The diversion of the South Australian election caused this site to take its eye off the ball during a highly eventful period for federal preselections, which it now endeavours to make good. We start in Victoria, where Labor’s process for the Senate is finally coming to a head. In common with the rest of Labor’s Victorian preselections, the matter has been in the hands of the party’s national executive, which asserted control in response to the branch-stacking scandal surrounding Victorian MLC Adem Somyurek. An already fraught situation was gravely complicated by the sudden death of Kimberley Kitching a fortnight ago, whose hold on the Right-mandated position at the top end of the ticket has since been a matter of fierce dispute.
• Kitching’s vacancy will be filled by Jana Stewart, a Muthi Muthi and Wamba Wamba woman and until recently the deputy secretary at the Victorian Department of Justice, who had previously been lined up to run in the safe seat of Pascoe Vale at the Victorian state election in November. Stewart will serve out the remaining months of Kitching’s term and take the one of the two seemingly unloseable positions on the Senate ticket, in an order to be determined. Tom Minear of the Herald Sun reported Stewart had backing from the Transport Workers Union and Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association, the chief Right faction parties to a pact with the Socialist Left that has frozen out the Right forces associated with Bill Shorten. The Shorten forces reportedly favoured Natalie Hutchins, the state Corrections Minister and member for Sydenham. Minear further reported that Fiona McLeod, a barrister who performed creditably as the candidate for Higgins in 2019, was “another name in the mix”.
• Following Kim Carr’s retirement announcement on Sunday, the Left-mandated position at the top of the ticket will be filled by Linda White, retired former assistant national secretary of the Australian Services Union. Carr cited health concerns in bringing down the curtain on a Senate career going back to 1993, but it was widely expected he would lose preselection in any case, most likely to White. There were widespread earlier reports that the position was also being pursued by Ryan Batchelor, executive director of the McKell Institute, but both Stewart and White have in fact emerged unopposed.
• A contest has also been avoided in the south-eastern Melbourne seat of Holt, to be vacated with the retirement of Anthony Byrne, with Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association organiser Cassandra Fernando emerging as the sole nominee. The seat will thus remain with the Right, despite what Tom Minear of the Herald Sun described as “a small push from the Left to claim the seat”. The faction’s favoured nominee appeared to be Jo Briskey, political co-ordinator of the United Workers Union.
In New South Wales, the Liberal Party’s long-delayed preselections for Warringah, Hughes, Parramatta and Eden-Monaro and Greenway are to be determined by a three-person committee consisting of Scott Morrison, Dominic Perrottet and state party president Christine McDiven, following an intervention by the party’s federal executive. Here too legal action is afoot, with earlier federal executive intervention being contested in the New South Wales Supreme Court by conservative activist Matt Camenzuli. The party’s conservative forces stand to benefit from party reforms to increase the power and the rank and file, which Scott Morrison and his centre-right factional ally Alex Hawke have been seeking to circumvent.
• The intervention entails the cancellation of a rank-and-file ballot to choose a candidate for Hughes, held by the once Liberal and now United Australia Party member Craig Kelly. Where previously it was thought an intervention would rubber-stamp the preselection of Alex Dore, a management consultant who lives in Manly, Murray Trembath of the St George & Sutherland Shire Leader reports there is “now speculation war widow Gwen Cherne, who was the inaugural Veteran Family Advocate Commissioner on the Repatriation Commission, is being considered”. The acknowledged front-runners for the now-cancelled rank-and-file ballot were state Holsworthy MP Melanie Gibbons and local lawyer Jenny Ware.
• Anne Davies of The Guardian reports that David Elliott, state Transport Minister and centre-right factional ally of Scott Morrison, is considering putting his name forward in Parramatta or Greenway. Elliott’s federal ambitions may be complicated by his recent efforts as minister, which placed him at the centre of a shutdown of Sydney’s public transport network last month.
• One rank-and-file ballot that was allowed to proceed was that to replace John Alexander in Bennelong, which was won by Simon Kennedy, a partner at consulting firm McKinsey. Anne Davies of The Guardian reports that Kennedy, a factional conservative, emerged an unexpected winner in a rank-and-file ballot over moderate-aligned Gisele Kapterian, former chief-of-staff to Michaelia Cash, by 148 votes to 95.
• A weekend meeting of the party’s state council determined that incumbents Marise Payne and Jim Molan will respectively fill the first and third positions on the Coalition Senate ticket, the second being mandated to the Nationals. This amounts to defeat for the third incumbent, Connie Fierravanti-Wells, who has compared her situation to that of Kimberley Kitching. Another unsuccessful nominee was Mary-Lou Jarvis, a lawyer and Woollahra councillor.
Elsewhere:
• Andrew Charlton, economist and former adviser to Kevin Rudd, is expected to be imposed by Labor’s national executive as its candidate for Parramatta, where the Liberals are hopeful of overhauling a 3.5% margin with the retirement of Julie Owens, the Labor member since 2004. Michael McGowan of The Guardian reports Labor “spent weeks shopping for a celebrity candidate in a bid to railroad a local rank-and-file ballot”, with targets including former state Granville MP David Borger and Sydney barrister Cameron Murphy. A rank-and-file ballot would likely have yielded Durga Owen, a former staffer to Owens, who seemingly was not favoured by Anthony Albanese. Other prospective candidates for a rank-and-file ballot were Alan Mascarenhas, a former Sydney Morning Herald journalist, and Abha Devasia, a Left-aligned lawyer. All three are of of Indian background, and thus representative of a demographic with a strong presence in the electorate. The move to install Charlton, who lives in Bellevue Hill in the eastern suburbs, has predictably “infuriated local branch members”, and drawn criticism from Owens.
• Nick Xenophon announced last week he will seek to return to his earlier vocation at the election as Senator for South Australia, a position he held from 2008 until his ill-fated bid to gatecrash the 2018 state election. He has since maintained a profile as a partner of law firm Xenophon Davis. Rex Patrick, who filled Xenophon’s Senate vacancy in 2017 and later abandoned his Centre Alliance party, appears to have recognised that Xenophon’s return has ended whatever chance he had of being re-elected to the Senate, and is reportedly contemplating a run for the lower house seat of Grey.
• Joe Spagnolo of the Sunday Times reports the Nationals will field candidates in lower house seats in Western Australia against the wishes of Mia Davies, the party’s state leader and, thanks to the extraordinary result of the March 2021 election, the state’s Opposition Leader (a nicety that eluded Scott Morrison during his trip to the state a fortnight ago). The party’s strongest seats in the state are Durack and O’Connor, respectively held for the Liberals by Melissa Price and Rick Wilson.
nath
What say you about below selections. It appear SDA captured seems to have captured 2 out of 3 available seats for themselves. How can you say their influence is waning? Or are you saying blackmailing through media worked?
”
WB:
Tom Minear of the Herald Sun reported Stewart had backing from the Transport Workers Union and Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association, the chief Right faction parties to a pact with the Socialist Left that has frozen out the Right forces associated with Bill Shorten. The Shorten forces reportedly favoured Natalie Hutchins, the state Corrections Minister and member for Sydenham.
Following Kim Carr’s retirement announcement on Sunday, the Left-mandated position at the top of the ticket will be filled by Linda White, retired former assistant national secretary of the Australian Services Union. Carr cited
A contest has also been avoided in the south-eastern Melbourne seat of Holt, to be vacated with the retirement of Anthony Byrne, with Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association organiser Cassandra Fernando emerging as the sole nominee. The seat will thus remain with the Right, despite what Tom Minear of the Herald Sun described as “a small push from the Left to claim the seat”.
“
Simon Katich
It’s bad enough that the population appears too stupid to listen or discern, it’s even worse when our supposed media representatives can’t decide between what’s critical to the education and wellbeing of the public and what’s of only daily interest to some for 24hr.
ABC RN: There was no mention of CFW until the Shane Crow interview where PK introduce the remarks with the caveat that she had an axe to grind because of senate selection. This possibility was not brought up over the last two weeks regarding KK.
jt1983 @ #41 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 8:41 am
Lose The Election Please – created during the Kevin07 campaign…
‘Voice Endeavour says:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 9:45 am
@Boerwar – that’s not how government budgets work….’
————————————————–
The Greens have a magic pudding. $400 billion means that that magic pudding is going to have to do some serious lifting. They are going to borrow the $400 billion and pay it back and maintain the housing stock with the rent? Bandt is going to out-Triguboff Triguboff?
BTW, on which 100,000 hectares? Any development anywhere is opposed by the local Greens on principle. There are always endangered species there.
Greensborough Growler says:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 9:40 am
Vic Opposition Leader Matthew Guy is isolating because one of his children has tested positive for Covid. So, that’s the Premier and the OL out of action for the next week or so.
————-
Perfect time for the Michael O’Brien comeback coup….
D&M,
The person may be using a voice activated dictation programme and may not have the capability to edit the content manually.
pattern against user @ #95 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 9:47 am
And raining. Yet again. On the Central Coast. And slated to do so till the end of the week.
Greensborough Growler @ #107 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 10:00 am
That’s something I never thought of. A person with quadriplegia, MS or Cerebral Palsy. Maybe even a stroke victim.
max @ #106 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 9:59 am
Or Tim Smith. From outside the parliament. 😆
Another fascinating aspect to the coming Election is that the Liberal Party changed the law so they now have a monopoly on the word ‘Liberal’ but none of their candidates seem to want to use it on any of their advertising media.
310mm on the Goldy (Southport seaway gauge) in the last 24hrs.
That’s a huge total. The whole Gold Coast and hinterland and NE corner of NSW has had over 100 mm since 9:00 yesterday, including over 150 mm around Lismore.
At least further North, from what I can tell, it decides it’s going to rain, it buckets down and then it clears up. It doesn’t go on day in day out like it does in Sydney.
P.S. Over 100 mm on parts of Sydney’s Northern Beaches to 9:00, over 50 mm in the City and in the outer West.
So, when it all shakes out the ALP have gotten their pre-selections done. Some unhappiness but appears to be outcomes everyone can live with and no branches in outright rebellion.
Libs still aren’t sorted and have sufficient dissatisfaction in the ranks that their own people have been off to court on this.
Wonder if this has influenced Teal support from inside otherwise loyal Liberal branches??
My thought is that in the ALP the erghhhhhh over pre-selections will blow over as soon as the date is called and its on for real. In the Libs……..not so sure. They have a different enemy this time around as well that will make them more vulnerable to splits and giggles in seats the Teals are targeting.
Interesting. 🙂
”
ltepsays:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 8:32 am
You could also point out that Labor must not feel confident if they feel they need a star candidate to hold Paramatta.
”
Another point is how does Parramatta electorate know Charlton is a Star candidate unless you are a political junkee?
I did not know that he was ‘star candidate ‘ until PB bloggers ‘explained’ his credentials.
To paraphrase my earlier comments on this subject, a MP who can hold a marginal and diverse seat like Parramatta is a ‘Star candidate’ for me. So Julie Owens was a Star candidate for me and I want a candidate who has credentials like that who can hold their own irrespective of political circumstances and ethnicity and not a policy wonk who will not have time for the electorate.
“in my lived experience in the labour market, Phil Coorey’s phrase “A fall in unemployment to the lowest rate since 1974” is codswallop
And when are people going to talk about the quality of the job rather than just silly raw numbers?”
In 1974 employment meant full or near full-time employment. Fraser and Howard changed it to the barest hours in the early 80s – couple of hours a fortnight.
Greensborough Growler says:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 10:00 am
D&M,
The person may be using a voice activated dictation programme and may not have the capability to edit the content manually.
_____________________________________
Every voice activated dictation program has a dictionary.
Socrates @ #98 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 9:53 am
It makes me think we are heading for this:
Stagflation is a period when economic growth slows and joblessness coincides with rising inflation. As oil and gas hit record prices
That’s Josh’s Coalition policy-induced stagflation and a supine ABC rolling over as he brays about the government’s ‘economic success’.
GG
I did consider that possibility, but that would most likely result in phonetic spellings we often see on the bloopers on the captions for the TV news.
If something else is going on, and Aaron Newton has genuine communication difficulties, it would be helpful if they let us know. We are very friendly and welcoming bunch here, but we do like to know we are dealing with genuine people.
Ven @ #114 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 10:10 am
Well then, Ven, give him a chance to show you how good he could be. Don’t jump to conclusions.
pukka at 9.57am (and others) re ABC RN’s anti-Labor bias today (minimising CFW, maximising KK)…
Does anyone have a link to the interview (consider me digitally neolithic)?
Also, if you listened to it live and are as angry as I am from the descriptions here, please make an online complaint to the ABC.
It may now be THEIR ABC, but they must know WE are not happy with their bias!
D&M,
When are you back in Oz?
Steve777
Meanwhile here in Melbourne, still very dry.
Its either too much or too little.
Boerwar
You might be interested in this chaps view. Not so much of the rah rah rah. He gives a background and current assessment. He seems to have pretty good credentials. From a French Think Tank so unless your French is OK use Google translate. .
https://cf2r.org/documentation/la-situation-militaire-en-ukraine/
I like this reader comment from the Grauniad blog (its readers are more informative than the actual blog):
“I find it rather amusing that the Liberal party went to great lengths through the courts to stop other parties using the word “Liberal” when none of their own candidates want to use Liberal identification on their campaign materials……so toxic is the brand
Well done Scott….lol”
It seems to me that Kim K was very good at feeding information and insight to a whole lot of people, especially journalists. I’ve been surprised how many unlikely suspects have taken up the cause for her – Samantha Maiden and PK for example. I wonder if they are also feeling a personal, as well as professional, loss. Perhaps KK unburdened a lot of her angst about the preselection and other stuff to these journos and they are on a joint and several crusade because they feel the pressures did them in.
Or, more cynically, maybe they are unhappy about losing their ‘senior Labor source’ for so many of their stories and having a last push back.
”
Cronussays:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 8:48 am
Mean girls still leading with multiple articles in the Oz.
”
It appears either KKitching or her faction provided a lot of gossip material to Murdoch hacks on so called meangirls.
Now they will not stop printing them after ABC’s ‘Media Watch’ cast aspersions on their motives to write a few positive articles on Albanese.
It’s easier to ignore Aaron Newton that to try and decipher them.
Presumably someone will render any nuggets into English for consideration
Dictation software has been around for 40 years, it makes fewer spelling errors
The West Australian today devotes several pages to painting Frydenberg as gods gift to financial management.
Quickly turn the page.
Also of interest is the prediction of a “fiery” farewell speech from Christian Porter.
Some liberals are said to believe the speech will be a “distraction from the budget and the governments ability to successfully sell itself to voters ahead of the May election”
That’s a big prediction.
FUCK VLADIMIR PUTIN AND THE TANK HE ROLLED INTO UKRAINE ON!
Albo was great on RN this morning. Got all the talking points across, sharpened the narrative and got his licks in preemptively. He’s looking and sounding sharp ahead of the campaign.
Shame he can’t come to Mrs Burgey’s surprise birthday bash on Thursday night, but I suppose the will be a bit busy.
Boerwar @ #105 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 8:58 am
Every nation that uses fiat currency has a magic pudding. That’s what fiat currency is. Mostly worthless bits of paper, plastic, and metal (and bits in a computer somewhere) that only work because we (mostly) all agree that they should. Magic pudding.
“Dry” is a totally alien concept. Even when it isn’t raining it’s humid as all getout.
Got to admit I dropped a clanger regarding Albo when this term of parliament started.
Thought he should of shown a bit of mongrel but he and the party have so far played things quite nicely.
Was it Napoleon who said “never interfere with an enemy while they are making mistakes”? or wte.
Latest friendlyjordies.
https://youtu.be/O8ZhbsYnswM
“In a tweet, Ukrainian Foreign Minister Dmytro Kuleba said he spoke with Marise Payne, and he expressed his thanks for Australia imposing sanctions on Russia.”
Jolly good, perhaps nowMarise could get back to slightly more pressing concerns to Australians in The Solomons. Any chance a few billion in genuine aid and infrastructure (and genuine action on climate change) might forestall any need for tens of billions of dollars in military materiel?
Vic,
It’s hard to understand why people in Queensland and NSW put up with all that bad weather. I’d never live in a place that is so wet and dreary.
I predict Porter’s valedictory, like the rest of his political career, will be a fizzer.
Paul Murray on Skye after dark was last night angrily arguing that with our economy performing so well (the best in the world according to him), with the unemployment rate so low and soon to have a 3 in front of it, how dare Australian workers be demanding a pay rise. They should just shut up and be grateful. All I can say is good luck with that argument.
Murray has been coming across as a very angry man lately. He was particularly angry with the regular Labor identity on his commentary team last night (can’t think of his name at present) and ended up shouting at him to try and silence him because the Labor man wanted to offer an alternative view. Normally there is very good humour between them but not this time.
I think Murray can see the writing on the wall and he is not handling it very well. None of the Skye mob are. They’re a very unhappy bunch right now.
Yes porters speech may be a distraction butthe West Australian did not convince the publicto back the liberals when it comes to the state election where they were critical of mcgowan surprised nsw libs didn’t go with Ride mayor jordin lane in Benilong as he could be a future minister and conectid with moderits
Greensborough Growler
Re Liberal branding, quite pithy.
Are you a resident of Greensborough in the northern Melbourne suburbs?
I reckon the cadence and content (to the extent that I bother, which isn’t that much) suggests ‘nath’. I agree with D&M (bonjours!) it’s not automated text generation.
Stevie Wonder was early onto it, and was trying to get a brail reading machine to generate voice. It came out as “bip zoop ah uh cat urg luorp”. That was some time ago. Remember when automated speech recognition (telephone answering) first came on? It was a bit of a giggle. We’ve come a long way, and way past that stuff now the subject of more generosity than is its due, imo. As D&M said, the absence of an explanation is telling.
Anyway, apropos nothing to do with text, and everything to do with clever:
https://youtu.be/IvUU8joBb1Q
D & M,
Aaron is under no obligation to seek our approval or understanding.
He’s here posting on merit and that is fine by me.
His posts are a bit of a challenge. But, they are not that hard to follow, really. All it takes is a bit of effort and parking your ablest prejudices at the door.
ItzaDream says:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 10:33 am
I reckon the cadence and content (to the extent that I bother, which isn’t that much) suggests ‘nath’.
___________________
You are wrong.
Cronus,
Yeah. I have been hiding my location in plain sight.
max : “Perfect time for the Michael O’Brien comeback coup….”
Who?
@boerwar – honestly, I’m unsure how I can help you. What I’m explaining to you isn’t Greens party economics. It’s, what every government and every treasury does.
You have bought into some Joe Hockey and Tony Abbott bullshit.
nath @ #143 Tuesday, March 29th, 2022 – 10:39 am
No worries; good to hear.
ltepsays:
Tuesday, March 29, 2022 at 8:32 am
You could also point out that Labor must not feel confident if they feel they need a star candidate to hold Paramatta.
”
Bollocks. Just bollocks. Trying to get talented people into Parliament is important. Government is hard. Consider the shambles we see that currently passes for government. We have to do better than this. Politics is a rough-and-tumble business and it takes all kinds to put an effective college together.
We have not had a good, effective, purposeful, well-organised and intelligent government in this country since Hawke’s ministries. Consider what they accomplished. So much of what they did still stands. If Labor win, they will at least try to run a good government. They will need talented personnel for that at all levels, including in the NSW delegation, including from Parramatta.
I agree with GG. What has aaron done that has upset so many?
GG
Should I park my prejudice against arrogant smart arses taking the piss at the door as well?
My issue is not that AAron is hard to read. There are a few genuine posters like that here already. My issue is that AAron is a fake. I’m happy to be corrected by someone who understands dyslexia and, perhaps, illiteracy and can affirm that these posts are genuinely reflective of someone who suffers from one of these difficulties in communication. But I’m not interested in playing games, which is what I think is going on here.
If you like playing these games – fine. But there is no moral superiority in doing so.