Elsewhere:

• Previously believed bound for marginal Macarthur, Labor MP Chris Hayes has now been offered safe Fowler to compensate for Reid MP Laurie Ferguson’s accommodation in his existing seat of Werriwa. This is despite the fact that Ferguson wanted Fowler while Hayes preferred to remain in Werriwa, which was impossible because Fowler’s Right-controlled branches did not want Ferguson on their turf. The arrangement is a win for Julia Gillard and the “soft Left” over Anthony Albanese and the “hard Left”, which wanted Werriwa to go to Damien Ogden of the Liquor Hospitality and Miscellaneous Union. However, the drama may not be over yet: also out in the cold is Ed Husic of the Communications Electrial and Plumbing Union, whom the Right still wishes to accommodate. Phillip Coorey of the Sydney Morning Herald reports talk he might replace Roger Price in Chifley. Macarthur presumably available again to its candidate from 2007, Nick Bleasdale.

• Jennie George has announced she will retire at the next election, opening up a preselection contest in her seat of Throsby. A factional deal in place since 1997 has given Throsby to the hard Left and Fowler to the Right; Alex Arnold of the Illawarra Mercury reports the Left has everything in place to deliver the seat to Stephen Jones of the Community and Public Sector Union. The Mercury’s Brett Cox reports “no love lost between factions over the issue, with the Left accusing the Right of a behind the scenes campaign to oust Ms George and discredit Mr Jones’ links to the region”. Local Australian Workers Union branch secretary Andy Gillespie has labelled the Right dissidents “hypocrites”, as they had acquiesced in the imposition Lylea McMahon in the state seat of Shellharbour.

• The Liberal preselection for Bennelong looms as a contest between former tennis star John Alexander and Mark Chan, a 25-year-old manager for GE Capital whose Chinese background is being sold as an asset in the seat. Imre Salusinszky of The Australian reports the party has brought the preselection process forward so it can capitalise on Alexander’s exposure over summer as a tennis commentator. This would seem to suggest he is considered the front-runner.

• Saffron Howden of the Northern Star reports Pottsville pharmacist Tania Murdock is the “likely Nationals candidate” for Richmond. Tweed councillor Joan van Lieshout is considered a likely Liberal candidate.

• After a state and federal political career stretching back to 1965, Tasmanian Liberal MP Michael Hodgman has announced he will not contest the March state election due to ill health. Despite being 71 and suffering emphysema, Hodgman had remained on the six-person Liberal line-up for Denison when it was finalised last month. The party will now have to find a replacement candidate, and enter the election without a sitting member in the division. Among those who missed out at preselection was Hobart alderman and regular independent candidate Marti Zucco.

Elsewhere:

• Labor’s lead is steady at 58-42 according to the latest weekly Essential Research survey, which seems to be more closely resembling Newspoll than it used to. There are also various questions on the parties’ approaches to the global financial crisis and the rise in interest rates.

• Sue Neales of The Mercury reports Matthew Groom, son of former Premier Ray Groom, has nominated for Liberal preselection in the state lower house division of Denison. Neales suggests the “corporate lawyer with Tasmanian state-owned wind power company Roaring 40s” is likely to win a spot on the ticket when the party finalises preselection on Monday, which it earlier deferred because party leaders were “concerned by a lack of high-profile talent” (UPDATE: Kevin Bonham clarifies the situation in comments: Elise Archer, Michael Hodgman and Matt Stevenson were preselected in March, and the remainder of the ticket is to be finalised on Monday). Others reportedly seeking preselection are veteran incumbent Michael Hodgman, who is 70 years old and battling ill health which recently forced him to relinquish the Shadow Attorney-General position; Jenny Branch, a Glenorchy alderman who polled strongly as an independent against Treasurer Michael Aird in his upper house seat of Derwent in April; and Elise Archer, a Hobart alderman. Another Hobart alderman, regular independent candidate Marti Zucco, has been mentioned as a starter, but appears to face powerful opposition in the Liberal organisation. The result in Denison at the 2006 election was Labor three, Liberal one and Greens one; Peter Tucker at Tasmanian Politics rates the Liberals a solid chance of taking a second seat, possibly at the expense of accident-prone Labor incumbent Graeme Sturges.

• The Queensland Greens have preselected their unsuccessful Senate candidate from 2007, Larissa Waters, to head their ticket at the next election. Waters prevailed in a three-way contest over Jenny Stirling and Libby Connors, party activists and frequent candidates respectively based in Townsville and Toowoomba.

• Republished courtesy of Peter Brent at Mumble, Malcolm Mackerras in the Canberra Times lambasts Peter Dutton and his supporters over his reluctance to stand and fight in Dickson, and confidently predicts he will now not only contest the seat but win it.

• Senate polls have consistently proved themselves to be pointless endeavours, but let the record note that Roy Morgan has produced one from their last three months of surveys. This might be of at least some use if Morgan gave South Australian respondents a chance to indicate support for Nick Xenophon, but they presumably don’t because he is not up for re-election next time (unless there’s a double dissolution of course). Nonetheless, South Australia shows an “others” result of 19.5 per cent compared with 8 per cent nationally.

• The Tasmanian Liberals have preselected three candidates for the Hobart electorate of Denison for next year’s state election, after earlier delaying the process due to concerns about a “lack of high-profile talent”. The nominees are 70-year-old incumbent Michael Hodgman; lawyer Elise Archer, who polled a solid 3.2 per cent at the 2006 election; and Matt Stevenson, state president of the Young Liberals. No sign of contentious Hobart alderman Marti Zucco, but two positions remain to be filled.

• Yesterday’s Crikey Daily Mail had a piece by Malcolm Mackerras noting the looming by-election in New Zealand for Helen Clark’s seat of Mount Albert, and the absurdity of such a thing in a supposedly proportional representation system. If it loses, Labour will be deprived of one of the seats entitled to it by its national vote share at last November’s election. New Zealand’s mixed-member proportional system is modelled on Germany’s, but departs from it in that vacated constituency seats in Germany are filled by unelected candidates from the party’s national lists – which New Zealand was obviously loath to do as it would randomly match members to electorates with which they had no connection.

• Mackerras also notes that the May 12 election in the Canadian province of British Columbia will be held in conjunction with a second referendum seeking to replace its first-past-the-post single-member constituency system with “BC-STV” (British Columbia-Single Transferable Vote). I take this to be identical in every respect to Hare-Clark as it operates in Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory (complete with Robson rotation and optional preferential voting), except the number of members per region will range from two to seven. A referendum was also held at the previous election in 2005, but it received 57.7 per cent support while requiring 60 per cent to be binding. Get funky with the official website of British Columbians for BC-STV.

UPDATE (11/4/09): The West Australian carries a second Westpoll survey of 400 respondents on the May 16 daylight saving referendum, showing 47 per cent supporting and 51 per cent opposed compared with 42 per cent and 57 per cent at the poll last month. The West’s report says this means “community support for daylight saving has climbed steadily over the last month”, but I don’t need to tell you all what a load of bollocks that is. Taken together, the surveys suggest the proposal is most likely headed for defeat by the same narrow-ish margins as in 1975, 1984 and 1992.

• Kevin Rudd’s approval rating is up four points to a stratospheric 74 per cent, the highest ever recorded by ACNielsen, while Malcolm Turnbull’s is down eight to 43 per cent. Their respective disapproval ratings are 22 per cent (steady) and 47 per cent (up 12 per cent).

• Rudd leads Turnbull as preferred prime minister 69 per cent to 24 per cent, his lead increasing seven points.

• Remarkably, 57 per cent say Kevin Rudd would be “justified in calling an early election to try and break the Senate impasse that has frustrated the passing of some legislation” (although they might think differently if they realised no double dissolution trigger existed, and that any election for the House of Representatives before the middle of next year would throw the two houses’ cycles out of sync).

• Peter Costello is favoured as Liberal leader by 47 per cent against 39 per cent for Turnbull, although Turnbull has closed the gap six points.

• 66 per cent say they oppose sending more troops to Afghanistan, a near identical result to last week’s Newspoll.

In other news:

• Newspoll has published its quarterly geographic and demographic breakdowns. Charts aplenty from Possum, here and here.

• The Victorian Liberals have advertised for federal election candidates in Kooyong, Corangamite and Deakin. Andrew Landeryou at VexNews says “long-time Liberal fundraiser and multi-millionaire Andrew Abercrombie is believed to be the Baillieu faction’s secret weapon candidate” to run in Kooyong against the Josh Frydenberg, who is backed by the Kroger camp and “Malcolm Turnbull’s numbers man”, Senator Michael Ronaldson.

• The Australian reports the Left faction Australian Manufacturing Workers Union and Right faction Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association have joined in a “Moscow-Berlin pact” to seek a “Senate-style system for Victorian upper house preselections”. This would deny rank-and-file members a vote, and circumvent the recent deal between the two unions’ intra-factional rivals. For their part, the latter group are threatening to back separate ballots for each position rather than proportional representation, which would allow them to secure a clean sweep. More from Andrew Landeryou.

• Steve Grant of the Fremantle Herald reports that former Premier Alan Carpenter has backed Fremantle mayor Peter Tagliaferri to replace Jim McGinty as Labor’s candidate in Fremantle. His presumed rival, LHMWU state secretary Dave Kelly, now says he is no longer interested. While still denying it publicly, it is almost universally anticipated that McGinty will shortly quit parliament so a by-election can be held in conjunction with the May 16 referendum on daylight saving. Last week the Herald reported that Keith McCorriston, Maritime Union of Australia official and local party branch president, had “also emerged as a contender”. It was also reported that WA Opinion Polls had been canvassing the electorate asking respondents about Tagliaferri and Greens candidate Adele Carles.

• Speaking of which, The West Australian reports daylight saving advocates have been peddling an “online poll of 610 voters conducted last week by independent research company Synovate”, showing 50.5 per cent planning to vote yes against 46.8 per cent for no. Despite the smaller sample of 400, a Westpoll survey published earlier in the month showing 57 per cent for no and 42 per cent for yes might be thought more credible.

• The Tasmanian Liberals have been keeping busy with preselections for the state election due next March. Mark Worley of the Sunday Tasmanian reports three new candidates have been chosen for Franklin: Vanessa Goodwin, a criminologist who narrowly failed to win a seat in 2006; Clarence City Council building inspector David Compton; and Huon Valley small business owner Jillian Law. Party leader Will Hodgman will be a fourth, while the fifth will be “left open until later in the year”.

• In Bass, sitting members Peter Gutwein and Sue Napier will be joined by Michael Ferguson, who gained the federal seat for the Liberals in 2004 and lost it in 2007, and David Fry, who filled a vacancy in 2000 but failed to win election in his own right in 2002 or 2006. As in Franklin, a fifth position has been left vacant for the time being.

• Sue Neales of the Mercury reports plans to preselect candidates in Denison have been deferred as the Liberals are “concerned by a lack of high-profile talent”. Michael Hodgman, whose parliamentary career goes back to 1966, is apparently set on another term despite being 70 years old and “suffering ill health”. From Michelle Paine of the Mercury (thanks to Peter Tucker of Tasmanian Politics for scanning this) comes a report that Marti Zucco, Hobart alderman and twice-unsuccessful independent upper house candidate, is also gearing up to nominate despite troubled relations with the party.

• Over the fence, Rebecca White, a 26-year-old electorate officer to federal Denison MP Duncan Kerr, has been confirmed as a starter for Labor in Lyons.

• Anna Bligh says she will discuss fixed terms, possibly of four years, with whoever ends up leading the Liberal National Party. Queensland is the only state which still has terms of three years.

• Graeme Orr writes on the impact of optional preferential voting at the Queensland election, and related matters, at Australian Policy Online.

• Gary Morgan takes aim at Newspoll and Galaxy over their under-estimation of Labor’s vote in Brisbane. To which they might justifiably reply: either shit or get off the pot. When Morgan starts publishing his own state polls, and when these prove more accurate than his rivals, then he can reasonably presume to start giving them advice.

UPDATE: Essential Research has Labor’s lead blowing out to 63-37 from 60-40 last week, and also shows Kevin Rudd’s approval rating at record levels: 21 per cent for “strongly approve”, his best result since this question was first asked last September. Malcolm Turnbull’s overall approval rating is down four points to 28 per cent and his disapproval up five to 48 per cent. In answer to George Megalogenis’s question on Insiders yesterday, 50 per cent say our troops should be withdrawn from Afghanistan, and 75 per cent say there should be more armed security at airports.