By-elections of the 44th Australian Parliament (2013-2016)

[Smid]

So ... this isn't technically an election of the current Federal Parliament - but there is the risk that if the NT Country Liberals do not win the Blaine by-election today - since they'd technically go into minority status (12/25) it could trigger a motion of no-confidence and an immediate election be called.

There's only been one poll (electorate-level polling caveat considered) and it has the CLP up 51-49 (off a previous CLP margin of 15%)... so a big swing it probably on, how big and it's impacts remains to be seen.

Antony Green also discussed it. Electorates are exceptionally small, so relatively few voters can result in massive swings, hence why margins up there are notoriously poor indicators of potential performance in a by-election. Personal vote is very important, too, for the same reason, so a by-election (or other retiring member at a general election) typically sees a strong swing against. Bearing in mind this was one of the few seats the CLP held in the landslide loss a few elections back, and the retiring member is the former Chief Minister (for foreign posters, the Territories don't have Premiers, they have Chief Ministers).

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

So ... this isn't technically an election of the current Federal Parliament - but there is the risk that if the NT Country Liberals do not win the Blaine by-election today - since they'd technically go into minority status (12/25) it could trigger a motion of no-confidence and an immediate election be called.

There's only been one poll (electorate-level polling caveat considered) and it has the CLP up 51-49 (off a previous CLP margin of 15%)... so a big swing it probably on, how big and it's impacts remains to be seen.

Antony Green also discussed it. Electorates are exceptionally small, so relatively few voters can result in massive swings, hence why margins up there are notoriously poor indicators of potential performance in a by-election. Personal vote is very important, too, for the same reason, so a by-election (or other retiring member at a general election) typically sees a strong swing against. Bearing in mind this was one of the few seats the CLP held in the landslide loss a few elections back, and the retiring member is the former Chief Minister (for foreign posters, the Territories don't have Premiers, they have Chief Ministers).

My thoughts on the Blain by-election: There will be a massive swing, I can see the result being within no more of 2% either way. I think the CLP will narrowly hold this, although I wouldn't rule out a shock Labor win.

Also, should Labor win Blain, the government will try and get the support of independent member for Nelson, Gerry Wood. If they can't, well, a new election could very well be on the cards, as Polnut said.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

So far, the swing isn't enough.

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

So far, the swing isn't enough.

Seems to me on current figures, that the CLP are doing better than expected.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

I'd call it for the CLP quite easily - the primary got massacred, but it went to almost everywhere except the ALP.

I mean, it's really not that shocking - the NT Government is dysfunctional with a capital D, but if they voted for the ALP, or preferenced them highly, it almost guaranteed another election in 6-8 weeks time.

[Wake Me Up When The Hard Border Ends]

I'd call it for the CLP quite easily - the primary got massacred, but it went to almost everywhere except the ALP.

I mean, it's really not that shocking - the NT Government is dysfunctional with a capital D, but if they voted for the ALP, or preferenced them highly, it almost guaranteed another election in 6-8 weeks time.

Just had a look at the result, you've got a good point about how if Labor won, another election would have rolled around shortly.

Still, considering the history of by-elections in the NT, and the poll published for Blain, the CLP have done a little better than expected, I was expecting a CLP win of no more than 2%.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Louise Pratt has unleashed on Joe Bullock - thank God "homophobic" "disloyal" and calls on reforms to take away the faction's power to give it to the members and says the leadership of the SDA does not reflect the membership of their own union, let alone the party.

[Hifly]

She's just throwing a hissy fit and forgetting that she was preselected to the number one spot using the very same preselection methods in 2007 (and thus owes her entire political career to this factionalism), that over a third of the caucus don't support same-sex marriage, as well as the fact that the SDA is the party's largest donor so they naturally ought to have a right to preselect who they want under the ALP's own rules.

[MaxQue]

the SDA is the party's largest donor so they naturally ought to have a right to preselect who they want under the ALP's own rules.

So much for being "left-wing". You can apparently buy left-wing parties if you have enough money. No wonder than working-class isn't willing to vote for Labor.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

She's just throwing a hissy fit and forgetting that she was preselected to the number one spot using the very same preselection methods in 2007 (and thus owes her entire political career to this factionalism), that over a third of the caucus don't support same-sex marriage, as well as the fact that the SDA is the party's largest donor so they naturally ought to have a right to preselect who they want under the ALP's own rules.

The rules that should be changed, stat.

That said, Pratt should have stayed above the fray. I can't blame her, cause it is essentially Bullock's fault she lost her job, and it quite funny watching a party collapse in on itself like a concertina; but it's quite alarming that the ALP has this extraordinary tendency.

[MaxQue]

She's just throwing a hissy fit and forgetting that she was preselected to the number one spot using the very same preselection methods in 2007 (and thus owes her entire political career to this factionalism), that over a third of the caucus don't support same-sex marriage, as well as the fact that the SDA is the party's largest donor so they naturally ought to have a right to preselect who they want under the ALP's own rules.

Anyways, most Labor parties are removing their union power. Labour adopted a refom curtailing their power.
Canada's NDP (federal), removed most powers to unions in the early 00's (and if they didn't, they would do so now, since the majority of the NDP MPs is from Quebec, but Quebec unions always refused to be associated with NDP (Quebec unions are mostly for independence)).

[ObserverIE]

the SDA is the party's largest donor so they naturally ought to have a right to preselect who they want under the ALP's own rules.

So much for being "left-wing". You can apparently buy left-wing parties if you have enough money. No wonder than working-class isn't willing to vote for Labor.

I'd have thought more urgent reasons why working-class voters are reluctant to vote for modern social democratic parties might be related to the tendency of modern social democratic parties to:

i) trash the living standards of their own supporters in the name of "sensible" economic "reform" (Hartz IV, etc.),
ii) come across as cynical liars who say one thing during an election campaign and then do the complete opposite in government (hello Irish Labour),
iii) come across as a corrupt, faction-riven mess (particularly applicable to the ALP).

If the supposed alternative of dumping links to organised labour and concentrating on appealing to "urban progressives" (because, after all, where else can the working-class vote go?) was a panacea, then western Europe would have been a social democratic stronghold for the last twenty years.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

What loses votes in buckletloads more than anything else is open factional infighting. It doesn't really matter who it's between or what the issues at stake are...

[EPG]

The parties that represent old-style left-wing views do much worse than the modern social democrats almost everywhere in Europe and the West.

[Tetro Kornbluth]

The parties that represent old-style left-wing views do much worse than the modern social democrats almost everywhere in Europe and the West.

What do we mean by 'old-style' here?

[EPG]

That's open to the reader's interpretation, but to choose one possible example, let's consider parties that want much higher income taxes, much higher capital taxes, more state aid for and intervention in industry. Generally, this would just move countries back to 1970s levels of economic intervention rather than anything unprecedented in the West. Yet we don't see those parties doing as well as their social democratic predecessors in the post-war generation, when unions and low-skilled industries were major forces in Western society. My thesis is centre-left political actors have responded to changes in society rather than being wilfully naive or malevolent. Anyway, this is a bit off-topic for an Australian by-election thread, other than noting that as in the UK, strong unions in left-wing parties tend to lead to factionalism rather than resolving it.

[morgieb]

The one thing I don't get is why the SDA (which given who shopkeepers are would have a heavily female-skewing membership) are so socially conservative/bigoted?

[MaxQue]

The one thing I don't get is why the SDA (which given who shopkeepers are would have a heavily female-skewing membership) are so socially conservative/bigoted?

Because, like most unions, the leadership doesn't advocate the opinions of the membership, but rather their own opinions.

[Hifly]

The one thing I don't get is why the SDA (which given who shopkeepers are would have a heavily female-skewing membership) are so socially conservative/bigoted?

The SDA has been ruled by Catholics since virtually the beginning of time. This is down to the way that the SDA elects it's leaders and officials. We already know who Joe de Bruyn's successor is despite there having been no election. The SDA also has a de facto policy not to appoint gays and political opponents of the national leadership to any position of power within the union either.

[Fmr President & Senator Polnut]

Still doesn't change the fact that the union leadership does not represent the views of their membership.

It's sad the union movement refuses to change... at their own detriment.

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shop,_Distributive_and_Allied_Employees_Association#Criticism

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[Filuwaúrdjan]

It's not different to the much more common phenomenon of trade unions with hard left leaderships and should not be regarded any differently. Do the they reflect the political views of their members? Generally speaking the answer to that is a firm 'no' (and probably less than the SDA does its membership, if we're being absolutely honest). Most RMT members are not Leninists, for instance. But the key to power in a trade union* is a reputation for being effective. Trade Unions are not primarily 'political' organisations, remember. The fact that the SDA has the largest membership in Australia - despite the notorious difficulty of organising in the the sectors in which it operates - is a pretty good indication that it is a rather effective union.

_{*Other than an encyclopedic knowledge of The Rulebook, obviously.}

[Tetro Kornbluth]

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Shop,_Distributive_and_Allied_Employees_Association#Criticism

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But this isn't even a union issue... so why is it important?

[Tetro Kornbluth]

On this note - and I've been wondering about this: Is the unusually high Greens vote in Australia correlated in any way to the fact that the Unions - and often very conservative unions at that - still have a lot of power over Labor selections?

[🦀🎂🦀🎂]

I suppose because it is pretty much the first green party in the world; that Australia depends on it's natural beauty for tourism much more than europe and the divisided and unisnspiring ALP.