Well, it’s still too close to call, but it’s looking that way.
Antony Green couldn’t believe what was coming out of his computer. Swings of 20% and more to the ALP. It kept coming, so he had to believe it.
There are 89 seats in parliament, so the magic number is 45. By 7.15 the computer was giving 42 to Labor and 3 ‘other’. They are Rob Katter and Shane Knuth of KAP and the long-standing, principled independent, Peter Wellington. All three are against asset sales and were, I understand, putting the LNP last.
At the end of the night the ABC computer gave 43 seats to Labor, 40 to the LNP, 3 other and 3 undecided. Antony Green reckons Labor will probably get 45, possibly 46. Wayne Swan reckons the LNP can’t get past 42.
Annastacia Palaszczuk says it’s too close to call, but she thinks Labor will form government. During the campaign she said she wouldn’t do deals with the cross bench. If she has more members than the LNP the Governor will be obliged to ask whether she can form government. At that point she doesn’t need to do a formal deal. She will just have to consult the cross bench before she brings any legislation to the parliament.
Mark on Facebook said:
Tonight’s Labor victory in Queensland is a defining moment of change in Australian politics, which will never be the same.
I hope he expands on that, but I am inclined to agree. I think the Newman/LNP style galvanised the ALP base. Kate Jones in Ashgrove (Newman is history; we never need to listen to his voice again!) said she had 500 volunteers working for her.
Tim Nicholls and Jane Prentice (federal member for Ryan) on the ABC panel both couldn’t grasp that their messages were wrong, not their messaging. Both said, we need to “explain better and take the people with us”. They couldn’t grasp that they were heading in the wrong direction!
By the way, Prentice signalled that Tony Abbott had just two days to turn things around. She was openly calling for a change in direction, or something, and said that his forthcoming address to the press gallery would be “pivotal”.
I’d love to know the numbers, but I was pleased with the number of women who won seats for Labor. Jackie Trad for deputy!
Let’s hope Annastacia Palaszczuk does become our next Premier – and yes, Jackie Trad would make a good Deputy Premier.
There is, however, the big worry that, once more, we have a Brisbane Government that neglects the needs of people in rural and remote parts of Queensland.
There is the universal concern about over-restrictive tree clearing regulations. Not every land-holder is an ignorant crazy tree-hater and erosion-maker let loose on a bulldozer.
The loss of control and responsible use of land and water to mining interests is another.
Although some feel that foreign investment might be a good thing, many with whom I have spoken fear that the Brisbane bunch will sell off their properties from under them to foreign businesses pretending to be Australian ones.
The “Assets Leasing” fraud infuriated everyone and certainly alienated many traditional LNP voter – they don’t like being treated like ignorant mugs.
Nor did they like being lied to about all the essential services vanishing before their very eyes. One example out of very many: what used to be frequent long-distant bus services have almost all gone; I’ll bet the “Courier-Mail” didn’t carry the news that the North Burnett Regional Council had no choice but to take over part of a bus route so that people in some key towns could get access to various professional services – talk about living in the Third World!.
Then there in rapidly diminishing minority of the old-fashioned ones who are scared of an ALP are is chock-a-block full of layabout socialists and that the only thing that will save them is the LNP, even if it is run by the Devil himself. It was only the sheer ignorance of the 2015 living conditions in rural Queensland among the ALP’s election “strategists (??)” that prevented the ALP gaining a swag of rusted-on LNP rural and remote seats.
GrahamB, I am a long time proponent for regional development. Allowing rural communities to erode to uneconomic levels is in no-ones interest, city people included. Australia has a disastrous disinterest in building rural communities. Having said that Climate Change is now an inconvenient complication, but the prime motive to build inland cities will in future be focused on solar energy facilities, and the rural sector will benefit hugely as there will be many industries created that country labour can participate with in conjunction with their rural activities.
A massive industry for Australia yet to get underway is passive air conditioning. This is where solar energy is used to create cold air directly using absorptive chiller systems. Surviving in the center of this country will depend upon this technology (Australia has a huge history in this area, google “the icy ball refrigerator”). As the number and spread of 50 degree C days increases surviving in the bush will become ever more difficult, though less so in Northern Queensland perhaps.
However there is any amount of video with Palaszczuk saying the she has got the Queensland message, “don’t sell our assets”.
Abbott is declaring that there are lessons to be learnt from the Queensland election, then in the very next breath he is declaring that Australia will not join the “weak government club”.
Presumably it is only weak governments that take advice from the world’s scientists on the danger of accumulated waste changing the environment, preferring instead to get technical guidance from UK political hacks, and expatriate media moguls.
Presumably strong governments are incapable of managing public assets on behalf of the people who elect them and sell everything that is a distraction from listening to the people. People who are all saying that they like to have public assets run efficiently for their benefit.
Strong governments are incapable of managing debt in the way the “people” manage mortgages and operating budgets.
Strong governments of the right kind do not like criticism, it is all too difficult for them.
Tony Abbott has learnt from the Queensland election, he says. What he does not say at all is what it is that he has learnt.
I challenge a journalist to get Tony Abbott to say what it is that he has learnt.
I think the lesson is more than half of QLDers think $4,000,000,000 in interest on Govt debt, per year, is not enough.
Our Grandkids can deal with that so long as, right now, they can get free stuff.
They covet waste and debt.
Greece here we come.
( add personal debt, local council debt, Federal debt. All owned by us, right now and inherited by…well…not us, woohoo!!)
That all depends, Jumpy on how you do your sums. At the moment we are all paying some 30% at least more for our electricity than we should be. That is nationally some $20 billion and thanks to the shear ignorance (or dishonesty) of Abbott that money is not doing what it was supposed to be doing, building renewable infrastructure, it is going into pockets other than the public’s. Proper auditing of the energy company accounts should demonstrate how those funds are going astray and redirect them back to the public via state government owners of the assets that Newman was desperate to flog off quickly.
There are lies, damned lies, and outright bullshit. One example is the period when Hockey first came onto the government benches, but before the LNP officially took responsibility for Treasury disbursements, he, handed out some 18 billion dollars for projects to as yet unfunded infrastructure projects, and then hung that on the head of Labour taking the $30 billion short fall out to $48, as I understand it to have been. This was an intentional falsification. Abbott is completely guilty of intentionally exacerbating the electricity price to the public claiming that it was due to the Carbon Price, then when the carbon price came off and there was absolutely no saving to the public, doing nothing about the rorting of the public by the power companies.
Almost certainly, Newman was privy to the degree of the rorting which was best hidden by selling the assets for a pittance and creating auditing separation from the public auditors in the process. That whole disaster is sure to unravel, and I suspect that Newman knows it, and now that he cannot do anything to prevent that his best option is to get as far away as possible, to which end I have just seen him and his wife driving off in a Jeep.
Once the power companies have been called to account, a lot more of those profits will arrive in the state coffers and I suspect Queensland’s interest charges will be balanced by asset PROFITS. Then it is a matter of getting the state working properly again and preparing for the full onslaught of Climate Change.
BilB
I don’t know how that will work given the majority of power companies are state owned and run.
How will this ” called to account ” raise more revenue and lower prices ?
And i believe Beatie started the ” gold plating ” in 2004 after the Sommervile review.
https://www.legislation.qld.gov.au/Bills/51PDF/2004/ElectAmdB04_2Exp.pdf
Also a review into the results of that review was done in 2011 ( Bligh )
https://www.business.qld.gov.au/__data/assets/pdf_file/0018/9117/ENCAP_Review_Final_Report_3_new.pdf
You need to read the Jess Hill report on the power rort, Jumpy.
There a lots of ways of hiding money within a business, Jumpy, particularly when it is “free” money that you don’t have to work for. Buying expensive things that you don’t need but can sell later, ie stockpiling transformers, or buying futures options.
The states governments have the option to end the pricing rort and return electricity prices to where they should be, or indentify where the funds are being hidden, maintain the power pricing, used the increased funds to pay down debt (a little more slowly) of buld the renewable infrastructure that the increased electricity revenue was supposed to be building.
Surely, Jumpy, you can do the simple maths here, doubling the price over a relatively short period equals extra receipts for a product that has not increased in price, meaning hugely increased profits, should equal extra dividends for the shareholder, ie state government.
Yes, you are right, nobody comes out smelling good out of this, but the fact is that the gold plating has finished. The goods have been paid for. The price should come down or the profit balance paid to the share holder….the public.
Jumpy, you should read your 2011 report in conjunction with the Jess Hill report, and in conjunction with gross revenue calculations. The Jess Hill report shows how the power companies rigged the assessments to tell the story that they wanted to be heard.
That the thing, it was borrowed money.We’re still paying it off.
That’s my original point.
It’s a freakin hockey stick, a real one.
That was part of the con, Jumpy. They factored in the funds at market rates then borrowed the funds at government rates, hiked prices more than sufficient to raise the full cost over three years. So the question is, where are the funds. Do the calculation. 275 billion kwhrs at 13 cents is 35 billion dollars 7 years ago to 230 billion kwhrs at 26 cents is 60 billion a year today. The cost of the infrastructure was 40 billion to gold plate the grid. the electrcity has been at the current price level for several years now, so that is 50 billion dollars there extra billing in just those 2 years. Add to that the incremental increase over the previous 5 years and I think that you will find that the funds have been available at least twice over.
The irony is that the Qld government owns a lot of fossil power capacity that the Greens want to be shut down as soon as practical.
The other irony is that the government owned grid expects the peasants to pay whatever it takes to maintain their profits. Problem is that their charges have reached a point where people are buying solar at a rate of knots to avoid the rip-off charges of the grid meisters. There is lots of talk about people going off grid as the grid meisters try and use fixed charges to protect their profits. Interesting to see how the ALP deals with this one.
The other interesting thing is that governments need more revenue to get back to a point where income is high enough to at least balance running expenses and interest charges. I wait in hope that someone will treat us like adults and tell us what government taxes and charges need to be to achieve this.
Not holding my breath.
Interesting, 9 news reckons 43 ALP/43 LNP so a deal has to be done.
Annastasia promised no deals, so that would be broken promise No1.
But CanDo made the LNP promise and he aint around anymore, the new leader is not bound by any promises.
A unique position to be in.
LNP’s new leader will have no one to talk to as they all (the LNP) went out of their way to denegrate both PUP and KAP. ALP only have to stick to their policies and they can govern without an agreement.
The official figures are not what your 9 is saying
http://www.abc.net.au/news/qld-election-2015/results/
it is a wait and see.
Of course Bilb, to early to tell.
But an interesting possibility.
If ALP form Government with supply guaranteed by KAP then ok, but you and I both know that KAP will want some things out of it, that’s politics.
And as surely as night follows day, every time concessions are given, the opposition will scream ” Dirty Deals !! Broken Promise !! ”
Then the fake leadership speculation, …etc…
And it’ll work, just as it has in the past.
KAP have already said what they want, a 10% ethanol mandate. I think that is a great thing. It is not a big move as there will be such a mandate in due course.
Why do they want the mandate? So that they can build a new more efficient cane mill and ethanol distributor in either Gladstone, the Ord, or both, with the stability that the mandate will bring. The Greens will rightly apply stringent environmental conditions on the expanded farming area, with particular focus on farming runoffs that might affect the barrier reef.
..ethanol distillery…duh. I’ve got distributors on the brain.
Here they are, as of 12/01/15.
And wind back the Bikie Laws.
Keep in mind that Peter Wellington has also won his seat and has supported Labor in the past when it was needed. Also keep in mind that Peter was disgusted at the weakening of checks and balances as soon as the LNP got in.
Peter Wellington will not prop up the LNP, that’s definite, nor do I think that KAP will. So the LNP have to win outright to form government, which they won’t.
I do think KAP will want to leverage their position, if Labor come up short.
Andrew Elder has a long but interesting piece at Politically Homeless. I liked this bit:
And this:
KAP has said this morning that they would negotiate with the LNP, but not the existing team of Seeney and Nicholls.
Seeney has resigned as deputy of the LNP this morning. He called a meeting to elect new leaders tomorrow.
There is some doubt as to whether he has the authority to call the meeting and news has just come through that it has been cancelled.
Fiona Simpson (speaker) has thrown her hat into the ring for the leadership. From the Sunshine Coast, she has the advantage of being in a sense neither country nor city, like Rob Borbidge and John-Paul Langbroek before her. Nevertheless both had problems of acceptance by the bush Nationals.