Two new bits of federal polling news:
• Roy Morgan’s fortnightly poll has Labor’s two-party lead out from 53-47 to 54-46, from primary votes of Coalition 36.5% (down one), Labor 35% (down one), Greens 13.5% (up two) and One Nation 3.5% (up half). The state breakdowns have Labor leading in New South Wales with 55.5% of the two-party vote (up two on the last poll for a swing of about 7.5% compared with the 2019 election), in Victoria with 56.5% (up half a point for a swing of about 3.5%), in Western Australia with 55% (steady, a swing of about 10.5%) and in Tasmania from a very small sample with 58% (up five, a swing of about 2%). The Coalition leads with 51.5% in both Queensland (down three-and-a-half points, a swing to Labor of about 7%) and, anomalously, South Australia (up six, a swing to the Coalition of about 2%). The poll was conducted over the past two weeks from a sample of 2778.
• Essential Research has at last come good with its occasional dump of voting intention data, providing results from its last nine fortnightly surveys. If the 6% undecided are removed from the equation, and the results are rounded to the nearest half a point, the primary votes convert to Coalition 39.5%, Labor 38.5%, Greens 10.5% and One Nation 3%. If preference flows from 2019 are used, this comes out at around 52-48 in favour of Labor. The pollster’s “2PP+” measure has Labor on 49% and 45%, without allocating the 6% undecided. These numbers are Labor’s strongest over the period covered by the release, which goes back to the start of July.
I’ll finally get around to adding all of this, together with this week’s Resolve Strategic poll, to the BludgerTrack aggregate later today. Also:
• The new voter identification bill was introduced to parliament yesterday and can be viewed here. The Guardian reports Centre Alliance Senator Stirling Griff is “generally supportive”, which could give the government the vote it needs to get it through the Senate together with those of the two One Nation Senators. The report also says Pauline Hanson is claiming credit for the measure, saying she had made it a condition for her party’s support for government legislation lowering the threshold for political campaigners to lodge financial statements conditional. Antony Green’s account of the issue is naturally definitive; Peter Brent also offers his thoughts at Inside Story.
• Julie Owens, who has held the seat of Parramatta for Labor since 2004, has announced she will retire at the election. Joanne Vella of the Parramatta Advertiser reports that Julia Finn, who holds the state seat of Granville, is not ruling out seeking the nomination, potentially setting up yet another state by-election. Durga Owen, criminal lawyer and Western Sydney University lecturer, has confirmed her intention to run.
• Vince Connelly, Liberal member for the soon-to-be-abolished seat of Stirling and unsuccessful preselection candidate for the safe seat of Moore, has confirmed his intention to run for the far less attractive prospect of Cowan, held for Labor by Anne Aly on a post-redistribution margin of 0.9%.
• The Victorian state redistribution has been finalised, and you can read all about it here. I haven’t had time to look at it in any depth, but you can join in a discussion about it on the Victorian Resolve Strategic poll thread that went up yesterday.
New South Wales by-election latest:
• Andrew Constance has announced he will not resign from his New South Wales state seat of Bega until November 26, which, as Antony Green notes, means the by-election for the seat is unlikely to be held this year, and certainly not on December 4, which has been mooted as the date for a “super Saturday” of by-elections coinciding with the state’s local government elections. Indeed, it does not seem that any of the members who have announced their imminent departures has actually formally resigned yet.
• A third contender has emerged for the Liberal preselection in Willoughby to succeed Gladys Berejiklian in Kellie Sloane, former host of the Today Show and Seven Sunrise. The other two contenders are Willoughby mayor Gail Giles-Gidney and Menzies Research Centre executive general manager Tim James, although a senior Liberal quoted by James O’Doherty of the Daily Telegraph describes the latter as “not a viable option” since he could potentially lose the seat.
Jesus. That’s not a couple of drinks, that’s borderline wasted.
If you are an ex Australian test cricketer and over 75, you just may want to sit down and take care.
Vic Police not breathtesting Dans wife puts Ven’s theory to bed.
Poor Ven just got a little bit too carried away with himself.
Three houses in this end of street only halloweening but not a commensurate reduction in demand.
This Halloween nonsense is a mild form of blackmailing. I preferred Bob-a-Job.
Am I living in an alternative universe or did I just watch an Insider’s that wasn’t all Pro the Liberals.
Sprocket,
The issue in Kooyong is unitfication. There have been so many subdivisions of previousyl big blocks that proximity to the City is very attractive for renters. Once you introduce the paradigm of non-home owners into Kooyong, the Blue Ribbon Liberal cliche changes.
Labor won Hawthorn at the last State Election which is in the Kooyong Electorate.
GG
Most of the subdivision was done in the 1960s and 1970s so its impact is overblown and the ALP won Hawthorn thanks to swings in established areas mostly intact and Kooyong and Hawthorn have to be enlarged to stay in quota.
Another right wing shambles.
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/oct/30/brexit-is-harming-the-uk-economy-say-44-of-voters
https://www.theguardian.com/politics/2021/oct/30/brexit-fishing-row-uk-and-france-hold-last-ditch-talks-to-avert-chaos-at-ports
l’entente cordial?
MB,
We have different opinions.
I can live with that.
I’m pleased to report that Labor’s federal campaign is up and running in Robertson. 🙂
Garbage out.
https://www.globaltimes.cn/page/202110/1237692.shtml
@MissBaileyWoof
12m
Waiting for the next Matthew Guy press conference. #springst
I’m probably now in the second half of my life. I’ve come to the conclusion that I have better things to do with my time than listen to bullshit. So, I fast forwarded through Angus Taylor’s interview on Insiders this morning. I’m assuming I didn’t miss hearing anything useful.
So, Perrottet says the $140/170 mill was already in the budget for Wagga Wagga Hospital.
Gladys tells her bleating boy friend in the phone tap that she’s fixed it, she’s told Dom to do it, to put the money in, Dom does whatever she tells him.
Somone’s lying there – if the allocation was there, she should/would have said I’ve spoken to Dom and the money is already there, so I didn’t have to tell him what to do, this time. She a braggart. She’s in a relationship where , tellingly, she needs to continue to prove her worth.
The question is not, as Tingle pointed out, the merit of Wagga Wagga Hospital getting the funding. Name a hospital that doesn’t want $140/170 mill.
If the hospital got the money because of her relationship, she’s acted improperly. If the hospital got the money regardless of her relationship, but she saw to it that the relationship benefited by that funding, then I still think she acted improperly.
Off to do a KayJay, who is above and beyond all this, bless him.
Matthew Guy says, “Hold my beer”…
“A lot of angry Liberals today and they want Matthew Guy to pressure Tim Smith into resigning from Parli – as he did with Simon Ramsay in 2018 for drink driving offences.
“Kew is a seat for future premiers, not disgraced backbenchers,” one Liberal said.
https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/liberal-mp-tim-smith-resigns-after-crashing-car-driving-more-than-twice-legal-limit-20211031-p594pt.html
sprocket_ @ #1315 Sunday, October 31st, 2021 – 5:46 pm
Someone in the Age Blog comments was suggesting push Tim in to resigning and draft John Pesutto. Wrong seat but not far out.
And hearing of Tim Smith’s drunken episode, Jordan de Goey says:
“You call that drunken, hold my beer!”
https://www.theage.com.au/sport/afl/de-goey-groping-allegation-puts-heat-on-magpies-and-afl-20211031-p594py.html
The Instagram video is worth a watch..
Morrison’s mask wearing is political, that flag plastered across his mug all the time at home. That he isn’t wearing one in meetings with the world leaders who are, is foolish, thoughtless, selfish, and plain diplomatically rude. So, guess it makes some sense. He should have been banned from wherever it was till he put one on.
Itza
I’m surprised (not?) that one of his advisors doesn’t point it out to him.
I believe that at one time Tim Smith was destined for great things.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/nsw-records-177-covid-19-cases-one-death-on-eve-of-international-border-reopening-20211031-p594n6.html
I cringed when I heard SfM rabbiting on about Bert Newton. You’d think he was a close family friend of the man the way he was carrying on. Totally OTT.
Let Pesutto have Kew.
Vote Josh Out
@votejoshout
·
1h
Nothing beats a hangover like some donuts. We had these made for Tim Smith, to celebrate his special blood alcohol reading milestone. What a shame he won’t be able to drive over & pick them up! Let’s #VoteJoshOut for giving us this guy as MP for Kew. #DimTim #DonutDrunkDick
🙂
48 hours since he arrived in our lives and Bubsy already has his scaffold: a complete nesting complex has been erected so that he can roost on it and learn to fly from it without hurling himself down the stairwell to certain death. All precious objects have been removed from the cabinet top.
Hear how happily he chirps.
You win, Bubsy.
Bushfire Bill says:
Sunday, October 31, 2021 at 6:14 pm
___________________________
Are you an aromatherapy practitioner?
David Rowe. Bloody hell!
“I am his highness’ Dog at Kew
Pray tell me sir, whose dog are you?”
Alexander Pope
From Guy’s dog, to just a dog, is Tipsy Tim.
In life, you get what you give.
As someone who has lived other than where I was born, educated, played my sport and commenced my working life for now over half my life, there are occasions where events have you reflecting.
You stay in contact with some from past times – and from some social circles.
There are reunion events you can sometimes attend, and do if possible.
So when it is reported that Ashley Mallet has passed away, after a fight with cancer, you reflect.
If I had bumped into him at the Boxing Day Test, in the Members, I would have said “How the hell are you?”
And questioned re Nick, who was talking of moving to Scotland because his wife had inherited a hotel and Colleen (I think it was) and Nick were to become “mine host” somewhere in Scotland (the mind boggles!!!)
But you lose contact, because life goes on.
So you have regrets.
On the same day as Ashley’s passing was reported, I took a call from an unknown number, the wife of another Ashley (AJ) telling me that AJ was in a bad way, and had said he wanted to talk with me (after 40 years!!)
So I rang back in the afternoon, when his wife was with him.
Present at that time was another from my long distance past, one I dropped a couple off when standing at first slip a very long time ago now.
He had not forgotten,
It was a great conversation, with plenty of laughing by all.
But, the circumstances AJ is in are the daunting fact.
When I referenced AJ Mallet instead of AA Mallett, well, I was distracted.
As a kid, in school, because of family members, I was privy to First Class and Test cricketers of the time.
So sitting on deck chairs on a suburban back lawn in Adelaide after Queensland had defeated SA in the Xmas match, Ken Mackay, in his drool, calling me over, telling me to go ask Wally (Grout) how he thought he went behind the stumps today.
Wally lazing in his deck chair, glass in one hand, fag in the other.
Takes a mouth full and has a drag, then says “Didn’t make one fucking mistake, not one fucking mistake”
And, after a period of time
“That was because not one fucking ball past the fucking bat of fucking McLachlan”
I was still at school!!!
The response from the Queensland players was a lesson in life, I had been set up.
Wally died early.
Too early.
I think I felt sad.
Today, with the passing of some I also knew as a school boy (and later, so of my vintage just about exactly) the impact is different.
Les Favell, Neil Hawke, TJ (“you can fucking well catch, can’t you, hurling the ball at me).
Characters gone too soon.
Their names live on.
Their deeds live on, and not just on the cricket field.
I recall a dining table conversation involving G StA Sobers, ahead of his final Shield Match for SA in his first season in Adelaide – v a Test strength NSW including Davidson.
The performance so far in that season was the subject.
The invitation to me was to get to Adelaide Oval over the 4 days (doing Leaving Honors so a flexible because you only did selected subjects).
Sitting on the pickets in front of the Members.
SA did not make many in the first innings, but Sobers taking some wickets restricted the damage.
The second innings, 251
The ball hitting the pickets with such force it just about finished back on the pitch (well, not quite, but very near).
And Davidson bowled him.
Some more second innings wickets and SA won.
Memories.
Activated as they are, so with sadness.
And regrets.
At least I have spoken with AJ, and I will continue to ring every few days.
And I am being called for tea.
I see you have a portrait to remember me by on your wall, BB. 😉
No Lars, an alchemist.
My son is going to England in the New Year to visit his girlfriend, now that we can again travel overseas. This is the way he is going to fly over with Emirates:
😯
Is being a total yob a prerequisite for playing in the AFL?
No, but it helps.
Fulvio – the visual is aromatherapist with black skivvy and man bun.
Alchemist would need a darker vibe.
C@t:
He’s going first class?!
mikehilliard @ #1333 Sunday, October 31st, 2021 – 6:28 pm
Football more generally these days.
Let Pesutto have Kew.
It’s an interesting idea for the Liberals. Probably makes more sense though for Tim Smith to resign at the next election.
A bye-election and drafting John Pesutto to the leadership would be too late. Because the Liberals have already changed leaders. And they have committed going with Matthew Guy even if Smith agrees to quit parliament. Pesutto may be a more credible choice as leader but having the effect of Campbell Newman in QLD in 2012 or Bob Hawke federally in 1983 he is not though.
It was reported in the Herald sun that Smith allegedly almost rammed into a children’s bedroom. Considering what Senator Sam Dastyari had to resign for its really untenable for Smith to continue on.
Bushfire
I was going to suggest a branch or two to enable Bubsy to practise flying but I see that you have already done it. I hope he appreciates the special service he is getting.
Glad you, of all Bludgers noticed that, C@t.
The photo is of Angus, my black Burmese wondercat. He lived ’till 22, and then just faded away one day. A great companion. He died in 1998.
He used to appear out of nowhere like a ghost cat. Hence the shallow depth of field in the image.
I miss all of my dear departed animals. Too much, sometimes.
‘Confessions says:
Sunday, October 31, 2021 at 6:33 pm
mikehilliard @ #1333 Sunday, October 31st, 2021 – 6:28 pm
Is being a total yob a prerequisite for playing in the AFL?’
——————————-
Not for all of the AFL. It definitely helps if you want to play for the Pies.
Tim Smith…shades of Troy Buswell.
The lack of mask wearing by SmoCo probably suits certain demographics that would vote for him.
He never, repeats never does anything unless there is something to be gained .
Oh and its The Australian Way.
We need to kick the bastard out.
Yet another Coalition cock up.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2021/oct/31/australias-net-zero-plan-could-cost-far-more-than-the-20bn-allocated-angus-taylor-suggests
EVERY.SINGLE.THING.
Lizzie, it’s a case of “Snoozevilles’s luckiest butcherbird meets Snoozeville’s biggest mug.”
I envisage a pointy hat (like Morrison wore during his schooldays) a blue bathrobe of stars and moons design, a wand, a telescope pointed at the signs of the zodiac, a tub of molten mercury, and a menagerie of assorted dead and convalescing birds.
Look, the Republicans in America are quite happy to put up as candidates former NFL players with brain damage who have been convicted for assaulting their former wife. So, maybe Jordan Degoey might be a better choice to replace Timmy? The Liberals like to do everything the Republican way these days, after all. 😉