Newspoll has not reported on its more-or-less usual three-weekly schedule, but the usual weekly Roy Morgan should be along later today, followed by the usual fortnightly Essential Research poll tomorrow. In other developments:
• Simon Birmingham, Shadow Foreign Minister and Senate Opposition Leader, announced last week he will retire from parliament by the end of the year. As well as creating a vacancy for his South Australian Senate seat, his departure has resulted in the Senate leadership going from a leading moderate to a factional conservative in Western Australian Senator Michaelia Cash.
• Labor in Tasmania has confirmed its Senate ticket will be headed by Left faction incumbent Carol Brown followed by Right-aligned newcomer Richard Dowling, adviser to state Labor leader Dean Winter and former director of public policy with Meta. Matthew Denholm of The Australian reports Jessica Munday, Left-aligned secretary of Unions Tasmania, withdrew after recognising she lacked support, but now hopes to fill the casual Senate vacancy created by Anne Urquhart’s looming bid for the lower house seat of Braddon. Munday was subject to a party disciplinary process earlier this year after featuring a poster for Labor-turned-independent member David O’Byrne in her yard during the March state election campaign.
• Lachlan Leeming of the Daily Telegraph reports three candidates have nominated for preselection to succeed retiring Nationals member David Gillespie in Lyne: former Berejiklian-Perrottet government minister Melinda Pavey; Alison Penfold, senior adviser to Gillespie; and Forster-based accountant Terry Murphy.
• Hawkesbury councillor Mike Creed has been preselected as Liberal candidate for the Sydney fringe seat of Macquarie, held for Labor by Susan Templeman on a post-redistribution margin of 6.3%.
• The flurry of legislation the government was able to pass through the Senate last week did not include its campaign finance reform bill, which was pulled from the notice paper after a failure to land an agreement with the Coalition. Michelle Grattan at The Conversation reports the Liberals sought to “insert a potential legal time bomb” in the form of a provision that would likely mean the entire bill would be invalidated if the High Court found against any of it in the seemingly likely event of a High Court challenge. The Liberals also pushed for higher donation caps and disclosure thresholds and less generous caps for peak bodies, being specifically concerned about the ACTU. The responsible minister, Don Farrell, says consultations will continue over summer, seemingly with both the Coalition and the cross-bench.
Apropos this:
• The flurry of legislation the government was able to pass through the Senate last week did not include its campaign finance reform bill, which was pulled from the notice paper after a failure to land an agreement with the Coalition. Michelle Grattan at The Conversation reports the Liberals sought to “insert a potential legal time bomb” in the form of a provision that would likely mean the entire bill would be invalidated if the High Court found against any of it in the seemingly likely event of a High Court challenge. The Liberals also pushed for higher donation caps and disclosure thresholds and less generous caps for peak bodies, being specifically concerned about the ACTU. The responsible minister, Don Farrell, says consultations will continue over summer, seemingly with both the Coalition and the cross-bench.
I would hope that The Greens, David Pocock and Jacqui Lambie come to the table with the government over summer and that cool heads prevail in order to get this very important piece of legislation done and dusted and passed in February. Without Coalition ‘inserts’ into it.
The Greens talk a lot about Campaign Finance, so they really should be pro active and put their commitment and their votes where their mouths are.
Still no Newspoll, opinion polling hasn’t moved , the federal lib/nats combined primary vote still struggling to get to 40%, and Labor primary vote around 33/34%
WB: “Labor in Tasmania has confirmed its Senate ticket will be headed by Left faction incumbent Carol Brown followed by Right-aligned newcomer Richard Dowling, adviser to state Labor leader Dean Winter and former director of public policy with Meta.”
—————————————————————-
Well, at least we’ll get a relatively new face Labor at some level of government. Bec White isn’t new. Anne Urquhart (whom some serious people down here believe can win, although I think she’s got Buckley’s) isn’t new. In the last state election, the only new Labor face to get elected was Meg Brown, who I believe is Carol Brown’s niece (ah, Tasmania…six degrees of Jim Bacon).
—————————————————————
“Munday was subject to a party disciplinary process earlier this year after featuring a poster for Labor-turned-independent member David O’Byrne in her yard during the March state election campaign.”
—————————————————————
Campaigning against the party, like voting against it in the parliament is normally a career-ending act for a Labor person. (Fatima says hi!) But the David O’Byrne issue continues to be a highly fraught one in the Labor branches in Franklin (where I reside) and Munday might be cut some slack. And I understand that, when she isn’t campaigning against the ALP, she is a nice person who is well liked within the party, so she might soon become a senator.
Taylormade says:
Sunday, December 1, 2024 at 10:26 pm
pied pipersays:
Sunday, December 1, 2024 at 9:57 pm
Pocock will reveal any day now what Albo promised him two “significant”concessions.
_____________________
Keep an eye on it Pied, and let us all know when you hear something.
————————-
Lol Taylormade ,
Would had thought the lib/nats voters would be more interested in when the significant announcement of Dutton’s Nuclear thought bubble will be made , which he promised to release before this year May budget, but didn’t
#weatheronPB
Washed clean and naked,
the dogged clouds have dissolved,
and the earth is still.
BW at8.50pm last night on the previous thread:
——————————————————————————
“harrowing stuff: homelessness, mental ill health and drugs.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/nov/30/evan-b-harris-portland-addiction-homelessness-america
——————————————————————————
It was a very interesting article, which raised a lot of questions. Here’s my take, which is unlikely to be popular with too many on here. Sorry it’s long, but you are free to click past it.
Mr (or sometimes Ms) Harris appears to be someone with a large number of unresolved childhood problems and perhaps also a genetic disposition towards psychotic illness. They turned to drugs – in this case pot – and that’s what seems to have triggered an ongoing propensity to experience psychotic episodes. Although, in my experience, one always has to be careful in assuming that someone’s psychiatric problems are as recent as they say they are: it might be the case that they’ve also experienced them in the past, but that they went unrecognised at the time.
Like a lot of people who endure bouts of psychosis, Mr/Ms Harris turned to stronger and stronger recreational or unprescribed medicinal drugs that they purchased on the streets . It seems they also had some interactions with the medical system and was perhaps at times on prescribed medicine: it seems that they are on this sort of medicine now, but it’s not entirely clear from the article how much this had happened in the past.
Unfortunately, many people who suffer from psychotic episodes prefer to deal with them with alcohol, dope, opiates or a combination of all three. Many people find that the conventional anti-psychotic medicines have unpleasant side-effects: they make them feel stupider and generally a bit weird. And, of course, they don’t give those that take them any sort of high or sense of well-being.
And the big camps of street sleepers (or, if you prefer a good euphemism, “homeless people”) in the US “blue”cities, particularly along the west coast, and also in Vancouver, are the ideal place in which to do this. The weather is good for sleeping outdoors for most of the year. The drug dealers are right there: in some cases (including Portland) under little threat from law enforcement agencies because the government has decriminalised a lot of drug use. Various social workers and do-gooders come along regularly to these camps with food and other support. And the residents can obtain money by begging, prostitution, theft or simply by menacing tourists and other passing strangers.
The Democrats who govern these cities (or, in the case of Vancouver, the New Democrats) have allowed these camps to flourish seemingly because of a belief that the people who sleep there have “nowhere else to go.” However, the question has to be asked as to whether allowing these places to exist actually provides the severely mentally ill with too easy an option to refuse proper treatment and self-medicate with dangerous and addictive substances. I suspect what we have here is an instance of killing people with kindness.
And then, of course, there’s all the squalor and unpleasantness about having these camps in the downtown areas of otherwise beautiful cities like Vancouver, Portland, Seattle and San Francisco. This doesn’t seem to me to be a sustainable approach. Proponents of the supposedly “humane” approach say that the answer is to provide all of these people with free housing, which I suspect is an unaffordable solution for even the wealthiest cities of the world, and which won’t appeal to those people who want to be right where the drug dealers are. Proponents of the lots of free housing approach often point to Helsinki as an exemplar of how this can work, without mentioning that the weather of that city makes street-sleeping far less viable for most of the year than on the Pacific Coast.
Sooner or later these camps will need to be broken up. Trump is proposing to do so, and I think that’s a policy that even a lot of Democrat voters would quietly support. Unfortunately, Trump doesn’t deliver on most of what he promises, so I suspect that the problem won’t be addressed until there is a shift in the thinking of the Dems.
The other question that comes to my mind is whether or not the medical and pharmaceutical experts have come up with the ideal combination of chemicals required to help these people. There clearly seems to be a significant proportion of people who are prescribed anti-psychotics whom they don’t make feel better. Would there be some way of adding a “feel good” sort of chemical into the mix. Why not a mixture of anti-psychotics and opiates, administered under close medical supervision? Has this ever been tried? I’m not a medical or pharmaceutical expert, but I’d be interested in the views of the PB posters who are.
Good morning Dawn Patrollers
A senior Coalition MP has attacked the teal independents as a “giant green con job” who managed to dupe traditional Liberal voters as Anthony Albanese signalled next year’s poll would be later rather than sooner. Shane Wright tells us that opposition communications spokesman Paul Fletcher, who suffered a major scare at the last election from an independent, will use a speech today to argue it was a “deliberate plan” by the teals to put up the daughter and niece of long-term Liberal MPs as part of their effort to win.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/coalition-frontbencher-says-voters-conned-into-backing-independents-20241201-p5kuw4.html
Demonising Dutton will backfire for Labor, just as it did for Harris with Trump, declares George Brandis.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/demonising-dutton-will-backfire-for-labor-just-as-it-did-for-harris-with-trump-20241201-p5kuuo.html
Mark Kenny says that in 2025, Labor remains the narrow favourite. But its hardheads recognise that no opposition leader is unelectable, no historical precedent immutable, and no seat lead impregnable.
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8834199/mark-kenny-labors-uncertain-path-to-2025-election-triumph/?cs=14258
Nick Toscano explains how Victoria and NSW risk sporadic gas shortages as soon as 2026 unless they turn to imports.
https://www.smh.com.au/business/the-economy/victoria-nsw-risk-gas-shortages-unless-they-turn-to-imports-20241129-p5kumk.html
Amgela Macdonald-Smith reports that the South Australian government is urgently seeking to have two mothballed diesel-powered electricity plants restarted amid escalating concerns that a new heavy-duty power cable will be finished even later than NSW’s Transgrid has admitted.
https://www.afr.com/companies/energy/south-australia-wants-to-restart-diesel-plants-as-cable-dream-frays-20241129-p5kun1
More than two years have passed since the NSW Crime Commission found that criminals are funnelling billions of dollars of “dirty” cash through poker machines every year in NSW and said mandatory cashless gaming cards would be the most effective way to fix the problem. The editorial is very annoyed that the report has not been released, let alone actioned. It says Chris Minns has shown admirable leadership of late on a range of issues. He could do the same on this one by releasing the report today.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/a-critical-nsw-government-report-is-being-kept-from-you-why-20241201-p5kuwo.html
The federal government will boot predatory rent-to-buy operators off its Centrepay debit system as part of sweeping reforms designed to stop the financial abuse of vulnerable Australians. The reforms, set to be announced today, follow a Guardian Australian investigation that revealed shocking failures in the Centrepay system and helped trigger an urgent government review.
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/dec/01/rent-to-buy-operators-barred-from-centrepay-debt-system-in-sweeping-reforms-from-albanese-government-ntwnfb
While lifting the rate of productivity growth is the obvious solution to the cost of living crisis, judging by the experience of most developed economies, it is not obvious how to restore productivity growth, writes Michael Keating.
https://johnmenadue.com/are-you-better-off-if-not-why-not/
Thousands of Australian students have been told their qualifications will be cancelled in an unprecedented government crackdown following the closure of three colleges accused of issuing fake diplomas, reports Daniella White. Experts say legitimate students in areas such as childcare and disability services have been caught up in the saga and are probably unaware their qualifications have been cancelled. Yet another example of spivs moving in where federal money is available.
https://www.smh.com.au/national/nsw/colleges-shut-thousands-of-students-lose-qualifications-in-fake-diploma-crackdown-20241127-p5ktx4.html
Meanwhile, dodgy NDIS providers and charlatans have been put on notice as the government pushes through $110 million in fraud detection enhancements. The Crack Down on Fraud program will receive a $110.4 million funding boost and follows an initial $83.9 million investment made earlier this year to help officials better detect and prevent the exploitation of the National Disability Insurance Scheme.
https://www.canberratimes.com.au/story/8834191/ndis-fraud-crackdown-gets-110m-boost/?cs=27845
After 15 years of policies encouraging people to go to university, Australia’s skills tsar says it is now time for a reset if we are to address chronic skill shortages, writes Julie Hare.
https://www.afr.com/policy/health-and-education/why-we-got-it-wrong-on-education-and-skill-shortages-20241128-p5kudr
The head of Australia’s financial crime watchdog says key overseas allies are welcoming moves to close gaps in anti-money laundering and terror financing rules, conceding criminals have been able to exploit ineffective laws for too long. Tom McIlroy tells us that just days after parliament passed new laws to add real estate agents, lawyers and accountants to the dirty money protection regime, AUSTRAC chief executive Brendan Thomas said he was determined to crack down on more than $60 billion in harm caused by drug trafficking, scams, child exploitation and human trafficking.
https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/tough-new-dirty-money-rules-to-disrupt-60b-in-criminal-activity-20241201-p5kuv2
With ex-partners suing them, the parliament grilling them, the government firing them, AFP investigating them, and media lambasting them, the scandal-ridden PwC has their lawyers pick on an academic, writes Marcus Reubenstein.
https://michaelwest.com.au/resting-bulldog-face-pwc-boss-has-feelings-hurt-in-the-midst-of-lawyer-fest/
Calling the most popular podcast host in the world repulsive and predatory isn’t just lazy. It shows how deep the ABC’s reluctance to evolve really is, writes David Swan who says that what Joe Rogan has achieved with his podcast is precisely what the ABC has largely failed at for years – to meaningfully engage with young audiences.
https://www.smh.com.au/technology/by-dismissing-joe-rogan-kim-williams-has-missed-a-golden-opportunity-20241129-p5kuj2.html
Tech giants including OpenAI, Meta and Google are being urged to tackle AI’s dirty secret – its massive power problem. David Swan explains how generative AI already uses as much energy as a small country and is predicted to rival that of Japan within a year. Such searches use 10 times the energy of a normal web search, and the technology has tripled the energy requirements of the entire tech sector in just two years.
https://www.theage.com.au/technology/every-time-you-use-chatgpt-half-a-cup-of-water-goes-to-waste-20241128-p5kubq.html
Fears of a global trade war have risen after Donald Trump threatened to impose 100% tariffs on countries in the BRICS group if they create a new currency to rival the US dollar. Writing on his social media platform, Truth Social, on Saturday, Trump declared that he would also act if they supported another currency to replace the dollar.
https://www.theguardian.com/business/2024/dec/01/trump-threat-100-per-cent-tariffs-brics-nations-dollar
Donald Trump’s plan to nominate as FBI director the “deep state” conspiracy theorist Kash Patel, a virulent critic of the bureau who has threatened to fire its top echelons and shut down the agency’s headquarters, is facing blowback in Congress as US senators begin to flex their muscles ahead of a contentious confirmation process. What could possibly go wrong?
https://www.theguardian.com/us-news/2024/dec/01/kash-patel-trump-fbi-pick
Cartoon Corner
David Rowe
Matt Golding
Glen Le Lievre
Peter Broelman
Badiucao
Geoff Pryor.
Leak
From the US
Yeah, no shit? Say it isn’t so!
meher babasays:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 7:12 am
BW at8.50pm last night on the previous……
–harrowing stuff: homelessness, mental ill health and drugs.
https://www.theguardian.com/society/2024/nov/30/evan-b-harris-portland-addiction-homelessness-america
————
The greatest number of young people and adults suffering mental health issues, maybe homelessness, violent behaviour, drug taking to dull the pain will be from children who have experienced traumatic childhoods, drug or alcoholic parents, domestic violence physical or sexual abuse at home.
Not from social media.
Helping young families and their children who are suffering is not what the Albanese government wants to do. Spend our taxes on helping the State and Territory governments put many more programs in.
A saving in the long run against the cost of dealing with these problems down the track.
I write on this often.
Albanese is a fraud.
The South Australian government is urgently seeking to have two mothballed diesel-powered electricity plants restarted amid escalating concerns that a new heavy-duty power cable will be finished even later than NSW’s Transgrid has admitted.
SA minister for Energy and Mining Tom Koutsantonis believes the outlook for the reliability of power supply in the state is “materially worse” than has been identified by the Australian Energy Market Operator because it has not taken into account further delays to the $2.3 billion Project EnergyConnect.
https://reneweconomy.com.au/south-australia-wants-to-bring-back-mothballed-diesel-plants-due-to-lack-of-demand-side-options/
meher baba,
Re Portland, etcetera:
Having recently been to Portland I have first hand experience of the situation there and I have to say that one of the greatest irritants to the citizens of that fair city is seeing the homeless encampments on the side of the freeway which they see every day as they go to and from their jobs. Of course they are elsewhere too but not as many as I expected to see and I went all over the place when I was there. One thing I did see when I went to check out that bookshop you recommended was that the local council was in the process of clearing a vacant lot near there in order to provide a clean and safe place for the homeless to put their tents and their belongings. It had been fenced and there were regular patrols, not heavy-handed, in order to keep the peace among the people who were there. It seemed to me, from looking at some of the ‘residents’, that it was intended as a safe space for middle aged homeless women first and foremost. Similar projects have been successfully instituted in other cities where Tiny Houses have been placed in a group setting together, services are wrapped around the vetted residents and they have to follow the rules and regulations-infringement means your place is turned over to someone else. So it’s not as if elected officials are just throwing their hands up in the air and thinking it’s all too hard. I don’t think the residents want them to do that anyway.
As far as your suggestion wrt drug regimes to treat the mentally ill which may make them feel better about taking the more onerous treatments, I would suggest that there’s research which has found MDMA is a relatively harmless mood elevator and so it may be included to get the desired effect. Though Griff is probably more knowledgeable about potential interactions and side effects with the necessary medications prescribed to treat serious mental illnesses.
I write on this often.
Albanese is a fraud.
Yes you do.
No he isn’t.
You on the other hand, Irene…
Get in the bin Shane Wright.
Handing a megaphone to a desperate and self-interested mp just to get an exclusive is very hack-ish.
Morning all. Thanks for the roundup BK. Like Confessions I found this story about Paul Fletcher laughable:
“Paul Fletcher, who suffered a major scare at the last election from an independent, will use a speech today to argue it was a “deliberate plan” by the teals to put up the daughter and niece of long-term Liberal MPs as part of their effort to win.”
So an old, male Liberal candidate representing a party that has problems with women, is complaining about the women standing against him, when they are exactly the sort of women the Liberal party fails to preselect? ROTFL 🙂
c@t at 7.49am: thanks, interesting.
The worst of these encampments that I have seen was in downtown San Francisco a few years back: and I believe it got even worse during COVID, when new ones also sprang up in other spots.
And then, I believe, all of the camps were cleared out late last year so that the city was at its sparkling best for the attendees at APEC: wasn’t that sweet? I’m not aware of what the situation is 12 months on, but I would assume they are back to a certain extent. I wonder if Trump will end up putting all the street sleepers into nissen huts behind barbed wire fences in the desert, or whatever it was he proposed to do. He hasn’t said much about it lately, and so far he’s been all bark and no bite on just about every issue.
When I was still working, I had to engage with Paul Fletcher on a number of occasions (quiet Mavis, I don’t really think this counts as serious name dropping). I found him less interesting than a five hour arthouse flick from Eastern Europe.
The only extraordinary thing about Fletcher is that there was a time when his name was being bandied about as a possible future Federal leader.
In some happy news: Liverpool 2 Man City 0
https://www.theguardian.com/football/2024/dec/01/liverpool-manchester-city-premier-league-match-report
Meher Baba
I have had the misfortune of hearing Fletcher speak when he was Infrastructure Minister. He achieved nothing. His time saw the funding approval of two major projects that did not meet IA performance criteria (Barnaby Rail and Westconnex) and zero policy reforms. Wasted years.
Socrates: “In some happy news: Liverpool 2 Man City 0”
Sorry, but I’m a lifelong Palace supporter and therefore don’t have a dog in a fight between the bride of Frankenstein and the son of Dracula. 🙂
But I’m glad for you.
I think it’s plausible that Alabanese shelved the EPA for base political motives. It would be a rational thing to do if it meant losing a lot of votes in WA.
The ABC is running with another story: That he simply didn’t have the votes in the Senate because nobody had bothered to check how Fatima Payman would vote. She was taken for granted. WA mining interests had already put the hard yards in to get her vote.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-11-29/fatima-payman-helped-sink-key-environmental-laws/104664940
My Occam’s Razor doesn’t know which way to cut on this one.
On the other hand, Trump is attempting to put in place people that will be bite more than bark:
https://www.washingtonpost.com/opinions/2024/12/01/kash-patel-fbi-nomination-trump-unqualified/
Re Rex @8:07. ”A senior Coalition MP has attacked the teal independents as a “giant green con job” who managed to dupe traditional Liberal voters…”
No con job about it. Erstwhile Liberal voters are looking for an alternative to an increasingly Trumpified “Liberal” party that no longer represents their views and values. Meanwhile, Labor voters like myself aim to assist them by tactically voting Teal to help eject the sitting Liberal from the House.
An interesting story by Patricia Karvelas on Australian political sentiment, compared with other countries.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-12-02/new-survey-australians-dissatisfied/104666872
And then there’s this guy:
https://www.nytimes.com/2024/11/30/world/africa/rfk-jr-kennedy-international-work-public-health-policies.html
”I think it’s plausible that
shelved the EPA for base political motives.”
A politician deciding something for “base political motives”? Entirely plausible.
Luigi Smith @ #23 Monday, December 2nd, 2024 – 8:57 am
Thanks for this, LS. I found this statistic telling:
More than three in 10 respondents reported they are finding it difficult to get by on their current income, with younger and middle-aged groups particularly affected. Financial stress correlates with lower satisfaction with democracy and reduced political trust.
Peter Dutton cynically plays on this. He doesn’t offer any solutions though, just amplifies their grievance.
“ I think it’s plausible that
shelved the EPA for base political motives.”
_____
I sincerely hope so. Ruthless focus on the main game is what is required in the championship rounds. Shelving the EPA legislation (and how many of you suckers even had this on your radar before last week?) shows exactly that sort of focus.
Problem identified and successfully dealt with by the Albanese government:
https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2024/dec/01/rent-to-buy-operators-barred-from-centrepay-debt-system-in-sweeping-reforms-from-albanese-government-ntwnfb
Former federal MP turned anti-vaccine campaigner Craig Kelly has announced his plans for a political comeback. Kelly on Monday revealed he had joined the Libertarian Party and planned to run for the Senate in next year’s election. “We need better government in this country, and I’m determined to try and get back into that federal parliament,” Kelly told 2GB Radio.
The 61-year-old was elected as a Liberal MP to the House of Representatives in 2010, before defecting in 2021 to sit on the crossbench, and eventually joining Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party. In February, he left the UAP to join Pauline Hanson’s One Nation as federal campaign director but left in September.
This is a link to a video from the Sub Brief youtube channel about progress on the USN Columbia Class SSBN. These are the #1 priority for the USN, being their nu lear deterrent, and take precedence over the Virginia class. They are already a year late and going up in price.
https://youtu.be/wiZBdOu2zzc?list=UU9bMgCQyFNaMPsK9GtzM5dQ&si=zqegu1nmlVpZTjyu via @YouTube
This adds to the risks on AUKUS delivery.
Luigi Smith @ #20 Monday, December 2nd, 2024 – 8:52 am
Indeed. It hinges on whether Albo is untrustworthy, or just stupid.
You’re right – this is a tough one to call.
*sigh*
https://www.washingtonpost.com/technology/2024/12/01/trump-social-media-influencer-cabinet/
To what extent is this a factor in the current ALP primary?
It’s all well and good saying Labor’s vote is lower at the 2022 election, but if it’s because (in part) of this, I’m not sure HQ’s going to mind too much.
Re the EPA legislation, it’s been stuck in the Senate since mid-year, with negotiations with the Coalition and the Greens having been unsuccessful.
Albo has probably calculated that:
– anything that the Coalition would agree to would be so weak as to be useless. The Coalition would be unlikely to pass watered-down EPA legislation in any case, even if they agreed with it. “Base political motives” and all that.
– anything that the Greens would agree to would bring on a massive scare and disinformation campaign from the Liberal-Newscorp-Mining coalition in the lead-up to the election.
In short, there are no votes to gain and plenty to lose. Best leave it for now and try again with a new Parliament.
Labor voters tactically switching to teals would only have made a difference of a few percent in a dozen or so seats. It might have contributed to the overall drop in Labor’s vote, but only by a tiny amount.
Listened to an interview with Steele-John on 4ZZZ yesterday talking about the ndis reforms.
He’s such a good speaker, and never comes from a position of party politics, but rather advocating for disabled australians.
Though he didn’t say so, the interview really illustrates how destructive the labor political party’s inability to work constructively with the greens is (beyond turfing the epa). It means that sensible amendments from Steel-John are ignored in short order – the upshot being that ndis participants can have robodebt style debt notices sent to them because of the behaviour of dodgy providers.
Thanks albo!
Ante Meridiansays:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 9:55 am
Labor voters tactically switching to teals would only have made a difference of a few percent in a dozen or so seats. It might have contributed to the overall drop in Labor’s vote, but only by a tiny amount.
______________________________
Say the teals target 15 seats, if at least 10% of ALP voters change their vote in those 15 seats “Tactically” for the teal. You are talking north of a full percent in the ALP federal primary vote. Possible more as the teals expand their target range.
“.. the upshot being that ndis participants can have robodebt style debt notices sent to them because of the behaviour of dodgy providers…”
“CAN HAVE” OK, I’ll believe that, but somehow I think that if “robodebt style debt notices” were routinely being issued, the media would be all over it.
And a little factoid from the Robodebt Royal Commission – a unilateral debt notice isn’t any such thing. This is very recent history.
Re Ante Meridian @9:55.
Labor’s vote in North Sydney declined by 3.6% in 2022, in spite of a general swing to Labor across the nation of a similar amount and in spite of Labor having a good candidate. The Green vote dropped by 5.1% in spite of a general swing of 1.9% to them.
So in North Sydney, the Labor and Green votes both reduced by about 7%.
In the case of Labor, let’s say 5% of North Sydney voters were usual Labor voters voting Teal. Let’s say that this was reflected across 12 seats in which Teal’s ran. That would have depressed the overall Labor vote by about 0.4%. The Green vote may have been depressed by a similar amount.
Luigi Smithsays:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 8:52 am
Who’d thought!
I/c ‘are you better off now than at the last election’, or ‘who is the bigger threat to your standard of living going forward’, I saw the ‘analysis’ about ‘a freight train of voter anger’ on #WhoseABC seemingly confusing longitudinal surveys with ‘national mood’ or ‘direction of country’ polling, in contrast this seems more factual
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/abc-news-misleads-on-the-economy-and-risks-pushing-more-australians-into-poverty, note the Hilda inequality data quoted covers 8 years
IMnotsoHO, governance or powershift might not set gov/ opp apart much, unlike climate, may be inequality, healthcare
And I do not doubt that gazillionaires prefer the opp, generally
Shane Wright of 9 Entertainment is a Tory hack – now giving Fletcher a headline
Last week the RBA Governor (no less) gave an address to an invited audience then took questions
Wright reported on the Governor’s appearance – totally ignoring the text of the address and the response to questions
Instead cherry picking out of context – and no doubt to advantage his Masters, the Tories
Then you get to 9 Entertainment reporting Brandis saying an attack on Dutton will backfire as the attack on Trump did
In regard 9 Entertainment there is no contra space given to Labor – so there is no regular contributor as Brandis is to this Tory broadsheet, dedicated to their masters
Then you get to Murdoch, Stokes, the USA proprietor of 10 and the cowered ABC (apart from MediaWatch)
Focus is on social media outlets, now joined by Trump and his outlet BUT attention should also be on the quoted outlets in Australia
That their readership is declining and they are under financial pressure as advertising revenue falls (apart from the likes of Harvey Norman who props them up) will be the final arbitrator – so people
Alpha Zero,
Your maths is correct, of course, but I disagree about the tactical voting amounting to ten percent.
In Kooyong, for example, the drop in Labor’s vote was a smidgen over ten percent, but there’s no way the whole lot was tactical. Then, for every, say, Goldstein (17% drop) there was a North Sydney (3.6%).
It’s impossible to know how much was truly tactical, but I would put it (wild guess) at more like five or six percent average.
Which is still significant, but I wouldn’t be using it as an excuse for complacency about an overall vote of under a third.
VCT Et3esays:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 10:20 am
I/c ‘are you better off now than at the last election’, or ‘who is the bigger threat to your standard of living going forward’, I saw the ‘analysis’ about ‘a freight train of voter anger’ on #WhoseABC seemingly confusing longitudinal surveys with ‘national mood’ or ‘direction of country’ polling, in contrast this seems more factual
https://independentaustralia.net/politics/politics-display/abc-news-misleads-on-the-economy-and-risks-pushing-more-australians-into-poverty, note the Hilda inequality data quoted covers 8 years
IMnotsoHO, governance or powershift might not set gov/ opp apart much, unlike climate, may be inequality, healthcare
And I do not doubt that gazillionaires prefer the opp, generally
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Stats showing the economy is improving, and conditions not as bad as reported by the MSM.
Those are some dangerously deviant thought you have posted there…
Now I suspect the stats would be better if migration was lower conditions would be better (especially on the housing front), but that the share of national income is rising for worker is quite an achievement.
And Dutton promotes the destruction of superannuation
So taking your accruals to cover living expenses and, no doubt, terminating contributions so you have more money in your pocket today
Short term and dangerous across society
How dare Labor take money from your pocket and put it into superannuation when you need that money now?
And work until you die – no doubt the Pension unaffordable so dismantled, again work until you die peasants
That ABC article which states, “More than three in 10 respondents reported they are finding it difficult to get by on their current income” is a huge surprise.
Normally it’s difficult to find a single person on the face of the Earth who thinks they’re not doing it tough. And those on higher incomes usually whinge the loudest.
Only three in ten is remarkably low.
Western Sydney MP and “Industry Minster Ed Husic has appealed to voters, asking them to consider the government’s progress on Palestinian sovereignty amid fears of a protest ballot over the war in
in the 2025 Australian Federal election”, in the series the gov is shit lite compared to the opp being full of shit …
Read in The Nightly: https://apple.news/AIhbOIf6iQ0icjFs8jM0I0Q
“Stats showing the economy is improving, and conditions not as bad as reported by the MSM”
The MSM have been exaggerating for a few months now. Its all about getting Dutton elected. Using same tactics that got Trump elected.
‘banquo911 says:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 9:59 am
Listened to an interview with Steele-John on 4ZZZ yesterday talking about the ndis reforms.
He’s such a good speaker, and never comes from a position of party politics, but rather advocating for disabled australians.
Though he didn’t say so, the interview really illustrates how destructive the labor political party’s inability to work constructively with the greens is (beyond turfing the epa). It means that sensible amendments from Steel-John are ignored in short order – the upshot being that ndis participants can have robodebt style debt notices sent to them because of the behaviour of dodgy providers.
Thanks albo!’
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banquo and steele-john agree with each other that it is all Labor’s fault for not buckling to the Greens’ plethora of DEMANDS!
S-J main job is to turn the ADF into a Hamas equivalent. He is a fool.
Ante Meridiansays:
Monday, December 2, 2024 at 10:48 am
That ABC article which states, “More than three in 10 respondents reported they are finding it difficult to get by on their current income” is a huge surprise.
Normally it’s difficult to find a single person on the face of the Earth who thinks they’re not doing it tough. And those on higher incomes usually whinge the loudest.
Only three in ten is remarkably low.
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So directionality matters, and even if the survey shows things “getting worse” a bit more of a comparative profile would have helped. I posted several days ago about the outrage around the cost of school uniforms, where I showed they were getting cheaper, yet the MSM posts the same rage headlines every year.
The ABC should also be linking to primary sources – as noted in the ACOSS/HILDA take, one can be exceptionally “clever” with the statistics to spin whichever story you wish. For example, the ABS posted minutes ago:
“Company gross operating profits fell 4.6%; Wages and salaries rose 1.2%”
https://www.abs.gov.au/statistics/economy/business-indicators/business-indicators-australia/sep-2024
Sounds great huh? Sure is, but in some industry profits are rising faster than wages, in others wages are rising faster than profits. And that’s only a one quarter snapshot – you could pick any arbitrary compassion point to make the opposite case