Preselection developments

A major Labor preselection resolved, plus a few slightly less major ones.

The big news at the moment is of course yesterday’s New South Wales state by-elections, where you can continue to follow the count here. On the polling front, there may be a Resolve Strategic result this week and presumably a Roy Morgan – Newspoll isn’t due, unless The Australian has decided to quicken the schedule with an election in view. That leaves the following preselection news:

• Alison Byrnes, staffer to Sharon Bird, will succeed Bird as Labor’s member for the safe Illawarra seat of Cunningham after the withdrawal of Misha Zelinsky, Australian Workers Union assistant national secretary and former criminal defence lawyer. Rob Harris of the Age/Herald reports it had “become clear in recent days he would not have enough support among branch members”, his prospects having been harmed by the emergence of past online activities in which he made comments denigrating women.

• Some new Labor candidates for unlikely-but-not-impossible seats: Amanda Hunt, chief executive of Uniting WA, will run against Andrew Hastie in the Perth fringe seat of Canning; Naomi Oakley, former police officer and owner of a private security firm, will run in the eastern Melbourne seat of Menzies, where Keith Wolahan will succeed Kevin Andrews as Liberal candidate; and Sonja Baram, a family therapist, will run against James Stevens in the eastern Adelaide seat of Sturt.

• Recently announced independents of note: Kate Chaney, Anglicare WA director of innovation and strategy and member of a family of local Liberal Party and business notables, will run against Celia Hammond in the blue-ribbon Perth seat of Curtin; and Craig Garland, a local fishing identity who made a minor splash in the seat at the by-election in 2018, will again run in the north-western Tasmanian seat of Braddon.

• It was reported this week that ASIO had rumbled an effort by Chinese spies to financially support “sympathetic and vulnerable” candidates for Labor preselection in New South Wales. Anthony Galloway of the Age/Herald reports the agency is satisfied no candidates of concern were endorsed, but that it remains concerned about the ongoing activities of “a wealthy businessman with deep ties in both Australia and China, who was known to ASIO as ‘the puppeteer’”.

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.

406 comments on “Preselection developments”

Comments Page 2 of 9
1 2 3 9
  1. Once again the wet lettuce Spears is going for the “GOTCHA” this time with KK. She is politely asking him to let her finish her answers to his gotcha questions.

    RD BILL – Strike
    CHINA CHOOSING LABOR and interference in the election- Strike

    Come on David, try again you moron.

  2. Rakali
    When I was in Scandinavia it was quite a beautiful sight to see groups of young fathers pushing prams & meeting for coffee.
    In Finland I was told that if you need a break from your new born, toddler etc to do some shopping or just to sit still for awhile they cater free of charge professionally qualified carers at childcare type centres. Children are the future & everyone’s contribution is paramount.
    The philosophy is simple but so difficult for Australia & likeminded nations to grasp.
    We tend to focus on the $ & not on the returns to the community.

  3. Steve777 says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 8:58 am

    There’s no point in voting for a minor party or independent…’
    —————————
    Unless you want to risk pandemonium, confusion, shouting, look-at-moi, sordid horse trading…

  4. sprocket_ says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 8:21 am
    After the crowing of triumph this week by Adam Bandt and his acolytes, how did the Greens fare in NSW Super Saturday? Greens primaries at COB are:

    Bega – 8.0% a fall of 2.7%
    Monaro – 7.5% a fall of 0.3%
    Strathfield – 6.1% a fall of 2.8%

    And in Willoughby, which was uncontested by Labor, the Greens finished a poor third behind Liberals on 43.5% and a Teal Independent on 32.2%:

    The proto-Reactionary Greens are in line to lose at least a few of the upcoming Senate contests. Excellent. The Liberals lost ground. The Greens also lost ground. Their deceits, their malice, their phobic games are driving voters away.

  5. Victoria records 18 deaths, 7,223 new cases

    There’s now 465 cases in hospital, with 62 of those in intensive care and 17 people in ventilators.

    That’s a decrease from numbers from yesterday’s figure of 79.

  6. Is that swing against LABOR last night in inner west Strathfeild a cause for concern ? I am not familiar with the geography but Labor needs to hold their Western Sydney seats and target Liberal one’s.

  7. I am going to make a prediction. There won’t be a war in Ukraine beyond what is already happening in the Donbass, because there was never going to be one. The build up is just more lies like we saw before Vietnam and the Middle East, except this time the opposition is not some third world country.

    The right wing loons will then claim a great victory, just in time to save us during the election campaign.

    Beat that Nostradamus.

  8. ‘Not sure this would work with the Pinkeyed Brownshirts infesting Scummostan at present – most have severe irony deficiency and are actually attracted to brainworms. I think it’s all the ivermectin flavoured Kool Aid they swallow…’

    RHWombat
    Thnks for another laugh. I just read the screed put out by the twits in Canberra about Pink eye.
    Altho I’m actually finding it all a bit sad that so much misinformation is sucking them in and many will get sick.

    SkyNews was as expected. Unfortunately Albo’s iview was done yesterday. Lots of interruptions for Albo, barely none for Keith Pitt.

  9. With regard to the Eastern European military build up, the yanks have sent a couple of thousand troops to existing bases in Poland, (how many came home?) and the Brits have withdrawn the very few who were on a training mission in Ukraine. Hardly preparation for WW3.

  10. Granny Anny

    I see a skirmish of sorts.
    Putin retreats and pays a heavy price by his own side who will blame him wholly for this indulgence.

  11. Prince planet says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 7:50 am

    Anecdotally does anyone else on here think charities and not for profit organisations might be a good source of high paying jobs for the progeny of well connected LNP families?

    I first became aware of a charity in the disability space in 2008 that appeared to be a sheltered workshop for a disfunctional lawyer whose father was on the charity’s board. my informant didn’t think charity was fulfilling its brief

    Of course charities pay stipends, not salaries so don’t pay income taxes or payroll taxes. Staff working in charities get low salaries but credit cards with high expense limits and no rules.

  12. Elmer_Fudd @ Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 9:46 am

    Could be. The demographics have also changed in this seat. Reid at the Federal level. There previously was a large slice of working class that is no longer apparent.

  13. Is that swing against LABOR last night in inner west Strathfeild a cause for concern ? I am not familiar with the geography but Labor needs to hold their Western Sydney seats and target Liberal one’s.

    Strathfield had a strong independent in Elizabeth Farrelly, who took 9.5% of the vote. Much of that must have returned to Labor via preferences, although nearly half of preferences were exhausted. The 2PP showed a small swing to Labor.

    https://www.pollbludger.net/nsw2022by1/Results/LA.htm?s=Strathfield

  14. Hey Steely, here is a winning strategy for your mates Morrison and Dutton. Announce conscription just like Menzies did 50 years ago so we have enough troops to go give those Russians a bit of a flogging. We could put Generalissimo Abbot in charge to shirt front their generals.

  15. There are some general laws of war, based on wars past.

    Generally only one side gets to start a war. The other side just has to respond. (In the latter case the Greens would deploy half an ADF configured as a Light Mobile Force.)

    It is easier to start a war than to stop a war.

    Wars rarely go the way the initiators thought they would. This goes not only to whether the war ends up being ‘won’. The wars might cost more than planned. They might last longer. Other states might join one side or the other. They get a long, very wet winter. They get a mouse plague. Etc, etc, etc.

    Wars intended as ‘limited wars’ have a habit of spiraling out of control.

    I note that most of the commentary is the usual bludger commentary: dissing actions of Western countries, dissing the Ukraine, and downplaying Putin’s intentions. Those who reflexively adopt this frame for their commentary might do well to reflect why they give comfort to Putin in this manner.

  16. The NSW byelections are somewhat different to the federal elections as the former was conducted under OPV. If full preference flows were in place, the results could have been even worse for the Liberals.

  17. C@tmomma says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 9:17 am

    Could the seat of Aston be the canary in the coalmine on the night of the election with Alan Tudge determined to contest again?

    I doorknocked in Aston for ACTU in 2019
    The people in Aston tend to be religious, I think Tudge will be punished for his extra marital affairs

    Higgins: Katie Allen had to cross the floor on religious bigotry bill to stop the Greens mobilizing the gay community to run against her, like they did in 2019
    The proposed Higgins electoral boundaries changes did not go through, so the electorate follows municipality boundaries except in Windsor (close to St Kilda town hall)

  18. Boerwar, so instead of critisising conservative bullshit factories we should stay silent and let them get away with it in case we give comfort to Putin.

    I am sure Putin spends more time on Pollbludger than you do.

  19. I find it interesting that Andrew Constance is reported as “popular” and therefore a good candidate for the Liberals at the federal election. Part of his popularity came from criticising the Federal governments response to the bushfires. Now he wants to join the same crew and is going to be fully on board with ScoMo and his band of incompetents. Not sure how that will fly.

  20. The Reactionaries are usually the war party in Australia. This has frequently meant subordinating Australian interests to those of others. There are numerous examples. When WW2 broke out, Menzies was willing to submit to Churchill’s strategies, which would have left us almost undefended against Japan. In VietNam, Menzies again tried to dance to the tunes of others, in this case the US. Howard did the same in Iraq and Afghanistan.

    The Reactionaries believe in war as a device for propping up their domestic political support. For them, foreign conflicts are useful distractions from their failures in the many serious matters with which we’re confronted.

    They are so incredibly incompetent the prospect of war at their hands is truly frightening. The Reactionaries are not to be trusted with anything so grave.

  21. I am not worried about Strathfield … I was a resident in the last state election but have since moved next door.

    2 issues: Farrelly, a left leaning independent (she enrolled as an ALP candidate in the local elections but didn’t actually run) who took 10% of the overall vote. If she hadn’t run, the swing would have been a lot higher to Labor. The post-mortems generally fail to note this.

    The other was the postal voting forms only in English – so many ethnic chinese, which are a high number of the Strathfield population, would have been confused (esp elderly with little to no Engish). The scrutineers will be interested in the informal votes in postals.

    Finally, the Liberal Sakr might have had a ‘sympathy’ vote because her child was one of those (5?) from 2 families who were run over last year.

  22. Looking at those NSW by-election numbers I think Greens members might need to make it immediately clear that either Bandt swiftly re-calibrates the communication strategy and focuses wholly and solely on promoting their policies without the commentary on others, or Waters will be the preferred leader for the election.

  23. Granny Anny says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:11 am
    Boerwar, so instead of critisising conservative bullshit factories we should stay silent and let them get away with it in case we give comfort to Putin.

    __________________________________

    I really hope that there is no invasion of Ukraine, because of the amount of blood that will be spilt. I cannot see the reason why, either.

    However, the incredible massing of Russian troops around the border of Ukraine (including in Belarus) is an obvious fact, not a T0nkin Gulf or WMD situation.

    So I think having a go at conservative media is disingenuous when it is Putin that is being most threatening. If there is any parallel to the situation today, it is the Nazi German invasion of Czechoslovakia after first occupying the Sudetenland in 1938.

    History doesn’t repeat though, and there are many differences. But the central idea of a heavily armed major power threatening to attack a smaller country next to it on the pretence of defending the right of fellow ethnics is a very strong parallel.

  24. Andrew Constance will have an uphill battle in Gilmore where people who have been burnt out in Jan 2020 are still trying to rebuild. The financial support has caused a lot of bad blood. The Red Cross deposited $60,000 in bank accounts of bushfire victims.

    Liberals have demonstrated their lack of concern for bushfire victims. Domicron opened the state up in school holidays. Sick Gilmore residents are sent to hospital in Canberra and Woolongong

  25. “ The NSW byelections are somewhat different to the federal elections as the former was conducted under OPV. If full preference flows were in place, the results could have been even worse for the Liberals.”

    This is the key to understanding Strathfield. With compulsory preferential voting its likely that the result would have been well over a 10% swing to labor on 2019. however 2019 was conducted on OPV, so on an ‘apples with apples’ comparison probably a typical by-election 6% swing would have been in order. Having a look at the overall progressive vote yesterday, and factoring in compulsory preferences at federal elections, I reckon labor has a real shot in Reid.

    However: the implications for NSW Labor in 2023 are bad: even if a state wide swing is ‘on’, the same exhaust rates we saw in the 2015 and 2019 elections (let alone the 2011 wipeout election) will see labor fall well short of majority government.

    Minns has to find a way to get the public to hate the Libs so much that the public make sure they fill in all the boxes on the ballot paper to truly make their vote count: that’s how Anastasia beat Newman in the 2015 Queensland election & without that same effect in 2023 the best that NSW Labor can hope for is minority government: perhaps with Labor winning 42-44 seats, with 2-3 Greens (yuk), and a couple of progressive independents (ie. independents that represent otherwise progressive seats like Sydney and Lake Macquarie).

  26. ‘Granny Anny says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:11 am

    Boerwar, so instead of critisising conservative bullshit factories we should stay silent and let them get away with it in case we give comfort to Putin.

    I am sure Putin spends more time on Pollbludger than you do.’
    =============================================
    I note that you have ignored my post more or less completely. You have responded with a false binary and a straw man.

  27. Andrew Constance will have an uphill battle in Gilmore where people who have been burnt out in Jan 2020 are still trying to rebuild.

    I wondered about this too and vaguely recall some commentary to this effect during last night’s coverage from Speers I think it was.

  28. If Russia invades Ukraine (and I doubt that) I think it will be relatively short lived, except for the Donbass region.
    It would probably be orchestrated to follow a show of support for Russia from within Ukraine.

    I would compare it to what happened in South Ossetia in the republic of Georgia. A swift invasion that overwhelmed almost half the country (just to show they could) before withdrawing to the rebel claimed area. They are still there and very slowly extending the rebel controlled area.

    A long term occupation of area that are very anti Russian (the east and central areas) would be counterproductive.

    Having just made my prediction I am sure that Putin will prove me wrong.

  29. Agreed with Farrelly with optional preferences would act as a spoiler to the Labor vote more-so than the Liberal vote.

    But I also perceive Reid as having a changing demographic. I accept that this is in no small part in having grown up in the area. Every time I visit the parents I see yet another lifestyle related shop to help alleviate folk of their disposable income. The inner west is invading 🙂

    EDIT: removal of tautologous word

  30. ‘Rex Douglas says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:17 am

    Looking at those NSW by-election numbers I think Greens members might need to make it immediately clear that either Bandt swiftly re-calibrates the communication strategy and focuses wholly and solely on promoting their policies without the commentary on others, or Waters will be the preferred leader for the election.’
    —————————–
    I hope that the Greens double down. Assuming they are open to advice, the Greens should (hehe):

    1. Sack Bandt. He is far too radical for the bulk of the Australian electorate.
    2. Recalibrate their policies so that they are not directly and heavily destructive to so many people, towns and regions.
    3. Recalibrate their polices so that the policies reflect reality. Halving the ADF at a time when the security settings in the region are the worst since WW2 is insane, for example.
    4. Desist from giving priority to badmouting Labor tactics, strategies, people and policies.
    5. Focus on attacking Morrison, Joyce, the Nationals and the Liberals.
    6. Finally, the Greens habit of assuming that they are the fount of all ethical correctness needs to be put to bed forever. They aren’t. It alienates potential voters.
    7. Get their preferencing in order so that they stop electing Liberals.

    My guess? The Greens know that they were always right, are always right and will always be right so they will double down.

  31. PaulTu says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:27 am

    If Russia invades Ukraine (and I doubt that) I think it will be relatively short lived, except for the Donbass region.
    It would probably be orchestrated to follow a show of support for Russia from within Ukraine.

    I would compare it to what happened in South Ossetia in the republic of Georgia.
    …..’
    —————————–
    Putin loves frozen conflicts that he can unfreeze anytime he wants to amp up the negotiating frame.

  32. The exhaust rate in Strathfield under OPV was 46%

    All the non-major party candidates standing were of the progressive ilk, so it makes sense that if they were forced to number all squares, the swing against Liberal would have been higher.

    And then we get to the grubby ‘Jason Sun-yet Li is a Communist sympathiser’ that the Liberal Party Dirt Unit, NSW Chapter, was spreading around the Chinese community. He even called it out in his acceptance speech last night.

    Let’s see if we get a redux of this low as sharkshit tactic in Reid and Banks where Labor have Chinese-origin candidates in the Federal election. And what the counter measures will be, now the LPDU have shown their hand.

  33. Putin would do well to recall the Russian experience in Afghanistan, which so sapped Russian will and capacity that the USSR collapsed.

    On the other had, Putin has had some successes too…in Crimea and in Syria. So military aggression has worked for Putin. The West really turned a blind eye to the annexation of Crimea.

    He might think that Ukraine should be returned to its former status as a Russian dependency; as a border zone, sitting between Russia and the West. Doubtless he has designs on Poland and on the Baltic states too. He might be thinking the West will turn a blind eye to Russian aggression right along its western border and around the Black Sea.

    Putin is neo-tsarist in nearly every sense. The Tsars made war. Putin would like to do the same.

    The Europeans are in no fit state for war with Russia. So the integrity of their Eastern borders and the matter of peace in Europe is for the US to underwrite. This is not good for Ukraine. The US has no vital interests in Eastern Europe and nor do they have irreplaceable assets in the Black Sea.

    If I were Putin and I wanted to take Ukraine, I would prepare the ground. I would try to exploit the weaknesses in the US….hope that the Democrats lose the mid-terms, support the Republicans and then take advantage of a crippled Democratic Presidency.

    So next year. In the meantime, Putin has nothing to lose from its posturing…from its current parade. Russia is showing its strength and readying opinion for its eventual use.

  34. A disclaimer first. I live in Brisbane so my knowledge of NSW state politics is in the “ cupboard is bare “ category.

    Re Strathfield. I see very little “ bad “ news in the unfolding result for labor. Yes, the labor PV has ( on current figures) fallen. However, those votes have not gone to the liberals. The recalcitrant votes appear to have flowed to Farrelly and with OPV just under half of votes exhausted. So, given labor has a new candidate ( and the “Chinese bad “bullshit of recent days )after the retirement of a well recognised labor member the results so far do not, in my opinion, appear to be in gloom and doom territory.

    It is the three liberal/ national seats that deserve the most attention. In all three the government candidates have been wacked. Strathfield is a labor seat so no one to really wack and the liberal candidate has not exactly been “ rewarded” for being a liberal. I see no reason to assume that the current slight swing against labor is anything more than “ circumstances my dear fellow” and nothing to do with suburban voters being happy with the liberals and turning off labor.

    Anyway, just the observations of a Queenslander from afar with no idea about much at all.

  35. Strathfield

    The by-election was caused by a former Leader of the labor party leaving parliament, and the Liberal Party did not make any inroads

    Should be a concern for the liberal party and the lib/nats propaganda media units

  36. Remember that bushfire effects those who are burnt out, their families and neighbours who observe the rebuild process and note support and lack of it.

    The rebuild process is hampered by shortages of framing timber from Mallacoota to the Queensland border

    Gilmore is a popular beachside area whose population swells from Boxing Day to Easter. Many small local businesses survive on the summer trade which has been smashed by 2020 bushfires, 2021 covid and then the 2022 Omicron wave

    I just don’t think the voters of Gilmore think the LNP has their back

  37. Boerwar says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:36 am

    The Greens exist for one reason only: to occupy sinecures in the Senate. They hope to achieve this by one simple device: defiling Labor at all times and in all places.

    Nothing else matters to them. Life is brilliantly clear for the Greens.

  38. TPOF, it is winter in the Northern Hemisphere, not an ideal time to be waging war. Might I refer to the adventures of Hitler and Napolian.

    It is very likely that the Russian military is already in eastern Ukraine and they have already annexed Crimea. NATO and the Ukranians have done nothing about it because they can’t unless they are prepared to wage a massive war. Imagine for a moment that they did react on that scale and drove the Russians out. What do they do about the civilian population, they are Russians.

    I do not like it despite what Boarwar might claim but it is the reality. Like so many conflicts its history lies in Powers drawing lines on maps without considering who lives within those lines.

    None of this alters my main point, WE are being lied to.

  39. ‘Lynchpin says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:46 am

    Could someone in the Greens party explain why they didn’t allocate preferences on their HTV cards in Willoughby yesterday?’
    ———————–
    Given the mathmatics, the only rational conclusion is that the Greens wanted to maximize the chances of the Liberal candidate getting up against the Indy.
    Apart from the statistics, there is a political problem for the Greens. The Indies are competing directly with the Greens. Why would the Greens want an Indy to get up?

  40. Lynchpin says:
    Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 10:46 am
    Could someone in the Greens party explain why they didn’t allocate preferences on their HTV cards in Willoughby yesterday?

    The Greens are directly threatened by the Lite, who will take votes away from the Greens whenever they stand. It makes no sense for the Greens to offer support to their immediate competitors. Rather, they hope these newcomers lose. Since the Greens also hope Labor lose, they will wherever possible try to make sure the Lite lose to Liberals.

    They will never say so. But this is the mathematics of electoral politics.

    In all but name, the Greens are pro-Reactionary.

Comments Page 2 of 9
1 2 3 9

Leave a Reply

Your email address will not be published. Required fields are marked *