Election wash-up...the plot thickens

[lordy]

Seriously SeaHunt,

You are way off the money on this one - go and have another look at the figures.

The Greens actually emerged in this election as the third biggest voting block behind the Coalition and the Labor Party with over %7 of the primary vote.

They are the biggest political force outside the major parties. In fact if you look at trends over the last few elections - at the next federal election they ARE likely to be a major party.

Bugman

Maybe but I don't think so. Most of the "increase" was just picked up from the dying Democrats. I don't see it as a growth in their market, since the Demos and Greens were very close on many policies.

The question is whether the Greens can maintain the growth, to do that they'll have to eat into the major parties not consume their dead siblings carcases. I didn't see much of that this time around. In the senate (not the lower house where protest votes are made) the Greens picked up about 2.5% of the vote, the Democrats lost 4.5+ of the vote. Do the sums. Those are voters the Greens wanted, 1/2 of them went elsewere.

Scratch the surface and Bob Brown must be very dispointed because its not really a gain in percentage. I'm sure he was aiming for 10-12% (their old 5%, 3+% from the Democrats, 3% growth). He didn't get it. He got 2.5% from the Democrats and almost 0% real growth.

Full credit to the Greens though, they are currently exploiting the senate system pretty well to get up to 2 per state on just 7% of the vote (via the two half-senate elections). I thought it was pretty rich of Bob Brown to complained about Family First possibly getting a senator with just 2% because the Greens are the most grossly over represented party in the senate (1st preferences per senator).

[Y-Not]

Well done kc!! We voted 1 for the fishing party!! Lets hope it makes a difference!

[PinHead]

Pinhead you are not the only one, I get butterflies in my stomach everytime I think of what is to come .
[smiley=hammer.gif] [smiley=behead.gif] but the primary vote highlighted who they wanted to govern, after years of eyes wide open, Telstra, Aust post, Fairness in dismissal, Medicines etc etc.nq

Mate, I don't get butterflies at all over it..it does not perturb me one iota to be honest.

[flattymattyb]

Great work KC,

I was hoping to see a seat in the senate for you but I guess that would be a big ask to pull off in your first election, lets hope the deal means we get a fair deal.

Cheers
Matty

[Dug]

Fishing in my passion my sport I work long hard hours to have the money to spend on it, but it is not the be all to end all my boys future with a healthy environment is MY No1 priority

p.s. I guess no one will talk to me after this outburst but I am quite upset.

Cheers Steve
[/quote]


110% with you Steve if we protect fish stocks now we will have them in the future short term pain for long term gain. We will now have the Nationals supporting the cane farmers with massive pollution runoff land clearing and coastal development gone mad.

If you can find a fish in 30 years you will be lucky It is short term greed that has got us into this situation and it will just get worse.

My bet is the super trawler guys will have backed the Libs to the tune of several millions. Talk to the guys in the USA about what beach conditions are over there medical waste dumped at sea and all sorts of toxic shit into rivers GW Bush has the worst environmental record of any modern president and GW Bush is Howard's pin up boy.

If Howard gets to control the senate then all sorts of money making, profit driven, short cut, schemes are on the boards.

What would I rather a scheme that locks up areas of the reef or surf beaches up the Queensland coast because the reef is no longer there.

Your choice guys, I would have the fishing party backing the Greens they have the future of the environment at heart not the Liberal National alliance who have proven by their record they are only interested in money and power and will do say or promise anything to get it.

As for telstra I never saw the sense in selling off the house bit by bit to pay the mortgage, If you have a business that is making a good profit for everyone, WHY SELL IT?????

[kevy]

bad luck nictim, the caravan moves on. we all had a vote & bear with the result. just keep fishing & enjoying. all the best, kevy.

[kevy]

bad luck nictim, the caravan moves on. we all had a vote & bear with the result. just keep fishing & enjoying. all the best, kevy.

[PinHead]

"My bet is the super trawler guys will have backed the Libs to the tune of several millions. Talk to the guys in the USA about what beach conditions are over there medical waste dumped at sea and all sorts of toxic shit into rivers GW Bush has the worst environmental record of any modern president and GW Bush is Howard's pin up boy.

If Howard gets to control the senate then all sorts of money making, profit driven, short cut, schemes are on the boards.

What would I rather a scheme that locks up areas of the reef or surf beaches up the Queensland coast because the reef is no longer there.

Your choice guys, I would have the fishing party backing the Greens they have the future of the environment at heart not the Liberal National alliance who have proven by their record they are only interested in money and power and will do say or promise anything to get it.

As for telstra I never saw the sense in selling off the house bit by bit to pay the mortgage, If you have a business that is making a good profit for everyone, WHY SELL IT??"

I ma not sure if it is on the net but political parties have to declare where their donations are from so perhaps you could find out that way. As for medical waste dumped at sea in the USA...the USA cannot be compared with here..they have a population of about 250 mill. compared with our measly 20 mill so far more waste there to dispose of.

And the Labor party is not interested in money or power?

As for the sale of Telstra - governments are put in place to govern, not run companies..that is a private sector venture under a capitalist system. Also remember with Telstra that the sale is only of the software and service etc...the Govt will retain the main infrastructure (exchanges and cables etc) under Austel ( I think that is the name from memory) which already owns all that.

No need to be paranoid about one party having control of the house and the senate...if you live in Qld you have lived under a single house system for years as opposed to the federal bicameral system.

[lordy]

I wouldn't get too worried about waste. The states control most of the waste management and they are all Labor.

Just because the Libs may control the senate doesn't mean the world is going to fall apart. Just like Labor in Qld (no senate), they have to face up every three years and answer the public. They aren't going to do anything too radical.

The problem with the Greens is no matter what Howard does they woouldn't back him over Labor. Bob Brown was teasing and luring Howard and Latham with the preferences. Latham fell for it and it cost him seats. Even if Howard does what the Greens want they wouldn't back him over Labor. Soo he doesn't even try. If Brown's Green vote was genuinely up for grabs you'd see more competition for it, from both sides. The best thing Latham could have done was completely ignore the Greens and their policies, he's going to get their vote no matter how much they dislike his policies because they hate Howard more.

[Burley_Boy]

It's an interesting thing discussing if it is good or bad that the senate is a clean run for the govt. If there is a single individual from whatever organisation holding the balance of power I don't necessarily see that as a good thing. They will be able to use undue influence to achieve all sorts of good or bad deals not necessarily democratic or fair. We vote for a govt and then we want them to be held to ransom by a minority in case the things they want to pass are not cool.

A majority in the senate is a great thing if your policies are good and you will get chucked out ...at the next election ....if they are all bad (well thats the idea anyway, not perfect but no system is).
Unfair control by single independents, though a nice check at times is dubious democracy in my eyes as we voted in a governing body and for good or bad have to trust them to do the right thing
Democracy however includes letting them know how important you feel specific issues are and thus putting those on the agenda so they can't run all over you. That is what independents and minor parties are supposed to do. That they also have major controlling power is a totally different side of the coin that I don't condone.

Go the fishing party for putting the items on the agenda and keeping our voice heard above the ruccus of specific independents whose votes have to be bought with favours in the senate.

I'm not in any way saying a specific party would be better in govt but that any elected govt has to be able to make decisions based on their ideology not on the votes they have to buy in the senate.

[Dug]

No need to be paranoid about one party having control of the house and the senate...if you live in Qld you have lived under a single house system for years as opposed to the federal bicameral system.

Hey Pin Head
Some of us are old enough to remember Queensland an Sir Joh less than 20% of the vote and he ran the state like a personal corrupt empire.

"Power corrupts absolute power corrupts absolutely"

I do not feel anyone party or system should have total power without review.

[lordy]

PETER BEATTIE on why more upperhousees haven't been disbanded: Because it's too hard. And what happens is, all the people in the upper house run fear campaigns. They say, "Look, if you don't keep control of the executive government then they'll get out of control and we're the only ones that can do it. Ignore the fact that I'm here for eight years, ignore the fact that I got elected by two men and a dog, ignore all that, I'm you're accountability mechanism."


It was Labor in the 1920s that did away with the Qld upperhouse. Labor also introduced the gerrymander in 1949.


http://sunday.ninemsn.com.au/sunday/...cript_1428.asp

HELEN DALLEY: But in a tale of political skullduggery, one state, Queensland, did away with its upper house, which was branded the slaughterhouse because it killed off so much legislation. Back in the 1920s, Labor premier 'Red Ted' Theodore was absolutely fed up with the upper house blocking his legislative agenda. After all, he argued, the members in that house were unelected, they were appointed for life, and they were basically there to protect British financial interests. It was a colonial leftover, he said, that had to go. So he rather cleverly plotted to get rid of it without having to take it to a referendum. And in 1922, the Queensland Legislative Council was abolished.

PETER BEATTIE: It was an elitist body, landed gentry, no vote one value, none of that nonsense. It was just based on privilege, money, landowning, all that sort of stuff. It represented greed basically and I think it was quite appropriate to get rid of it. I mean, why should greed be the basis of an upper house? That's what it was.

HELEN DALLEY: To get rid of such an undemocratic institution, 'Red Ted' Theodore used that fine Labor tradition – he stacked the Upper House with ALP appointees. They've gone down in political legend as the suicide squad, because they voted to abolish their own chamber.


HELEN DALLEY: Decades after its demise, many argue that the lack of an upper house led to the authoritarian excesses of the Joh Bjelke-Petersen government.

DR JOHN UHR, POLITICAL SCIENTIST, ANU: Maybe things could be better with an upper house, better with a kind of dispersed power that would just act as a kind of check and brake upon powerful governments – we had the Fitzgerald Commission, we've had a history of corruption – and that maybe somehow another house could have slowed that down in some way.

PROF DEAN JAENSCH: I've always rebutted that on the grounds that if there was an upper house, Joh would have gerrymandered it just as much as he gerrymandered the Lower House, so it wouldn't have been any protection whatsoever.

HELEN DALLEY: You would agree that he did benefit ...

PETER BEATTIE: Oh, absolutely.

HELEN DALLEY: .. from Labor's abolition of the upper house?

PETER BEATTIE: Yes, I agree with that because it's an historical fact and I couldn't argue with it. It's true. But why didn't we win here, the Labor Party? Because we were basically hopeless. I mean, in those days, Bjelke-Petersen got away with it because my political party didn't perform well, too many people in the media were compliant, there weren't mechanisms like they exist now.

HELEN DALLEY: Premier Beattie argues the accountability mechanisms set up after the Fitzgerald corruption inquiry, such as the Crime and Misconduct Commission, have now taken over the review function of an upper house.

HELEN DALLEY: So do you reckon you benefit as much as Joh did, from no upper house?

PETER BEATTIE: No, because Fitzgerald changed all that. The Fitzgerald inquiry has given us accountability mechanisms that don't exist anywhere else in Australia. The Joh days are gone, they're dead, finished, over, buried.

HELEN DALLEY: The Queensland upper-house chamber is still used for the opening of parliament, pomp and ceremony. Premier Beattie admits the political reality of referendums means Queensland's upper house will be the first and the last to go.

HELEN DALLEY: Why don't these sort of reforms ever get past referendums?

[budgie]

Is this a fishing web site ??? or maybe im just not worried about the outcome anymore. Decision is final and lets get back to FISHING

[Glug]

Interesting, do some people still believe there is such a thing as democracy? Even when that Demo guy started it the slaves had no say, only the dominant part of society had "democracy". Today is no different and the Americans call it "Practical Democracy" possibly because it is practicaly not there.

Why not sack all the politicians and just pick one guy from each state, thats cheap and practical. They reckon too many cooks spoil the broth any way.

The Greens are well on their way to taking over from Labour, if Labour does not get its house in order by next election we may have a Green Government. The Liberals are already telling us we could be in for a rough ride if oil prices stay high. This is because the present government have behaved like corporate raiders and completly wrecked Australia's local economy to have cash enough to buy themselves back into power. If we do have a rough ride under the Liberals you can expect a Green Government. To me Labour, Liberal and Green are all just another form of extreem religion, I don't give a stuff for their ideologies as long as they run the country for the good of the people and in a humanistic manner.

[lordy]

No need to be paranoid about one party having control of the house and the senate...if you live in Qld you have lived under a single house system for years as opposed to the federal bicameral system.

Hey Pin Head
Some of us are old enough to remember Queensland an Sir Joh less than 20% of the vote and he ran the state like a personal corrupt empire.

"Power corrupts absolute power corrupts absolutely"

I do not feel anyone party or system should have total power without review.

It was actually the Libs that suffered from the Gerrymander much more than Labor. The Nats grabbed the lions share of the seats on very little vote while the Libs and Labs battled for the big urban seats. Joh got 20% of the vote at times but the Libs got the rest (just not the seats they deserved).

You can win full control of the lower house with only 26-27% of the total vote (stand only in winnable seats, win each just 1%).



"You don't quite tell the whole story there. In all those elections in Queensland the coalition polled more than 50% of the 2 party preferred vote. The coalition was always rightly elected. The biggest loser was the Liberal Party as it was denied the necessary number of seats to be the major coalition partner. The gerrymander in Qld was instituted by the ALP to ensure it stayed in power because at that time rural electorates were ALP strongholds. It just happened that the boot got on the other foot."