Preselections: Groom and WA Liberal Senate

Early manoeuvres for a Liberal vacancy in a looming federal by-election, and a preselection to fill Mathias Cormann’s Senate seat set for November 7.

With Newspoll and Essential Research both having said their piece this week, there is likely to be a fortnight gap between federal polls. Not counting state and territory election action, which you can be assured you will be hearing more about shortly, there are two important preselections on the boil on the conservative side of politics:

• A situation is vacant for the Liberals in the Toowoomba-based federal seat of Groom following last week’s resignation announcement from John McVeigh, the member since 2016. In a column for the Brisbane Times, former Newman government minister and current 4BC presenter Scott Emerson says the vacancy presents an opportunity to head off a stoush over the order of the next Senate ticket between James McGrath and Amanda Stoker. The winner of this fight will get top position while the loser must settle for third, second being reserved for the Nationals. Emerson reports that this amounts to a battle between moderates and the Christian Right, of which McGrath is apparently one of the former. The suggestion is that Groom might give McGrath an opening, but in this he could face opposition from locals who support the claim of Toowoomba councillor Rebecca Vonhoff. Suggestions the seat might be of interest to another Senator, Matt Canavan, are complicated by the fact that he is a National, the sensitivity of which was illustrated when the LNP organisation blocked an attempt by the seat’s previous member, Ian Macfarlane, to jump ship from Liberal to the Nationals in 2015.

• Nathan Hondros of WAToday reports the Liberals will hold their preselection to fill Mathias Cormann’s Western Australian Senate vacancy on November 7, with the winner to take third position on the party’s ticket at the next election behind Michaelia Cash and Dean Smith. There would appear to be three nominees: Julian Ambrose, stepson of the late Perth construction billionaire Len Buckeridge; Sherry Sufi, an arch-conservative party activist; and Albert Jacob, former state Environment Minister and current mayor of Joondalup, who emerged as a “last-minute nomination”. Jacob held the coastal northern suburbs seat of Ocean Reef from 2008 to 2017, when he was defeated in the landslide the tipped the Barnett government from office. Cormann is reportedly lobbying for Ambrose, and his backers are pressuring Sufi to withdraw.

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.

2,450 comments on “Preselections: Groom and WA Liberal Senate”

Comments Page 49 of 49
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  5. Bushfire Bill @ #2400 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:38 pm

    No mention of the Aged Care report on ABC TV News.

    Therefore it didn’t happen.

    ‘Therefore it didn’t happen’
    Excellent and insightful.
    Mundo hangs on in the quiet hope that someday he may make comments as pithy.
    Although, it is after all, just a variation on the comments Mundo regularly makes in relation to Labor’s lacklustre performance of late.
    Apparently this is verboten!!!
    But ‘therefore it didn’t happen’ is another pearler from the Bushman.

  6. All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

  8. poroti @ #2405 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:54 pm

    All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

    So good to me (bah da bah da da da) Nice!
    Pappa Mundo approves!!$@#!#@!!

  9. poroti @ #2406 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:54 pm

    All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

    So, Mundo should die with a sandwich in his gob?

  10. Greensborough Growler @ #2408 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:56 pm

    poroti @ #2406 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:54 pm

    All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

    So, Mundo should die with a sandwich in his gob?

    MUndo hates to be pedantic but, pretty sure it was Denny Doherty on lead vocal.
    Just sayin!
    Cheese. 🙂

  11. Greensborough Growler @ #2408 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:56 pm

    poroti @ #2406 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:54 pm

    All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

    So, Mundo should die with a sandwich in his gob?

    Very nice Green Gobbler. Making fun of the fat lady?

  13. mundo @ #2410 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:59 pm

    Greensborough Growler @ #2408 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:56 pm

    poroti @ #2406 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:54 pm

    All together now , sing along with Mama Cass

    Bah-da bah-da-da-da
    mundo, mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    A mundo mornin’, mundo mornin’ couldn’t guarantee (bah-da bah-da-da-da)
    But whenever mundo comes, you can find me cryin’ all of the time
    mundo mundo (bah-da bah-da-da-da)

    So, Mundo should die with a sandwich in his gob?

    Very nice Green Gobbler. Making fun of the fat lady?

    Oh, and yes, it was Denny Doherty, not Momma Cass.
    You really need to research your nasty little comments before posting Gobbler.
    It was fun though!

  16. mundo

    ‘Therefore it didn’t happen’
    Excellent and insightful.

    Perhaps you could rework this into something appropriate for Labor at the mo’.

    If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s nobody around to hear, does it make a sound?

  17. Off to bed now.
    Hope Albo wakes refreshed in the morning for a new day of taking up to the Scrooter, who, by all accounts here is a real piece of work. Little wonder Albo is on fire!!$#@$@!!
    Night, night.
    🙂

  19. mundo @ #2418 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 9:12 pm

    poroti @ #2416 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 9:08 pm

    mundo

    ‘Therefore it didn’t happen’
    Excellent and insightful.

    Perhaps you could rework this into something appropriate for Labor at the mo’.

    If a tree falls in the forest, and there’s nobody around to hear, does it make a sound?

    The sound of one hand clapping?

    oh, and yes, empirically it does.
    But, philosophy is great, no question.


  20. Anthony Davis, LeBron James and Quinn Cook of the Los Angeles Lakers kneel during the national anthem with VOTE shirts on.

    More Than a Vote, the collective of athletes headlined by the basketball superstar LeBron James, will announce Wednesday that its initiative to increase the number of poll workers in Black electoral districts had amassed 10,000 volunteers since it began.

    …In a release provided to The New York Times, More Than a Vote and the Legal Defense Fund said the second phase of their push would be more targeted, aimed at 11 cities “where significant poll worker shortages remain,” the release said.

    Those cities include Black voter hubs in the South, like Birmingham, Jackson, Houston, San Antonio and Montgomery, as well as cities with significant Black populations in critical battleground states: Charlotte, Cleveland, Detroit, Flint, Milwaukee and Philadelphia.

    Elections officials throughout the country have cited a shortage of poll workers to staff in-person voting sites as a major problem for November’s election, which has been upended by the ongoing coronavirus pandemic. The shortage has been particularly acute in Black communities, which have historically experienced longer wait times and have had fewer polling locations than many white communities.

    https://www.nytimes.com/live/2020/09/30/us/presidential-debate

    More than a basketballer.

  22. Nothing quite like an AFL final, after a ridiculous, almost pointless hub season, to remind me how much I hate Geelong, and how all their players are impossible to like.

  23. caf

    I think it hardly matters what Labor is doing right now since by all accounts the voters aren’t paying a blind bit of attention until the 4 weeks preceeding an election.
    ————-
    Well, that’s ok if you think MPs are only elected to Parliament and paid handsomely by the community for the sole purposes of winning an election.

    If the lazy bastards only have to work for 4 weeks, they should only be paid for 4 weeks.

    MPs should be paid just casual rates for the 4 weeks like they force on the rest of the community with a small addition to cover any holidays or sick leave.

    The Australian Parliament is on the whole a collection of useless overpaid failures. I suspect having to work 4 weeks every three years may be too much to ask of them!

  24. Rakali @ #2423 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 9:19 pm

    caf

    I think it hardly matters what Labor is doing right now since by all accounts the voters aren’t paying a blind bit of attention until the 4 weeks preceeding an election.
    ————-
    Well, that’s ok if you think MPs are only elected to Parliament and paid handsomely by the community for the sole purposes of winning an election.

    If the lazy bastards only have to work for 4 weeks, they should only be paid for 4 weeks.

    MPs should be paid just casual rates for the 4 weeks like they force on the rest of the community with a small addition to cover any holidays or sick leave.

    The Australian Parliament is on the whole a collection of useless overpaid failures. I suspect having to work 4 weeks every three years may be too much to ask of them!

    Sounds like you can’t deal with the democractic process.

    Easy to whinge. Harder to make a commitment and get involved for a cause.

  26. Rakali @ #2423 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 7:19 pm

    caf

    I think it hardly matters what Labor is doing right now since by all accounts the voters aren’t paying a blind bit of attention until the 4 weeks preceeding an election.
    ————-
    Well, that’s ok if you think MPs are only elected to Parliament and paid handsomely by the community for the sole purposes of winning an election.

    If the lazy bastards only have to work for 4 weeks, they should only be paid for 4 weeks.

    MPs should be paid just casual rates for the 4 weeks like they force on the rest of the community with a small addition to cover any holidays or sick leave.

    The Australian Parliament is on the whole a collection of useless overpaid failures. I suspect having to work 4 weeks every three years may be too much to ask of them!

    I think the way Australia, the UK and the US have turned to absolute morons because they feel so betrayed by the ‘collection of useless overpaid failures’ pretty makes this thesis unarguable. You’d have to be rusted on mindless to not see the broad anger at the failure of the two major parties in these countries.

  28. caf @ #2399 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:32 pm

    If you think anything that happens in the political sphere today is going to affect anyone’s vote in 18 months time, I think you’re sadly mistaken.

    The next election could be – and probably will be – in 12 months.

    And if you think that election will be decided in the last 4 weeks of the campaign, and nothing Labor does now really matters, then I have some bad news for both of you!

  29. Player One @ #2428 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 7:34 pm

    caf @ #2399 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 8:32 pm

    If you think anything that happens in the political sphere today is going to affect anyone’s vote in 18 months time, I think you’re sadly mistaken.

    The next election could be – and probably will be – in 12 months.

    And if you think that election will be decided in the last 4 weeks of the campaign, and nothing Labor does now really matters, then I have some bad news for both of you!

    If there is an election in the next 12 months it has already been decided and Morrison will win.

  30. I say that because I’m a labor member a keating true believer and I have no idea where the ALP stands on any of the important policy issues.

  31. zoomster says:
    Thursday, October 1, 2020 at 6:56 pm
    mundo

    When someone has made it clear to someone else that they don’t like being addressed in a certain way, it is polite to stop calling them by it.

    To continue to do so is harassment.
    —————
    Oh is it time to start piling on mundo again? Well it worked for you.

    Obviously no one should “harass” that delicate flower C@tmomma. I suppose the next time she calls another poster, oh I dunno, a grub maybe, you’re going to jump all over her. Right?

  32. WWP

    I think the way Australia, the UK and the US have turned to absolute morons because they feel so betrayed by the ‘collection of useless overpaid failures’

    I hold by my hypothesis that there is a link between the craptitude of politics in Anglo-Saxon societies and the meeja dominance of

  33. AG

    You missed an important point I was making, but that’s no surprise.

    Do you ever actually make a contribution here, or do you just snark?

  34. Particularly cool that Tom whiney pathetic thin skinned figjam Hawkins, pretty much personally handed port adelaide the win with a goal kicking performance that would embarrass an under 15 D grade player.

  35. poroti @ #2432 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 7:59 pm

    WWP

    I think the way Australia, the UK and the US have turned to absolute morons because they feel so betrayed by the ‘collection of useless overpaid failures’

    I hold by my hypothesis that there is a link between the craptitude of politics in Anglo-Saxon societies and the meeja dominance of
    ” rel=”nofollow ugc”>

    I think Murdoch explains the win rate of the conservatives and the rock solid devotion of both the centre right and far right parties in each country to clearly failed trickle down economics, but the massive angry protest vote isn’t down to him it is down to the failures of the centre right and far right parties that have swapped govt with very little policy variation screwing more of society than they help for something like 40 years.

  36. WeWantPaul

    but the massive angry protest vote isn’t down to him

    Ya reckon ? Watching Foxtel over the last couple of decades Rupe’s Fox has been bigly encouraging of the angry protest vote.

  37. Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #2096 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 5:04 am

    Simon Katich @ #2083 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 4:55 am

    No way they should turn off Trumps mic in the next debate. The main reason Biden won the recent debate was because we could all hear and see Trumps loutish, juvenile, desperate interference tactics.

    If his mic is muted, we won’t hear it but Biden still will. And Biden needs a calmer environment to perform well in these debates. Trump knows this and will keep bulldozing the format – mic muted or not.

    I doubt whether there’s a choice.

    Both sides would have agreed to the terms of the debates before agreeing to go ahead with them and the open mics was probably part of that agreement.

    Trump agreed to a range of rules, and then promptly disregarded them.

  38. The Age is as bad as the Sun these days. I have read a story in the Age that there is a new private security guard scandal at a Melbourne city hotel. Well what a load of BS, Lies Lies Lies!!! The reporters Towel and the Muslim women are making it up! Firstly the company and the Police both say they are NOT security guards which great reporters mention in there big news story! Secondly I know this story is lies as my son is a policeman and has worked there many times and there are NO private security guards there. There are heaps of police , prison officers, PSO’s ,nurses, and a doctor and Spotless staff!
    The other BS story is that Labor will lose 5 Upper House seats with an election 2 years and 2 months away ! I will ring them and ask for next weeks Tatts Lotto numbers for this week.
    These people are just idiotic!

  39. C@tmomma @ #2313 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 1:26 pm

    Spray,
    As someone who has, just now, indicated his business’ approach to COVID-19, plus the fact that they are an Indian-owned company, having stated how pro-active and effective was their response to the pandemic, can you venture an opinion as to why the Indian nation in general has made such a hash of its national response to COVID-19 considering the number of people it obviously contains, in decision-making positions, who knew what needed to be done to contain the virus?

    ps This is in no way a means to a slur of the Indian people.

    You’ve never been to India, have you?

  40. C@tmomma @ #2258 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 10:58 am

    Vic,
    I’m buggered if I know what federal Labor think is a good thing to be doing right now. All I can say is that on a Zoom book launch the other day Albanese said he’s not going to be an Opposition Leader like Tony Abbott. Maybe he’s trying the Joe Biden model?

    I want Shorten back. Albo is useless.

  41. Victor Scholar

    Journalists need to feed their families and the newspapers no longer have a business model that supports journalism (which is expensive). So they resort to making things in order to make ends meet.

    The only real exceptions are a few older journalists. They’re not better people than the youngsters, but aren’t under the same financial pressure as they’ve paid off their mortgages.

    It’s sad, but it’s the way it is. They are pitiable rather than evil.

  43. Anybody who seriously thinks that Albanese will be PM is deluded. It aint gonna happen. Albo is just not up to the job. I cannot think of one positive Albo possesses other than he is Labor.

  48. Yikes. Something to read on lunchbreak tomorrow then. (When I get to see the dead tree version of the West.)

    Even assuming the blueblood golden triangle seats swing a bit less than the average, that’s bad for the Libs. They’d be bashed down to Nedlands, Cottesloe, Churchlands, Bateman, South Perth and Vasse. Two of those have been won by independents in the recent-ish past (three if you count Bateman as the successor to Alfred Cove), but I’d be amazed if Labor won any of them.

  50. Barney in Tanjung Bunga @ #2439 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 10:56 pm

    C@tmomma @ #2313 Thursday, October 1st, 2020 – 1:26 pm

    Spray,
    As someone who has, just now, indicated his business’ approach to COVID-19, plus the fact that they are an Indian-owned company, having stated how pro-active and effective was their response to the pandemic, can you venture an opinion as to why the Indian nation in general has made such a hash of its national response to COVID-19 considering the number of people it obviously contains, in decision-making positions, who knew what needed to be done to contain the virus?

    ps This is in no way a means to a slur of the Indian people.

    You’ve never been to India, have you?

    Nope. Never been outside Australia. I did watch Shaun Micallef’s travels through India though. They seem like nice people. 🙂

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