Is our 2 party system just a con?

[willedoo]

I think Labor reasoned that they had no hope of winning so by not running a candidate the Labor vote would go to the independent to help her beat One Nation. Only problem was a fair bit of it would have gone to One Nation. Regardless, the One Nation primary vote was too strong for the independent to have any hope of beating. Not running a candidate might have saved Labor the embarrassment of a swing away from them to ON, but that's just theoretical speculation on my part.

[willedoo]

It's certainly interesting politics in this country lately. What we've just seen is One Nation take a traditionally safe Coalition seat, but not just any seat, the seat of the former opposition leader and leader of the Liberal party. What hurt the Liberals was the swing against them in the last federal election which knocked their safe margin down to 6%.

The big lesson there is that it doesn't matter how many seats you have, it's the seat margins going into the next election that counts. If you have a big majority made up of a lot of marginal seats, the switch can quite easily flick the other way next election.

 

The reason I had to edit this post is a sticky 'a' key on the laptop. If I don't proofread, I have to go back with an edit and add a heap of a's.

Edited 14 hours ago by willedoo

[onetrack]

Farley seems quite a sensible individual, with a very diplomatic turn of speech, unlike a lot of the ON rabble. It will be interesting to see what happens from here on in. A well-spoken, thoughtful individual such as Farley may bring a lot more credibility to the ON Party.

 

However, the general trend of elections in recent decades is voters vote for whoever is in Opposition, just to express dissatisfaction with the ruling Partys performance. No matter who is power, they all appear to have no answers to the ordinary voters pressing problems - inflation, the cost of living, fuel prices, housing unaffordability, lack of job opportunities - they all perform dismally in these fields.

 

I'd like to see some politicians with real backbone, take on the billionaires and giant global corporations, and tax them more heavily, and also lay into the betting conglomerates that wield so much power, and which every politician is too frightened to offend.

[willedoo]

By-elections are often a very different breed than general elections. Mainly due to a lot of local electorate issues, combined with the fact a certain amount of voters feel it's safe to cast a protest vote against the status quo in a by-election. In a general election, those same voters might play safe and stick with the majors. Water is one issue in Farrer, but along with some other local issues, a lot of voters saw the Libs promising to fix things in an electorate that's been held by them for decades. I can understand how a lot of them would feel neglected and think about giving someone else a go.

 

I don't think the poor coalition result is a reflection on their candidates. Both Liberal and National candidates were top knotch candidates, but incumbency worked against them, as well as the problems in Canberra.

[red750]

Every ON voter questioned on TV, when asked why, said "We needed a change."

[old man emu]

One seat in the House, and that seat is on the Cross Benches. He will be a voice crying out in the wilderness. It is interesting to note that teh Libs directed their preferences to ON and away from the Independant. Guess we know which way he will vote. However with Labor having such a big majority, the rest of the House won't have much effect. 

 

In order to bolster the standing of ON, Farley will have to spend the majority of his time on the ground working for the people of Farrer. He can't spend his time in Canberra pushing the ON manifesto. If he concentrates on working for his electorate, he might get re-elected at the next General Election.

 

Just a comment on the "donkey vote" discussion. I reckon most Australians don't care too much about politics and only come to vote for the Democracy Sanger. They have already decided which Party they will vote for and only take that Party's HTV card and follow it. Have you watched people going along the line of Party volunteers handing out HTV cards? You will see quite a lot of impoliteness. The percentage of votes found not to follow HTVs is an indication of teh amount of thought voters are putting into making their choice.

[Marty_d]

I never take a HTV card. Firmly of the belief that everyone who is eligible to vote should take their responsibility to engage in democracy seriously and number all boxes.

It's not a big ask, once every 3 years.

[red750]

I take a HTV card from everyone. No-one knows which I will follow, if any of them.

 

If you vote for X, then you want them to have the best chance to win. You may not know which order of preferences will best assist that result. Following X's HTV helps you decide which works best for them.

[willedoo]

57 minutes ago, old man emu said:

One seat in the House, and that seat is on the Cross Benches.

Two seats in the House ome, you forgot about Barnaby. Only two seats but one of them is an ex National Party leader, ex Deputy Prime Minister and a seasoned politician. So as one commentator said, it's not as if the new member will be wandering lost around Parliament House wondering where the coffee machine is, he'll be well chaperoned.

Edited 3 hours ago by willedoo

[old man emu]

I take  every HTV card offered to me from every Party as I walk towards the polling station. I do that out of politeness to the volunteer. I already know who I am giving my first preference to, but the card is useful in sorting out lower preferences amongst a large number of candidates.

[octave]

I used to take a HTV from every party so as not to signal my intentions.  I haven't done this now for many years.  My next stage where I used to live was because I knew the local school where the polling booth was, I was able to enter from a direction that avoided the people handing out HTVs 

Fir the last few years I have mostly voted by mail and therefore have done my research about who to vote for online. I did vote in person at the last election so I researched online, came up with a voting strategy and wrote it down so I wouldn't forget.

My area is a very safe seat so I usually vote for a smaller party or independent knowing  who will win anyway. 

[willedoo]

I can understand how some people would feel a bit awkward only taking one how to vote card and ignoring the others , or ignoring the lot of them. It stems from basic Australian politeness. I can remember when I first went to S.E. Asia how hard it was to learn to ignore the street hawkers. Totally ignoring someone who is in your face is not easy in our culture but over there you have to or it would take all day to get anywhere. The only time I ignore anyone here is with the chuggers outside the supermarkets. Edit: election time how to vote cards as well.

Edited 3 hours ago by willedoo

[willedoo]

One of the TV commentators during the election coverage last night made an obvious point. That was that the big challenge for One Nation to live up to their growing popularity is to address the traditional problems in their party structure and management. That included better candidate vetting, one area that has often let them down in the past. The party organisation has been hit and miss in the past and they will need a good management team going forward.

 

It's only my opinion, but I think as popular as Pauline is among the voters, before too long she will have to take a step back from the front line and take on more of a party president, party elder statesman type of role. She's had a long time faithful sidekick in Malcolm Roberts, but his strength is in social media and not in real time speaking and interviews. At the moment she's got Barnby there sharing a lot of the spotlight, so that takes the pressure off her a bit. At times you could be forgiven for thinking that the only time Barnaby opens his mouth is to change feet, but he does have his moments and he resonates with a lot of voters.

[willedoo]

Here's a totally ficticious and theoretical scenario, given the demise of the Liberal Party and the reality it could take years to rebuild: It's becoming obvious traditional politics as we always knew it under the two party dominance system has changed, possibly forever. So at some stage in the future, could we see a three party system, ie: the left of the Labor party merges with the Greens as one party, the Labor right and the Liberal centre merge, and the third party is made up of the coalition right and One Nation merging. Three parties - left, centre and right.

[facthunter]

It costs a Lot to fund a Candidate so if there's no Hope why do it if your funds are limited. Preferring the PHON was a big mistake for Taylor's strategy. It gave the entirely WRONG Vibe. There's even talk of a Coalition with PHON.  It's a MASSIVE LIB loss that didn't even have to Happen, If they hadn't done a hatchet job on Ley.  The Present Liberal party is a dangerous place for Women.. Nev

[facthunter]

Mass reorganisation like that willie, just does not happen. You can't herd Cats and snow won't form snowballs by itself. When Politics GETS involved  truth goes out the window, Like in WARS.   Money affects the narrative. Nev

[red750]

Look at the number of informal votes and other minor parties/independents.

 

 

 

 

 

 

[facthunter]

LESS informal than Previous. Quite a few didn't vote. Nev