The week’s federal election preselection developments:
• Facing the apparent certainty of preselection defeat, Craig Kelly announced his resignation from the Liberal Party at a party room meeting Wednesday. Kelly says he will sit as an “independent Liberal” and then run in his Sydney seat of Hughes again at the election, which I believe leaves open the possibility that that may be as the candidate of another party. He appeared to rule out running for the Nationals, as some in the party hoped he might, saying he was “not sure whether a pair of RM Williams and a big Akubra and a Driza-Bone will necessarily work in Sutherland”.
• It had generally been assumed the Liberal preselection in Hughes would prove third time lucky for Kent Johns, Sutherland Shire councillor and factional moderate, from whom Kelly had to be saved by prime ministerial intervention before the 2016 and 2019 elections. However, The Australian reported on Tuesday that moderates were cooking up a deal with conservatives in which Hughes would go to Dallas McInerney, chief executive of Catholic Schools NSW, in exchange for a free hand in the preselections for Warringah and Gilmore. Reports that the Hughes preselection might be contested by police commissioner Mick Fuller were dismissed as a “furphy” by a source quoted in the St George Shire Standard. Those who may run were said in the report to include Carmelo Pesce, a cafe owner and former Sutherland Shire mayor; Ned Mannoun, a former Liverpool mayor; Bree Till, a veterans service adviser whose husband was killed on service in Afghanistan in 2009; and Naji Najjar, a former Bankstown councillor and staffer to Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells.
• Nicolle Flint, two-term Liberal member for the marginal Adelaide seat of Boothby, announced on Friday she would not contest the next election. Flint said she had soured on politics after personal attacks against her during the 2019 election campaign, which the Liberals have cited in support of proposed electoral law changes that would clip the wings of the GetUp! organisation, and the recent rape allegation by former Liberal staffer Brittany Higgins.
• Labor has announced that Ali France, a motivational speaker and former television producer who lost a leg in a car accident in 2011, will again be the party’s candidate in Peter Dutton’s northern Brisbane seat of Dickson. Dutton won the seat by 4.6% in 2019 after a favourable swing of 2.9%, a fairly typical result for Brisbane.
Nicholassays:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 9:19 pm
“Was the inquiry into Dyson Heydon fascism because the judges were using a balance of probabilities standard of proof and the consequences of the finding were political, cultural, and organizational rather than a criminal penalty?”
………..
You are suggesting a witness be compelled to incriminate themselves. This is literal fascism.
Bushfire Bill says:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 9:33 pm
Pointing out that we can never know the truth about what happened between Minister X and the dead woman 33 years ago is NOT misogynistic, sexist, or acting in lockstep with “the Men’s Rights Movement”.
_____________________
To think you and c@t where such good friends, where did it go wrong?
Before the Bludger Army rush off to sign up for Boerwar’s China Invasion Force perhaps a bit of work first on our own back yard.
.
Wilmot says the life expectancy of the Martu was 40 years for men and 38 for women, nearly 20 years lower than that of the conflict-ridden Democratic Republic of the Congo, one of the world’s poorest nations.
“No Martu child has graduated from the high school in the 10 years we have been here,” he says.
https://www.watoday.com.au/national/western-australia/wrong-skin-tragedy-death-drugs-and-violence-in-a-divided-town-20210212-p571yg.html
No-one should accept this anymore and i think that the anger people fell indicates they will not.
https://mobile.twitter.com/abc730/status/1366677962418917377
We talk about justice, protection of identity etc. and so on.
Clearly however the system that we have is not working, that goes for the legal and political system.
I think The legal system needs to reflect on its failure. What is to be done about it I don’t know. On the one hand you have the almost complete failure, women whose lives have been ruined, no justice, no recourse, on the other you have BB’s view.
Clearly we have not put enough effort into educating what consent is.
Reflecting back on sex education, from our parents we barely learnt the biology.
I can remember embarrassing my son telling him how to treat a women properly when it comes to intercourse. I understand the issue, kids like to pretend they have discovered something that their parent havn’t. For my part my first education was from a book “the moon is a balloon” now there was a kid that got a solid education. For many it is the bullshit you hear behind the shelter shed “No means yes”. Lesson 1, no means no.
As for consent the lesson starts when they are in nappies, you do not hit a girl no matter how annoying, you definitely don’t do things when they say no. And even if they say yes remember if there are body fluids involved they get to decide if you have a child to support, not you. It’s a 20 year commitment, Be very sure you’re willing.
Anyway, enough reflection.
Akon:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 8:51 pm
You appear to be far more concerned for the effete, very well connected, entitled former frat boy than V1, a young woman who had her life ahead of her before she was anally raped at the tender age of 16, who, but for what seems on the face of it to be an exacerbation of her bipolar condition, would have most likely not instructed NSW police to bring to an end the investigation into her complaint, her body found the next day (June 24 last year). Yes, I’m well aware of the presumption of innocence but do you really think that she concocted such a harrowing story? I don’t. I believe her 100%, the former frat boy by most accounts having form. He gets off with little more than a rubbished reputation; V1’s family, her many friends were left with a body to bury. No less than a former NSW’s DPP, a judge of appeal, and quite a number of prominent lawyers have said a prosecution was possible but not the NSW’s Police Commissioner, the question dealt with in almost indecent haste. An inquiry is needed, headed up by a retired judge. Only then will many be, but by no means all, satisfied.
Rossmcg @ #1902 Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021 – 9:32 pm
Shh! Don’t tell Bushfire Bill. He’s put the matter to bed even before Scott Morrison has.
alias @ #1898 Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021 – 9:27 pm
Yep.
Interesting take
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/accused-s-future-in-politics-is-devastated-no-matter-what-20210302-p57766
boewar likes to get himself excited too much if any hint of China/west trouble, providing no productive solutions.
‘Pointing out the reality of the situation’ is not the same as calling people who are fighting for a dead woman’s story to be taken seriously and not dismissed casually, ‘a lynch mob’.
Lars Von Trier:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 9:39 pm
[‘To think you and c@t where such good friends, where did it go wrong?’]
As you’d know, friendship ebb & flow on this site depending on the matter under discussion and how strong the combatants feel about the subject matter.
I think that Tingle got to the nub of the issue.
This is not about the criminal law anymore. It’s about the steps that ScoMo took to satisfy himself that the anonymous cabinet minister retained his confidence. Cabinet ministers serve at the pleasure of the GG. The GG takes the advice of his chief minister as to whom should be appointed and removed from cabinet.
ScoMo has made a decision. He owns that decision. He made that decision based solely on the denials by the anonymous cabinet minister and without regard to the contents of the letter addressed to him, let alone the other material that is available.
This is not going to end well for ScoMo. Let alone the anonymous cabinet minister. The identity of the parties has already been leaked. All the source material will leak as well. As night follows day. At that point ScoMo’s decision to phone this in without making his own inquiries or at least considering the material first – his hiding being the skirt of the police (who only care about prosecutable crimes that have reasonable prospects of conviction) and the bald denials of the anonymous Minister – are going to prove troublesome. To say the least.
Australians are -recently at least – a pretty feckless bunch, but ScoMo keeps racking up one bad decision after another. ScoMo has already survived one ‘black summer’ clusterfuck. Covid won’t save his bacon forever.
Will it be this clusterfuck, or the next, or a redux of past clusterfucks that finally brings him, and his rabble of a corrupt rum Corp of a government, finally undone?
It only seems to be a matter of time & with 6 to 15 months still to run in the life of this parliament suddenly Albo is sitting pretty well placed. Ain’t he …
Anybody heard anything about the Brittany Higgins case lately? Some disturbing rumours all over the place that a certain person of interest, being a dual citizen, is back in Texas. If true, not even the welded-ons here could justify that. Bushfire Bill could probably give us a five hundred word essay on why he can’t be prosecuted, though.
Frednk:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 9:49 pm
Very good reflections.
Just like the dead woman cannot prove his guilt, the Senior Cabinet Minister is unable to prove his innocence because she is dead.
The outcome Jennifer Hewett suggests was always going to be the most likely outcome. We can never be sure of his guilt or innocence but he will end up paying a high price anyway.
Mavis @ #1917 Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021 – 10:11 pm
I thought we were still on friendly terms, Mavis? At the very least a characterisation of anything by LvT is to be viewed with a suspicious eye.
A very apt descriptor:
his rabble of a corrupt Rum Corp of a government
davidwh @ #1922 Tuesday, March 2nd, 2021 – 10:16 pm
I think what is also feeding into perceptions is the 4 Corners episode from last year. Otherwise he may have been given the benefit of the doubt more.
frednk,
You are a true gentleman.
“ You are suggesting a witness be compelled to incriminate themselves. This is literal fascism.”
Not so. A strict bar on the derivative use of such evidence would fix that. That commonly happens in our Justice system now.
I don’t actually think that Nicholas’s suggestion is a good one. I think that ultimately the final decion should be the PM’s, with the parliament able to effectively over rule him if his decision retaining confidence in the anonymous Minster causes parliament to lose confidence in the PM.
But an enquiry that the PM sets up to ‘get to the bottom of this’ – at the civil standard could employ a derivative use rule – especially regarding any reply from the said minister to a ‘show cause’ type letter.
Enabling legislation would obviously need to be established. But that’s all doable. Except that the current PM has zero interest in ‘getting to the bottom of it’. He’s made the call based on the anonymous Minster’s denial and the closing of the criminal investigation by nsw police. As far as he’s concerned: ‘case closed’ and Australia should get back to being wowed by his daily announceables. Maybe he needs to build a set of swings to go with the chook shed of female PMs and the cubby house for Jen and the Kids to live in as a reset.
I don’t see how you can believe her story to 100% confidence, not knowing her or the Minister, not being aware of the facts in depth (other than the puny summaries provided by the press, under threat of defamation). Even her friends wouldn’t go much further than believing she believed it.
You’ve simply taken a side, based on emotion (amply laid out in the rest if your post) and the political tribe you belong to. I wish you’d admit that, and then a rational discussion might arise from the situation.
I’m probably a member of the same tribe as you, politically, but I can see that wishing, hoping, praying for some kind of miraculous evidence to come forth, for justice to prevail, or for Morrison to order an inquiry to measure fitness for office is blundering up a blind alley.
Whatever her girlfriend on 7.30 wants, there will be no investigation, civil or criminal, based on evidence available now. You don’t have to be a sexist pig to realize that, just a realist.
https://www.pollbludger.net/2021/02/28/the-news-from-hughes-and-boothby-and-dickson/comment-page-39/#comment-3565911
It is likely that Morrison won`t make the election as PM because of this. The polls are likely about to dive for the government, likely making the Liberals look at a spill. The questions are how will Albanese (who now is very likely to make the election as ALP Leader) do against the next PM? And who will the next PM be?
I otherwise generally agree with your analysis.
If the minister is who we believe him to be I am reminded of the reporting of his maiden speech by SMH’s Paul Sheehan, who declared him a Prime Minister in waiting.
Sheehan ended up disgraced over a fictional story about a rape.
The Minister most likely will do likewise over another story about a rape.
This may be old hat, but if you search “kangaroo court” and the name most people assume Minister X to be then you come up with the most comprehensive account I’ve seen. Warning: the piece names the alleged victim, as well as the alleged perpetrator (though the whole thing is hardly state of the art reportage).
There may very well be a few senior ministers that are becoming increasingly ambitious for the PM.
Even considering the profile of the case of “Minister X” and the urgency of dealing with it, the NSW Police do seem to have dispatched it very quickly – a weekend plus two working days.
Tom, I don’t think my post is inconsistent with your point. I don’t think it’s a given that ScoMo will be deposed, but with each mounting blunder, that possibility grows. I think the collapse in his personal support levels, when it comes, won’t be gradual. They will simply tumble off the cliff. It’s already happened to him once and he got his covid miracle. I can’t see that sort of miracle happening again. Verily verily, Supply Side Jesus doesn’t love him that much. Surely?
Carve that in stone and hang it over the entrance to the Cabinet room.
https://www.pollbludger.net/2021/02/28/the-news-from-hughes-and-boothby-and-dickson/comment-page-39/#comment-3565927
I think it highly unlikely that something on the scale of the pandemic will come and save him again. I think the question is will his successor be Frydenberg, Dutton or someone else?
The Morrison Government reminds me of the death throes of the McMahon Government. McMahon was a snake in the grass just like Morrison. “BlackJack” McEwen personally despised him, claiming he was being undermined via his (McMahon’s) press contacts. On balance, McMahon’s Government was head & shoulders over Morrison’s, replete as it is with grubby, self-serving, lying nasties. How he fooled the electorate boggles the mind. Not that one enjoys sticking the boot in when he’s down.
These acts, as others have said, are never solo performances. Interesting from 4 Corners journo :
For God’s sake man!
● There’s no evidence.
● The complainant withdrew the complaint.
● Then she died.
It isn’t the cops’ job to trawl through the newspapers and look for likely scenarios to investigate, or else explain why they didn’t.
C@tmomma:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 10:20 pm
[‘I thought we were still on friendly terms, Mavis?’]
I never said we weren’t. I was referring to Lars’ post that you and BB seem to have had a falling out. Keep up your good work.
It isn’t the cops’ job to trawl through the newspapers and look for likely scenarios to investigate, or else explain why they didn’t.
Well, they need to review the evidence provided – a fairly detailed document I understand. They need to make up a list of purported facts, events and people to follow up, conduct interviews, review the veracity of the information. They don’t want to take any longer than they need to but I’m surprised that they can do it all in four days.
McMahon was a fairly benign figure compared to Morrison.
Mavis
There was a book on McMahon in the bookshop and the thing that surprised me was how thick it was then i wondered how big would a book on Morrison be if McMahon can manage that much.
Bushfire Bill:
[‘Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 10:26 pm’]
While I do admit to being emotive, I don’t resile one iota from what I’ve said on the subject. As Fred alludes to, there’s
a disconnect here between reliance on the presumption of innocence and the bare facts of this case. I don’t know what the solution is but – there probably isn’t one, but that doesn’t serve to negate my strong feelings on the matter, nor would it for her family & friends, and I dare say most of the public, a gauge of which will be gleaned in the next Newspoll.
I know that “triggering” is seen by some as a woke catchphrase, but my goodness the last couple of days on this blog has been hard.
The absolute pig-headed rush to “innocent until proven guilty” (essential and correct as a feature of the judicial system it is) is being used as a cudgel by some who’d like any witnessless victim of abuse to just be quiet.
It reinforces again (and again amd again and again) that victims of sexual violence must never, ever be believed.
Mavis, BB,
The presumption of innocence and the standards of evidence required of a court of law are there to protect the individual from misuse of the power of the state.
As individuals, we do not weald the same power, but nor are there the same requirements on our decision making.
To wit, Mavis can make whatever judgement he wants, and run his own affairs accordingly (within the law), based on whatever evidence he sees fit. That is a big part of the “liberal” bit of liberal democracy.
The issue isn’t whether the case proceeds or not because the lady withdraw the complaint but the minister’s problem has been the mismanagment of this story since last Friday.
● There’s no evidence.
● The complainant withdrew the complaint.
● Then she died.
The NSW police also say ‘For various reasons, the woman did not detail her allegations in a statement…”. So it appears she also had roughly six months to make a statement to the police Task Force and did not do so before withdrawing the complaint anyway.
But the key phrase that jumped out at me from the statement issued by NSW Police was ádmissible evidence”.
I’m not a lawyer. The most I can rely on is Year 12 Legal Studies, but if I remember correctly Hearsay is the most common form of inadmissible evidence.
These self-appointed advocate friends of the deceased woman are tying to make their case off the back of what is probably hearsay, ie their re-telling of what the deceased told them.
And what’s more, many in the media are trying to get some very significant things done off the same hearsay, ie a Cabinet Minister should be sacked, independent enquiry by eminent judges, etc.
having become aware of the issue only via the elements of the media which have painted this issue to be one of guilt by rumour and emotion, I now feel I’ve been robbed of any opportunity to offer up empathic thoughts about this tragic case.
Louise Milligan is not being cryptic. She says there are other complainants.
Morrison and co have been playing a very bad hand.
Personally I don’t know enough to take a clear guilty/innocent position. I don’t know how any of us can. However a minister can’t do their job while something like this is unresolved. Unfortunately it can no longer be resolver to any certainty.
He does need to step aside for the sake of the government. If the situation can become more clear the perhaps he has a future in politics although that seems unlikely.
If he is innocent then I sympathize with his family. It will be hard on them.
Mexicanbeemer:
Tuesday, March 2, 2021 at 10:58 pm
[‘There was a book on McMahon in the bookshop and the thing that surprised me was how thick it was then i wondered how big would a book on Morrison be if McMahon can manage that much.’]
McMahon wasn’t as bad as I made out, certainly better than Morrison. He was defeated in ’72 by the promise of great social change and Whitlam delivered in spades. And of course, Vietnam was a big factor. McMahon had the distinction of being the longest (21 years) continuous minister since we came of age, so the book you refer to probably reflects this. As for any book on Morrison, it’ll probably take the form of one of those coffee-table books, with nothing of substance contained therein other than a Machiavelian type treatise on how he fooled the electorate with glibness, lies & he how he could sell ice to the Eskimos.
Before I call it a night
Louise Milligan
@Milliganreports
·
1h
#Auspol Clarification: NSW police didn’t “end” their investigation. The investigation never began. Complainant never made statement. When I inquired, they were very interested to know if I knew of other complainants against #CabinetMinister. My answer: “Not in your jurisdiction”.
Louise Milligan
@Milliganreports
Replying to
@Milliganreports
So I say to my male gallery colleagues who doth protest too much: Hush now.
11:04 PM · Mar 2, 2021·Twitter for iPhone
davidwh
If he is innocent he has been very badly advised because if he was innocent and had come out on Saturday or Sunday with a public statement showing empathy to the lady and at the sametime rejecting the allegations then he would be far better off than waiting until Wednesday.
“If he is innocent then I sympathize with his family. It will be hard on them.”
Which family?
Which family? Any of them.