An ACNielsen poll conducted between Thursday and Saturday has Labor leading 61-39, with 83 per cent saying the Brian Burke affair had not affected their opinion of Kevin Rudd. The accompanying Sydney Morning Herald report also says "internal Labor polling had shown the Coalition’s relentless attacks on Mr Rudd’s judgement and character had hurt the Coalition more than Labor". Perhaps one might go so far as to venture that there are signs of a trend emerging.
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Well, you are up early this morning William!
See the previous Federal Election thread for two recent Morgan polls and for where the trend line is heading. This Nielsen poll will only strengthen it. We have Newspoll tomorrow (or is it next week?)…. will Newspoll jump off the bandwagon?…. THAT would give Dennis Shanahan something to crow about.
C.Woo: By mid-June, we’ll semi-know how the election will pan out.
….. in 1998 it was close all the way, 2001 6-7 for Beazley until Tampa and 9/11, and in 2004 …..did anyone pick the landslide before the election that year?
Believe in the trend lines. In 1998 the result was spot on a trend line that grew for Beazley steadily from 1997 to 2001. In 2001, the tip point came in May (petrol tax back-flip?, but not Tampa?). This pattern was repeated in 2004 (reason for the tip?), the lanslide occurred only on Friday night or Saturday morning over the Weetbix (my best bet for this hiccup…. it had gone away by the next weekend- was the handshake).
Some indication of the way the trend line (3 polls averaged over 3 fortnights) can be used can be seen in my 1996 Fin Review article which Mumble so kindly reprinted a few years ago. In that case the trend pointed squarely at Howard’s 46 seat majority all the way from a year before hand.
Too good to be true, but I believe there is a mood for change out there.
Costello might try and sneak some tax cut relief into the budget, but will bribery work this time?
It is obvious many people couldn’t care less about Brian Burke, or Kevin Rudd’s childhood!
Methinks Peter Hartcher (SMH p1/4 this morning) might have been hanging around this web-site. A lot of what he writes, and how he writes it, about where the election seems to be heading has strong echoes here.
An ABC presenter once told me that he had configured his web browser to make Bludger his Home Page and it was the first thing he looked at when he came into the studio.
Well done William.
“Perhaps one might go so far as to venture that there are signs of a trend emerging.”
Ah William, typical understatement. I’m surprised we didn’t have a headline along the lines of Poll-axed.
The real test of this trend is has anyone here who lives in a very safe Liberal seat noticed any increase effort from their MP
Geoff Lambert wrote
An ABC presenter once told me that he had configured his web browser to make Bludger his Home Page and it was the first thing he looked at when he came into the studio.
Well done William.
I thought i was the only one that had Poll Bludger as my home page, my wife calling me an obsessed nutter. I have always been interested in politics and elections, Studying profiles and Stats since a child but being part of it on the inside gives it an whole new dimension
In Kingston (not a safe seat ) Richardson is working hard in environmental and community issues but is up against it with a strong YR@W campaign encompassing many different groups that would normally have little common interests. A unknown (in the electorate) ALP candidate is also working hard to get known around the traps holding corner street stalls. If the polls start to go back to Howard which i still predict they will there will be an interesting fight in this electorate. On the one side you have Richardson known by most and does work hard in the electorate and on the other side an relatively unknown Rishworth riding on the back of the YR@W campaign. The minor party preferences will be the decider i feel very crucial and unlike the 2006 SA State election where the arrogance of ALP candidates and MPs showed in their contempt of minor party preferences, i feel that both parties will court and woo The Greens, Democrats, FF, etc to sure up their vote.
Whats up with Mumbles website
Looks like a cyber squatter – very scary
These recent poll results should serve as a reminder to those us with perhaps a slightly unhealthy over-enthusiasm for psephology – the great unwashed don’t really pay that much attention to comings and goings of political life. That said, I think the mob have taken a liking to Kevin Rudd. I think people have been looking for a reason to vote against Howard for the last couple of years, but the ALP hasn’t been giving them one (until now). Of course the government have shown their hand in recent weeks, throwing everything but the kitchen sink at Rudd, but it doesn’t seem to have made much difference. Or rather, it has, but only against the government.
There are several factors at play here, not least an “it’s time” sentiment that seems to be building within the community, but the issues, too, have started working against the government. Iraq has gone bad (or should I say, worse), climate change has suddenly sprung into the mainstream, David Hicks’ plight is getting traction and the trend of interest rates is up. However, Labor’s poll lead really started last March, when the government introduced WorkChoices. I don’t think the Libs truly appreciate the fear that these changes have put into the community (this might be because of the Libs’ employer/ small business constituency) – not just fear for their own jobs, but for those of their kids. The issue is continually talked down by the media (had to laugh when I heard Andrew Bolt commenting that he was more than happy with HIS AWA!), but it’s an issue that really cuts through out in the community, and I think it’s no co-incidence that the ALP has been ahead in the polls since last March.
Kevinism is certainly giving Labor a big boost, but the basis for it was there for nearly all of last year.
Gee you lot are excitable. The bookies still average the Coalition at shorter odds. Every election is the same these days. Labor holding massive leads 8 months out…
Can anyone out there explain the discrepancy in Green vote (about 5% in Newspoll over several surveys) and 9% (in AC Nielsen)?
Reasoned explanations please not Green breastbeating!
Hugo,
I agree with you on the IR laws. I can’t bring myself to call them WorkChoices because the employee has no choice. As a committed unionist, I do not understand how any government could put in laws that undo a century of progress, but that is what the Howard government has done. Everyone is potentially a victim of these laws, and they are so transparently a transfer of power from the employee to the employer that no insight is required to see the damage they will cause to Australian families. You may have a well-paid managerial position at the moment, but your daughter’s part-time job suddenly involves a pay cut when she is told to sign an AWA or have no more shifts. Word-of-mouth will spread these stories, and if Labor is resolute, rather than attempting to accommodate the bleating of The Australian, it is on a winner.
The Brian Burke dinner was never going to make a dent on Kevin Rudd, though the eviction story might. People do not expect perfection from politicians. They well know they aren’t perfect themselves.
Labor is in front because of the IR laws. It has gained more support because Kevin Rudd promises change, but change that is safe. At the national conference, he will see off the so-called “left†unions’ economic proposals, he will see the no-new-mines policy dropped and he will add clarity to Labor’s IR, family and education policies. This will all work to his benefit: he will slay the “left†of his own party and credibly promise a better life for the rest of the country.
It would be foolish to say that Kevinism is unstoppable, but I still think Labor will win and win clearly. I’ll leave the numbers till later. This is not 2001, or 2004, or even 1969. This is 1972, but with the advantage of no Whitlam government at the end of it.
Each of the pollsters seems to have a bias.
Nielsen tends to have a higher green vote, Newspoll tends to overstate the vote of the incumbent and Morgan tends to overstate the vote of the opposition. I have no idea why. But taken together they tend to cancel each other’s biases out.
I think many of us think that the numbers can’t get better. In fact a number much wiser than me seem to think these numbers are not possible (ever?) in an election. I guess, although they don’t say, this is a form of the ‘honeymoon’ theory which states in an election a number of these voters must move.
Who would think rusted on conservative voters would number much under 35%? That is if voters move back to Howard in the cut and thrust of an election there could not be much, if any of a countervailing flow.
How could preference flows be much better than in Neilson?
Now if we remember that many of these voters are voting labor for state elections what can Rudd do to keep them? What can Howard to (short of invading Iran – please no) to bring home these numbers?
The state ALP Governments of Victoria, NSW, and Queensland all have scored TPR vote of mid to high 50s, I’m not sure about WA, Tassie, SA and NT, so while we can dismiss 61-39 at this point but if come June/July and the ALP are ahead 55+ I feel its a safe bet they’ll win, but if Howard can hand down a good budget or soften his IR Laws he may save his own hide.
I know that the upcoming NSW Election is on state issues, but will we be able to obtain some sort of feel for how the voters are reacting.
ACNielsen almost replicates the often derided Morgan poll. Are they both so far out?
As well as Iraq and IR laws, high petrol prices are hurting the government.
Oh dear. I am finding my careful “it’s too early to get excited” position under considerable strain today. Nevertheless, I will wait until the next Newspoll before starting to look for a flat in Canberra.
Chris says “I do not understand how any government could put in laws that undo a century of progress.” Well Chris I have to tell you that CLASS is still alive and well in Australia and is at the centre of Australian politics. (You see although our current views are similarly Labor Right, my training was in the Marxist left while yours was in the NCC, so I know these things.) The petit bourgeois social base of the Liberal Party do not see protecting the rights of workers as “progress”, they see it as a damned impertinence.
John Howard has been the faithful lackey (a word I don’t get to use often any more) of the small business class all his life, and the IR laws were their payoff for their faith in him. I agree that the IR laws and fear for the future for Australian kids is the cause of the underlying decline in the Coalition’s position. But that was true under Beazley as well – in fact Kim made a bigger noise about IR than Kevin is currently doing. What has changed is that Labor now has a leader people are listening to.
Some years ago I hypothesized on Crikey that there was a long term trend (starting in the late sixties) that was making Australia more naturally Labor. This was the cause, at least in part, of the landslides at state level. On that theory 1999 and 2001 were aberrations caused by the unpopularity of the Keating government and the Tampa/911 events. 1998 was closer to where the electorate was at in terms of 2pp vote, but happened to be in the wrong places for Labor.
Although subsequent state votes have generally supported my theory, the 2004 federal election seemed to discredit it entirely. If the natural situation was now something like 53% for Labor then it seemed hard to see how one handshake could have turned that to 47%.
However, if these polls keep up it may be time to dust the theory off again.
According to my guesstimates, the natural predilections of the population were shifting Labor at a rate of about 1% every six years and would now be close to 54%.
On that basis these sorts of polling figures become understandable, as does how a government as useless as Iemma’s can appear set to cruise to victory.
lackburnpseph Says: Can anyone out there explain the discrepancy in Green vote (about 5% in Newspoll over several surveys) and 9% (in AC Nielsen)?
This was (sort of) touched on somewhere last week. I think it has to do with the options that are offered when respondents are polled. With Newspoll (it seems) they are offered only the following ALP,COAL,GRN,OTHER. With Nielsen (it seems) they’re offered a broader choice. On the surface of it, you would have though the latter would have produced the lower green %age- but there’s no accounting for the instransitivity of opinion.
Some of the comments in previous posts about the IR laws are reminiscent of the sentiment that is reflected in Robert Browning’s Pippa, the orphan girl who had to work long hours in terrible conditions and who knew everything was not “right in the world”. Maybe that is the sentiment that has tapped our collective unconscious and is now resonating with voters.
Do we know if Howard has ever seen a poll like this before. We know he was struggling badly in early 2001, which were dog days for his Gov’t, but was it ever 61-39?
Whilst there is no way this will be the election result, I can’t help but think that this is too far behind to come back from within 9 months, even for Howard. My ‘it will be a close election’ mantra may be ditched very very soon indeed.
IR is not going to be the silver bullet for the ALP,
Scare campaign yes but when it comes down to nitty-gritty time people will still vote on mortgages, money in the pocket etc AND REMEMBER
who is writing Labor’s IR policy, Jula MEDICARE GOLD Gillard.
Remember Kerry O’Brien’s 730 report put down “come back when you have an IR policy” you have to expect the ALP will have to provide a real policy by the election not just promises
Edward, no-one will be writing any of Labor’s policy on anything except The Leader and his office. I promise I won’t keep banging on about this, but I did have the opportunity of watching Rudd at fairly close quarters last year, and he is the most driven, focussed, disciplined person I have ever seen. He is a total contral freak, and no-one will put forward any policy that he has not seen and approved – and probably rewritten. If Gillard think she will get the kind of free run on IR policy that Macklin had on education in 2004 (which gave us the disaster of the “hit list”), she will soon learn otherwise. Labor’s IR policy will be what Rudd says it will be and nothing else. Don’t forget that Rudd has three of the biggest union bosses – Bill Ludwig, Bill Shorten and Joe de Bruyn – in his camp. If the Left make trouble about this they will be squashed like bugs. But I don’t think they will. The unions desperately need to be rid of Howard, and they will grit their teeth and support Rudd whatever he does.
Adam,
If Rudd is serious about IR and wants to demonstrate his leadership cred he needs to go into the election with an IR policy along these lines:
a) Abolish all state systems (ie all the premiers have agreed to one national IR system)
b) Adopt WorkChoices concerning abolition of awards etc ie make it easier to use for business
c) Put back fairness into the fair pay and condition standard preferbably with some form of national maternity leave scheme
This type of policy would outflank Howard whilst showing the ALP is contemporary and relevant. However it would require the ALP leadership to stare down some very self interested vested interests. I question whether Rudd could do it but that’s the way to win the debate and after all if he aspires to be PM it would prove his mettle.
I don’t think IR is a “silver bullet”, but rather it’s the issue that was Howard’s break with swing voters and the so-called “battlers”. It’s an issue that worries people that don’t otherwise take any interest in politics. The Right don’t get this, probably because not many of them (or their kids) have had to survive on a minimum wage job. People are correct when they point out that IR alone won’t win the election for Labor, but if Howard hadn’t gone so far with this matter, I tend to think he wouldn’t e looking so bad now. IR provided Labor (both the party and the movement) with the momentum it needed to start fighting back. Once they found an issue they could genuinely believe in, other issues started (Iraq, Hicks, climate change, interest rates) started to fall into place.
Adam,
I am not now, nor have I ever been, a member of the NCC. Nor was my training in the NCC. I learnt politics in the YDLA, the DLP, the LaTrobe University Democratic Club and the VSTA. The NCC was a negative influence on the DLP, and I saw that way back in 1973 when it was pushing the “amalgamate with the Country Party†line. The NCC would have closed the Victorian DLP down much earlier than 1978 if it had had the power to do so. It now seems to be working inside the Liberal Party, but that’s another story.
While not a Marxist – there are still some around, I believe – or even a fan of Marx, I do accept the class basis for politics. In fact at a DLP re-union I got called a communist by one attendee. My point is not that the Liberals have acted in accordance with the short-term interest of business, but that they have been so extreme in doing so.
I agree with you that Kim Beazley is responsible for the Labor turnaround, and I agree that Kevin Rudd is building on that. I too have to remind myself to avoid over-confidence, because who knows who has had a meeting with an old farmer to write a reference for some dodgy character on stolen electoral office printing credits?
I also agree with you on the general policy direction that will come out of Kevin Rudd’s office. I think Labor will have a vote-winning policy position in some detail well before the election.
It took Labor several elections to get a decent education policy in Victoria, but it finally did it. I think we will see the same thing federally, and not just on education. I think we will get a “sit up and take notice†set of policies that John Howard will find very difficult to counter.
Chris/Adam/Hugo,
I propose the following litmus test for government, can Kevin Rudd get the NSW government (and every other state government) to promise that it will transfer its IR powers lock stock and barrels to the Feds in the event of Rudd winning the election.
You forget that in NSW there are a heap of right wing unions that rely on a seperate State system for patronage, support, importance. I find it hard to believe they will willingly hand that over.
Similarly in QLD would Bill Ludwig agree to be part of a federal system?
The point of the litmus test is can Heavy Kevvie demonstrate that he is independent of unions and that he can impose reforms on the ALP.
Polls are fluff at the moment you forget that the rodent will keep digging and digging until he has fatally undermined the foundations of Kev’s house of cards and the ALP needs to show it is credible and serious about winning the election.
Adam said
Edward, no-one will be writing any of Labor’s policy on anything except The Leader and his office. I promise I won’t keep banging on about this, but I did have the opportunity of watching Rudd at fairly close quarters last year, and he is the most driven, focussed, disciplined person I have ever seen. He is a total control freak, and no-one will put forward any policy that he has not seen and approved – and probably rewritten.
Doesn’t sound very democratic at all. Is the future of politics the clash of dictator types?
The total control of Australia by the Federal Government will lead to a Democratic type dictatorship. We get to choose the dictator. Why are the major parties hell bent to take this step? Why is freedom of speech slowly being eroded? The current governments policies smacks of dictatorship lets hope the opposition don’t go that same path.
Hitler promoted racism, fixed the economy, had excuses to fight so called terrorism, took power from the states, Disabled the union movement, union leaders jailed, promoted nationalism, made the flag an icon, gave the power to the police to detain people under protection of the State, removed opposition parties etc etc
Edward I’m not sure I understand your post, the High Court, flawed and ridiculous as its reasoning was, has effectively already moved the IR power from the States to the Commonwealth. Why do you suggest moving it again should be a key test of Rudd?
Oh course the AUSTRALIAN LABOR PARTY cannot be independent of the unions it is an absurd proposition. The ALP is and always has been the political wing of the labor movement. But your implication that union officers direct, directly, the leader of the opposition is just as absurd – see what Mr Weller says. And on that score, yes I think politics will be dominated at a Federal and State level by the clash of the dictator types. The media doesn’t really allow anything else.
Was just looking at Australian Politics site http://aussiepolitics.proboards51.com under heading of psephology and the latest acnelson thread.
A Mary Guest has doorknocked the suburb of Hawksbury which lies in the marginal seat of Greenway (Lib 3.1%) over the last weekend, here is a copy of her poll sample of 473 homes:-
Labour 164 34.7%
Independant 128 27.1%
Liberal 123 26.0%
Undecided/Donkey Vote 48 10.2%
Greens 9 1.9%
Democrat 1 0.1%
She goes into detail of what people said to her, very interesting the high ind and undecided vote, what are peoples thoughts on this.
Depending on the independent leanings that seat could go to three candidates the undecided is normal this far out but the green vote is unusually low and no FF as a choice or no votes. seems a strange seat
Hugo, March 12th, 2007 at 11:49 am, spot on. The issues will decide Howard’s fate and those issues are going against him. He maybe able to make some type of U-turn on global warming and Hicks (with much scepticism from joe public) but he can’t change IR and Iraq. IR is the underlying issue that has seen his popularity deminish. The trends behind the polls must be very worrying for the coalition. There comeback from here will depend on Labor doing a Hewson and presenting to the electorate a 200 page suicide note.
Jim, March 12th, 2007 at 11:53 am, boy have the bookies changed. Check them out.
Something tells the poll numbers for this tells me this is past a honeymoon stage.
Thanks Gary. Yes, now is my opportunity to get some good odds on the Coalition. Because it won’t last. Hey, the Newspoll tomorrow should be interesting though.
Let us not forget that sometimes these changes show no change. lackburnpseph asked about how the two polls could show such a big difference in the green votes. We must remember the statistics of sampling here. If I take a poll with a large sample, I get a certain result with a certain statistical error. So I get a 50% vote for Labor with a 2.6% margin of error. Which means that the “actual” vote is 47.4% to 52.4% However statistics then tell you that this is only with a 95% level of confidence which means that once out of every twenty samples, the figure may be outside the “actual” range.
So it is quite possible to get 2 different figures, 9% and 5% which are both statistically correct – especially since they are taken on different weekends. The populations are different.
If you want an example of the 95% confidence – think of that morgan poll which showed a labor landslide days before howard had one. Outriders – they can always happen – you just don’t want one two days before an election.
workchoices are not extreme
employers arent evil
we wont be returning to having primary school kids cleaning bottles and having their baby hearts brake
employers are open about their reluctance to rely on workchoices because they havent been tested in practice
also the high court actually adhered to precedent (the name escapes me now, but its a 1928 case overruling harvester) the only problem is its against the principle of federalism
(just helping to balance everything out)
Inclined to agree with Stephen L on the long-term shift theory. Back in the early 1980s when David Kemp was announcing that Fraser had won the culture wars Don Aitkin argued that non-Anglo migration and the leftward shift of women (as they entered the paid workforce) was favouring Labor, unlike the 1950s when social trends were against Labor. 1983-96 confirmed his argument I think and perhaps this trend has continued, you can’t defy political gravity endlessly? Howard’s culture war politics has short-term gains perhaps but in the long-run it may be costly, the current problems of the US Republicans could be a pointer.
Edward,
As I understand it, the High Court decision has allowed the corporations power to be used to destroy the federal compact, so NSW IR powers are in the main already under federal control. I don’t expect a Labor federal government to hand them back. There is a case for employees not employed by corporations to be covered to.
One industrial relations system for the country makes sense, but the method of achieving it has been highly damaging to federalism and opens the way for the destruction of the states, a prospect which Liberals may in future be aghast at.
I do not think it is necessary for Kevin Rudd to be independent of unions. Labor is the party of the unions – no apologies needed.
Labor does have to develop and present reasonably detailed policies – I believe it will do so.
Yasmine,Chris etc,
The High Court confirmed corporations are covered by Federal law, however you have a number of state industrial commissions and state governments actively trying to redefine laws to maintain seperate state systems so you have a system where many many employers are unsure as to whether or not they are corporations such as local councils.
For many employers now they may be:
a) In the Federal system but unsure if they are still covered by some State laws; or
b) Unsure as to whether or not they are constitutional corporations
Unions represent less than 20% of the working age population – surely an ability to seperate himself from the unions is a precondition for Rudd demonstrating he gets it.
Edward,
Union membership may be down to 20 per cent of the work force, but that does not stop the union party getting 50 per cent plus of the two-party preferred vote in state and territory election after state and territory election. I am the only person in my family who is a union member, but none of the others are anti-union. Outside of committed Liberal supporters, there are very few people hostile to unions. The Labor Party’s union links are not in my view an election issue.
I have already said I agree with one IR system for the country. My objections are to the Liberals’ version of it and to the use of the corporations power to destroy the plain meaning of the federal constitution’s IR power.
The point Chris is,
1. Most reasonable people support fairness and the IR system doesnt generate fairness at a reasonable price, ie why spend $100M on state tribunals to give fairness when all you need is a reasonable set of minimum conditions
2. Most business can live with a simple set of rules, you dont need 8 seperate systems and a law degree to interpret the rules – except you do in Australia.
That’s why to win the IR war RUDD has to propose something that addresses business concern for a simpler system whilst making some acceptable changes to give people minimum rights.
I just dont believe Rudd could talk the union boys into handing over their state systems – but thats the way to demonstrate to business he has got the stuff of leadership.
BTW – No less an authority then John Button called for a union/ ALP divorce – if No1 wife is getting to be a drag on your career why wouldnt u broom her?
bill weller, aren’t you the greens candidate for kingston? maybe you should disclose that on your postings?? we would expect labor/liberal candidates to do it.
Button has obviously forgotten that he owes his ministerial career to a Prime Minister trained up in the union movement and an ALP-unions accord that gave Labor 13 years in office. There’s plenty of juice left in this marriage, Edward. If we’re going to talk about being married to a corpse, look how the Nats are dragging Howard down – AWB, endless porkbarrelling scandals, crazy subsidies to water-guzzling rice and cotton farmers – plain grounds for divorce.
Edward,
I don’t think Kevin Rudd has to demonstrate anything to business to win the election. The Australian goes on about business and the need for Labor to meet its needs all the time, but it would, wouldn’t it? Politically speaking, I don’t think it matters what the CEOs of Australia think, any more than the Csar’s opinion counted after 1917. In fact, a few wealthy CEOs getting stuck into Labor would be helpful to it.
Don’t underestimate the influence of America. We’ve just seen a wipeout over there, surely some of the sentiment there could have drifted over here? We saw it in 2000-01, and 2004, now the tide seems to be turning.
Goodness me, Chris, quite the Bolshevik, aren’t we? It’s a pretty pass when old Groupers are too left wing for me. Actually Cde Ruddsky will spend quite a lot of time mending fences with business leaders. Most of them are pragmatic enough to know they need to work with Labor governments, but they were very pissed off with the way Latham treated them – cancelled appointments, no-shows at functions etc etc (they didn’t realise he treated everyone like that).
“old”?
robert white.
Bill has mentioned being the Green candidate numerous times. Not his fault you missed it. Or do you want him to put in EVERY post?
Chris, given that CEOs have influence over the investments of their companies, I’d reckon that it does actually matter what they think. It’s not much good for Australians if CEOs have a general impression that NZ is a much better place to invest, is it?
NZ might not be a good example due to the CER, replace it with some other country.
To Bill Weller:
Your comparison of a future Australian government with Nazi Germany is really drawing a long bow (for lots of reasons – the least of which is that ours is a very mature democracy which has not endured the years of social and economic crisis that Germnay did between 1914 and 1933).
If you are worried about a future dictatorship – you have evidently missed the elected dictatorships that the Westminster system throws up on a regular basis – the prime example being in Australia the state of queensland where absolutely nothing can stop the government of the day doing virtually anything it puts its mind to as there is nothing to check it. At federal level the senate – usually – acts as a check because it is very difficult for a government to gain a majority in both houses. Preferential voting also acts as a check as voters have a final say on where their vote finally goes.
Would Mrs Thatcher had a 144 seat majority in 1983 on 42% of the vote – I don’t think so.
On the other hand what we do have is the dictatorship of the political parties as a smaller membership base wields proportionately greater power – opening up of the political parties and a promotion of áctivity’ may bing some energy to the process. It would indeed be interseting to see who the rank and file of the political parties would throw up as leaders if they had their choice – the political leaders would then have to sell themselves to a wide audience before being thrown to the wider electorate.
Those who have responded to my post about WorkChoices seem to have missed my point, which was to say that WorkChoices is where things started to go wrong for Howard. I was not especially talking about the rights and wrongs of the legislation, but rather that WorkChoices is electoral poison for the government. They have, after all, been behind in the polls since last March (when it came in) and have taken a dip whenever the issue rises in prominence (eg, after the rallies, when the ACTU ad campaign came on). IR alone won’t win it for Labor, but it did help them get back in the game.
I suspect any discourse on the Act itself should be left for another forum, but I will say that WorkChoices does represent a huge shift in IR in this country, which has traditionally been monitored by an “independent umpire” (the IRC, Arbitration Court etc). This is what freaks people out, that there is no arbitor to consult during disputes. The great flaw of WorkChoices (both in a political and in a moral sense) is that it takes that safety catch away, leaving employees largely at the whim of their employers. This is not to say that employers are necessarily evil, but most people appreciate that their boss will shaft them if it suits the needs of the company, and the IRC (or equivalent) does give them some protection.
Oh, and can we end this cannard that “unions represent 20% of the workforce? By my (admittedly poor) maths, that means over 2 million people. Are there any other organisations in the country that have that many members?
There is a political element with this union membership, too. 40% of union members apparently voted for Howard in 2004, or about 800,000 people. WorkChoices effectively says to these people that they have to choose between Howard and their union. It doesn’t take a genius to work out that if even half these people vote against the government this year, then Howard is stuffed.
To describe the gutting of the arbitration system and the transfer of power in the workplace to the employer as a “flaw” in the IR legislation is rather to miss the point. That was the central *purpose* of the legislation – to “turn Mr Justice Higgins on his head” as Costello once said (Mr Justice Higgins being the author of the 1907 Harvester Judgement which established the principle of wage justice).
This legislation was only made possible by the Coalition’s victory in the 2004 Senate election, which was in turn made possible by the electorate’s rejection of Mad Mark. We now see Labor’s master plan in all its fiendish cunning: install a complete loony as leader, lose control of the Senate, allow Howard to pass his poisonous IR laws, sweep to victory in 2007.
Yes, I suspect you’re right Adam – a fiendishly clever plan. Let’s just hope it works, eh?
Hugo, I agree with you that the federal government overreached itself, electorally, with the Workchoice legislation – it mispredicted the response to the legislation. I would be prepared to go out on a limb and say that the coalition govt started to lose its extremely political senstive antennae once it knew it had a majority of the senate. Winning a majority in the Senate will be seen to be the Coalitions downfall – I think it would have been in a better position now if it hadnt won a Senate majority.
‘For many employers now they may be:
a) In the Federal system but unsure if they are still covered by some State laws; or
b) Unsure as to whether or not they are constitutional corporations.’
Well they are great questions shouldn’t Mr Howard have considered them before he went into to use the Corps power to steal the constitutional power over industrial relations from the States? Not only did the federal government over reach in a moral and political way it is clearly very poorly thought out and was not discussed with the electorate before the last Fed election nor with the States who were being disempowered.
If it were a Labor Government these very substantial and very basic failures would be screamed by rabbid opponents for years. But rather than attack the problem and the problems authors to try and suggest somehow fixing Howard’s mess the way Howard would want as a test for Rudd is amazing.
‘BTW – No less an authority then John Button called for a union/ ALP divorce – if No1 wife is getting to be a drag on your career why wouldnt u broom her? ‘
The political wing of the labor movement divorced from the labor movement would end up a directionless, morally bankrupt club … why would we need a second Liberal party?
Opps was that partisan?
Sacha – I think your reading is spot on. Before the Libs got their Senate majority, they were required to debate any and all legislation through the Senate. The GST, for example, had 18 months of modelling and public debate before a compromise saw us with a tax. While market fundamentalists aren’t happy with food being tax free, there’s no doubt that this makes the GST far more equitable. Likewise Howard first run of IR ‘reforms’ in 1996 – the laws had to be debated extensively, and as such, we were left with sounder law.
WorkChoices on the other hand was only thought of AFTER they got the Senate majority. Consequently, the Act is enormously cumbersome (700 page Act, 500 of explanatory notes, 500 pages regulations) and something of a lawyers picnic. It takes long-held rights away from employees, and leaves employers with great legal uncertainties and a suspicious workforce. However, WorkChoices is only part of the legacy of this illusory benefit of a Senate majority – the sale of Telstra, Welfare to work, draconian anti-terror laws etc. While on their own, these things won’t lose the government office, they add to the impression of a government out of control and drunk on absolute power.
Labor should probably start being grateful to Mark Latham!
BTW – Jasmine is right to baulk at a “divorce” between the ALP and the union movement. This has nothing to do with history (though that’s important) but with structure. If the Libs lose the Federal election this year, they will be in office precisely nowhere. This is a much bigger problem for the Coalition than Labor precisely because of the existence of the union movement. If the ALP is out of office everywhere (as was the case in 1969-70), then Labor figures can still operate within the unions. If the Libs are out of office everywhere, where do they go? To business, to be sure, but history suggests that this is not a great way to keep up political experience. This is why the Labor Party has survived largely intact since 1891, despite not being in office that often, while the conservative side of politics has splintered several times.
Sorry Robert but i have disclosed it many times i started to annoy myself adding it to every post but……
Green Candidate for Kingston
AMWU delegate
Hugo,
What “long held rights” does WorkChoices take away from employees?
And I’m sorry but I thought the ALP actually supported a national IR system, seems the Whitlam Government certainly did in the 1974 referendum.
And yes we do have a ridiculously complex system of law in this country – shock horror that the ALP should be expected to fix it if they are elected.
And of course unions are for ALP apparatchiks to shelter within – I thought they were there to represent the interests of their members, oops silly me.
The total separation of the union movement and the ALP would weaken the later to the point of never winning an election but i would expect a new or amalgamation of the left into a more ‘radical’ ( in this climate of conservatism it would look radical) party with emphasis on workers rights social justice and the environment. As the pendulum has moved so far to the right it is a natural thing to start to swing back.
bill, is there a complete list of Green candidates available somewhere yet?
What i was trying to show with the dictatorship comparison is the loss of civil liberties in Nazi Germany Stalinist Russia etc shocked the world during those times, but what we are witnessing now is again the removal of those things which i posted before. On a different note the formation of a group of environmentalists to run for the senate seems strangely out of the blue. It will be interesting to watch which party they send preferences to. The Greens or more likely a major party to counter the possible election of more Green senators and gaining the balance of power. Like i have said before when a minor party becomes a threat you remove it by stealth. eg One Nation and Democrats. This is another road to dictatorship leaving only two major parties and the removal of those pesky irritating minor parties. This leaves no chance of having to form a coalition or policies blocked in the senate and this will destroy community groups that depend on a voice in Parliament be it environmental, religious or social justice groups and yes i see Family First as a threat to the major parties and they themselves will be engulfed by either the ALP or Libs. It is interesting to note that MPs in FF strong areas like Kingston are attending AOG churches and Christianity seems to be cool again with many a budding pollie and dare i say leader coming out ( sorry had to use the pun)
Edward I know you weren’t talking to me at all but here goes.
First answer – are you kidding – it explicity took away rights to fairness and its very purpose was to take away rights to union representation, bargaining power and pay….
Secondly you are right the libs will regret for many years centralising this power because Labor will be able to use something designed for evil for good.
No Adam NSW is in State election mode we in SA are still to finalize a few seats and as for the rest i haven’t heard
“Like i have said before when a minor party becomes a threat you remove it by stealth. eg One Nation and Democrats. This is another road to dictatorship leaving only two major parties and the removal of those pesky irritating minor parties”
Bill, the Democrats have “removed” themselves as a consequence of a majority of their senators some time ago effectively not recognising that the federal parliamentary party leader was chosen by Democrats members, not the parliamentary party.
Talk of dictatorship is absurd.
In addition, the Greens will probably be around for a while, especially there isn’t any other minor environmental, left or centre party.
Sacha i do believe we will be around and grow but as i said above
‘On a different note the formation of a group of environmentalists to run for the senate seems strangely out of the blue. It will be interesting to watch which party they send preferences to. The Greens or more likely a major party to counter the possible election of more Green senators and gaining the balance of power.’
I’m sorry Bill, I havn’t understood that paragraph both times it’s appeared. Do you mean in the NSW or Federal election, and which group of environmentalists are you talking about?
In the NSW election, a group calling itself “Climate Change…” are running for the Legislative Council, but, as we all know, they can’t direct preferences – that’s up to voters, and they wouldn’t have the people on the ground to hand out the millions of HTVs to do that. I think that they would be scraping off a small number of environmental voters from other parties, mostly the Greens.
It’s quite possible to have an environmental party with different policies to the Greens – there could exist a party that advocates pro-market and pro-environmental policies – my guess is that such a party would gain a couple of percentage points (maybe 3-5%), and possibly more if the Liberal party is on the nose.
In saying that, I’m not saying that the Greens don’t promote pro-market policies, but there’s electoral room for a centre-right environmental party.
Sacha in the Federal election
What scares me with all this environmental talk is the political gains the major parties have using that word and others like green , clean etc. Its not to be used to gain power its the future or lack of it for our children. The Greens have been pushing climate change solutions for years along comes the major parties hijacking it because all of a sudden theres an urgency and promote wishy washy policy. Its just too dangerous to play politics with
I’m intrigued to know what “pro-market environmental” policies might be.
Talk of a Democracy under Howard Bush Blair and co is absurd and i hope the ALP have the ticker to change that
Yasmine,
Its nice to talk in cliche and adjectives but what rights to “fairness” does it take away?
Sacha,
In answer to your point re CEOs and investment – I hope Adam is sitting down for this one – the workers of the world have to unite; i.e., work across borders to forestall any race to the bottom in working conditions.
Workers of the world unite! touch one touch all! brings back memories
The Howard government has tried to weaken the Union movement head on and failed. After the YR@W campaign has helped to catapult the ALP into government. The next assault on the Unions will come from within the ALP. I believe Rudd will reward the ACTU by promoting a slightly watered down version of Howards IR / work choices policy. The union movement cannot rest after an ALP victory as the fight has only begun
Edward – WorkChoices (ya gotta love the Orwellian names this government uses!) guarantees only minimum conditions. These include the minimum wage, 8 days sick leave, 4 weeks annual leave and a year’s unpaid maternity leave. Before the advent of these changes, minimum conditions were set by broad-reaching Awards, most of which had superior conditions to Howard’s minimum conditions. Whereas in the past empoyees were protected by the “no-disadvantage test”, that no longer applies. Consequently, thousands of employees have lost a great many conditions, as the “floor” for such things has dropped considerably. WorkChoices also puts great emphasis on AWAs. The government has gone to some lengths to ensure that we don’t have much in the way of detailed analysis of AWAs, but that which we do have shows that 100% of AWAs do away with at least one Award condition, 64% do away with penalty rates and most also do away with several other conditions. And don’t try and say that these employees either enter this by choice or are adequately compensated – this is patently not true.
Bill – you are right to be cautious of what a Labor government will do. It’s safe to say that they will keep elements of WorkChoices in place – certainly the Federal control will stay. Areas where they might water it down will be: to reintroduce the no-disadvantage test; introduce a rule where if the majority of employees want a collective agreement, the company has to negotiate; a beefing up of the IRC; an informal model of the unfair dismissal mechanism; and a move away from AWAs. This will make it a far preferable system to what is now in place, but probably not enough to frighten the horses.
Chris Curtis, what does this:
“the workers of the world have to unite; i.e., work across borders to forestall any race to the bottom in working conditions”
actually mean and how would it happen?
Sacha,
One story of the Middle Ages is that of how the king managed to centralise power away from the local barons, so the peasants could seek justice on the royal courts not at the local manor house (emphasis on “seekâ€).
Globalisation is occurring in the economic sphere (do you like that? – globalisation, sphere), but not the political one. In essence, ordinary people’s lives are subject to the trillions of dollars sloshing around the world in monetary transactions, but they have very little say because their national governments are frightened of the damage that can be done by those with the economic clout.
We need to build up union institutions across national boundaries, so that Bill’s “touch one touch all†applies to all working people – yes, I know it’s just a slogan. We also need to democratise world institutions; e.g., time to elect the United Nations General Assembly.
This topic deserves thousands of words, but this election discussion is not the place for them
Chris, many people have the view that the “race to the bottom” may also be characterised as “pulling the people at the bottom up”. What’s your view on this?
Did you miss the right to not be unfairly sacked disappearing Edward, and I like the new name thank you. (bit of a flash back).
I just noticed at Wikipedia that the SA Libs have endorsed Grant Chapman for another term in the Senate. You have to wonder about the Liberals sometimes. Chapman has been in and out of Parliament for 32 years and has never done or said a thing that I can recall. People accuse Labor of putting too many logs and hacks into Parliament, and frequently that criticism is justified. But consider: at this election, this Libs will be running Alan Cadman (age 70, 33 years a backbencher), Stewart McArthur (70, 23 years), Wilson Tuckey (72, 27 years, failed minister) and Bronwyn Bishop (65, 20 years, failed minister). Three of them in safe seats where new talent should be promoted and one in a key marginal which the Libs could well lose.
Now, now Adam don’t be unfair. Alan Cadman was a shadow minister for a few years when the Liberals were deeply depleted in numbers so he has not been a backbencher for all his 33 years. The same may be true of McArthur. And I’m sure he did something in that time, even if not one of us political obsessives can recall it.
It’s also worth considering the question of what political talent are they supposed to be promoting. Not long ago an article was hailing Andrew Lamming as the Libs most talented backbencher and someone who deserved quick promotion to the ministry. Liberal talent outside the current leadership is not thick on the ground.
Yes I see I have grieviously misrepresented Cadman. He was Parly Sec to the PM for two glorious years, and was shadow minister for immigration 1985-89. McArthur was on the opposition frontbench 1990-93. But both are total duds in terms of their contribution to parliament. Cadman speaks a lot but just recites whatever cliches have been put in his hand by the whips office. McArthur hardly says a word. I could add to the list Joanna Gash (62, 11 years a backbencher). Alby Schulz is 68 but I wouldn’t call him a log, he does add a bit of colour to the place.
Sacha,
I am about to be deprived of internet access, but I will get back to you. Remind me if I don’t.
Regards,
Chris
Yes, it was disappointing that the talented Turnbull and King had to fight it out for a(marginal-ish) seat in 2004 when you had the likes of Bishop and Cadman uselessly occupying very safe seats. To be fair, Labor has difficulty drafting in talent in large part because of all the dead wood in safe seats. Irwin, Hatton, Hoare and Hill all come to mind. Good gried, who are these people?
Peter King is a nice bloke but I wouldn’t call him talented. I watched him at some committee hearings in 2003 and thought he was a pretty dim bulb.
As to the Labor side, preselections are on hold until after the state elections. At least a couple of those you mention will be in some trouble. But it’s true that over the past 30 years the NSW branch has had a poor record of picking talent for its safe seats, although it did better in 2004 getting Garrett, Burke and Bowen in. In Victoria of course we had a big cleanout last year, and Shorten, Marles and Dreyfus are all ministerial material, as is Feeney if he gets up, which I increasingly think he will. If the left could bring themselves to get rid of Jenkins or Vamvakinou they could bring Combet in.
Yes, and I suspect that Combet won’t be interested if he isn’t offered a safe seat. He’d certainly be a big asset for Labor. Oh, but that’s right, the unions provide nothing but a bunch of hacks, don’t they EdwardStJohn?
On another matter, I can’t help feeling that the minor parties are going to be squeezed in this year’s election. The ALP vote has been firmed up by Rudd, and the issues – Iraq, climate change, IR – are taking on quite a polarising aspect. You’d expect the Democrats to be largely wiped out, and even the Greens may see a bit of a contraction in their vote (I think Nettle will be in some trouble in NSW).
However, assuming a Labor win and a subsequent double dissolution, we can expect to see the Senate fracture again in time.
I live next to Scullin, and I’ve heard rumblings from councillors and other prominent people about a possible alliance to kick Jenkins out (so as to force the ALP to choose some one else). Not large rumblings, but something might happen.
Well preselections in Victoria happened last year already, so Jenkins can’t be forced out unless he can be persuaded to go. The problem is that the more it looks like Labor will win, the more he will want to stay, so that he can be Speaker like his father was. I imagine Kim Carr will have to go and sit on him – a terrifying fate.
As to the Senate, Hugo, I agree – I have made my prediction somewhere here already – it will be Coalition 3, Labor 3 in every state except Tas, where Brown will hold his seat. That would give a Senate of Coalition 37, ALP 33, Greens 3, Family First 1. Of course if the current level of Labor support was maintained in October, Labor could take seats from the Coalition, but I’d be surprised.
Adam are you saying not only will the Greens not gain extra senate seats but will actually loose one?
Yes. Three quotas is only 42.9%. The disappearance of One Nation and the Democrats has boosted the primary vote of both major parties, to the point where the most likey result is 3 seats each. In 2001 the Greens won a seat in NSW with 4.3% of the vote, while in 2004 they got 7.3% and failed to win a seat. Why? Because the combined Coalition-ALP vote rose from 75.1% to 80.4%. In 2007 the Green vote could rise again to 10%, and they would still miss out. But I don’t think it will rise – Nettle is not a very conspicuous Senator and Rudd will bring a lot of the floaters back to Labor. The Coalition vote will fall, but not enough to cost them a seat, while the Labor vote will rise. Nettle will be left stranded with her primaries and nothing much else. The same will happen in the other states, except Tas.
Hugo said
On another matter, I can’t help feeling that the minor parties are going to be squeezed in this year’s election. The ALP vote has been firmed up by Rudd, and the issues – Iraq, climate change, IR – are taking on quite a polarising aspect. You’d expect the Democrats to be largely wiped out, and even the Greens may see a bit of a contraction in their vote (I think Nettle will be in some trouble in NSW).
That could happen if the ALP keeps its form to the polls but i cant see the Rudd/ALP staying this far in front all the way along. The sad thing is on the issues you mentioned above the Greens have much stronger policies but i doubt, due to the anti Green media they will see the light of day. I myself am running far left of the ALP in Kingston have been involved in the YR@W here and have been a union activist for many years turning up to actions where even the AMWU have not bothered. Along comes an outsider of Kingston gets preselected for the ALP and then starts turning up to meeting etc and gets a article in the local paper. There are parts of Kingston especially in the towns of Willunga, Aldinga , Maslins beach and possibly Mclaren Vale which have good Green booths. ( example 13.4% 10.33 % 9.22 %) and seaside suburbs booths pushing 9%. These are what you would call true green voters. The rest of Kingston sits around 5%. I would hope that my work as a unionist would increase that 5% but without any media coverage its going to be hard. Can you imagine the horror of the major party conservatives and their media buddies if the Greens could poll around 15 %!
Adam
If thats the case and if Rudd wins the workers will still be fighting for rights. Many Unionists are hoping for a Green controlled senate due to their IR policies. They want Bob Brown to visit Kingston and that would do wonders for me but i am being a bit selfish there. haha
Bill, I’m sure you are doing an excellent job drumming up the 10% or so “left” vote and feeding it to Amanda Rishworth as preferences. No doubt as a good SDA sister she will remember you in her prayers. But as a minor party candidate that’s all you can expect to do. As Hugo said, the real worth of the Greens is getting issues on the table so that the major parties respond with policies of their own. Read Chris Evans on coal in today’s Australian. He has taken a sensible centre posiition between the Libs and the Greens – and he is a leader of the Labor left, by the way. But it was Brown’s raising of the issue that got it on the front burner, so to speak.
I did get the childhood obesity and tuck shop debate into the last state election. From one letter i wrote it snowballed to radio and had the local MP stating ” The community is not ready to take that responsibility ” after community support went for 3 weeks it suddenly became an ALP policy. Pity one year on and we now have the government slashing spending on physical education in schools. As for the SDA what a useless waste of space its unions with weak leaders that show a need to have one big super union worldwide but then i am delving into the Wobblies territory .
Adam, I am sure you meant Coalition 39, ALP 33, Green 3 FF 1. What do you think of the Greens chances in picking up a seat off the Coalition in Vic or SA? As you mention possibly the ALP could pick up 4 in one or two states, also the best chance being in SA and Vic with the current polls.
Either option would need the ALP and Greens to swap preferences in both states.
Could you comment Bill?
Yes that’s what I meant.
I think the Greens have zero chance anywhere except Tas and possibly WA, for the reasons described above. The collapse of the Dems and ON virtually guarantees that both Labor and the Coalition will get close to 3 quotas in the other four states, leaving no surplus for the Greens, and the Greens are not going to get a quota in their own right.
It’s possible that Labor will gain seats from the Coalition, but I think it is unlikely. I will be happy to be proved wrong.
Labor won`t get 4 senators up in any state.
Any surplus over a third quota would be distributed for a Green vs Liberal fight(barring a Vic 2004 FF like thing).
Question: where will Peter Andren run?
* Where voters in the new Calare come from: Calare: 54.2, Parkes 41.8, Gwydir 3.9
* Where voters in the new Macquarie come from: Macquarie 51.3, Calare 42.7, Lindsay 5.8, Gwydir 0.2
* Where voters in the old Calare have gone: Calare 55.0, Macquarie 45.0
All this suggests that Andren should contest Calare.
That assumes a uniform vote across the old electorate. In rural areas in the old electorate and in Orange he polled in the 60% band. In the population centre of Bathurst he polled around 75%. In Lithgow 80%.
Check out the Booth results from 2004.
While Andren would clearly win if he moved west, his strongest areas are moving east into Macquarie. Given that he’s got a hard road ahead in either Calare or Macquarie, if he wants to be sure of holding his seat, he’s likely to come east.
The question is whether he is indeed a man of integrity and principle, or if he’s actually just keen on staying in, no matter what. I mean, if he is about giving country people the voice that the Nationals no longer provide, as he’s said all along, he should go west and fight the Nats, rather than coming east, into a metropolitan/regional seat, and fighting Labor.
I thought the open secret in and around Orange was that Andren would run in Calare where he will be up against the demoted “assistant minister” John Cobb.
The Nats must be disappointed by Cobbie. After his time leading the NSW Farmers Association, there was talk of him as a future leader, but his performance in the House and as a junior minister have left very little confidence in him.
Which begs the question – who could succeed Vaile as Nats’ leader? Truss might be deputy, but the thought of a Qld Nat in charge of the party just seems a little too crazy…
Cobb is a total dud, Truss is reasonably competent but very dull, McGauran is a goose, and who else is there? The Nats do have a serious lack of talent. That’s why they are keen to get Larry Anthony back in Page.
Yes, you know you’re in trouble if Noah Vaile is the only plausible leader. Why are we talking about his succession? Are the rumours about the melanoma true?
If the polls stay this bad for the government, what are the chances of Jeanette coming down with a “serious illness” necessitating JWH’s retirement in, say, July? Unlikely, to be sure, but he’d probably rather history saw him “cutting & running” rather than “losing after staying on too long”.
Interesting analysis from Cameron on Lateline last night – basically that the great unwashed are a bit sick of Howard, and that the phrase “cunning politician” was morphing from a compliment to a criticism. There’s always the risk for a leader of Howard’s vintage that he would overnight transform from a “wise & sagacious” leader, to one who’s just “old & past it”.
The thought processes of the masses are indeed a deep mystery. At what point for example did all the qualities Keating had been admired for all his career suddenly become negatives? Why did they suddenly turn on Kennett? Why are they willing to forgive Iemma all failures? There is a very wide cultural gulf between us of the chattering classes, whatever our politics, and them of the non-chattering classes, who don’t know why they behave the way they do and therefore can’t tell us.
Adam and Hugo,
None of this really matters chaps, The economy is doing well and there are 7 Labor state Governments, the rodent aint going anywhere come October – and dont forget Julia MEDICARE GOLD has still to come out and produce a TURKEY of a policy with DOUGIE at the ALP national conference next month.
*counts states on fingers, can’t think of seventh state* – nauru?
Sadly I’m not a delegate next month, sure the PTB will ensure I’m there next time but having declared that lack of conflict … can’t see if running anyway but like clockwork.
Any sparks will be well scripted and the fire put out by the ‘brilliant statesman and leader’.
If the ALP and Greens can do a preference deal i think the Greens could win an extra seat or two in the senate. I think the Greens will push Downer in Mayo as well
It’s either six state governments or eight state/territory governments. Or Ed counted his thumb twice. Or he could have been including a state of denial.
Mr Q said: “Or he could have been including a state of denial”
The funniest thing i have heard all month.
bill I have carefully explained twice now why it not likely that the Greens will win more Senate seats. Either you have to agree with me or you have to refute my arithmetic. You can’t just go on asserting it as a matter of faith.
As to Mayo, the Democrats gave Downer a scare in 1998 when John Schuman outpolled the ALP. But as I have said before, you can’t just assume that the Greens will inherit the whole Democrat vote. A lot of Democrats have gone back to the Liberals, others have gone to Labor. The Democrats challenged Downer from the centre, you are trying to do it from the left. I think you will find that people in the Adelaide Hills like their cars and their fur coats more than you think. Schuman got 22% of the vote. In 2004 the Green got 7.6%. You might get up to 10 or 15 but you won’t get ahead of Labor.
Adam, yet again the whole loss of cars and fur coats fiction comes out. I know you aren’t stupid enough to believe it, so don’t spread lies. The Greens aren’t against cars, they are against using fossil fuel for the sake of using it. As for fur coats, there aren’t that many fur coats that are real fur coats, thus there is no problem.
You ask Bill to rebut your numbers with his numbers (logic), whilst you refute arguaments with obvious lies. So you must either be hypocritical or a moron. Or maybe both
Lol – yes I didnt even think of toytown – home of the Al Grassby statue and yes NT is not a state.
But Hugo/Adam so unions have produced parliamentarians who have been other then hacks – name one after hawke?
Sacha,
You ask me what my view is on the characterisation of the “race to the bottom†as “pulling the people at the bottom upâ€. The topic deserves more than can be dealt with here, but I will give a few thoughts.
110 years ago, if you wanted to bring something from NSW into the progressive state of Victoria, you would have had to pay a tariff. Federation put an end to that, and no one says we should go back to creating Victoria as a separate manufacturing or economic entity. The world must and will take the same path. Eventually, though not in my lifetime, we will have one world economy, one world currency and one world government. These things will not result from a grand plan – they will evolve.
When a peasant in a poor country leaves the farm for a poorly paid job in the city, he may be taking a step up compared to what he has known. So we ought to be gradually opening our economy to the efforts of other nations to help that person. But we cannot do it quickly for it would create too much dislocation here.
We need to be conscious that the purpose of the union movement is to distribute the wealth created. We are in an era when company profits as a percentage of GDP are the highest they have ever been – and it’s not regarded as an issue, not even by the ‘leftâ€. We should therefore assist the union movement in other countries.
I am conscious that this discussion is off-topic, but I believe that the Labor Party should not apologise for its union links. I know we cannot recreate the highly unionised workforce of 30 and 50 years ago, but I do not think the Liberal tactics of union-bashing are anything to be frightened of.
Bill,
I admire your determination and commitment. I used to think like you when I was a DLP candidate – jus a bit more effort and I would eventually get enough votes for preferences to come from someone to push me over the line. I’m not saying that you expect to win personally, but your belief in the Greens makes you think they are going to do better than they will. In the 1977 Greensborough by-election, in what I think was a first in Australia, we hand-addressed, hand-sorted and hand-delivered letters to every voter, with a separate letter to teachers, given my background in teaching in and unionism. My vote went up, but unfortunately it was the Democrats’ first outing, and they had the media on side. Without the Democrats, I would have done better, but not by a lot. Basically, the DLP was on the slide – and nothing I did -either publicly or within the party – could stop that. The Greens aren’t on the slide, but there is a limit to their appeal, and that’s just the way life is.
It is easy to criticise the SDA. Teachers are forever criticising the weakness of the AEU, but then they go and vote for the deterioration in conditions that it agrees to in its EBA. Most teachers do not vote in union elections. Given the quality of the opposition group, which still thinks it’s 1970, this is not surprising, but you would think that somewhere in the profession there are some talented people willing to put a realistic alternative view. The retail workforce is largely female, young and casual. The SDA people I know are genuine decent people who are as appalled at the Howard government’s IR laws as you are, but they are not in an industry whose personnel are militant. Don’t forget that miners, once in the most militant union you could have, have sold out the whole idea of solidarity by signing individual contracts in their thousands.
Chris, thanks for your reply.
Hi Chris thank you for the complements and your background as a DLP candidate. The problem i have with the SDA is not the membership but the leaders. Two years ago Howard attended a Liberal conference at the Festival theater in Adelaide. There was an action organized by students who worked at the various fast food restaurants etc which was against the introduction of Howards IR laws. There was no representation by the SDA bosses leaving it to the students to organize themselves and spreading the word. It was attended by the Greens AMWU, students, anarchists and the DSP/SA with some elderly pedestrians joining in. Scuffles broke out due to the Police pushing everyone back as first Vanstone and then Howard showed up. The best action i saw that day was an elderly lady standing face to face with a policeman and silently shaking her head. If the SDA had got of its backside the numbers would have showed Howard they meant business but alas it was not to be. Inactivity breeds complacency and shows anti worker forces where to attack first.
Hi Adam i cannot produce any figures to refute your ideas just a belief that unless we suffer another false anti Green campaign the Greens will produce more senators. We will have to wait and see.
Bill,
I stand ready to be corrected on this, but the only street protests that I can recall that ever had a significant effect on politics were those over Vietnam. S11, G20, XXX, George Bush with a little moustache, mindless chanting – none of them mean anything in the big scheme of things. (I confess I did attend the first anti-Kennett march in Melbourne, but I found myself in fear of being run over by a truck literally a metre behind me which those with some authority thought was safe to be driven in the midst of hundreds of people, so that was the end of this ex-DLPer’s physical protest activity.) Change in a democratic society comes via a different route.
If the members of the SDA are unhappy with their leaders, they are free to organise and elect different ones. You are obviously free to criticise the leaders of the SDA, but I don’t think it will get you anywhere.
Chris said :The Greens aren’t on the slide, but there is a limit to their appeal, and that’s just the way life is.
Thats true but what do people who like myself believe in Green principles? Join the ALP left faction to become another voiceless member with the rest? With the Greens i not only believe in our policies but have a voice and there are ample opportunities to be involved in all parts of the party. For two long i was just a voter moving from the ALP to the Democrats and finally with the Greens. It was when i was handing How to vote cards for a small party in SA that i talked to a Green member and went home thinking this guy makes sense. I am the tireless worker that would normally work in the background. For me to be a candidate has been a big turn around as i am quite shy but having to change this has made me a better person
Santo Santoro has just resigned over his share dealings as he quotes it “a number of oversights”
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21392639-1702,00.html
The government is steadily losing its grip especially in QLD.
Also Morgan Poll just out – steady at 61-39 to the ALP
http://www.roymorgan.com/news/polls/2007/4149/
Chris YR@W actions are making a huge difference. it will have the ALP candidate win in Kingston as it will in most marginals.
From Lib briefing
The Prime Minister today released the following statement:
“Earlier today I accepted the resignation of Santo Santoro as Minister for Ageing.
After a detailed review of his financial records, required by me, he provided advice indicating a number of investments not hitherto disclosed to the Senate or to me.
He has written to the Registrar of Senators’ Interests today providing the relevant information.
While commonsense needs to be applied to issues of ministerial conduct including the capacity to accept inadvertent error, circumstances such as those now outlined by him are unacceptable.
Senator Santoro clearly has failed to comply with the rules of the Senate and has not made the disclosures to me required of him as a Minister.
He had no option but to resign.”
Once a government’s luck turns, it REALLY turns. I see Hardgrave has committed political suicide today as well (Australian, p2). Milton Dick must be positively tumescent with glee.
If the polls turned into the actual result “61-39 to the ALP” nation wide How many seats would the ALP win?
Too many for a healthy democracy. Thankfully, that won’t happen
It seems Labor have picked up Morteon (Gary Hardgrave’s seat)… the first win for Labor of the election.
Labor 61% of the 2PV would be a 17% swing, which would leave the Coalition with 12 seats.
Here is the link (I hope) to the item mentioned above by Adam on Gary Hardgrave in todays copy of The Australian…
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21390681-5006786,00.html
At least Gary Hardgrave got one thing right, when he reportedly said… “how stupid the faction-driven Queensland Liberal Party can be”. I suppose that he should know better than most of us.
I am certain that whatever the ultimate result nationally, the ALP in Qld will gain a much better than average swing (or in case of some dire eventuality, due to circumstances as yet unseen, less of a negative one).
i know im late but on the SDA
a pack of middle aged women dont care for politics generally.
the reason for the the sda inability to mobilise is because it isnt like other unions, it rarely strikes, it cosies upto the businesses its meant to fight with and its member ship dont think the union actually does anything for it
SDA people are members but not believers in their union.
I know this from too many years at coles myer
if 61-39 was the election result Labor would win about 55 of the coalition’s seats, as adam said leaving them with 12.
It is a truely strange situation when the Roy Morgan results start to sound sensible, i’m wondering if the other polling companies have caught the strange Morgan disease and are grossly overestimating the alp vote
POLITICAL UPDATE
The Howard government look over. One or two more disasters (and with interest rates and inflation going up) as i said, it’s Rudd if he wants it.
Thank you Queenslander you have shown the points i was making. The choice in Kingston on the anti Howard side is a non resident { of Kingston) SDA ALP candidate or a long time resident AMWU delegate Green.
NEWSPOLL NEXT WEEK
I think Labor’s and Rudd ratings will go up at average of 2% maybe.
More importantly is, how can the government get back. Except with 24 hours with the Brian Burke thing and slightly with the Murray-Darling thing, they just don’t seem to have any momentum on their side at the moment.
My thinking is that they are using 2004 tactics for a 2007 electraote. And at the moment their failing either out of changing situations (Iraq) or just general government clumsiness (what happened today).
At the moment you feel they have only one weapon. The economy. My feeling is if they want to start getting dominance of Rudd over this, they have to start this week. Lay off the name-calling unless it’s relevant to what you’re talking about and let Howard/Costello and Rudd/Swan have a good debate about economic debate (especially with inflation and interest rates expected to rise, this will make for a good debate). If they don’t, by early May, they will not look urgent. And that’s Howard’s problem. He’s expecting to win like in 2004. And i don’t know whether he’s got enough advantages to do that (even the economy ie:interest rate broken promises could be a weakness.
What was “the Murray-Darling thing”? Was Andrew Murray found in bed with Captain Darling?
I have made eight unsuccessful attempts to post to this thread. This is a test.
That worked, so I will break my post into smaller bits.
Bill,
You are right to say that YR@W is making a difference, but I don’t think big – okay, not that small – rallies at the MCG have helped.
If I were you I would disabuse myself of the notion that the ALP left faction is left. It’s best thought of as a tribe, rather than an ideological entity. I’m not in the ALP left faction, so I am not voiceless.
It won’t allow any more. This is another test.
I’m not saying to give up the Greens either.
Just be prepared for disappointment. As the counting proceeded in the 1970 Senate election, it was apparent that we would get Frank McManus, Vince Gair and Jack Kane elected.
At the Midhurst booth, which we had not previously manned, we got, from memory, 30 per cent of the vote. I thought this was the beginning of new triumphs for the DLP. There were even articles in the press about the DLP winning House of Reps seats because there were places where we had outpolled the Libs. In fact, this was the last hurrah.
I do not regret my involvement in the DLP or my candidacy for it. It was a valuable learning experience. We were treated like lepers by the press, lied about, abused, etc, etc. We were labelled right-wing, fascist, etc, etc, when we were a progressive party. Even today the ALP is adopting DLP policies, probably unknowingly. There are still people around today who say the most idiotic things about the DLP. But that’s politics. You have to get used to it.
The Greens are the third party of choice, just as the DLP once was and then the Democrats were – but I do not think the Greens will ever be any more than that. Even so, being the third party of choice gives you some influence.
There is a missing sentence after “Jack Kane elected.”. Nothing I do will get this site to accept it.
I was so excited that I rushed down to the Greensborough booth and held up a sign for the DLP scrutineers to see through the window to show our success.
That is a slight rewording of the original sentence. This is just weird.
Wouldn’t 61% of the 2PP vote be a 14% swing, not 17%?
God, imagine what would happen if two Howard Government ministers were found in bed together!
Chris, this site has been set up so that it automatically rejects any mention of J*ck K*ne.
C-Woo, that would depend on which two ministers they were. The laws of defamation and good taste preclude any further comment.
Jack Kane!
Psephophile, I believe it would be 13.7%, not 17. Either way, they’re the sorts of numbers you’d think unlikely – I stuck a uniform 13.7% swing into a little pendulum toy I put together, and came up with this: http://flag.eaglesflyinghigh.com/election/index.php?snap=2
I think most people would find that unlikely…
I missed this interesting commentary on the “doctors wives” when it came out. This is part of Howard’s problem in Bennelong and Turnbull’s in Wentworth: http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,20867,21315015-28737,00.html
Chris I was always under the impression that the DLP were the right of the ALP- Catholic anti communists and became a preference machine for the Liberals. Can you tell Chris what the DSP were all about? I love learnibg and this site is great for that
A new phenomenon i have seen in Kingston is the “Union Wives” There seems to be an increasing trend for Union wives and even ALP wives becoming Green voters and even members
I said it some time ago but the governments problem is that it has too many bushfires to put out – David Hicks, Iraq, IR Laws, Climate Change, Howard seen as too old etc. In 2004, everything was relatively smooth and they just had to wait until Latham self imploded, which he did – Rudd won’t do that and thats the problem. He isn’t out there in everyones face like Latham was. Its only strength is the economy however the down side is that interest rates went up 3 times in the past 12 months and the RBA has put it on the record that it may yet have to move. Thats important coz it constrains Howard and Co in the May Budget – too many giveaways and the RBA puts them up and that will be the final nail in the Coalition coffin. Its amazing how a change in leader can the dynamics of politics.
I still reckon if things aren’t on the improve by end of April, Howard will retire. He won’t be able to face the prospect of 1) losing his seat and 2) losing government.
The opinion polls have been showing trends for the past 15 or so months and the Lib/Nat primary vote has been stagnating around the 40% mark whilst Howards approval ratings have barely been above 50% (only 6 Newspolls in 15 months). It has all been there but the key difference is that the ALP with Beazley at the helm didn’t offer hope to the voters, Rudd has and the polls are a reflection of that.
The old adage – “Governments lose elections, Oppositions don’t win them” – is playing out yet again, it seems.
I believed that Rudd would have obtained a swing of approx. 6% in Qld when he took over. Given whats happening in Qld, I reckon 8% is now on the cards in Qld.
Could Kelvin Thomson be a problem for the ALP in Vic at the Fed election?
Bill,
It won’t let me post at any length again.
It could be a Trotskyite fringe party of some sort, still waiting for the revolution that has been and gone.
The DSP.
The Democratic Labor Party was formed by anti-communists “expelled†by the ALP in 1955 (Victoria), 1956 (NSW) and 1957 (Queensland). It recommended preferences to the Liberals ahead of the ALP in order to keep the ALP out of office till it reformed. While to the right of the ALP of 50 years ago, it would be on many issues (IR, privatisation, deregulation, PPPs) to the left of the ALP today.
I would like to reply at great length, but it would really take the discussion away from the topic of this thread and, based on past experience, it would encounter the computer problems of my previous attempted response to you. I have put a lot of material on the upperhouse site under the thread about the DLP and on this site under various threads related to the 2006 Victorian election. I also recommend The Split, by Robert Murray, The Pope’s Battalions, by Ross Fitzgerald, and The Great Labor Schism, by Brian Costar et al.
As a Green, you may be interested to know that I got the DLP to add an environmental principle to its basic objectives in August 1974:
‘The protection and conservation of the natural environment and the planned use of natural resources in recognition of the close relationship between man and nature and the finite nature of the earth’s resources.’
The sentence it will not accept did not mention Jack Kane.
I will now try phrase by phrase – I don’t know
- a lot about -
It will not accept the name of the DSP.
- the Democratic -
It blocks the second word.
- even with an * – Party.
Thanks Chris can you give me the link to I have put a lot of material on the upperhouse site under the thread about the DLP and on this site under various threads related to the 2006 Victorian election. As for the DSP i meant to say DLP as i did flirt with the DSP/SA many years ago but they were too dogmatic, no chance to have a personal say. As i think you would have experienced being involved with a small party has many pluses. The involvement at a higher level, The chance of being a candidate, members listen to you more, job satisfaction and what others would class as small wins in elections are in fact huge if the parties were even. At this stage i doubt many Greens, FF , DLP would think they could win a lower house seat but i believe that will come. As the major parties lean further and further to the right it allows for lefty type parties and independents to gain votes in a wide range of seats. I think the chances of FF ever gaining a lower house seat is minimal considering their base is supermarket Christians where churches in the electorate bulge and sag due to them having the latest miracle fad ( how do i know this? I was a member for 4 years of a pentecostal baptist church ). The closest AOG type churches near me have grown moved grown again fallen apart and moved back to grow again. People actually will move house to be close to this type of moving church. What is another negative for FF is their belief that God will do what needs to be done so just pray and believe. This goes against being in parliament and making things happen yourself. I have witnessed and reported to the authorities the attempted stoning of native birds guarding their young by Christian youth as church leaders looked on laughing. The FF party is a contradiction
Bill,
If you look at the right-hand side of the pollbludger homepage you will find a heading for the Victorian election. The other link is http://www.upperhouse.info. At the side of the homepage is a list of topics. The most relevant is “An original DLP take on the new DLPâ€. I have no other comments as I do not intend to spend my life splitting posts into phrases.
Makin.
After reading the paper and seeing Bob Day’s “Interest rates aren’t the problem”, I think it’s goodnight to the Liberals in this marginal.
Another thing.
Do you think that Newspoll figures on Tuesday will be similar to ACNeilsen & Morgan’s recent ones?
I would say that all 3 marginals in SA will go to the ALP. I am starting to think Boothby will fall also
Are there Labor candidates in the field in Boothby and Sturt yet?
Havent heard as yet Adam
bill, if you were part of the DSP/SA you would have no chance of influencing public policy whatsoever. As a member of the Greens you might have much more ability to do that, even if it’s hardly any say.
My spies tell me that the Liberals have endorsed the former MP Ken Aldred, a well known crackpot and LaRouche sympathiser, for the marginal seat of Holt.
* http://www.wej.com.au/adc/profiles/paranoid.html
* http://www.aijac.org.au/review/1999/244/ed.html
* http://www.greenleft.org.au/1997/286/16245
This will be a fairly large-sized scandal. It also shows how little chance the Libs give themselves of winning a key marginal like Holt, where the demographics are moving in their favour and where they got a big swing last time.
Not able too say too much without compromising my anonimity, but Aldred’s victory was more to do with two rather big cock-ups by the Kroger forces (who were hoping to get Emmanuel Cicchiello preselected, and should have easily had the numbers) in the final week of campaigning which seemed to annoy many people in their own faction, handing victory to Aldred.
A “fairly large-sized scandal” it may turn out to be. But as yet there is zero coverage of this in the mainstream media.
You won’t find any mention of it in today’s Crikey either.
The media are probably exhasuted from covering the mud fights of the last two weeks. It’s probably reaching the stage where ministerial resignations are no longer news!
It really doesn’t matter what Aldred’s victory was “due to,” he is now the Liberal candidate, and this will no doubt be brought to Howard’s attention in Question Time tomorrow. Since it was Howard who got Aldred disendorsed in 1996, after his slanderous attack on Mark Leibler (a Liberal donor), this will be a bit awkward for him.
The Advertiser reports today that Bob Day, the multi-millionaire businessman who is the Liberal candidate for Makin, has so far spent $100,000 even before the election campaign has begun. The builder and businessman is sending packs containing mini-rulers, notepads, calendars and eight-page glossy brochures to each of Makin’s 95,000 voters and is taking out half-page advertisements in local newspapers. His Labor opponent, described by Day as a “fantastic Salisbury mayor”, has spent a few hundred dollars on business cards and a fax machine. Political analyst Haydon Manning said it wouldn’t be surprising if the Liberals retained Makin against a national trend.
You took my thunder Phil. I brought the paper home just to write it. What is interesting to look at is the answers the 3 people they interviewed on the question How much is the way you vote influenced by political advertising? person 1: “No political advertising wont influence me at all. I already know who i am going to vote for in the election. advertising wont change the way i am going to vote” person 2: “I don’t think it would influence who i vote for. Bribery’s not going to win me over. i haven’t made up my mind who im going to vote for yet. I don’t even know who’s running.” person 3 ” If ones advertising and the other is not, i guess they’re the ones you will know. Ill probably decide on the day. If they’re giving away free stuff it could change my mind”
So we have one decided, two undecided and one of those two could be bought with “free stuff”
Sad state of affairs where someone can be bought with a ruler and note pads. Very sad indeed for democracy.
Isn’t there a law against giving gifts to electors? There certainly is in the UK.
What is said is not the first couple that give out gifts its the snowballing affect where everyone will try to out do each other. I suppose i could give out native tree seedlings but could only afford one little street
from the ABC just to show my point
A Democrats candidate on the New South Wales north coast is giving away free beer in the lead-up to next week’s state election.
Ben Smith is standing in the safe Nationals seat of Ballina.
He says distributing stubbies of beer with his name and picture on the label is a novel way of raising his profile.
Mr Smith says the stunt would make the party’s founder, the late Don Chipp, proud.
“We’re a good commonsense party and this is basically just about the promotion of Australia values,” he said.
“Also I guess having a bit of a laugh and not taking yourself too seriously.”
The “treating” law in the UK was introduced precisely to stop candidates giving out free beer, thus corrupting the vote.
bill you could give out little bottles of whale oil for people to light their homes with when Bob Brown shuts down the coal industry (joke)
Newspoll just in on Lateline – also 61-39.
I tipped this!
Threadsters, you now have a new home. This one is closed.