Fisher covers the southern part of the Sunshine Coast, from Caloundra north to Mooloolaba on the coast and inland to Maleny and the Glass House Mountains. It originally extended inland to Gympie and Kingaroy when it was created in 1949, but assumed a progressively more coastal orientation as a result of the area’s rapid development. The seat was a fiefdom of the Adermann family for the first 35 years of its existence, being held for the Country Party first by Sir Charles until 1972 and thereafter by his son Evan. Evan Adermann moved to the new seat of Fairfax in 1984, and Fisher was retained for the Nationals by Peter Slipper.
The seat was one of a number of gains for Labor in Queensland amid the debacle of the 1987 Joh-for-PM push, which had found an ardent proponent in Slipper. For the next two terms it was held for Labor by Michael Lavarch, in which time the eclipse of the Nationals progressed. A redistribution in 1993 made the seat notionally Liberal, prompting Lavarch to move to the new seat of Dickson. Slipper then made an improbable return to the seat as a Liberal, and enjoyed double-digit margins between a 14.0% swing in 1996 and the statewide crunch in 2007, when there was a 7.9% swing to Labor.
Slipper managed to win promotion to parliamentary secretary for finance and administration after the 1998 election, despite lingering memories John Howard may have had of 1987, but he was pushed aside to make way for Peter Dutton after the 2004 election. He became increasingly marginalised thereafter, copping an avalanche of bad press in the local Sunshine Coast Daily newspaper and receiving the smallest swing of any Queensland LNP candidate at the 2010 election, when his margin went from 53.5% to 54.1%. It was reported during the campaign that Howard government minister Mal Brough, who had lost his seat of Longman in 2007, had sought to have Slipper disendorsed in his favour, but that Slipper’s position was secured by the terms of the Liberal National Party merger which guaranteed endorsement to all sitting members.
With a clear expectation that he would not again win preselection, Labor identified Slipper as a weak link in the Coalition after losing its majority at the 2010 election, and bolstered its position slighty by successfully nominating him for the deputy speakership at the expense of Coalition nominee Bruce Scott. Shortly afterwards, Brough confirmed that he would contest preselection in the seat. In November 2011 the government went one better in persuading Slipper to take on the Speaker’s position at the expense of incumbent Harry Jenkins, resulting in his expulsion from the LNP and a fierce campaign against him from elements of the media, most notably Sydney’s News Limited tabloid the Daily Telegraph.
In April 2012, a staffer to Slipper, James Ashby, launched legal action claiming he had been sexually harassed by Slipper, and presented evidence purportedly showing Slipper had misused Cabcharge vouchers. The matter soon embroiled Mal Brough, who initially dismissed suggestions he knew of Ashby’s actions in advance before conceding he had met him on multiple occasions and sought legal advice on his behalf. In December 2012, a Federal Court judge dismissed Ashby’s sexual harassment charge on the grounds that it was an abuse of process in which Brough had been directly involved.
None of this prevented Brough from winning a strongly contested LNP preselection in July, after spearheading a vigorous local recruitment drive which reportedly doubled the local party membership. The preselection contest played out against a backdrop of conflict going back to Brough’s tenure as president of the Queensland Liberal Party before the Liberal National Party merger was effected, which saw Brough stand down from the position over dissatisfaction with the terms of the merger.
A surprise late entrant in the preselection race was James McGrath, who had been the director of the LNP’s hugely successful 2012 state election campaign and was thought to be set to secure preselection for the neighbouring seat of Fairfax. McGrath’s backers included Malcolm Turnbull, Joe Hockey and Julie Bishop. Brough was nonetheless able to win the support of more than half the 350 preselectors in the first round, and McGrath has since been accommodated with Senate preselection. Also in the field were Peta Simpson, director of a local recruitment agency, who had backing from Brough foe Barnaby Joyce; Richard Bruinsma, a former adviser to Slipper; and Andrew Wallace, a barrister.
Labor’s call for Brough to be disendorsed after the Federal Court ruling on the Ashby matter met short shrift from Tony Abbott, who contented that Brough had been “quite transparent and upfront about his involvement”. The following month, Slipper received a Federal Police summons concerning the allegations he had misused Cabcharge vouchers.
In the immediate aftermath of the Ashby ruling, a ReachTel automated phone poll of 661 respondents suggested Brough was unlikely to suffer electoral damage, putting him at 48.4% on the primary vote against a derisory for 2.7% for Peter Slipper (who remained publicly committed to seeking re-election as an independent), 21.2% for Labor, 11.7% for the Greens and 7.4% for Katter’s Australian Party. Brough was viewed favourably by 41.8% of respondents against 34.0% unfavourably, while the respective figures for Slipper were 6.9% and 75.5%. Brough’s involvement in the Ashby matter made 37.3% of respondents less likely to vote for him, against 39.8% for no difference and 22.6% going so far as to say it had made them more likely to vote for him.
Thanks Ian.
I suspected it was from around the time of the leadership challenge.
Ian I have been considering your post, not entirely sure what to make of it. Perhaps first I would say I think Beazley should have been PM rather than Rudd, I think he would have been PM and a much better one than either Rudd or Gillard. So if you have me confused with a Rudd loyalist you are gravely mistaken.
You claim:
[Rudd’s loyalties lie not with the grassroots but with a group of much more genuinely faceless men (and a few women)—big business and captains of industry.]
Yet Rudd’s Resource Rent tax would actually have raised money, it was Gillard and Swan who caved to these big businesses and now have a tax that cost them lots of votes in WA and delivers no revenue. So as I said your post puzzles me.
As for the Unions
[Without union influence and their block vote, the ALP would truly be just “Another Liberal Party]
it would be nice if the unions had some influence other than in the Labor party, you know like members they look after in the community. It would also be nice if they were responsible for their actions inside the Labor party but they are not.
debolnay
[I had once such in the war years and they remained in place for many years afterwards.and many school kids had same too]
So did I (as well as OH), and we both had War Savings’ Certificates to which our parents contributed in the hope of building our savings into a deposit on land – as most then married as teens (esp girls) or early 20s, they would need that deposit before they were paid adult wages.
At the time (indeed, until the late 80s, early 90s) people’s saving for domestic housing, for the future, was promoted by all governments and banks, which then paid interest … as the lyrics of this song from Mary Poppins, AND from a pre-neoCon economics & fiscal era, demonstrates:
[If you invest your tuppence
Wisely in the bank
Safe and sound
Soon that tuppence,
Safely invested in the bank,
Will compound
And you’ll achieve that sense of conquest
As your affluence expands
In the hands of the directors
Who invest as propriety demands …
When you deposit tuppence in a bank account
Soon you’ll see
That it blooms into credit of a generous amount
Semiannually]
(Interestingly, from the 1990s until quite recently, bank fees effectively meant that having a bank savings account Cost savers money – facilitating the growth of CUs and BSs which continued to pay interest on savings.)
Neither my parents nor OH’s cashed in our War Savings Stamps (I still have both, still with blue stamps stuck on) because, well before they matured, Menzies’ 1st & 2nd Terms’ out-of-control inflation (inc a 22% – Oz’s highest ever) had effectively reduced our savings’ cards & accounts to souvenir-value only Australia’s prime Minister: Robert Menzies
[One of the Liberal Party’s promises at the December 1949 election had been to ‘put value back into the pound’. The new government proved reluctant to confront inflation. The two measures economists at the time recommended – a tax on wool sales (wool prices soared during the Korean War) and an appreciation of the Australian pound (then worth 16 shillings sterling) – were unacceptable to Menzies’ Country Party coalition partners. It was not until late 1951 that action was finally taken – a ‘horror budget’ with a 10 per cent income tax increase and increases also in company tax, sales tax and customs and excise.
An unwillingness to respond quickly to adverse economic developments and ‘stop–go’ management of the economy characterised Menzies’ second term as Prime Minister]
I’ve never believed that Menzies’ inflation completely lacked any intention to reduce, very dramatically, the value of the debt the Commonwealth owed to millions of Australians who had patriotically invested a substantial portion of their income.
666
briefly
[Voltaire was arguing about censorship. William has not censored JM, who remains completely free to start a fight anywhere he likes, other than in William’s salon.]
Exactly. There is no censorship issue here. Not even close.
[Voltaire was arguing about censorship. William has not censored JM, who remains completely free to start a fight anywhere he likes, other than in William’s salon.]
Using that argument, the OO not reporting any comments by Labor ministers isn’t censorship as they can be reported elsewhere.
646
zoomster
[e.g. how do you get the message out about the NBN? – TV ad? Leaflet? Radio ad?]
Keep rolling it out, to as wide a cross-section of the community as possible, so that everybody has some contact with it somewhere in their life, at their neighbour’s, brother-in-law’s, business competitors’, etc.
The more people see it in action, see what it can do, and realise the consequences of missing out, the more they are going to want it, nay, demand it.
(We are already seeing Coalition voters and MPs whinging about not getting it fast enough. Abbott cannot stop that rapidly rising tide, nor alter its direction in favour of the vastly inferior wireless option.)
Which is good news for Labor, as Abbott has firmly and very foolishly hitched his and the Coalition’s wagon to destroying it (or selling it cheap to Rupie Baby), and he cannot now recant without serious loss of face.
I should add that I agree with JM’s banning.
We often see an Icarus here who briefly flies against the breeze, gets lots of attention and then burns up as the sun melts the wax on their wings.
@nickharmsen: Full cabinet list here #saparli #adelaide #reshuffle http://t.co/pqNRAcyV
Zoidlord,I struggle to believe that Julia Gillard will have a swing of more than 20% against her based on something that affects 5% of her electorate. All the other seats mentioned are held on more than 5%. The article really wasn’t worth writing, I think SMH and the Age, rightly or wrongly, are trying to push the issue along. None of the members mentioned are really under threat.
Unless of course, you believe Rankin is likely to fall to Katter’s party or the Greens.
[Using that argument, the OO not reporting any comments by Labor ministers isn’t censorship as they can be reported elsewhere.]
Which is exactly the case. It’s not censorship, it’s bias. Much as I’d like to annihilate any opinion I disagree with, censorship is something that requires the power of the state.
If that quick-typing octogenarian JM wants to send me a photo of herself holding up a piece of paper saying something to the effect of “I am JM, the PB commenter”, I shall allow her back on. Bonus points if she’s doing the Gangnam Style dance.
[Abbott cannot stop that rapidly rising tide, nor alter its direction in favour of the vastly inferior wireless option.]
Should read:
…in favour of the vastly inferior fibre-to-the-node and wireless options.
William
😆
Wouldn’t it be easy for a quick-typing octogenarian to photoshop something?
OPT, Australians have generally been good savers. Household savings, retained earnings by business and public sector savings have usually added up to about 20% of GDP. We are still saving at this kind of rate. The only recent savings slumps were in the 1920’s and again in the late 1990’s/early 2000’s, when waves of speculation in financial markets both actively discouraged saving and encouraged debt-financed consumption booms.
Savers have endured very very poor returns on their savings for hundreds of years, but this has not killed off the desire to save or the need for it.
In China, where real interest rates are usually negative, households save because they know they cannot rely on the state to care for them in their old age or infirmity. Frugality is deeply ingrained in the culture, and savings rates are very high.
Things are not so out of whack here, but there are plenty of signs that households are re-acquiring the savings habits of their parents and grandparents.
@SPIEGEL_English: Major Setback for Merkel: Last-Minute Win for Germany’s SPD and Greens http://t.co/SGr6k2Nu
They probably haven’t heard of the Gangnam Style dance out back of Bourke.
Albo on 24 news opening new freight rail in Sydney.
Way to go Labor 🙂
Quite right, William. I have to say, much of what JM posted left me feeling somewhat bemused as well.
Hi Guytaur. A new week so hope we are still friends after last week’s discussion? And no I don’t want to start up where we left off 🙂
briefly 🙂 🙂 🙂
[briefly
Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 12:19 pm | PERMALINK
Quite right, William. I have to say, much of what JM posted left me feeling somewhat bemused as well.]
Agree hope the photo of JM to William is good!
Briefly is that you I found on Twitter and followed, not sure
if not will unfollow 😉
DisplayName:
[Wouldn’t it be easy for a quick-typing octogenarian to photoshop something?]
And even easier for someone who wasn’t an octogenarian but a handful of Menzies House work experience kiddies.
Given where “Gangnam” is in Seoul, the other requirement would be entirely apt …
davidwh
Yes still friends. I still hold same view.As so we are disagreeing. No big surprise. Only time I came close to voting Liberal was at 16. Close call. Learnt quickly.
🙂
Fran
Yes the horse riding dance is very apt. 🙂
guytaur it’s wasy to vote Liberal. Just leave your conscience at home when you go out to vote 😉
Hi mari….I do have a twitter account…briefly1….I am not much good at tweets. I am too verbose. But I like to see what’s going on and follow some good people. Am I following you? I usually counter-follow. Is that a word?
Happy New Year Bludgers.
If I was any good with photoshop I would be sending a picture of Bronwyn Bishop holding a sign declaring that she is JM.
briefly
The term I have seen used is follow back.
Censorship requires power. The state can find that in legal and monopolistic ways. But that’s just a paradigm. Private bodies can censor.
A university trying to forbid an academic speaking a certain way or publicly – that’s censorship, if there is a serious power of discipline over the employee.
Or remember the case of Australia Post and its contractors refusing to distribute an anti-Iraq war leaflet? The one that showed the boy who lost all his limbs to an allied bomb, alleging offensiveness or some similar decorum policy? (A photo, incidentally, that papers like the Oz had run publicly). That was political censorship regardless of who owns Aust Post or its claim that the activists could still drop the leaflet by foot or by finding some other delivery agent.
William
I’d ask for photo ID. JK must have a drivers licence or one of these –
http://www.rta.nsw.gov.au/licensing/photocard.html
It’s sort of a quiet start to the week waiting for something to happen. The ComSec Report was interesting because QLD was rated ahead of NSW/VIC/SA/TAS despite all the Newman effects. Not sure how we managed that with all our major economic sectors under stress.
WA remains the state to be and as The Petshop Boys would sing “Go West”.
[briefly
Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 12:27 pm | PERMALINK
Hi mari….I do have a twitter account…briefly1….I am not much good at tweets. I am too verbose. But I like to see what’s going on and follow some good people. Am I following you? I usually counter-follow. Is that a word?]
Word sounds pretty good to me I am @randlight and have just followed you . Arn’t you lucky 😉
Guytaur #768 – yay, a Whitlam government proposal implemented. Now for the NDIS!
davidwh
Not how ABC reported. They put WA and NT in top. QLD,NSW and VIC in second tier and other states last.
Same tier not ahead. So Newman is having his effect. QLD mining state should be with WA and NT.
On the basis of ‘you don’t know if you don’t ask’ – hubby and sons (two teenage boys) are wanting to dash up to the South Coast of NSW sometime within the next ten days (flexible in that time) for a couple of nights.
Anyone know of anything available? (Cheap is good and they’re not fussy, either).
mari, is that your charming Greek Church?
guytaur apparently QLD was ranked 4th after WA/NT/ACT but only just. NSW and VIC were close behind with SA and TAS falling at the last turn. But it’s only one organisation’s survey which doesn’t mean a lot when much of the country is struggling.
So Portolesi is demoted and Wortley is out. Fox stays.
Does anyone know what the story is with Caica? Why did he leave or was he pushed?
It reminds me of a summer or two I spent in the Cyclades when I was young and free, in the arms of a delightful French lover…and of incorruptible friendship too.
I must go to work!!!
I’m going to disagree with the definition of censorship which is popular here.
I’m going with the one on wiki.Idon’t think it has to be a government body.
[Censorship is the suppression of speech or other public communication which may be considered objectionable, harmful, sensitive, or inconvenient as determined by a government, media outlet, or other controlling body. ]
[briefly
Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 12:35 pm | PERMALINK
mari, is that your charming Greek Church?]
In my favourite part of the world Greek Islands, although avatar is Santorini it is too touristy now, people recognize it. Beauty wise Santorini is wonderful I go to the quieter islands(more Greek people go to these islands) am lucky regarded as “family” at the apartments I go to on both islands. Greek people are wonderful which is why I am so sad at what has happened to Greece. Once you are “accepted” they spoil you so much, especially the Mommas
WWP
[Yet Rudd’s Resource Rent tax would actually have raised money, it was Gillard and Swan who caved to these big businesses and now have a tax that cost them lots of votes in WA and delivers no revenue.]
Arguably so, but the trouble was the context. RSPT didn’t emerge out of an orderly process in which a government on a roll outmanoeuvred its enemies and secured support for policy. It was a panicked response by a PM who suspected the ground was shifting underneath his feet, (partly because he’d retreated on carbon pricing, BER, HIP and used the phrase “Big Australia”) and was desperate to claw back ground and perhaps back his growing numbers of enemies in caucus into a corner. The miners may be venal, but they weren’t stupid. They knew weakness when they saw it. Rudd was stupid showing it to them.
I’m not convinced the RSPT structure was ideal anyway. If you want to tax windfall or anomalous profits on a commododity, the simplest way would be to take your baseline as the rolling average price paid for the commodity over time (say the last 20 years) and deem prices above that threshhold “anomalous” and levy an “anomalous profits tax” (APT!!) on that. In PR terms “super” was the wrong term, because people think of “super” as superannuation and of course, the miners reminded people their super was invested in resources.
One option would have been to guarantee that some fixed proportion of the “APT” revenue (say 5%) would be placed into super accounts of those on the bottom six deciles, so as to underpin the value of these savings in the light of their decline due to the GFC. That would have been simple to explain and have wesged the Rolex revolutionaries very well.
Of course, all this should have been initiated post the 2010 election. Before that, Rudd should have said simply “we need to have a national conversation about how to share the enormous wealth of the mining boom amongst all Australians” — giving the MCA and their groupies nothing to swing at. He could have said that in December/January 2009 and gone to a DD in February over CO2 pricing and the health rebate. As I’ve said before though, he really should have implemented Garnaut as soon as it came out, dared the LNP to block it, and if they had, gone to a DD in November 2009.
Far better. He’d have romped in. Caucus could then have rolled him after, if he’d refused to treat them properly.
All water under the bridge now though …
[briefly
Posted Monday, January 21, 2013 at 12:38 pm | PERMALINK
It reminds me of a summer or two I spent in the Cyclades when I was young and free, in the arms of a delightful French lover…and of incorruptible friendship too.]
Just saw this and the next comment from you was “have to go to work” I am not saying anymore :devil:
BTW Have been to 37 islands and the Cyclades is the best group as far as I am concerned
Which may be oneself.
Re Fisher:
In the event Brough is charged and convicted for collusion and/or receipt of stolen diary notes… who is there to replace him and is this likely to affect the outcome in Fisher?
Gecko I don’t think the LNP would have trouble finding a replacement who would almost certainly win the seat.
Whichever definition you prefer, censorship is clearly something that is beyond my meagre powers. If you want to get your opinion on the internet, there are a million ways to go about it. I am doing what any publisher must do by definition – deciding what and what not to publish.
And I have followed you too, mari.
Very nice house for an Agios, overlooking the sea. We should talk about Greece one day. About the singing, the bouzoukia and the Cretan lyra, and the dancing, the thyme and the lemons and the little red fish and squid, the retsina and metaxa, the olive groves and the pan-pipes; and seferis.