Australia 2022 Election

[Ebowed]

The most glaring exception (Fowler) was lost because it turns out that parachuting a white and loudly anti-immigrant candidate

I can't seem to find any record of Kristina Keneally being especaily anti-immigrant beyond some proposals to cut post pandemic temporary immigration from a quick google.

She was Labor's shadow minister for Home Affairs & Immigration.  All of Labor's policies on reducing immigration and torturing refugees she had to be out there defending week to week. 

[Pulaski]

The teal candidate who won that district is a Vietnamese refugee who used to be a Liberal until 2016.

I wouldn’t consider her to be a ‘teal independent’. Her campaign was focused on being a longstanding local figure standing against an imposed (white) outsider rather than environmentalism. She’s even went as far as to attack the teal independents as not proper independents (like her apparently) due to their funding.

I think the differences between the new independents has been understated so far. Sure, lots of them are teals, but you also have Le, who I expect to align closely with the Coalition, and Chaney, who looks very much to be in Wilkie’s mould.

[Хahar 🤔]

I don't know much about the selection process in Fowler, but it's curious that Labor tried to parachute KKK there specifically. Was there no other safe seat in Sydney available or was representing that particular constituency going to be helpful to her as immigration minister?

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I don't know much about the selection process in Fowler, but it's curious that Labor tried to parachute KKK there specifically. Was there no other safe seat in Sydney available or was representing that particular constituency going to be helpful to her as immigration minister?

There were four retiring Labor members in NSW. Sharon Bird (Cunningham), Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter), Chris Hayes (Fowler) and Julie Owens (Parramatta).

Cunningham saw 18 year incumbent Sharon Bird retire, and as she's still very popular with local branches the pre-selection was stitched up for her staffer Alison Byrnes. Strike one.
After the nasty surprise in Hunter next election Labor needed a strong local candidate to massage the seat, so they got a coal mining olympic pistol shooting redneck agreed to by Fitzgibbon and Albo without local branch input. Strike two.
Parramatta is a fairly marginal seat losing a popular incumbent so Labor needed a high profile strong candidate with vague local ties. For all his faults Charlton is strong on policy, is a self-made man, grew up in Parra, still has family in Parra and proved fairly adept at campaigning (admittedly helped by the car crash Liberal pre-selection). Strike three.

So the only seat left is Fowler. The retiring member Chris Hayes is from the right and the left has no claim on it, so there was no factional problems. While Hayes and the local branches strongly supported Tu Le the western sydney branches have been well and truly neutered over the years, so it was unlikely they'd put up a fight. Keneally didn't have the factional support to beat O'Neill for the top senate spot, and dropping to third meant certain defeat. Keneally is very close to Albanese, he absolutely wanted her to stay part of the team so Fowler was the only option.

What Labor completely misjudged is Fowler already had a strong independent ready to jump in the race. Dai Le has strong name recognition and ran three strong challenges in the state seat of Cabramatta in 2008 and 2011 as a Liberal and in 2019 as an Independent.

[Epaminondas]

The tightest races this election look like the reverse of 2019:
2019: Labour won 13 of 18 races within 3%
2022: Liberals win ~7 of 9 races within 3% (Moore, Menzies, Casey, Bass, Sturt, Deakin, Gilmore...)

One could have expected the winning party to dominate the close calls.

[EastAnglianLefty]

I don't know much about the selection process in Fowler, but it's curious that Labor tried to parachute KKK there specifically. Was there no other safe seat in Sydney available or was representing that particular constituency going to be helpful to her as immigration minister?

There were four retiring Labor members in NSW. Sharon Bird (Cunningham), Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter), Chris Hayes (Fowler) and Julie Owens (Parramatta).

Cunningham saw 18 year incumbent Sharon Bird retire, and as she's still very popular with local branches the pre-selection was stitched up for her staffer Alison Byrnes. Strike one.
After the nasty surprise in Hunter next election Labor needed a strong local candidate to massage the seat, so they got a coal mining olympic pistol shooting redneck agreed to by Fitzgibbon and Albo without local branch input. Strike two.
Parramatta is a fairly marginal seat losing a popular incumbent so Labor needed a high profile strong candidate with vague local ties. For all his faults Charlton is strong on policy, is a self-made man, grew up in Parra, still has family in Parra and proved fairly adept at campaigning (admittedly helped by the car crash Liberal pre-selection). Strike three.

So the only seat left is Fowler. The retiring member Chris Hayes is from the right and the left has no claim on it, so there was no factional problems. While Hayes and the local branches strongly supported Tu Le the western sydney branches have been well and truly neutered over the years, so it was unlikely they'd put up a fight. Keneally didn't have the factional support to beat O'Neill for the top senate spot, and dropping to third meant certain defeat. Keneally is very close to Albanese, he absolutely wanted her to stay part of the team so Fowler was the only option.

What Labor completely misjudged is Fowler already had a strong independent ready to jump in the race. Dai Le has strong name recognition and ran three strong challenges in the state seat of Cabramatta in 2008 and 2011 as a Liberal and in 2019 as an Independent.

What's the procedure for selecting Senate candidates? Why was the leadership able to stitch up House nominations for its preferred candidates but not for the Senate?

[Estrella]

I am shocked.

[CumbrianLefty]

The tightest races this election look like the reverse of 2019:
2019: Labour won 13 of 18 races within 3%
2022: Liberals win ~7 of 9 races within 3% (Moore, Menzies, Casey, Bass, Sturt, Deakin, Gilmore...)

One could have expected the winning party to dominate the close calls.

Maybe shows the last minute scare campaigning from the coalition (and Murdoch) had an effect. But it also leaves those seats vulnerable to the ALP next time if they govern effectively.

[(no subject)]

The Greens's current figure of 11.9% is only 0.1% ahead of where they were in 2010.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

I don't know much about the selection process in Fowler, but it's curious that Labor tried to parachute KKK there specifically. Was there no other safe seat in Sydney available or was representing that particular constituency going to be helpful to her as immigration minister?

There were four retiring Labor members in NSW. Sharon Bird (Cunningham), Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter), Chris Hayes (Fowler) and Julie Owens (Parramatta).

Cunningham saw 18 year incumbent Sharon Bird retire, and as she's still very popular with local branches the pre-selection was stitched up for her staffer Alison Byrnes. Strike one.
After the nasty surprise in Hunter next election Labor needed a strong local candidate to massage the seat, so they got a coal mining olympic pistol shooting redneck agreed to by Fitzgibbon and Albo without local branch input. Strike two.
Parramatta is a fairly marginal seat losing a popular incumbent so Labor needed a high profile strong candidate with vague local ties. For all his faults Charlton is strong on policy, is a self-made man, grew up in Parra, still has family in Parra and proved fairly adept at campaigning (admittedly helped by the car crash Liberal pre-selection). Strike three.

So the only seat left is Fowler. The retiring member Chris Hayes is from the right and the left has no claim on it, so there was no factional problems. While Hayes and the local branches strongly supported Tu Le the western sydney branches have been well and truly neutered over the years, so it was unlikely they'd put up a fight. Keneally didn't have the factional support to beat O'Neill for the top senate spot, and dropping to third meant certain defeat. Keneally is very close to Albanese, he absolutely wanted her to stay part of the team so Fowler was the only option.

What Labor completely misjudged is Fowler already had a strong independent ready to jump in the race. Dai Le has strong name recognition and ran three strong challenges in the state seat of Cabramatta in 2008 and 2011 as a Liberal and in 2019 as an Independent.

What's the procedure for selecting Senate candidates? Why was the leadership able to stitch up House nominations for its preferred candidates but not for the Senate?

It's rather a lot harder to override the entire state party than an individual electorate branch.

[Pulaski]

Sturt has been called for the Liberal.

The Liberal's lead is up to nearly 900 votes in Deakin and I think that's falling out of reach for the ALP.

Labor is still ahead of the Greens for 2nd in Brisbane, but only by 500 or so votes, and the Animal Justice Party (surely heavy Greens preferencers) has nearly 1500 votes, so still anyone's game.

Gilmore is very close.

Labor have a little breathing space in Lyons but it will be tight all the way.

Labor will win Macnamara.

[Pulaski]

The Greens's current figure of 11.9% is only 0.1% ahead of where they were in 2010.

But they've tripled (at least) their numbers in the House of Reps. Might be getting the hang of this thing.

Of course, if seats were awarded proportionally they'd have 17 or 18 of them and Labor wouldn't have a hope of governing without them.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

There were four retiring Labor members in NSW. Sharon Bird (Cunningham), Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter), Chris Hayes (Fowler) and Julie Owens (Parramatta).

Xahar's point would be that you can expand the pool: if it is decided that it is important to get a particular person a seat, then it makes more sense to quietly convince someone who represents somewhere suitable to stand down and to carefully massage local opinion to make it seem like a good idea, rather than just to foist said person on whichever open seat is easiest to rig a selection meeting for. Of course the latter is normal in Australian political culture, even though it frequently backfires in one way or another.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

There were four retiring Labor members in NSW. Sharon Bird (Cunningham), Joel Fitzgibbon (Hunter), Chris Hayes (Fowler) and Julie Owens (Parramatta).

Xahar's point would be that you can expand the pool: if it is decided that it is important to get a particular person a seat, then it makes more sense to quietly convince someone who represents somewhere suitable to stand down and to carefully massage local opinion to make it seem like a good idea, rather than just to foist said person on whichever open seat is easiest to rig a selection meeting for. Of course the latter is normal in Australian political culture, even though it frequently backfires in one way or another.

The latter is normal only because forcing incumbents to step aside isn’t really feasible, and would likely only cause even more mess. Not only are you foisting someone on a eat you’re knifing their incumbent in the process (who will protest rather loudly!).
Overall the least bad solution for Keneally was running her again in Bennelong, given her byelection candidacy sets the precedent. But they didn’t want the risk of a marginal seat.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Whoever mentioned forcing? But, again, this is a matter of political culture.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Whoever mentioned forcing? But, again, this is a matter of political culture.

Really more than anything else it’s because of the far smaller parliament. Just breaking down the options, of the 13 Sydney Labor seats from 2019 9 are held by Shadow Ministers and the Deputy Whip. Of the remaining four you have the two retirements mentioned (Parramatta and Fowler), Macarthur (a marginal locked down by an extremely strong local MP) and just one real alternative to the open seats, Kingsford Smith. Which is held by a very powerful factional chief and a former chair of the state party.

That’s the real problem. We don’t have swathes of anonymous powerless backbenchers like in the House of Commons. Especially not in the powerful NSW branch!

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Of course the small size of the Australian parliament makes things trickier, of course, but the fundamental point is that if it is so important to find a seat for a particular individual, then there are all sorts of ways of going about it that are less crude and so less likely to end badly. It only seems like a logical and natural thing to do because such practice is normal in Australian politics.

[AustralianSwingVoter]

Of course the small size of the Australian parliament makes things trickier, of course, but the fundamental point is that if it is so important to find a seat for a particular individual, then there are all sorts of ways of going about it that are less crude and so less likely to end badly. It only seems like a logical and natural thing to do because such practice is normal in Australian politics.

Of course if it were so important for all a solution could be found. But if it were so important for all she never would've lost her senate spot in the first place! It was important only for some, and those some happened to hold the power to override a local pre-selection in an open seat.

[Secretary of State Liberal Hack]

I see a lot of ALP supporters celebrating Dutton becoming LNP leader saying it gurantees them the next election. Is there any reason to think Dutton would be any more toxic than any other realistic LNP choice ?

[Talleyrand]

How likely is an expansion of Parliament in the coming years?

[Pulaski]

I see a lot of ALP supporters celebrating Dutton becoming LNP leader saying it gurantees them the next election. Is there any reason to think Dutton would be any more toxic than any other realistic LNP choice ?

It's hard to answer that question as at this stage there isn't any other realistic choice (though I maintain Andrew Constance is an option they may look at down the line provided he wins Gilmore). But it's not hard to see that Dutton is much less daunting a prospect than Frydenberg would have been.

Personally I can't see him being a popular leader, but I don't rule anything out after Abbott.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

If there are actually people saying it *guarantees* them the next election, then it looks like utter hubris to me. I don't think that three years ago, you'd see many people predicting, say, the teal independents being a real political force, let alone the sheer amount of success they had in this election. It's really quite perilous to be too confident.

[Filuwaúrdjan]

Of course the small size of the Australian parliament makes things trickier, of course, but the fundamental point is that if it is so important to find a seat for a particular individual, then there are all sorts of ways of going about it that are less crude and so less likely to end badly. It only seems like a logical and natural thing to do because such practice is normal in Australian politics.

Of course if it were so important for all a solution could be found. But if it were so important for all she never would've lost her senate spot in the first place! It was important only for some, and those some happened to hold the power to override a local pre-selection in an open seat.

Is there any particular reason why you're being so weirdly belligerent about this? I don't think that anyone here is in deep disagreement that it was a) a foolish thing to do but b) reflected the norms of Australian political culture, many of which are quite odd.

[President Punxsutawney Phil]

Anyone else shocked a bit at the results in Durack?

[Intell]

Anyone else shocked a bit at the results in Durack?

Not in the slightest