Weekend miscellany: duelling pendulums, Tasmanian seat polling and more (open thread)

Summarising federal redistributions ahead of the looming election, polling pointing to a status quo result in Tasmania’s federal seats, and various other electoral news.

Antony Green has published a pendulum display of post-redistribution seat margins for the federal election along with some explanation of what this entails. He did so exactly as I was finalising my own parallel effort, which I present here in the shape of a mock-up of the entry page for the federal election guide I’m hoping to publish around mid-January (a Western Australian election guide will precede it by a couple of weeks).

The margins shown are simply those from the 2022 election where no redistribution has been conducted, but the redistributions for New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia and the Northern Territory require a process of distributing the votes from 2022 across the redrawn electorates. The Northern Territory redistribution is still in the public consultation phase, but I have taken a punt on the proposed boundaries (in this case simply a matter of drawing the line between Solomon and Lingiari) being adopted as they seem impossible to argue with, and it appears Antony Green has reached the same conclusion.

I believe the redistribution calculation methods used by Antony and me are identical with respect to how they handle ordinary votes, (i.e. those cast on election day or at pre-poll voting centres), but we have presumably adopted different methods to deal with the difficult question of “non-static” vote types, such as postals, which are published in aggregate for the whole electorate with no indication of geographic variation. I haven’t crunched the numbers too thoroughly, but the biggest anomaly I can see is that we have landed 0.5% apart in the substantially redrawn seat of Chisholm. We are in agreement that the margin in Deakin is a tiny 0.02%, but where he has it in favour of the Liberals, I make the seat to be notionally Labor.

Where we substantially differ is in seats where an independent is part of the equation. Calculations here are necessarily speculative, as independents will not have been on the ballot paper in newly added areas (where transfers have been conducted between teal seats, this can be dealt with by treating them as a collective). Antony has a method involving comparison of House and Senate vote shares which he says is “imperfect, but so are all alternatives”. The imperfection of my method, which gives independents no primary votes from newly added areas and allocates only the preference flows they might have expected from the other candidates, is that it’s very harsh on the independents, a fact most apparent with respect to Kooyong, where my 0.1% margin for Monique Ryan compares with Antony’s 2.2%.

Complete accountings of my redistribution calculations can be observed through the following links, for New South Wales, Victoria, Western Australia and Northern Territory.

Polling and electoral developments of note:

• This week’s Roy Morgan poll had the Coalition leading 52-48, out from 51-49 a week before, from primary votes of Labor 28% (down two, their worst result of the term), Coalition 38% (down half), Greens 13% (up half) and One Nation 6.5% (steady). The previous election two-party measure was a dead heat, unchanged on last week.

The Australian reported last Saturday that a EMRS poll covering all five seats in Tasmania pointed to a status quo result of two Labor, two Liberal and one independent. In Labor’s precarious seat of Lyons, a generic party-based question has Labor on 34%, Liberal on 31%, the Greens on 11% and Jacqui Lambie Network 4%, while a separate question specifying candidates had 40% for Labor’s Rebecca White, 31% for Liberal candidate Susie Bowers and 9% for the Greens. The Liberals were well ahead in Braddon, leading 44% to 27% on the primary vote with the Greens on 9% and JLN on 7%. In Franklin the results were Labor 36%, Liberal 35% and Greens 11%, suggesting Labor would survive a substantial swing.

• Liberal MP Paul Fletcher announced this week that he will not recontest his seat of Bradfield. Fletcher retained the seat by 4.2% in 2022 in the face of a challenge from teal independent Nicolette Boele, who will run again at the coming election. His announcement comes shortly after teal independent MP Kylea Tink said she would not contest the seat following the abolition of her existing seat of North Sydney, much of whose territory will be transferred to Bradfield. The Sydney Morning Herald reports on two contenders to succeed Fletcher as Liberal candidate: Gisele Kapterian, an international trade lawyer and former staffer to Julie Bishop who shares Fletcher’s moderate factional alignment, and Penny George, director of corporate affairs at AstraZeneca and wife of state upper house member Scott Farlow. Kapterian was endorsed last year as the candidate for North Sydney, but had the rug pulled from under her with the seat’s abolition.

• Liberal MP Ian Goodenough, who lost preselection in his northern Perth suburbs seat of Moore to former Stirling MP Vince Connelly, has surprised nobody by announcing he will seek re-election as an independent. Connelly was the member for Stirling, part of which is now the southern end of Moore, from 2019 until its abolition in 2022. Goodenough claims to have been told that “opportunities might arise that would be of benefit” if he didn’t run.

The Australian’s Feeding the Chooks column reports former Senator Joanna Lindgren is “poised” to be preselected as the LNP’s candidate for the Ipswich region seat of Blair, held for Labor by Shayne Neumann on a margin of 5.2%. Lindgren served in the Senate for a year after filling a casual vacancy but failed to win re-election at the 2016 double dissolution. Trevor Evans, who lost Brisbane to the Greens in 2022, is expected to again be chosen as the party’s candidate for the seat at a preselection to be held today, though he faces an opponent in Fiona Ward, a past federal and state candidate and regular preselection aspirant. Two contenders are named for the party’s preselection for Lilley, held for Labor by Annika Wells on a 10.5% margin: Kimberley Washington, a former staffer to LNP-turned-independent Senator Gerard Rennick, and Dylan Conway, an army veteran and founder of a mental health charity.

Sarah Elks of The Australian reports Clive Palmer has launched a High Court bid to overrule a section of the Electoral Act that disallowed him from re-registering his United Australia Party for the next election after his voluntary deregistration of it in September 2022. The report quotes electoral law expert Graeme Orr saying the section exists to prevent newly deregistered parties having their names poached and did not reckon seeking to de-register and re-register, the “obvious reason” for which was to avoid having to make financial disclosures.

• The Victorian state by-election for Prahran will be held on February 8, with the ballot paper draw to be held on January 17. Tony Lupton, who held the seat for Labor from 2002 to 2010, has announced he will run as an independent, calling his former party’s decision to forfeit the contest “cowardly”. The Liberals will choose their candidate in a preselection ballot today.

• South Australia’s state redistribution has been finalised. Ben Raue at The Tally Room has taken a much closer look than I have, and concludes that the already minimal changes from the proposal have become even more conservative in the final determination. One change is that the seat of Frome will become Ngadjuri, owing to concerns raised that the seat’s namesake had been involved in a retribution attack on an Aboriginal encampment.

• Poll Bludger regular Adrian Beaumont offers an overview of results for last month’s US presidential and congressional elections with a more optimistic take for Democrats than most commentators, especially their prospects at the November 2026 midterm elections.

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.

655 comments on “Weekend miscellany: duelling pendulums, Tasmanian seat polling and more (open thread)”

Comments Page 13 of 14
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  1. Stinker,
    Do you mean, by Kevin Rudd’s ‘defeat’ and a 2nd run, when the party turned to him to save the furniture in 2013? Which he did.

  2. Howard learnt with the RC which identified “Bottom of the Harbour” tax evasion that you do not ask open ended questions

    You detail the result you seek then frame the agenda around achieving that answer leaving no wriggle room

    So the answer dictates the question

    This is the Tory approach from Howard – only coming asunder with the so called Banking Royal Commission designed to terminate Industry Funds, except it was the banks which had to exit

    There was no RC into the banking industry

    The Terms of Reference were written by the government and the banking industry (led by Maxstead then Chair of Westpac, a position Lindsay never should have been appointed to – but that is another story from his accounting days)

    That PNG enter the RL competition, joining the NZ side is an excellent move

    And if it costs $600- million so be it – it will be money well spent

    PNG is a diverse and emerging Nation, a stone throw from Australia

    Noting the damage done at Ok Tedi when the initial investor sold including to the PNG government, the financing with Pari Parsu agreements between Australian and International banks

    The days of Michael Somare, a unique character indeed

    As the relationship between PNG and Australia is unique

    Australia supports PNG accordingly including when Rabaul was obliterated and at times of other National disasters

  3. Cat

    I already posted it yesterday near the start of the thread. To summarise:

    Methodology
    For infrastructure economic assessment there is a standard process defined by IA. Frontier Economics (Front) have not said anywhere they have followed it. I can’t see that they have followed them in several respects.

    One critical requirement under IA guidelines is to assess construction cost risk. I can’t see anywhere that has been done.

    Another critical requirement is to sensitivity test the results for different depreciation rates for economic analysis and interest rates for financial analysis. I cannot see anywhere that this has been done either. Obviously with such a large capital (and borrowing?) requirement higher interest rates early could be crippling.

    CAPEX
    The most critical assumption is capital cost. Front have assumed it, based on data that is neither included nor referenced. Their assumption looks to be 1/3 to 1/2 of current Finnish, UK and US projects costs.

    Amortization
    Front have amortized (sort of averaged) the CAPEX cost over 50 years. They have then done an NPV based on the first 25 years. So half the cost would still have to be paid for.

    Decommissioning and Disposal
    Historically these have been very high for nuclear reactors, sometimes exceeding the construction cost. Front do not detail them, and lump them in with “variable” (operating?) costs. This is both wrong (decommissioning and disposal costs are incurred at the end, not during operations) and looks far too low.

    General
    Costs in the Front report are not defined in accordance with IA guidelines. This makes them hard to compare.

    The modelling has tabulated graphs and summary result tables included. However detailed tables of the input data, demand and year by year results are not included. This makes it impossible to replicate and verify Front’s results.
    https://www.frontier-economics.com.au/economic-analysis-of-including-nuclear-power-in-the-nem/

    These are separate to all the demand scenario issues that Renew Economy raise.

    It is possible Front have explanations for all these things but I couldn’t find them.

  4. Just filling in a bit of time c@t, in case we get a poll in the AFR. I think it turned up around 1am, last time, but hoping it might turn up on the AFR website in the next 30 mins or so.

  5. C@t at 8.21pm

    Do you mean, by Kevin Rudd’s ‘defeat’ and a 2nd run, when the party turned to him to save the furniture in 2013? Which he did.

    —————-

    No, I don’t. Both Rudd and Swan lost as candidates in 1996. They were subsequently elected in 1998.

    For a Labor doyen, your memory seems a little sketchy at times.

  6. It seems to make sense for the LNP to reselect Trevor Evans in Brisbane, it’s a seat they could realistically win back and he’s got a profile. There’s nothing unprecedented or controversial about it. Stephen Bates doesn’t seem to have built much of a national profile in his time in parliament, though I don’t know if that’s also the case in his electorate.

  7. C@tmomma says:
    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 7:49 pm
    nadia88 @ #585 Sunday, December 15th, 2024 – 7:38 pm

    LNP in QLD eyeing off the Division of Brisbane, by selecting their former candidate Trevor Evans.
    Madonna Jarrett (ALP) is also in the running as is the incumbent Steven Bates (Grn), who won the seat despite coming third in the primaries in 2022.

    This just proves that the LNP have no depth of talent to choose from. They are running also-rans who have already been defeated once, once again……
    ========================
    I see the ALP is giving Madonna Jarrett another shot. She had a go in 2022 and is back again?

    Anyway, going by the article, the LNP seems to thing the “momentum” in Brisbane is still there for them. I’m still thinking in QLD the existing LNP margins are more likely to increase. Perhaps they may snag Ryan. Dr.D is fairly confident that Moreton is a bridge too far. I don’t think Max will lose his seat.

  8. mj at 8.27pm

    It seems to make sense for the LNP to reselect Trevor Evans in Brisbane, it’s a seat they could realistically win back and he’s got a profile. There’s nothing unprecedented or controversial about it. Stephen Bates doesn’t seem to have built much of a national profile in his time in parliament, though I don’t know if that’s also the case in his electorate.

    —————

    I mentioned previously that I’m a constituent. From personal experience, Bates has been unobjectionable personally, but hasn’t built much of a personal profile to my knowledge (perhaps overshadowed by MCM). My gut feeling is he’ll hold on, but I wouldn’t be putting money on it. It’ll be very interesting to see a straight three-way rerun of 2022 in the seat.

  9. C@tmomma says:
    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 8:18 pm

    I thought a Muslim party had contested the last UK election and drawn a lot of support away from Labour for that reason already?

    ———

    They weren’t a party at the last election, all 5 of these possible new party members stood at the election as independents but were all basically elected on being pro-Gaza, with the exception of Corbyn who is of course pro-Gaza as well but was elected more on being a long-standing and respected local MP in Islington North.

    They’ll need to find some left wing economic policies with broader electoral appeal to expand, not enough people nationwide care enough about Gaza for that to be the only thing they trumpet about. But yeah there is the potential Labor’s vote is further balkanised, they might want to implement some PR or preferential voting reform while they still can.

  10. Stinker says:
    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 8:04 pm
    nadia88 at 7:38 pm

    LNP in QLD eyeing off the Division of Brisbane, by selecting their former candidate Trevor Evans.

    ——————

    As a constituent, I’m pleased to see this. I won’t be voting for him at 1, but he’s a smart bloke, a moderate, and was a decent local member first time around. He’ll get my preference before the incumbent (who, in fairness, has been fairly unobjectionable as far as Greens MHRs go).
    ===============================================
    I don’t think the “Teals” have quite made it to Brisbane yet. I think there has been some chatter about fielding a Teal in Griffith, but my read of QLD is the state is too polarised to accommodate Teals.
    Best they stick to Bean & Bradfield.

  11. Stinker @ #605 Sunday, December 15th, 2024 – 8:27 pm

    C@t at 8.21pm

    Do you mean, by Kevin Rudd’s ‘defeat’ and a 2nd run, when the party turned to him to save the furniture in 2013? Which he did.

    —————-

    No, I don’t. Both Rudd and Swan lost as candidates in 1996. They were subsequently elected in 1998.

    For a Labor doyen, your memory seems a little sketchy at times.

    Ha ha ha! I’m no Labor doyenne. 😆

    I’d hardly heard of Rudd and Swan in 1996. In fact, I had just come back to NSW from living in WA for 15 years in ’96 and didn’t join the party until 2001, after Tampa, Children Overboard and the Patrick Stevedores abomination. Even though my family had been involved in the Labor Party since the early 20th century.

    I did come up with a policy in 2004 that the ALP finally implemented in this term of parliament though and which I’m very proud of.

    That’s about it. In fact, you ask Lars Von Trier, I’m just a Branchie. 🙂

  12. Stinker says:
    Sunday, December 15, 2024

    I mentioned previously that I’m a constituent. From personal experience, Bates has been unobjectionable personally, but hasn’t built much of a personal profile to my knowledge (perhaps overshadowed by MCM). My gut feeling is he’ll hold on, but I wouldn’t be putting money on it. It’ll be very interesting to see a straight three-way rerun of 2022 in the seat.

    ———

    Interesting, thanks it’s better to get a perspective of someone like you that lives in the seat. I think you are probably right, the Liberals even with a solid nationwide swing I suspect will only break even, maybe go backwards in inner urban electorates and will do relatively better elsewhere. It seems like the broader electorate could be undergoing something of a realignment on social values/capital rather than pure economic capital.

  13. nadia88 at 8:54 pm

    I don’t think the “Teals” have quite made it to Brisbane yet. I think there has been some chatter about fielding a Teal in Griffith, but my read of QLD is the state is too polarised to accommodate Teals.
    Best they stick to Bean & Bradfield.

    —————

    I tend to agree, nadia. For whatever reason, the inner city Brisbane areas have jumped straight from Labor or Liberal to Green, without an intervening independent / teal. I’m sure a well-known and locally popular teal independent could potentially make a decent run in a sympathetic electorate, but I’m not sure there are any feasible ones in electorates that aren’t already held by the Greens. In which case, they would perhaps seem redundant – although, as you foreshadow, I am interested to see whether MCM’s approach endears him in Griffith. I suspect he’ll be fine next year, but I guess we’ll see.

  14. nadia88 @ #607 Sunday, December 15th, 2024 – 8:29 pm

    C@tmomma says:
    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 7:49 pm
    nadia88 @ #585 Sunday, December 15th, 2024 – 7:38 pm

    LNP in QLD eyeing off the Division of Brisbane, by selecting their former candidate Trevor Evans.
    Madonna Jarrett (ALP) is also in the running as is the incumbent Steven Bates (Grn), who won the seat despite coming third in the primaries in 2022.

    This just proves that the LNP have no depth of talent to choose from. They are running also-rans who have already been defeated once, once again……
    ========================
    I see the ALP is giving Madonna Jarrett another shot. She had a go in 2022 and is back again?

    Anyway, going by the article, the LNP seems to thing the “momentum” in Brisbane is still there for them. I’m still thinking in QLD the existing LNP margins are more likely to increase. Perhaps they may snag Ryan. Dr.D is fairly confident that Moreton is a bridge too far. I don’t think Max will lose his seat.

    Labor are also running Ali France again in Dickson. I wouldn’t be doing it but they must think there’s a positive benefit to it I guess.

  15. Nadia
    [I don’t think the “Teals” have quite made it to Brisbane yet. I think there has been some chatter about fielding a Teal in Griffith, but my read of QLD is the state is too polarised to accommodate Teals.
    Best they stick to Bean & Bradfield.]

    The Greens came from third to win the seat of Brisbane at the last election and my feeling at the time was that the Greens benefited from some possible Teal voters looking for a parking spot.

    The Teals have announced support from Climate 200 for a number of independents in Qld seats in the 2025 election.

    Climate 200 feels their selections are well supported in the community.

    The Teals seem a Achilles Heel for an LNP resurgence however we possibly won’t get an indication till nearer the election.

    The Dutton Nuclear thingie would appear as a negative in the inner cities and for women.

    Climate 200 has not supported candidates to run against the three successful Qld Green candidates.

  16. I just guessed without any real local knowledge that the 2022 floods in Brisbane probably had an influence in more people moving towards the Greens at the Federal election. You also have the situation where there is no upper house in Qld so maybe the Greens have developed a better Darwinian ground game than other states in their attempt to win seats.

  17. mj at 9.03pm

    Interesting, thanks it’s better to get a perspective of someone like you that lives in the seat. I think you are probably right, the Liberals even with a solid nationwide swing I suspect will only break even, maybe go backwards in inner urban electorates and will do relatively better elsewhere. It seems like the broader electorate could be undergoing something of a realignment on social values/capital rather than pure economic capital.

    ——————-

    I think the Libs will generally fall further behind in inner city seats, but despite my view that Bates will win again, I wouldn’t write Evans off totally. Take into account that he’s an ex-member, and that the LNP will have a swing in Qld, and he’s certainly not without hope. I also have no doubt that there’ll be a lot of young constituents who feel left behind in the housing market (whether renters or recent purchasers), which could contribute to an anti-incumbent mood, but Bates as a Green rather than Labor member should presumably be inoculated from that to some degree.

    So yeah, Evans isn’t without hope (and I think he’s also fairly unobjectionable personally, as a party moderate), but I wouldn’t be counting on it as a Coalition gain. But I’m pleased to see him have another go.

  18. Gosh Ali France! Oh well, good on her. She might break the record of Alex Bhathal in Batman.

    Usually the majors give candidates two strikes, maybe a third, and then they drop them for a new candidate. It’s why I’m sceptical about Bec White in Lyons. Three times she’s been given a run at the Premiership, and clearly Tasmanian’s (and her own party going by the internal division under her watch) are not enamoured. Maybe I’m wrong about her Lyon’s candidacy.

    Back onto the AFR. Looks like nothing has turned up yet. Nothing on the Freshwater site either.
    4 weeks ago I think WB located the poll around 1.30am. We can’t all hang around until then.
    I gather it will turn up overnight and we’ll assess tomorrow morning.

    Also tomorrow – last Morgan for the year, and Tues AM the last Essential poll for 2024.

  19. [‘Meanwhile, the world has failed to help Israel return the hostages through greater pressure on Iran and Hamas. It may soon be the longest such crisis in the modern history of terrorism, surpassing the 444 days that Tehran held hostages from 1979 to 1981.

    That is why it is so despicable that the Australian government has chosen to vote for the latest UN ceasefire resolution, which doesn’t make that conditional on the release of the hostages. In doing so, we have repeated our heinous behaviour at the Evian Conference in France in 1938 when, together with the other countries, Australia callously rejected Jewish refugees from Nazi Germany. It was Evian that sent the signal to Hitler that the world didn’t care what he did with the Jews.

    What signal have we now sent to Hamas?

    Instead of its current vague and poisonous commentary, the government would do better standing up for the principles of self-defence and against the crime of aggression. It should support the efforts of Israel to survive and thereby open up the possibilities for a better future for the region. It should demonstrate a genuine concern for the hostages through active diplomacy, not the neglect it has just so shockingly demonstrated.’]

    https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/australia-s-damning-of-israel-is-poisonous-i-say-that-as-an-ex-labor-minister-20241213-p5ky5b.html

    While former Labor minister Mike Kelly makes some salient points, the bottom line is that the IDF has killed circa 40,000 innocent civilians. For this, Netanyahu should be condemned and forms the basis of the ICC issuance of a warrant for his arrest for war crimes and crimes against humanity. I think Albanese & Wong have got it right and that the Muslim community in Sydney and Melbourne’s western suburbs would agree. That’s not to suggest Labor’s playing politics with this(?).

  20. mj at 9:10 pm

    I just guessed without any real local knowledge that the 2022 floods in Brisbane probably had an influence in more people moving towards the Greens at the Federal election. You also have the situation where there is no upper house in Qld so maybe the Greens have developed a better Darwinian ground game than other states in their attempt to win seats.

    ——————-

    With great respect, I actually think this may be overthinking it. Unlike the 2010/11 floods, I don’t recall there being a lot of controversy about the politics of the 2022 floods – it just hit out of nowhere without a lot of warning or much in the way of government decisions contributing to the flooding/making decisions that had a direct bearing on where copped the brunt of it (it was just a ridiculously torrential and steady rain over a number of days that caused the issues in the inner city, not dam releases like the previous time). And I don’t think the Greens in Qld necessarily have a better electoral apparatus than (most) other states. Somehow they’ve hit their marks federally in Brisbane and Griffith very neatly, but I’m not sure there’s much to read into it beyond that.

  21. The Royals causing more problems for the UK:
    A businessman with close ties to Prince Andrew who has been banned from entry into the U.K. is a longtime operative who did little to hide his ties to Beijing.
    RFA can identify the man who served as a business advisor to the Duke of York as Yang Tengbo, a director of the consultancy Hampton Group International, based on details revealed in the immigration judgment against him, as well as evidence gathered from open source intelligence that corroborates information released by the U.K. court.
    Yang is listed as a director of the London-based group, which was known to have gained connections to top U.K. government officials as early as in 2020, including Prince Andrew.
    The judgment from the Special Immigration Appeals Tribunal made public Friday determined that a Chinese national, codenamed H6, should be barred from entering the U.K. on national security grounds, as he is alleged to have plotted to secretly advance Beijing’s interest in Britain using his ties to high profile figures.
    https://www.rfa.org/english/china/2024/12/13/chinese-spy-uk-prince-andrew-yang-tengbo/

  22. Thanks Stinker, as I said I just assumed, it’s kind of curious how the Greens picked up 3 seats in Brisbane and we all try to explain how it came to be but I guess no one knows for sure.

    On another note you can’t express Dutton’s evident concerning personality traits without getting your post censored. I get it, such comments will probably start a flame war, maybe litigation, but it’s the truth. If we don’t warn people of this there may be serious consequences.

  23. Sorry all, to rabbit on about the Freshwater poll. It must be very close to being fully published.

    It looks like the sample was 1051, taken from Friday to this morning.

    Via this AFR link: https://www.afr.com/politics/federal/dutton-s-nuclear-plan-a-4trn-hit-to-the-economy-chalmers-20241215-p5kygc

    “No poll shift
    The latest The Australian Financial Review/Freshwater Strategy poll, which has tracked the popularity of various energy sources over the past two years, shows little shift in the immediate aftermath of the announcement.

    The poll of 1051 voters, taken from Friday, the day the costings were unveiled, to Sunday shows that on a net favorability basis, nuclear and coal are the least favoured energy sources.

    They lag rooftop solar, which has a net favorability of plus-78 per cent – the difference of an 82 per cent approval rating and a 4 per cent disapproval rating.”

    ….
    I’m sorry – I don’t have full AFR access, but I assume the poll numbers are due very soon, unless someone with AFR access can have a deep dive on their site pls.

  24. mj, the funniest part about it to me remains the reconciliation of the Queensland redneck stereotype with the fact that it’s been the only state to ever return multiple Greens MHRs at a single Federal election, which should make people say “wow, what a progressive place”. Of course, ultimately the two points are totally reconcilable, given the concentration of the Greens vote. But I have chipped someone from down south who asked “how is it in redneck land” by responding “when’s the last time your electorate returned a Green?”

  25. He was lurking this evening Pied, but nothing further.
    I’ve got the sample – 1051 – but no primaries.
    Anyway, the overnight posters can deal with it.
    Evening all

  26. Stinker, it should be pretty evident to an informed person that Brisbane is your typical city, the difference in Qld is 50% live outside the capital so unsurprisingly it’ll be more conservative as a state overall. It’s still to a Perth observer kind of surprising 3 Greens MP’s were elected though , Brisbane in my mind isn’t that different to Perth so I look for possible reasons. Maybe Brisbane is just ahead of the curve?

  27. Blair is the most likely pick up for the Coalition in SE Qld.Labor hold it with a 5.2% margin.Why is everyone so interested in these posh seats where the Coalition have no chance.

    At the recent state election the LNP got a swing to them of 10.4% in Ipswich West and 6.3% in Bundamba.The seat voted 29% yes in the referendum.Labor are about a 30% chance of holding this seat imo.

  28. Bystander:

    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 9:41 pm

    [‘Mavis

    Just while you are on the subject, who do you think should be condemned for the 7 October atrocities?’]

    Well, that’s axiomatic but it still doesn’t absolve Netanyahu of his
    horrendous response of killing so many innocents, including babies & the elderly. As regards the senseless killing of those attending the music festival, I read an article some months back (see link) that the Israeli women who keep an ear to unusual noise on the Gazan border reported it to Israeli authorities but it fell on deaf ears, the purported effect of which is that Hamas had been planning their atrocities for some time. And what of Mosard, the crème de la crème of intelligence services? Why wasn’t it aware of what Hamas had planned?

    https://www.bbc.com/news/world-middle-east-67958260

  29. In regard the Banking Royal Commission it was actually the banks which approached the government attempting to stop the haemorrhaging courtesy of negative publicity – and in concert with the government they drew the Terms of Reference the focus of which was doing terminal damage to Industry Superannuation Funds

    (Disclaimer; I have no funds with any Industry Superannuation Funds)

    Bragg, who is continuing this vendetta against Industry Superannuation Funds has put that CBUS was being paid bonuses to approve fewer claims under the Premium Adjustment Mechanism

    This claim I am informed was rejected by TAL Insurance CEO Oliver who said the insurer had paid CBUS members over $370 million last year and praised CBUS for working very hard on behalf of their members making insurance claims

    The person discussing this with me did so because they are aware of my opinion on Briggs and the danger he represents to universal superannuation (and by extension Industry Superannuation Funds which have always been the target because of association with Unions)

    Bragg is described as one of the very few remaining moderates in the Liberal Party, which is its own commentary

    My opinion is that the likes of Bragg are dangerous and have no place in the parliament (noting he is on a Senate ticket so not voted for)

    The difference between he and me is that I am of the view that Universal Superannuation, and a diversity of Fund Managers by individual choice, is a very significant positive for Australians and retirement

    And was it that Tory preferences delivered seats to the Greens in Brisbane?

    When referring to the seats an analysis of the votes cast would be of interest – and what was the ultimate 2PP vote between who?

  30. Peter C at 10.10pm

    Bragg, who is continuing this vendetta against Industry Superannuation Funds has put that CBUS was being paid bonuses to approve fewer claims under the Premium Adjustment Mechanism

    This claim I am informed was rejected by TAL Insurance CEO Oliver who said the insurer had paid CBUS members over $370 million last year and praised CBUS for working very hard on behalf of their members making insurance claims

    —————

    You’d be surprised to see the CEO of an insurance company say otherwise publicly, wouldn’t you?

  31. Queensland was strongly Labor before and just after World War two because it had a large unionised agrarian workforce.The Communist Party had some support amongst that workforce as well.

  32. The Banks had decided that a Royal Commission into them was inevitable. In the face of a widespread expectation of a Shorten victory in 2019, they decided to have it while their friends were still in power.

  33. Bystander:

    Sunday, December 15, 2024 at 10:27 pm

    [‘Mavis

    How would you have preferred it to play out?’]

    I’m not an expert on the ME; that’s why I rarely comment on it but I’ll say this. Netanyahu did way more than invoke Exodus 21:23-25 or Leviticus 24:19-21: his retribution has resulted in thousands of mainly innocent people murdered, injured or starved to death, with some reports claiming the fatalities total 45k, whereas 364 Israelis were killed at the Supernova Sukkot Gathering, with many more wounded & hostages taken. The Gazans haven’t stood a chance with the advanced weapons of the IDF. Netanyahu’s response has been disproportionate, something not lost on the ICC. Anyway, nice to have a chat. I’m off.

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