Comments on: Bradfield and Higgins results

By: Nick C

Nick C — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 05:29:51 +0000

deconst, you make some fair points. Yes, Susie’s campaign didn’t start out with such a heavy focus on climate change, but particularly in the last fortnight, when circumstances opened up bigger opportunities, everything did appear to focus narrowly on climate change. I do stand by my point (though you’re welcome to disagree), see the HTV for instance (assume this is it):
http://greens.org.au/system/files/u143/Greens%20Bradfield%20HTV%202009.pdf

By: deconst

deconst — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 03:28:10 +0000

I think the Greens tried to cut through the perception that they were solely running a climate change campaign in Bradfield by running a local candidate who understands local issues like development. Unfortunately to a certain extent the NSW Greens’ campaign was hijacked by the VIC Greens campaign thanks to Clive Hamilton’s media profile and his proclamations that their campaign is being fought on climate change alone.

I have to agree with Ben’s well-known criticism of running Clive Hamilton in an almost-feasible seat as I believe it did affect the running of the campaign in Bradfield and single-issue blow-ins will never win lower-house seats no matter who it is. However I don’t believe that any candidate could really have won Higgins, even on the most well-funded, well-oiled campaign – Higgins’ voters just aren’t angry enough yet with the Coalition and the Greens just don’t have the brand power in Victoria yet to be trusted with public office by the voting public. That’ll change as Di Natale gets into the senate at the next election.

I think Adam Bandt will learn from how the NSW Greens ran their campaign against the VIC Greens and will use that experience to help win Melbourne. Andrew Bartlett with Brisbane too.

Most senators will continue to be elected from the low-pop states, but the first lower house seats will be won in the three high-pop states due to demographic concentrations. Remember.. it’s the highest primary vote yet for the Greens in federal lower house.. so it speaks well for targeted inner-city seats.

By: Nick C

Nick C — Mon, 07 Dec 2009 00:50:31 +0000

Circumstances in Higgins a bit different, but I was a bit disappointed that the Bradfield campaign seemed to focus so entirely on climate change. With the turmoil in the Libs in the last fortnight I would’ve thought a more general message about the Greens offering certainty and authenticity vs the Libs’ chaos and flip-flopping might’ve provided an opportunity to appeal to more voters for whom climate policy was not the primary factor influencing their vote. Would it have made much difference to the result, who knows, but I make the point that voters already know where the Greens stand on climate change, wouldn’t it be better to tell them something they don’t know?

By: John Thomas

John Thomas — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 06:03:41 +0000

The DLP volunteer, Neil, was not abusive. He was speaking up for many other volunteers from all the other parties and independents. Neil requested that the toilets be opened. One Green gentleman challenged the request on alleged safety grounds which was ridiculousbecause the toilets were only available to the electoral commission workers. The Green man made a sudden charge towards Neil, having first becoming verbal. Neil, on reflex just pushed the man back with both palms of his hands in defence.

By: John Thomas

John Thomas — Sun, 06 Dec 2009 05:58:39 +0000

The whole of NSW, not just northern NSW, are represented by the NSW Branch of the DLP more than adequately Ziggy.

By: Polly Morgan

Polly Morgan — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 23:31:41 +0000

The booth by booth breakdown of Higgins looks really interesting. There were some massive anti-liberal swings on some of their best booths, but they neutralised them by picking up solid swings to them on some of the better booths for the ALP. That’s a very impressive campaign effort from Kelly O’Dwyer. I can’t help but wonder if the ALP would have given her a bit of a fright if they’d run a really good candidate.
Tim’s right to point out all the qualifiers on the Greens performance, but it’s still a good result for them. They got a massive swing to them when the ALP vote could have split off everywhere. Despite what some people from both the left and the right think, it’s just not a given that all ALP voters will (or should, for that matter) automatically prefer the Greens to the Liberals. You can see in most by-elections where one of the majors don’t run that the other major picks up some of their votes. I was expecting all the candidates in Higgins to increase their primary vote, and that turned out to be wrong this time – but that’s because of the anti-liberal swing on some of the strongest liberal booths. There was a protest vote from traditional liberal voters, but it was effectively neutralised by the ALP voters who preferred the Libs over the Greens. So although it’s a solid result for Tony Abbott and the liberals, the anti-lib swing on those booths is something they should not ignore.
As for the minor parties – it’s interesting to see how well the Sex Party and the DLP polled in Higgins. Those two parties could have an impact with their preferences in the senate in Victoria next year. Even a vote of 0.5-1.5% could change the outcome for the 3 contenders (ALP, Greens & Libs) for the last 2 spots.

By: Ziggy

Ziggy — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 23:15:34 +0000

Nick Says: Good grief, the DLP topped 10% in two Higgins booths: Hawksburn Central (13.84%) and Hughesdale North (10.22%). Recount please

Victoria and some parts of Northern NSW and Qld still hold pockets of high support for the DLP. As the party rebuilds I dont think that these figures will be uncommon.
As for the Democrats, I really think that there support has moved off either to us or the greens and that became obvious with Andrew Bartlett gaining pre-selection for the greens.

http://news.ninemsn.com.au/article.aspx?id=928606

A lot of Democrats who were involved in some of the foriegn issues IE West Papua have found a home with us as well.

By: Tim Andrews

Tim Andrews — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 23:04:55 +0000

8:14pm – The best ever vote for the Greens in the House of Representatives before tonight was 28% in the Kooyong by-election in 1994, when Peter Singer ran after Andrew Peacock’s retirement. Hamilton is on track for over 34% tonight, the first time the Greens have cracked 30% in a federal lower house seat.

Am I missing some qualifiers to this statement?

By: Paul (Australia Votes)

Paul (Australia Votes) — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 14:02:19 +0000

The person who was abused (and the guy who was there with him) are from the Blacktown Greens. The Blacktown Greens guy not abused is a friend of mine and he rang me at about 3:30pm and told me about it. I tweeted about it but it seems as though most people on Twitter either missed it or didn’t care.

By: Nick C

Nick C — Sat, 05 Dec 2009 13:34:00 +0000

In Bradfield, I don’t see any evidence of the CDP’s strategy of giving each candidate an area to target making much of an impact, no stand-out results for any of their candidates in any booth. Simon Kelly got over 5% in a couple of booths around St Ives, and the Sex Party got over 4% in a few booths, otherwise, no significant results for any of the minor candidates in any individual booths. Some big variations in informal votes across some of the booths.