The Australian Electoral Commission is dampening expectations about the progress of the count:
The initial sorting and collation of postal and other declaration votes already received by the AEC will finalise on Monday. The AEC will also check every declaration vote against the electoral roll and other requirements in order to include them to the count. Once this examination process is complete, the counting of declaration votes recently included in the count will begin. This is expected to be on Tuesday. Postal and other declaration votes will continue to be received, sorted and included in the count up until the deadline for receipt on 15 July.
What this amounts to is the AEC taking extra special care to ensure there are no repeats of the Senate fiasco from Western Australia in 2013. Many will grumble about the slow progress, but you can’t have it both ways. So no counting yesterday or today, which I’m personally relieved by as it’s giving me a chance to wrap my head around a complex situation. Here’s how I described it in response to a commenter’s query on the previous thread:
Barring some freaky late count development in a seat currently off my radar, I have the Coalition home in 70 seats, Labor home in 65, others home in five, and ten up in the air (though I haven’t yet absorbed Kevin Bonham’s notion that the Liberals could theoretically win Melbourne Ports, as may the Greens, although a Labor win seems most likely). So they would need to break 8-2 to Labor for them to win more seats than the Coalition (UPDATE: I beg your pardon — make that Coalition 69 and Labor 66, and Labor needing a break of 7-3). Out of the ten, I would, in descending order of degree, rather be in the Coalition’s position in Dunkley, Chisholm, Gilmore and Capricornia, and Labor’s in Herbert, Cowan and Hindmarsh. There are three seats I don’t even care to speculate about:
Flynn, because the LNP would make it home if they did as well on pre-polls and postals as last time, but that was apparently because they did well from fly-in fly-out workers, of which the electorate now has fewer with the end of the mining boom. It’s also possible that Labor has run a stronger postals campaign this time after abandoning the seat as a lost cause in 2013.
Forde, because there looks like being so very little in it.
Grey, because we don’t know enough about the preference flow yet, but the early indications are encouraging for the Liberals.
I’ll have a more detailed paywalled account of the situation in Crikey later today.
19 minute interview with lots of bombshells
http://www.skynews.com.au/news/top-stories/2016/07/04/turnbull–broke-the-liberal-party-s-heart-.html
Turnbull ‘broke the Liberal Party’s heart’
Updated: 8:23 pm, Monday, 4 July 2016
Sky News contributor Peta Credlin has delivered a powerful broadside against Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull, saying he ‘broke the Liberal Party’s heart.’
In a fiery interview with Andrew Bolt, Ms Credlin issued a series of incendiary criticisms of Turnbull and his strategic inner-circle, describing Liberal HQ’s campaign as ‘lacklustre.’
Raaraa – I’m not opposed to the idea, but I think Labor would be foolish to consider it unless they have both a majority of the national TPP and the higher number of seats.
Hope Dutton wins his seat because he needs to take over from Malcolm ASAP to give the Nation strong uncompromising leadership with no further thought or empathy required…
SHY actually quite good on Q&A tonight (pressure’s off).
Greens need to allow a member vote for leader as it spills only into the party room after an election at the moment. You know Grassroots democracy aye Doc di.
pedant @ #1245 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 11:27 pm
Wow… through that I found these:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=f18qGIEkDU0
The response is just appalling.
BREAKING NEWS – THE HOR HAS SHRUNK TO 140 SEATS
From the SMH another dose of Murdochian political reporting
“
Fergus Hunter
Breaking news reporter
Beloved ABC election analyst Antony Green has cautioned people that the Australian Electoral Commission’s website seat tallies are wrong and causing confusion as the results of the 2016 election wait to be finalised.
Green, a 25-year veteran of Australian elections, says there are 10 seats in doubt and predicts the Coalition will win 68, Labor 67 and five for independents and minor parties.
Read more: http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2016/federal-election-2016-dont-t rust-aec-seat-count-warns-abcs-antony-green-20160704-gpyde9.html#ixzz4DRm2dD5t
I don’t know how to break it to you Fergus Hunter of the SMH, but there are 150 seats in the HOR, not 140 which claim is Antony Green’s prediction – 68 + 67 +5 = 140 you moron. I didn’t bother reading further
[The greens would need to get about 21/27 (about 68%) of ALP preferences to cross the line. It looks as if Danby has still got 80% of greens preferences.]
You don’t think that might reflect the views of the Labor voters not preferencing the greens? Why wouldn’t a Labor voter not preference the greens I wonder. Personally I used the new OPV system in the senate to not preference the greens at all, and if it means an LNP govt I’m still very happy with my choice.
I expect that Labor will be stretched even further to fund another campaign this year. Personally I hope that the LNP form a shaky minority government and are humiliated by their efforts to get stuff through the senate. In a year or two let’s have another crack at an election where Labor will romp it in … but admittedly still have a difficult senate to deal with.
jimmydoyle @ #1239 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 11:21 pm
Labor would need 73 or more likely 74 seats in there own right to make this viable.
Certainly a more workable permutation than any I’ve seen involving the Coalition.
The GG is not an automatic puppet of the executive, and the constitution has a kind of code that is accepted to mean when the GG acts solely on the advice of the executive, and when this doesn’t apply.
So eg, when the constitution talks about the GG issuing writs for an election (s32), it says:
“The Governor-General in Council” is taken to have a very specific meaning that the GG is acting on the advice of the executive.
The section on royal assent does not describe the GG’s involvement in this way. It says, simply, that the GG has discretion in the matter (s58):
And this is perfectly consistent because I don’t think it was ever intended for the executive to have a veto power over the legislature, and I’m pretty confident that no such veto power exists.
The GG will confirm royal assent on any bill that passes the parliament unless there are very exceptional circumstances – not just that the executive is stamping its feet.
Just did the maths, in WA microparties (so I’ve excluded X, Hanson, Greens) got approx 1.79 quotas between them, before there was some doubt about which of them would get the seat, now they just wont, and I bet they wont even do the maths to tell us how many of those voters effectively wasted their vote (by exhausting rather than giving up and moving the vote to a major which was the plan after all).
bemused @ #1242 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 11:23 pm
LOL ridiculous! If anything Anna Burke had a good presence in the area. Chisholm is generally Box Hill South and Burwood, what would tend to lean towards the Libs. After Burke retired, it was going to be a tough fight.
If, by chance, the ALP was able to form a minority government with a bare majority, things might not be so difficult for them. There would have to be a pretty good chance at that point that the Liberals would undergo fission or radioactive decay, which would make the numbers in the House much more manageable. It could be like the Opposition benches after the DLP split from Labor.
[If, by chance, the ALP was able to form a minority government with a bare majority, things might not be so difficult for them.]
Unless the greens acted sensibly (they haven’t and they wont) it can only go horribly.
jimmydoyle @ #1252 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 11:35 pm
It doesn’t even have to be an alliance or an agreement. Plenty of bills can be worked through this path.
@ Puff
“What is that kitten in your gravatar standing on? The kitten is too big for it to be fingers and I can’t make it just what it is, unless that is one teeny tiny kitten?”\
It’s a heavily edited image of a kitten being “held” between two fingers, yes. I believe this was the source image:
pedant @ #1262 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 11:53 pm
And some people say there’s hot air coming from the parliament. This would fix the energy problem.
I watched Eric Abetz on Lateline blaming anyone but the Libs for the wipe of Tasmanian Liberal MPs.. He tossed all his toys out of the cot including his Get Up colour in book, his Medicare card and the bottle of Brasso he used to polish his head and Andrew Nikolic’s medals he got as a “highly decorated officer”. I recall Adolph Hitler was one too. ‘We was robbed and the electorate were duped into foolishness – sounds like Malcolm Yurnbull on the weekend.
I would be concerned, as a Labor member of Parliament, that the idea of getting to attack a fairly fragile, “illegitimate”, Green-scary-monster and Nick X-joke-fringe-SA-crazy, minority government is exactly the sort of thing that would really unite the Coalition and their media toadies.
They could even stick Abbott back in the driver’s seat and we could do 2010-13 all over again!
Rogue Scholar – I noticed Howard blowing smoke up Nikolic’s rear end in his election night interview too. Something about an ex-man in uniform that really does it for aging Liberal men.
teh_drewski
Tuesday, July 5, 2016 at 12:04 am
Rogue Scholar – I noticed Howard blowing smoke up Nikolic’s rear end in his election night interview too. Something about an ex-man in uniform that really does it for aging Liberal men.
Too Funny
kevin-one-seven @ #1007 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 8:39 pm
The associated problem is that excess pork in SA will inspire similar demands from MPs from other States. As well, to reward X is to place more seats at risk in the next election, whenever that might be.
Better qanda tonight but one thing really irks/irked me: Holly Ransom, and to a lesser extent, Kelly, are great at articulating a problem (i.e. a more intelligent whinge, but a whinge nonetheless) yet they did not provide ANY suggestion for solutions. This is something they expect of politicians, saying it is their responsibility.
At the same time they complain about politicians not listening but when the politician panelists do offer up the beginning of an explanation of their proposed solution, Jones cuts them off.
I also noted that Kelly said Julia Gillard did negotiate and achieve a lot while in minority govt — shame he and his colleagues refused to acknowledge that at the time.
True but clearly something was going on. The obvious thing would be the retirement of a popular sitting member but that seems insufficient to me to explain the swing away when so many Vic electorates swung to Labor.
Murdoch already pushing hard for the return of Abbott?
http://www.heraldsun.com.au/business/terry-mccrann/goodbye-malcolm-turnbull-and-goodbye-triplea/news-story/06b96a766f956d800735b6b216c858cd
pedant @ #1204 Monday, July 4, 2016 at 10:57 pm
Masterly understatement, Pedant…
The LNP threw a lot of money at this electorate.
We had “CFA” phone calls.
The electorate does take in parts of Mont Albert/Mont Albert North/Blackburn which are hard core lib areas.
There were some trees removed around Blackburn station as part of the long overdue railway crossing removal that upset some of the locals.
corporate_misfit @ #1276 Tuesday, July 5, 2016 at 12:23 am
Read a similar thing off a rail forum. There’s a website for these people. Some were going to rally at the smallest things as a sign of protest.
Always useful to hear from people in the electorate.
Thanks, it now makes more sense.
More Royal assent.
Jackol, you (and others) are correct that Sprocket confounded the legislative and executive powers of the Commonwealth. However you have probably over-stated the case when you said, ‘The GG will confirm royal assent on any bill that passes the parliament unless there are very exceptional circumstances’. One would certainly expect the GG to do this, but Section 58 says the GG can do whatever they want as to withholding assent, ‘subject to this Constitution’. And Her Majesty’s representatives have been known to do very odd things when put under a bit of pressure. The point is that, taking s58 at face value, the GG does apparently have real discretion to withhold assent, lamentable though that may be. If they went about capriciously exercising that discretion they probably wouldn’t remain GG for long, but that is another matter.
First Dog on the Moon election wrap. Winners and Losers.
I loved;
WINNER
Whoever has the contract to supply tissues to News Corp opinion writers.
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/04/snitty-the-psephological-cassowarys-election-winners-and-losers
I hate bolt, have never managed to watch more than 5 mins of his show, but that interview with Credlin is worth it.
Looking forward to the Libs infighting continuting and splitting out a Australian Conservatives party under Bernadi and all being forgotten.
Bug1
It was certainly a bit of a love in.
I also watched Bernardi on 7:30.
I think he was more pissed off with all the minor RWNJ parties stealing his votes.
Where will his new party fit in?
I just watched the Bolt Credlin conversation (I wouldn’t call it an interview).
What planet does Bolt live on?
Those confused by the reference to Coalition 70 and Labor 65 in my post were right to be – I misallocated a seat, and it should have said Coalition 69 and Labor 66.
I think people need to forget any notion of ALP running a minority govt.
Whoever takes it will be in for a real fluster cluck.
We should just be thankful that the LNP has to jump through two hurdles namely NXT and McGowan in the HoR and then a circus of a senate crossbench which includes Lambie and Derryn Hinch. He is the biggest unknown here.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2016-07-04/election-2016-party-status-beckons-for-nick-xenophon-team/7568370
The volunteers I saw giving out NXT HTV cards wore high vis vests like the ones here with the X Nick Xenophon Team on them, which I thought was pretty smart and visible. One of the Getup volunteers giving out HTV card (a much older man) joked and asked if they’re joining Getup as it was nearly the same shade of orange.
New thread.
This is worth reading
Blair knew Iraq would be his epitaph. But he dared not defy Bush
https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2016/jul/04/phone-call-bush-blair-failed-iraq
One day someone will write a similar piece about our little runt of a “sheriff ” & how Bush manipulated Howard
Blanket from last night (11:35), re internal coalition polling. In the GG article yesterday by I think Pamela Wilkinson, by Thursday Turnbull and others were briefed about internal polling that reflected the result.
Of course the Canberra Press Gallery were none the wiser.
Also the Moir cartoon in today’s SMH is good, Turnbull on the retreat from Moscow, doubly suitable following a winter election.
“Those confused by the reference to Coalition 70 and Labor 65 in my post were right to be – I misallocated a seat, and it should have said Coalition 69 and Labor 66.”
* IN * YOUR * FACE *
er, thanks William.
Bizarre
test
one of these