Galaxy: 56-44 to Coalition
GhostWhoVotes reports that a Galaxy poll, conducted from a sample of 995 from Friday to Sunday, has the Coalition leading 56-44 on two-party preferred, from primary votes of 31% for Labor, 49% for the Coalition and 12% for the Greens. Supplementary questions find 64% believing the government is worse off now than it was under Kevin Rudd, against 20% who think it better off; 59% believing the Prime Minister has failed to deliver an effective policy to reduce carbon emissions, against 59% who believe she has; and 57% saying she has failed in sharing the benefits of the mining boom, against 29% who say she has succeeded. There is also a frankly silly question as to whether the government has succeeded in stopping asylum seeker boats, to which 9% (presumably Labor partisans irritated by the question) wrongly said yes, and 80% offered the obvious response.
UPDATE: Essential Research records two-party preferred steady at 56-44, from primary votes of 33% for Labor (up one), 49% for the Coalition (steady) and 10% for the Greens (steady). Other questions cover most trusted party to handle various issues (Greens environment and climate change, Labor industrial relations, Liberal everything else); whether the economy is heading in the right or wrong direction (43-32 in favour, compared with 36-41 against in March); trust in people and organisations (Kevin Rudd and Malcolm Turnbull do better than Julia Gillard and Tony Abbott, who do better than Clive Palmer and Gina Rinehart; and bias in media reporting in favour or against various groups (Liberals and business seen to do better than Labor and unions).
In other news, some state, territory and local government matters of note:
• Roy Morgan has published three phone polls of state voting intention for New South Wales, Victoria and Queensland on Friday, from a small combined sample of 811. While the margins of error are about 5.5%, the results are roughly in line with other polling in showing little change on the most recent elections, with the conservative incumbents leading 52-48 in Victoria and 62-38 in both New South Wales and Queensland. Personal ratings show a strikingly poor result for Ted Baillieu, at 29% approval and 53.5% disapproval. The polls were conducted on the Tuesdays and Wednesdays of the previous two weeks.
• I have lazily neglected to cover the publication of draft boundaries for the state redistribution in South Australia, but as always Antony Green has been well and truly on the job. The proposals have been uncommonly controversial in that they have essentially ignored the legislative injunction that the commissioners must, “as far as practicable”, draw boundaries which on the basis of the previous election results would have achieved “fairness” with respect to the major parties’ shares of seats and two-party preferred votes. Given Labor’s success in winning 26 out of 47 seats at the 2010 election from 48.4% of the two-party vote, this would have demanded tremendous creativity on the part of the redistribution commissioners, and presumably some very contorted electoral boundaries designed to slash Labor members’ margins.
• Refugee advocate Linda Scott has won the “community preselection” to determine Labor’s candidate to take on Clover Moore in the Sydney lord mayoral election in September. Half of the vote was determined by a ballot open to any of the 90,000 voters in the municipality (albeit that they were required to pledge that they were not members of a rival party), with the other half determined by party members. It attracted 400 party members and 3900 non-members. Labor will now trial the procedure in five yet-to-be-decided seats for the next 2015 state election. However, Andrew Crook of Crikey has reported the party’s various state branches are backing away from the idea of conducting primaries for the federal election, which they had been encouraged to pursue by the December national conference and the Bracks-Carr-Faulkner post-election review.
• Antony Green has published his guide to the Northern Territory election on August 25.
Federal preselection news:
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Categories: Federal Politics 2010-
For those few of us interested in the reform of unions, Robert McClelland fires a broadside at Gillard & Shorten:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/fairwork/story-fn59niix-1226404844642
by Thornleigh Labor Man on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:44 am
Thanks OPT.
I might get to Land Downunder this weekend!
by Lynchpin on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:46 am
I’ve never commented on Julian Assange, i won’t in future and I’m not interested in further discussion. All I want to say is this – if the bloke had exercised some self control, had used condoms and had made sure that his attentions were wanted by the women involved then he would not be in his current predicament. Why this country is supposed to pull out all the stops to help someone who when it’s all boiled down to the basics is just a badly behaved rat is something I don’t understand.
by leone on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:46 am
I see the Fortescue metals Appeal against the MRRT has now been lodged.
This is the Appeal that the WA and QLD Governments had made noises about joining-in, but backed down after receiving ‘legal advice’. Thay were going to argue that the tax was in fact a Royalty and that only the Crown in the right of each State could levy Royalties.
This, apparently, may not be the case at all. The right to levy Royalties might in fact, since Federation, reside with the Crown in right of the Commonwealth of Australia instead.
They backed-out because any adjudication of the issue in the HC would have torpedoed their right to levy Royalties if it went against them and they weren’t prepared to risk that portion of their Budget income on a roll of the judicial dice.
Smart move.
by smithe on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:48 am
Those of you who have been following the Ashyb/Brough scandal might enjoy separate articles by Ms Hannah Low and Ms Verona Burgess in today’s ‘Financial Review’. If you just want to read one, I suggest that of Ms Low, by a country mile.
An interesting tidbit from Ms Low: wtte, that Harmer’s follow a practice, at times, of launching a media blitz in order to create the kind of situation whether opponents are happy to settle. Clearly, the Ashby strategy was consistent with this.
IMHO, equally clearly, it is in the Commonwealth’s interest to nail Mr Ashby for politically motivated bastardisation of both Ms Slipper and ov the law, if it can do so. So settlement was not on the immediate horizon.
Ms Burgess is very strongly critical of Ms Roxon for going to the media.
Putting the two together, since Mr Ashby’s team has gone to the media, it is unreasonable to expect the Commonwealth, which is a defendant, not to go to the media.
OTOH, Ms Roxon has responsibility as minister for maintaining signfiicant parts of Australia’s legal structure. She is therefore a keeper of the rules and a participant under the rules. This is potentially an awkward conflict of interest situation. Paticularly so when your opponent rushes to the media to try and damage your interssts.
I suggest that Ms Roxon should not have been the one who went to the media on the issue but another minister, perhaps, or a senior relevant public servant.
But then Ms Burgess, without noting anything odd about it, makes the observation that Ms Roxon has put her public servants at grave risk of Mr Abbott’s ‘revenge’.
Call me old-fashioned but how intellectually-corrupt can journalistic standards of critical thought be, when a journalist just casually write as if there is a reasonable expectation that Mr Abbott would act in a vengeful fashion, and that that is not even worth discussing?
Instead of giving Ms Roxon the fulsome rounds of the kitchen sink, shouldn’t Ms Burgess be saying someting mildly critical about her not-so-sanguine expectations of Mr Abbott? Even in passing?
by Boerwar on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:49 am
As he has not as yet been formally questioned, we can’t know that this is so. For all we know, the claims are entirely bogus.
Yet even if he had done as is suggested, his predicament is entirely a product of the wider context rather than the event itself. In normal circumstances, he’d have been questioned in Sweden and the matter dealt with at the time according to law.
Accordingly, he is in this predicament because of who he is rather than what he has allegedly done.
by Fran Barlow on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:51 am
No you’re entitled to your opinion, your just not entitled to have that opinion taken seriously if you’re not willing to take on board the other P.O.V.
If all your going to do is stand on the side-lines and pontificate to others that they are wrong, all the time, then why should any one listen to you ?
Theres nothing principled in the attitude that you’re always right and everybody else is wrong. Which is the position that the greens seem to always take.
There are consequenses in standing on “principle” as we have seen in this latest tragedy.
If the Greens were willing to comprimise then we could have an ethical solution to Refugees that doesn’t see them drown on leaky people smugglers boats
Your tedious waffle hides you’re “intellectual accumen”
by Mick Collins on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:51 am
You’re = your
by Mick Collins on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:54 am
‘Don’t Come Here By Sea!’
We’ve heard your stories one and all.
Widow, orphan, soldier amputee,
And how you strive to reach landfall
Here beyond the Arafura Sea.
You know that if you come by boat
People smugglers charge a hefty fee;
No guarantee you’ll stay afloat
To journey’s end across the Timor Sea.
If Tony Abbott now held sway
He’d stop your boat. That’s his policy.
He’d turn you round, have you towed away,
Deaf to your cries, back to the cruel sea.
A plan to lessen your suffering
Is proposed by the ALP,
Anxious to find a buffering
Between Oz and the surrounding sea.
It’s suggested by PM Gillard,
Wherever your starting point may be,
Boarding leaky boats must be barred.
You may not risk your life at sea!
There now will be an orderly queue
For you to join, perhaps certainty
That at last we might welcome you.
Though for that, you’ll have to wait and see.
Be patient. Understand you’re seeking refuge
In a land already sanctuary
To people whose anxiety is huge,
Girt as Australia is by sea.
Things here aren’t what they used to be
When we had endless plains to share
With those who came across the sea.
So forget all that, and – ‘Come By Air!’
by PatriciaWA on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:54 am
Actually Mick, it’s your own ignorant, tribal, ill-considered and intemperate venting that is the clue to your intellectual and ethical acumen.
by Fran Barlow on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:55 am
Twiggy’s case holds that the MRRT discriminates against different states in contravention of s51(ii).
In the landmark HC case of Commissioner of Taxation V Clyne (Clyne argued that having different taxation zones based on (adverse) climate was “discrimination”) he too tried to push it up hill with a pointed stick and failed.
In his judgement Webb J said that applying taxation according to how mother nature defines different parts of the country is not discrimination such as is proscribed by s51(ii).
So if one state has more mineral wealth, it must suck it in and pay it’s tax. Tough!
by psyclaw on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:55 am
Smithe @6553
It appears that they have not gone the royalties argument, preferring discrimination between states as their fanciful issue.
by psyclaw on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:57 am
guytaur
LOL.
Only a post or two ago you said that all you were worried about was the secrecy of the courts.
As I’ve pointed out, if you believe a country is capable of rendition, then any assurances they make are meaningless.
Neither have I.
In which case they can do that from the UK, too.
Because you haven’t raised them before. (See what I mean about shifting goalposts?)
Evidence?
Right. But it’s valid under EU law. So it’s valid.
All you’re saying is ‘political interference’ – you’re not saying what occured. You simply assume that there has been.
As I’ve explained, it’s quite common for police to drop a case and then reopen it. For them to tell a witness it’s fine to go, and then ask them to come back again.
We’ve had several high profile cases recently regarding crimes which occured decades ago.
Probably because further evidence came to light.
Or if they have been, you’ve refused to accept the answers. Tony Abbott would be proud of you.
Fine. So the extradition order is legit. So he should comply with it.
The jail’s are filled with people who argue that they’re not guilty. It’s also filled with people whose lawyers argued that they shouldn’t go to jail because it might be detrimental to their well being.
Your arguments would not only see them all go free, but mean that most of them didn’t stand trial in the first place.
by zoomster on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:59 am
Mr McClelland, who was for years in a position to do something about it, and did nowt, now criticises Labor for not doing more about the standards of union management. The Rudd Restorers must be getting desperate, eh?
But wait, Mr McClelland also goes shock jock and raises old, old, discredited muck about his Prime Minister. Not the LOTO, not that wonderful person, Mr Abbott. No, his prime minister. The unrequited hate of the hasbeen?
Poor Mr McClellend. I diagnose a bad case of the feather duster disease. Not that he was all that much of a rooster.
He joins other Labor luminaries whose ongoing contribution to their erstwhile cause is to try and stomp on a Labor Government. Mr McClellend has company of the quality of Messers Latham, Richardson and Bramton.
All blokes, btw.
by Boerwar on Jun 22, 2012 at 11:59 am
#fakeAbbott# says,
I would just like to say thank you to Bob. It is great to see team Labor tearing itself to bits in public. It is going to make my majority bigger than it otherwise might have been. With a bit of luck I’ll gain control of the Senate as well.
So, keep it up Bob. You are doing good for Australia in particularly for the ordinary Joes.
Vision Statement: Suck up to the very rich; whack the ordinary Joe; root the environment.
by Boerwar on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:02 pm
It is worth mentioning that there have been some exceptionally erudite and informative contributions in the past few days… I have enjoyed them immensely. Keep it up Bludgers.
by Gecko on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:03 pm
Yep, lets just let the Refugees get conned by the people smugglers and risk life and limb, cause then we can stand on our principles.
Noting like that smug, self-superior, and warm inner glow that being a Green gives you, eh Fran ?
by Mick Collins on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:03 pm
You bet they haven’t. An adverse finding on the issue would smash the ability of the states to levy Royalties and that would annoy the crap out of their mates in power in both WA and Qld.
No point in damaging a friendly state Government, eh?
by smithe on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:05 pm
zoomster
Do not put words in my mouth. Do not be Tony Abbott. Do try you might find it refreshing.
I have made it clear over several posts that I am concerned about secret trials.
Give it up.
You are losing by not really answering any questions.
Not really. You are certainly not answering the issues at the heart of the Assange claims.
By not doing this you are showing you are a blinkered foot soldier that would have been of great use to Stalin, Hitler or like person in an admin role so questions would not be asked,
by guytaur on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:05 pm
Boerwar
I tried to respond to your question about selling permits and decreased run-off before, but you’d gone to bed.
Here are my thoughts:
http://www.sciencedirect.com/science/article/pii/S0022169409007458
This paper discusses exactly what you’re talking about. I can’t see it all but the abstract agrees with you.
Run-off happens when soil moisture is high. So you can imagine that following extended drought would require a lot of rain to lift the soil moisture… Well that’s my first thought anyway.
Selling your allocation… That’s a big question!
We are heading towards an El Nino, so that may indicate more drought is coming…
You should probably follow the long term forecasts and watch the development of El Nino
http://www.cpc.ncep.noaa.gov/products/analysis_monitoring/lanina/enso_evolution-status-fcsts-web.pdf
That gets updated every tuesday
by Astrobleme on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:06 pm
[leone
Posted Friday, June 22, 2012 at 11:46 am | Permalink
I’ve never commented on Julian Assange, i won’t in future and I’m not interested in further discussion. All I want to say is this – if the bloke had exercised some self control, had used condoms and had made sure that his attentions were wanted by the women involved then he would not be in his current predicament. Why this country is supposed to pull out all the stops to help someone who when it’s all boiled down to the basics is just a badly behaved rat is something I don’t understand.
Leone
I have no desire to discuss the matter any further either, so I'll just make this one point and leave it at that. Assange has not been convicted of any of the behaviour to which you refer. So he is entitled to the presumption of innocence, a concept you seem to be just as willing to trash as the Liberals have been in their disgraceful pursuit of Craig Thomson and Peter Slipper.
by Darn on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:06 pm
New senator Whish-Wilson already coming under attack. He’s yet to say a word in the Senate.
by triton on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:06 pm
Jesus Fran, have you swallowed a thesaurus or something?
by smithe on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:08 pm
BW, I think Roxon has every right, and is in fact required, to advise the public what their case is (ie public = Commonwealth). I saw nothing wrong with her statements about the direction the case is taking.
Those who claim sub judice are talking out of their fundament.
by Lynchpin on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:11 pm
Guytaur
I’ve asked you for evidence for some of your claims. You haven’t provided any.
This leads me to the conclusion – not for the first time, in your case – that you’re blindly parroting opinions you’ve received from elsewhere.
This makes your wild claims of toeing lines etc rather amusing.
by zoomster on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:13 pm
I said on day one that I thought Ashby had probably been given advice that he could go hard with a flimsy case and the Commonwealth and Slipper would respond by wanting to settle to get it out the way quickly. But this advice was terrible. And now Ashby is up shit creek.
by bluegreen on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:13 pm
Of course the bible belt lot wil agree with newman
its a sadday when yesrs of good deeds , are being reversed
I hope our premier is keeping a list for our state election
by my say on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:13 pm
PatriciaWA, do you mind if I take your verse and put it to some music. It would be a country/folk ballad style ala Dylan or Springsteen?
by Lynchpin on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:14 pm
Assange – I have more respect for the faecal matter of a dung beetle than I do him.
The President of Ecquador and Assange deserve each other.
I feel sorry for his alleged victims in Sweden.
Hopefully they can take some solace from the fact he is locked in his own little prison of his own making for the foreseeable future. He has removved his liberty by his own actions for probably much longer than the Swedish justice system ever would.
I wonder if he will ever pay back the bail money to the suckers he fleeced.
His supposed fear of the US just doesn’t stand up.
by Compact Crank on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:15 pm
Lynchpin
Agree 101%.
Ashby brought the Commonwealth into it and let him suffer the consequences.
by psyclaw on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:15 pm
Yes but newman cannot stop ivf can he,
by my say on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:17 pm
I have enormnous respect for dung beetle faecal matter. It is enormously valuable for farmers and the environment.
by bluegreen on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:17 pm
zoomster
You lie again. I have provided evidence of what the Swedes could have done instead of what they have done.
You again say there is no evidence. A small fact that did not stop Gillard declaring Asasnge guilty.
So it is no wonder Assange is suspicious of the Australian Government.
The fears of Assange of begin subject to rendition will not become evidence until it happens.
What we do have is evidence that rendition has happened in the past. We have no evidence it will not again.
Assange has valid fears. Your claims to the contrary are just BS.
by guytaur on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:18 pm
@6553 – Smithe – have you (or anyone elese) seen the legal advice to the States about a proposed Constitutional Challenge to the MRRT?
by Compact Crank on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:18 pm
Absolutely.
The media shock and awe blitz didn’t work and now he can look forward to a defended hearing with a full-on forensic analysis of each phone call, texting communication, meeting with LNP figures and so-on by silks representing the Commonwealth and Slipper.
It’ll be a tag-team effort and it’s gonna get ugly.
by smithe on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:19 pm
@6581 – I know their poo rolling activities are important and there should be more of it but I am unsure of the role of their own feacal matter wrt the making of dung balls.
by Compact Crank on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:19 pm
Its interesting that the # of people supporting Assange here has decreased over the last two years and the # of people supporting the Malaysia Solution has increased.
It used to be a small club who held both those positions.
by bluegreen on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:20 pm
Nope.
But you don’t have to be Tony Mason to work it out.
by smithe on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:22 pm
Fran would have been a great script writer for some of the speeches by Sir Humphrey Appleby in the Yes Minister and Yes prime Minister series.
by Darn on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:23 pm
Go ahead, Lynchpin, and feel free to change lines/ words/verses etc. where necessary. Thanks for the compliment!
by PatriciaWA on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:25 pm
Unless I’ve misread the Act, they backed off because MRRT is presented as a tax on the profits of the most profitable mining companies, not rent or tax on mining itself – a very ‘nice’ distinction, in the literal meaning of ‘nice’.
However, according to gossip, what stirked Qld was the possibility of an HCA ruling that gave the Commonwealth over-riding right of mineral ownership. That issue (among others) is discussed in Tax challenge may see states lose mining profits
Imo, WA, QLD & NSW – even SA & Tas – will not want to risk losing sovereignty over their mines, and with that loss, mining revenues to the Commonwealth for whatever distribution it decides to allow those states. Nor will they ignore the fact that a future Commonwealth Government might be able to make whatever laws it wants re mining. It could, if it has sovereignty, reverse environmental protection orders, even try to reverse World Heritage listings, and reopen mines, eg Tasmania’s closed mines.
by OzPol Tragic on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:26 pm
@6587 – so perhaps you and others should qualify your posts as opinion because they certainly aren’t fact.
For all we know – they may have received legal opinion that a challenge might succeed but have decided against it on different grounds.
by Compact Crank on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:27 pm
guytaur
No, what you gave was your opinion.
Er, what?
Obviously you wouldn’t recognise a small fact if it danced naked before you in a tea cosy.
Gillard did not say Assange was guilty.
She certainly didn’t say he was guilty of the crimes Sweden wants to question him about.
You seem to be confusing several issues here.
And we have no evidence it will.
Assange has fears. They may be valid.
But having valid fears about the possible outcomes does not excuse someone from complying with the law.
I can have valid fears that if I submit myself to questioning, I might be charged with a crime. If that’s a reason not to submit myself to questioning, then no criminal anywhere will ever have to face trial again.
by zoomster on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:28 pm
Mick persisted with:
Now who is being patronising? It’s certainly very likely that at least some of the poor fisherfolk who are enlisted to operate these vessels from Indonesia are conned into jeopardising their lives, but of course, they go under the heading of “people smugglers” in your book. The refugees themselves surely have a very strong presentiment of the kind of risk trade they are accepting when they board those vessels. They aren’t being conned any more than that someone who is in a financial jam makes a bet on a horse that he is told is “a sure thing”. As things stand, apparently about 96% make it — not a sure thing but presumably they like those odds.
In a way, it’s odd that you should complain about this reasoning. Perhaps the refugees, challenged that boarding such vessels put themselves and others at risk might respond using your paradigm above that “if you’re not willing to compromise your safety you have no business complaining about living in squalor. Sure it’s not a perfect solution but isn’t it better than the alternatives? It’s all very well for people living comfortably in Australia to say that they are worried about the risks we’re accepting but they don’t see what we see here.”
Really Mick, you ought to be embracing these people as those not demanding purity and wearing sackcloth but as people willing to take a punt in order to try for something better.
Once one grasps that one can see “people smugglers” as mere agents of apparently relatively rational choices made by vulnerable people. How can one object to people giving others the chance to exercise a right to relief under an international treaty to which Australia has been a signagtory for 60 years?
The proper term for such folk is not “people smugglers” but (ad hoc) travel agents and sailors.
Putting aside the serial pleonasm … you are the one declaring that you and our government are best placed to serve the interests of the vulnerable folk making these journeys. I don’t think you or the regime can be, though doubtless, the regime thinks predisposing these folk to endure misery is in the regime’s best interests.
The onus really is on you to show that as things stand, they ought, in their own interrests as a class claiming releif from misery, not to get onto boats.
by Fran Barlow on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:28 pm
OzPol
When states give their Minister’s legal adivce about such challenges they are usually super conservative. No Dept would give advice that leaves that scenario out and no Premier would chose to ignore that advice.
by bluegreen on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:28 pm
Astrobleme
Thank you x 2.
by Boerwar on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:28 pm
@6590 – Tasmania should be actively working to increase it’s mining activity instead of taking the begging bowl to Canberra via Wilkie.
by Compact Crank on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:30 pm
Word for the day: Pleonasm = superfluous words.
by Gecko on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:33 pm
zoomster
You are starting to behave like a troll. First you deny something that is on the public record.
Gillard did indeed say Assange was guilty. That paragraph was obviously about the credibility of the government in the eyes of Assange.
No conflating of issues by my. Just you.
Your no evidence that it will means we can leave the President of Syria in place because his past actions doing massacres are no guarantee he will in future.
See you are saying BS.
You are a rump of irrelevance ignoring facts and implications of things that do not suit you.
So I will not respond to any of your stupid blinkered posts again.
by guytaur on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:33 pm
Smithe asked:
Metaphorically speaking, I began consuming books from the moment I could read. I carried a “Little Oxford Dictionary” in my pocket with the hard navy blue cover from year 1 at school. I spent most of my spare time at school reading.
by Fran Barlow on Jun 22, 2012 at 12:33 pm