The reason why Labor ended up with such a huge majority was that the Liberal (and National) Party’s platform was all about Green-bashing and Orange Man Idolatry, while the Greens were all about hippy-dippy bullshit.
Greens voters went with Labor because their own parties policies weren’t perceived as realistic enough and LNP voters went with Labor to protest the Trumpian behaviour of the LNP.
The greens got more votes in the last election than the one prior, and their overall percentage remained unchanged. The greens lost out because the liberals preferenced Labor over them, and so a large amount of the swing away from the liberals ended up in Labor’s lap both directly and through preferences
Just loose wording from me. What I was trying to say is that their vote count was actually higher this time around, not lower, but the increase was so small it was a rounding error on their overall percentage. The point being, their voterbase didn’t go anywhere, but nor did they attract new folk.
Are you meaning this in a negative way? The seat was reapportioned and as is the Electoral Commission’s guidance on the matter, it was pushed towards as even of a split as possible.
Maybe it is unfair to call it Gerrymandering but my understand is that it worked against Greens (eg boundary extended across the Yarra into Kew - that is conservative territory).
I mean, to call it gerrymandering is valid, but people always tend to use it as a dirty word. Any time people are making the choices about electoral boundaries there’s gerrymandering at play. We just choose in Australia to generally try to make seats as competitive as possible. On the balance of things, Greens-dominant areas in Fitzroy North and Carlton North were also redistributed away from Melbourne to Wills, which meant that Peter Khalil (Labor) had a huge 7.60% swing against him. Samantha Ratnam (Greens) came within 3k votes of winning the seat. This is all coming from a Greens member by the way.
Do you think Greens would have won within the old boundaries? Or would the preferences have screwed them anyhow? Speaking of which…
The greens lost out because the liberals preferenced Labor over them
Just to be precise: Greens probably preferenced Labor in the previous election too. The difference this time is that 2PP was between Lab & Grn, whereas previously it was between Lib & Grn so of course the Kab preferences followed mainly to Greens.
You sound savvy enough to know it but your wording was ambiguous so I just want to make sure a fellow Green is armed with the info.
I no longer vote #1 Greens although they get my vote via preferences. A few of my friends have followed suit. Their support of the Digital Identity Bill was a sellout and their lack of criticism of Hamas put me off.
Also Larissa Waters using the hashtag #ibelievewomen. I have been arguing this week with two women friends who embraced it literally to mean that not a single woman would lie about rape. It took me a lot of energy to budge them from that delusional stance. That is why using the hashtag is irresponsible regardless of what Waters means.
Yup exactly. The Greens’ loss was mostly because the earlier Greens wins came on the back of Labor finishing 3rd and preferences going to the Greens. If the LNP finishes 3rd, preferences go to Labor and Labor wins. There was also a redistribution in Melbourne that favoured Labor pretty strongly. It’s one of the weird quirks of IRV and exposes a reason proportional systems like MMP (used in Germany and NZ) are better.
I voted against the Greens because their behavior voting against the HAFF was straight-up psychotic. They were throwing the homeless under the bus for headlines and renters.
The Greens’ behaviour on the HAFF was pretty objectively good policy. HAFF is a long-term project, not a quick win for homeless. The Greens stalled something that won’t pay off for years by a couple of months in order to make it better. And make it better they did. Including in the shorter term, by requiring it pay out a minimum amount.
By stalling it a couple of months, the HAFF was made better in both the short and long terms.
Many NGO’s were prepared to hit the ground running with the HAFF funding, by blocking the HAFF the Greens screwed up the prepared contracts. They delayed much needed housing for people genuinely in need by years just so they could get brownie points with renters.
On the minimum payout, Labor conceded on that point immediately. The Greens were not voting against it on those grounds.
And before you say Labor should’ve made concessions, the Greens unlike Labor don’t actually face any electoral pressures since they have less than zero chance of forming government and basically zero chance of losing senate seats. The Greens, for good reason, have become politically toxic to deal with because they think acting like whiny children makes them charismatic. If Labor met the Greens $10 billion spending demands, it would’ve been used as a campaign point in this year’s election and Labor would’ve lost to the LNP who would’ve then cut the HAFF.
The reason why Labor ended up with such a huge majority was that the Liberal (and National) Party’s platform was all about Green-bashing and Orange Man Idolatry, while the Greens were all about hippy-dippy bullshit.
Greens voters went with Labor because their own parties policies weren’t perceived as realistic enough and LNP voters went with Labor to protest the Trumpian behaviour of the LNP.
The greens got more votes in the last election than the one prior, and their overall percentage remained unchanged. The greens lost out because the liberals preferenced Labor over them, and so a large amount of the swing away from the liberals ended up in Labor’s lap both directly and through preferences
Isn’t that a contradiction? Was it increased or was it unchanged? I think you might be talking about first preferences vs 2PP.
Just loose wording from me. What I was trying to say is that their vote count was actually higher this time around, not lower, but the increase was so small it was a rounding error on their overall percentage. The point being, their voterbase didn’t go anywhere, but nor did they attract new folk.
Gerrymandering in Melbourne also worked against Greens.
Are you meaning this in a negative way? The seat was reapportioned and as is the Electoral Commission’s guidance on the matter, it was pushed towards as even of a split as possible.
Maybe it is unfair to call it Gerrymandering but my understand is that it worked against Greens (eg boundary extended across the Yarra into Kew - that is conservative territory).
I mean, to call it gerrymandering is valid, but people always tend to use it as a dirty word. Any time people are making the choices about electoral boundaries there’s gerrymandering at play. We just choose in Australia to generally try to make seats as competitive as possible. On the balance of things, Greens-dominant areas in Fitzroy North and Carlton North were also redistributed away from Melbourne to Wills, which meant that Peter Khalil (Labor) had a huge 7.60% swing against him. Samantha Ratnam (Greens) came within 3k votes of winning the seat. This is all coming from a Greens member by the way.
Do you think Greens would have won within the old boundaries? Or would the preferences have screwed them anyhow? Speaking of which…
Just to be precise: Greens probably preferenced Labor in the previous election too. The difference this time is that 2PP was between Lab & Grn, whereas previously it was between Lib & Grn so of course the Kab preferences followed mainly to Greens.
You sound savvy enough to know it but your wording was ambiguous so I just want to make sure a fellow Green is armed with the info.
I no longer vote #1 Greens although they get my vote via preferences. A few of my friends have followed suit. Their support of the Digital Identity Bill was a sellout and their lack of criticism of Hamas put me off.
Also Larissa Waters using the hashtag #ibelievewomen. I have been arguing this week with two women friends who embraced it literally to mean that not a single woman would lie about rape. It took me a lot of energy to budge them from that delusional stance. That is why using the hashtag is irresponsible regardless of what Waters means.
Yup exactly. The Greens’ loss was mostly because the earlier Greens wins came on the back of Labor finishing 3rd and preferences going to the Greens. If the LNP finishes 3rd, preferences go to Labor and Labor wins. There was also a redistribution in Melbourne that favoured Labor pretty strongly. It’s one of the weird quirks of IRV and exposes a reason proportional systems like MMP (used in Germany and NZ) are better.
I voted against the Greens because their behavior voting against the HAFF was straight-up psychotic. They were throwing the homeless under the bus for headlines and renters.
The Greens’ behaviour on the HAFF was pretty objectively good policy. HAFF is a long-term project, not a quick win for homeless. The Greens stalled something that won’t pay off for years by a couple of months in order to make it better. And make it better they did. Including in the shorter term, by requiring it pay out a minimum amount.
By stalling it a couple of months, the HAFF was made better in both the short and long terms.
Many NGO’s were prepared to hit the ground running with the HAFF funding, by blocking the HAFF the Greens screwed up the prepared contracts. They delayed much needed housing for people genuinely in need by years just so they could get brownie points with renters.
On the minimum payout, Labor conceded on that point immediately. The Greens were not voting against it on those grounds.
And before you say Labor should’ve made concessions, the Greens unlike Labor don’t actually face any electoral pressures since they have less than zero chance of forming government and basically zero chance of losing senate seats. The Greens, for good reason, have become politically toxic to deal with because they think acting like whiny children makes them charismatic. If Labor met the Greens $10 billion spending demands, it would’ve been used as a campaign point in this year’s election and Labor would’ve lost to the LNP who would’ve then cut the HAFF.
They said they did. Then they presented the original version to Parliament again.
Source? Not that I really care. It barely matters.
I found it out when I was talking to a Greens member and I shared exactly the same viewpoint you expressed in your earlier comment. You can verify it by looking at the timeframe of the bill’s passage through Parliament.