-is-simply-pork-barrelling-to-the-coalitions-electoral-base
Steve777 @ #157 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 12:52 pm
NSW Police are stupid for going to court.
You can’t stop mass protests. It will only inflame potential violence.
All you can do as a Govt and Police force is to advise that there is a risk that a return of restrictions will happen if there’s a spike in coronavirus infections.
Rex @1:14 PM. Yes I’m inclined to agree.
There is a n open air museum in the boondocks of Budapest that has all the toppled Soviet era statues.
Pretty sure he was deemed on the wrong side at the time.
Victoria ” 2020 has been like watching a dystopian movie.“
Well put.
Tripitaka,
All I can add to your eloquent exposition is that I am so glad that I had my children during the era when, despite living under Howard’s rule, Peter Costello made having children an aim of his and so he provided adequate social benefits to families for doing so. That extra money made a real world difference to what I could afford for my kids after I had to leave work when the second one was born with a severe disability and his father was unable to work due to a broken back which he suffered in a car accident with a drunk driver.
The extra money provided the stability that we needed.
Okay, back out into the sun on this perfect, sunny and warm Winter’s day in Sydney. 🙂
Rex Douglas @ #169 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:14 pm
Even if the court rules in their favor, that leaves them…where, exactly?
The police already have the power to move on protesters. And it would be up to the same police to enforce the court order. If the protesters still ignore them, then what? Back to court for yet another unenforceable ruling?
“It’s court orders all the way down.”
Now that Republican Senator Lisa Murkowski has belatedly and insufficiently condemned Donald Trump, let’s just say that Trump isn’t happy about it. After Murkowski said she agreed with General Mattis’ assessment that Trump is unfit and deranged, Trump vowed to destroy her.
Donald Trump vowed to go to Alaska two years from now, when Senator Murkowski is up for reelection, and personally campaign against her. But George Conway destroyed him over it:
Donald J. Trump @realDonaldTrump
Few people know where they’ll be in two years from now, but I do, in the Great State of Alaska (which I love) campaigning against Senator Lisa Murkowski. She voted against HealthCare, Justice Kavanaugh, and much else…
George Conway @gtconway3d
frankly I don’t see how you’d be eligible for parole by then
https://www.palmerreport.com/analysis/george-conway-just-destroyed-donald-trump/29403/
Good to see a second safe injecting room to open in Melbourne.
c@tmomma, citing Emma Dawson, “The grants are so poorly targeted to increase construction activity, it’s necessary to question whether that is in fact their intention. The outcome is more likely to inflate house prices, or at least to soften the widely expected fall in the value of existing homes. That might improve the nation’s headline GDP figures, but it does nothing to create new jobs or increase household living standards.”
Both Labor and Liberal Governments have offered first home buyers’ schemes in the past which could be used for new builds and for purchasing existing housing. And the above criticism would have been totally justified in relation to those programs.
But the Government’s new scheme – just like Labor’s proposed changed approach to negative gearing that they took to the last election – is largely focused on new construction. The addition to total housing stock coming from schemes focused on new builds should counteract any inflationary effect.
I must admit that the Government has sold this scheme very badly, by letting the debate focus on home renovation rather than home construction. And, as others have pointed out, most planned home building/renovation projects are not particularly shovel-ready, and those that are will be at the point at which they would have gone ahead with or without the $25k subsidy.
So it’s perhaps not the greatest scheme ever unveiled, but I’m sceptical that it will be particularly inflationary: because that would require it to have a higher level of uptake on the renovation side than I expect to occur.
c@tmomma: “Okay, back out into the sun on this perfect, sunny and warm Winter’s day in Sydney. ”
Lucky you. It’s raining cats and dogs down my way.
a r @ #175 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:23 pm
I see Vic Police are telling protest organisers that if more than 20 people attend the protest then the organisers will be fined. That’s at least more workable than the NSW intention.
Scotty from Marketing strikes again. What a shyster.
Further to that vile video I posted at 1.08 – this exchange is on Rick Wilsons twitter
Hannah Buehler @ HannahBuehler
BREAKING: Buffalo Police Commissioner Byron Lockwood has ordered the suspension of both officers involved in viral video in Niagara Square tonight . According to @MayorByronBrown the 75 year-old man is in stable but serious condition in the hospital.
@MayorByronBrown is “deeply disturbed by the video”
Rick Wilson @TheRickWilson
Suspension? AYFKM?
This is the inherent problem with tooling up the entire force in SWAT gear and bumping the aggro up to 11. You knock old men to the ground and walk by like you give no fucks.
Apologies if already posted, but it seems Morrison like Berejiklian, is dead scared of Australia’s treatment of Indigenous people being broadcast to the world.
Rex Douglas @ #179 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:30 pm
What a successful governing shyster.
SK: “There is a n open air museum in the boondocks of Budapest that has all the toppled Soviet era statues.”
I’ve heard about that: unfortunately, I didn’t hear about it (or perhaps it wasn’t open yet, as the Berlin Wall had only just come down) when I visited that city 30 odd years ago.
“Pretty sure he was deemed on the wrong side at the time.”
I think the real problem with Robert E Lee is that he has become a symbolic hero to a lot of people today who think that the wrong side in the Civil War was actually the right side.
Anyway, history at its best is always a contested space. A few pages back in this thread, we had OC raising the issue of Eamon de Valera’s decision to keep Ireland neutral during WWII. It appears OC is sympathetic to de Valera and highly critical of Churchill, who later confessed that he had plans to invade Ireland during the war if their continued neutrality became an obstacle to defeating the Nazis. Personally, I think de Valera was a scumbag for providing tacit support for the murderous Nazi regime and tend to see Churchill as a bit of a hero (albeit a deeply flawed one).
But I wouldn’t like to see statues of either man torn down. But I pessimistically predict that the global wokist forces will turn their attention towards cancelling Churchill sooner rather than later.
citizen: “Scott Morrison has raised the spirit of the Anzacs to urge Australians not to attend Black Lives Matters rallies over fears of spreading coronavirus.”
Or perhaps he feels like I do: that there doesn’t seem to have been much point in preventing many thousands of Australians (including several of my friends) from attending the funerals of their beloved family members, only to have large bunches of people congregate together to demonstrate against something that happened across the other side of the world, and for which the perpetrators have now all been charged with serious offences.
citizen @ #181 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:34 pm
Scrooter isn’t scared of anything.
meher baba @ #179 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:28 pm
Those cats and dogs are being let loose in my neck of the woods from Sunday. 🙁
Ph0enixRed
I could hardly believe it. They actually left him on the ground.
What the heck is going on in the mind of some people.
I have to say that I think certain state Premiers who won’t budge on exempting AFL teams to fly-in-fly-out are pretty stupid.
Direct transport from the plane to the stadium and back to the plane seems pretty safe to me.
More Moir:
C@t
Melbourne town has had some lovely weather over past few days. I’m enjoying it too whilst it lasts.
Btw when is son due back home?
Rex Douglas
says:
Friday, June 5, 2020 at 1:24 pm
Good to see a second safe injecting room to open in Melbourne.
_____________
Yes about time, and should take the pressure off the Richmond centre and nearby residents. I have the feeling that 2 more are needed. One in the North, say around Coburg or nearby, and another in the South East.
Victoriasays: Friday, June 5, 2020 at 1:45 pm
Ph0enixRed
I could hardly believe it. They actually left him on the ground.
What the heck is going on in the mind of some people.
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Totally agree Victoria – as bad as the initial incident was, the fact that they just calmly walked passed the bleeding elderly gent only magnifies how rotten to the core some people can be …..
nath @ #193 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:48 pm
Footscray as well.
Victoria @ #192 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:46 pm
Don’t know yet. Not that he wants to come home but he has to as his ETSA Visa has run out. He said that he had a flight booked on Qantas but it was cancelled due to not being fully subscribed. So it seems as though they will send them back when it is economical to do so.
He’ll probably organise a proper visa next time.
PR,
Will he be able to see Russia from his cell?
phoenixRED @ #194 Friday, June 5th, 2020 – 1:49 pm
When I originally saw the footage the thought went through my head that the cops did that because they thought that any white old guy that was demonstrating wasn’t worth saving. Sadly.
PhoenixRed
Yes. Very disturbing.
as bad as the initial incident was, the fact that they just calmly walked passed the bleeding elderly gent only magnifies how rotten to the core some people can be …..
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2 of those cops have been suspended without pay and have had the Buffalo Mayor and Police Chief call them out, as well as the Governor of NY.
Thanks once again for cameras and camera phones.. The police initially claimed he ‘tripped’.