#nswvotes

[axvoter]

Index to the Blatantly Partisan Party Reviews, 2023 NSW state edition

Saturday 25 March is election day in NSW, and it's going to be a fascinating and most likely close contest. As well as the major parties, there is a veritable constellation of micro-parties, independent groups, and solo independents running in the election.

I’ve written my blog entries to demystify these micro-parties and indies. I'm sorry I did not post these until the final days of the election; life got in the way. I do not review Labor, Liberal/National, Greens, or One Nation, as I assume anyone reading this blog already has views on them. All entries are written from a left-wing perspective sympathetic to democratic socialism and green politics, so calibrate according to your own predilections. I make no pretension to false objectivity—that’s why these are blatantly partisan party reviews.

When you go to vote, you will receive two ballot papers. One will be a very large ballot for the Legislative Council (the upper house). This is elected at large by the entire state: a candidate requires ~4.55% to win a seat. But the Legislative Council is the house of review; government is formed in the Legislative Assembly (the lower house). It contains 93 seats, and the number of candidates—both party-affiliated and independent—varies significantly between electorates.

On the small ballot for the Legislative Assembly, you must vote 1 for your preferred candidate and then distribute as many or as few additional preferences as you want. Your vote will be more powerful if you distribute as many preferences as possible. Do not skip or repeat a number. If your preferred candidate is not elected, your vote transfers at full value to your second preference, and so on. You might receive a how-to-vote card from party campaigners: this is a suggestion only and you can fill out your preferences in any order you like.

On the large ballot for the Legislative Council, you can either vote above the line or below the line. Whichever way you vote, you control your preferences—NSW does not have a dodgy system to harvest voter preferences like in Victoria.

Every grouping that has registered at least 15 candidates receives a square above the line; if the square is unlabelled, it is because the group does not have formal party registration. Groups with 2–14 candidates receive their own column but no square above the line; you can only vote for them below the line. Solo independents appear in the furthest right column and can only be voted for below the line.

For most voters, voting above the line will suffice: after you vote 1 for your preferred group, you can distribute as many or as few preferences as you like. You accept the order of candidates registered within each individual group, but you control the order of the groups. You will be able to express preferences for any party/grouping likely to win a seat; it is well nigh impossible for candidates who can only be voted for below the line to win a seat.

You should vote below the line if the following apply to you: a) you want to reorder candidates within a group and/or mix and match candidates across groups, b) you want to vote for ungrouped independents or a group of independents without enough candidates to receive a square above the line, or c) you are a completist like me who wants to indicate a preference for everyone. You MUST give at least 15 preference. Be warned that if you want to preference all the way, it will take a while—it took me over 20 minutes at the 2019 election.

In both cases, the further you preference, the more powerful your vote will be. Distribute as many preferences as you feel you can distribute in an informed manner.

This entry includes links to my reviews of each micro-party. There are 8 groups of independents or unregistered parties. These are noted below by their group letter on the ballot. The format is "party name (rough ideology / recommended preference)". A good preference is a party with few or no significant flaws for the left-wing voter; a decent preference indicates a generally positive platform or a single-issue party with a good but limited objective; a middling preference is a mix of positive and negative qualities; a weak or no preference is mainly negative and either you should give them a poor preference or let your vote exhaust—as noted above, your vote is most powerful if you preference as far as possible.

Animal Justice Party (animal rights / middling to decent preference)

Australia One / Riccardo Bosi—Group U (conspiracy theorists who are a threat to public safety / lowest possible preference)

Call to Freedom / Milan Maksimovic—Group E (Christian fundamentalism / weak or no preference)

Christians for Community / Milton Caine—Group T (Christian fundamentalism / weak or no preference)

Elizabeth Farrelly Independents (centre-left NIMBY / middling preference)

Family First / Lyle Shelton—Group A (Christian fundamentalism and conspiracism / weak or no preference)

Group P—Danny Lim (anti-racism personality / middling to decent preference)

Indigenous–Aboriginal Party of Australia (Indigenous rights / good preference)

Informed Medical Options Party (uninformed anti-vaxxers / weak or no preference)

Legalise Cannabis Party (single issue / decent preference)

Liberal Democratic Party (far-right libertarian cookers / weak or no preference)

Public Education Party (single issue / decent preference)

Revive Australia Party / Silvana Nile—Group G (Christian fundamentalism / weak or no preference)

Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party (fans of gun violence / weak or no preference)

Socialist Alliance (socialism / good preference)

Socialist Equality Party / Oscar Grenfell—Group K (socialism but for crackpots / weak or no preference)

Sustainable Australia—Stop Overdevelopment/Corruption (anti-immigration NIMBYs / weak or no preference)

United Australia Party / Craig Kelly—Group B (covid conspiracists in a policy-free space of grievance / weak or no preference)

Ungrouped independents (mix of ideologies and recommendations)

Happy voting and enjoy your democracy sausage!

[official-auspol]

Find you closest democracy sausage at:

democracysausage.org

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review VI (NSW 2023): Group G (Silvana Nile / Revive Australia Party)

Prior reviews (as the Christian Democratic Party): federal 2013, federal 2016, NSW 2019, federal 2019

What I said before: “The CDP sees no place in society for people who think, behave, or believe differently to them. Unless you worship the strict, narrowly-defined, judgemental, petty god to whom the CDP claims allegiance, this party is not for you.” (federal 2019)

What I think this year: This is all just a little bit weird really. Fred Nile was first elected to the NSW Legislative Council in 1981 for the Call to Australia Party, the predecessor of the Christian Democratic Party. He has been in the NSW parliament for over 40 years now; he is 88 years old. He secured the election of his first wife alongside himself for 14 years, the late Elaine Nile, and his second wife Silvana is running this year.

Perhaps unsurprisingly, Fred announced his retirement in 2021, endorsing Lyle Shelton as his successor. But then he rescinded the deal (eat shit Lyle) and has served out his term. The CDP dissolved in 2022 and Nile joined Seniors United, but it too has been dissolved. He again announced his retirement in October 2022, but—you can see where this is going—announced last month that he’d stand again. Weirdly, he’s the second candidate to his wife Silvana, and they are the only two candidates in Group G. They do not get a square above the line (you need 15 candidates for that) and even if they had a square above the live and Silvana won election, there’s no chance they’d get a high enough vote for Fred to win a seat from second place. Why is he going out on a loss rather than retiring with dignity? Strange stuff.

Anyway, don’t vote for the Niles, they’re awful bigots. I would say they’ve leapt on the latest bandwagon of bile against drag queens, but Fred’s been pulling that particular wagon since he came to prominence as an opponent of Mardi Gras in the 1980s. Forty years down the track and he has not become a better person.

Recommendation: Give Group G (Silvana Nile / Revive Australia Party) a weak or no preference.

Website: https://www.facebook.com/fnileindp/

[axvoter]

Index to the Blatantly Partisan Party Reviews, 2019 New South Wales edition

Here we are, two days from polling day in New South Wales. In my teenage years I watched NSW politics with a degree of disbelief and amusement from north of the border; since 2007 I have watched with even greater amounts of the same from south of the Murray. But now I am in New South Wales, about to vote in the state that gives us greater political dysfunction than any other. Say what you will about Queensland under Bjelke-Petersen, or South Australia and the Playmander, or Victoria pre-1955, no state has been more of a mess politically this current century than NSW. It does not matter what side of politics, it is here that you will find the most dysfunctional state branch of any party.

Anyway. On Saturday you will get two ballots. The smaller one is for the Legislative Assembly, where you elect one of 93 local representatives to the lower house of parliament. This is where the government is formed. You will also receive a large ballot for the Legislative Council, which is the house of review. The Legislative Council is elected by the state at large; 21 of its 42 seats come up for election every four years. This has two important implications: whoever you vote for gets eight years on the Legislative Council, and they only need to attain 4.55% of the statewide vote to get there.

To help you out, I have reviewed all the minor parties. I figure that if you are reading this blog you probably already have a decent idea about the Liberals, Nationals, the ALP, and the Greens. I have reviewed every minor party, the grouped independents, and the ungrouped independents, as well as the one independent standing in the lower house Division of Wollongong. If you are in a different lower house electorate and have an independent standing, I encourage you to Google them before casting your vote.

Without further ado, here are the parties I have reviewed. In brackets is an indication of their general ideology.

Advance Australia Party (anti-Berejiklian)

Animal Justice Party (animal rights)

Australian Conservatives (Christian fundamentalists)

Christian Democratic Party (Christian fundamentalists)

Flux NSW (direct e-democracy)

Keep Sydney Open (civil libertarian)

Liberal Democratic Party (right-libertarian)

Pauline Hanson’s One Nation (dysfunctional racists)

Shooters, Fishers, and Farmers (gun nuts who, in the wake of Christchurch, can get absolutely and completely fucked)

Socialist Alliance (socialism)

Sustainable Australia (anti-immigration)

The Small Business Party (neo-liberal minimal taxation)

Voluntary Euthanasia Party (single issue / assisted dying)

Group G aka Seniors United Party of Australia (single issue / seniors’ rights)

Group H aka Monaghan and Monaghan (right-leaning grumpy Boomers)

Group L aka Jeremy Buckingham and Friends (Claytons Greens, i.e. the greens you have when you are not having The Greens)

Group S aka James Jansson’s “Team for NSW” (progressive futurists)

There are also eight ungrouped independents contesting the Legislative Council: part one and part two (the latter also reviewing the one independent running for Wollongong in the Legislative Assembly), plus some more general thoughts.

If you are curious about my past reviews, please check out the indexes for the 2013 federal election, 2014 Victorian election, 2016 federal election, and the 2018 Victorian election.

Thanks to those of you who have left feedback. It has been most appreciated. Enjoy your democracy sausages and have fun casting your vote this Saturday!

By the way, if you want to generate your own how-to-vote card, you can create one right here.

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review IX (NSW 2019): Shooters, Fishers, and Farmers Party

Prior reviews: 2013, 2014, 2016, 2018

What I said before: “This is a party of right-wing anti-environmentalism that has found some measure of success in rural NSW … Exactly what it says on the tin. The SFF will water down our successful gun control laws, support environmentally destructive policies, back the mining and logging industries, and be a brake on urgently-needed climate action.”

What I think this year: Perhaps the most interesting quality of the SFF is that they are no longer the reliable ally of the Liberal/National Coalition that they used to be. They have experienced success in winning former Coalition seats, and they have not always co-operated on policy in the Legislative Council.

This is not an endorsement, however. The only limits they would place on mining are when miners and farmers come into conflict, such as we see in the coal seam gas debate—otherwise this is a staunchly pro-coal party who favour new coal power plants and are hostile to practically any serious steps to mitigate climate change. SFF would let the planet burn.

The party name is the clue. Emotive blather about “green bureaucracy gone mad” defines their policies about fishing. It’s not as if it’s hard to go fishing for recreation, but marine parks and catch limits just get these nutters foaming. Their rhetoric veers between recreational and commercial fishing with limited clarity, and anyone who knows anything about marine life knows that the commercial fishing sector is responsible for extreme degradation of oceanic environments within a context of poor regulation and limited enforcement.

Also, I’d take their concern for regional communities a little more seriously if their transport policy were not literally just a roads policy. They describe public transport in regional areas as inadequate—and just leave it there. Instead of backing meaningful improvements in rail and other public infrastructure, SFF are completely in hock to outdated road-centric transport policy rather than the integrated multi-modal approach essential to maximise economic and social gains.

I drafted these comments before the tragic events in Christchurch. I am now all the more sure that it would be grossly irresponsible to let this party remain in parliament. Australia’s gun laws need to be tighter, not looser. SFF are a threat to public safety—not just long-term from climate change, but also in the short-term. Reject their appeals.

Website: https://www.shootersfishersandfarmers.org.au/

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review VIII (NSW 2019): Pauline Hanson’s One Nation

Prior reviews: 2013 and 2016

What I said before: “if you’ve paid even a smidgen of attention to Australian politics since the mid-nineties you know what One Nation stand for and how odious it is.”

What I think this year: I’ve spent enough time bagging Mark Latham in reviews of other parties that it’s about time I got to the party of our most famous wearer of dirty polo shirts. Yes, that’s right, ol’ boy Latho—the absolute disingenuous shitrag, the most idiotic rat in the history of politicised labour in Australia, the utter twatcandle himself—is heading up the One Nation state election ticket.

One Nation’s policies are idiotic. They are opposed to renewable sources of electricity; they want to strip all critical thinking from education policy; they think men are somehow discriminated against despite the fact men earn higher wages and are over-represented in positions of wealth and power; they blather on about giving Sydney “a breather” from immigration even though state governments do not control immigration policy. We need a breather from One Nation.

Perhaps the peak of One Nation’s stupidity, however, is that they are spouting off drivel about Aboriginal people getting DNA tests before they claim benefits. Welcome to Stupid, population: Pauline Hanson, Mark Latham, and Friends. Besides the fact that this is straight up early twentieth century eugenics, DNA tests are hardly reliable for what One Nation wants to prove, and Aboriginality is derived communally as well as genetically. It is breathtakingly rich for Latho to rant about “welfare rorters” when he receives a very generous parliamentary pension and shows absolutely no interest in doing anything for the impoverished, disadvantaged, unemployed, precariously employed, exploitatively employed, and unwillingly casualised. It is as if he learned nothing during his time in organised labour—or perhaps he suffered brain damage. The cognitive dissonance of this man, seriously.

It’s kinda funny that both One Nation and Australian Conservatives go on about “common sense”, whether it’s Bernardi proclaiming that “common sense lives here” (no it doesn’t) or One Nation insisting that they will be “putting common sense back into politics” (no they won’t). What’s the betting that even if Latho wins a seat, he defects from the party before the end of his term? That, and disqualification, are the ordinary fate of One Nation members; there are almost none, at state or federal level, who have served an entire, unbroken term of parliament.

The comments on Christchurch from Latho, Hanson, and their associated pond scum are not even worth my time. Suffice it to say that Kiwis such as myself see you, and we will not let you rest. Some of us are dual citizens and we intend full well to punish you at the ballot box. That is only the beginning.

This dysfunctional party and its knee-jerk racist policies represent the absolute scum of Australian politics and the sooner we are rid of this vile rhetoric the better.

Website: https://nsw.onenation.org.au/

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review VI (NSW 2019): Keep Sydney Open Party

Prior reviews: none, this is a new party

I’m not going to bullshit you here. Live music is my life. If I go to seventy gigs in a year, it’s been a quiet year. I’m better at standing in the audience than performing on stage, which is why I am a historian rather than a frontman or a guitarist in a band you might know. I have no idea what I would do or who I would be without live music—but I do know that I would be a lesser person in a worse place.

Moving from Melbourne, one of the world’s great music hubs, to NSW in order to chase my academic career has not been easy. This state does not make it easy for creative people to thrive. It lets that awful fucking casino get away with everything, while stigmatising the night-time economy. It’s moronic because it means what late-night events do exist—especially in a city like Wollongong, where I live—are the most absolute unsafe trash. Everybody with talent is moving to Melbourne and everybody who wants to see them is sitting on their arse at home rather than having a social life. If you want to start a music venue or run live events, you are going to find yourself up against a system that assumes violence is the default and does not give a shit about what a cultural life means for the community.

So, look, I’m entirely with this party’s objectives. I don’t like some of their rhetoric about the “nanny state”, which is usually a lazy crutch relied upon by right-wing whingers, but in general this party’s policies appeal to me. They are a bit narrow, a bit single-issue, despite gestures towards larger concerns, so they will not be at the top of my preferences. Parliaments handle a vast array of business, after all; I have emphasised in past elections my dislike for single-issue parties no matter how much I support the issue. But Keep Sydney Open have made some effort to address questions of small business, policing, cultural heritage, and social inclusion. They are new and they are galvanised by an important issue. Good on them.

Website: https://www.keepsydneyopen.com/

[axvoter]

Blatantly Partisan Party Review IV (NSW 2019): Christian Democratic Party aka Fred Nile Group

Prior reviews: 2013, 2016

What I said before: “New South Wales, why do you keep letting this crank and his mates hold office at state level? Please stop.”

What I think this year: When I finished writing my Australian Conservatives review, I thought to myself “phew, I’m sure the next party won’t be this disgusting”. I should have known better, the Australian micro-party scene being what it is. Let me put it to you simply: Fred Nile is a complete fucknozzle, and anyone who associates with him is a fucknozzle.

Now that I live in NSW I understand that this man and his acolytes are not as popular as I thought, as the barrier for entry to the Legislative Council is set so low. But the CDP sure do like advertising on Wollongong television, and I say this as somebody who watches very little TV so you know they’re going hard if I’ve caught their ads frequently. Bad ads are one thing; bad policy, of course, is much worse. On a heavily stained political canvas, Fred Nile & Co. somehow manage to stand out as one of the nastiest stains.

The CDP website right now says that “We exist to glorify God in government.” This is the language of exclusive theocracy. They preach the need for Australia to be a “Christian Commonwealth” with laws rooted in “the Judeo-Christian ethic”, which is a very recent confection that the lunatic religious right uses to exclude others. The CDP do not respect the rights or even the existence of those who do not share their narrow interpretation of scripture—with particular disdain reserved for the Muslim community. If you want to know from whence came the hatred that enabled the Christchurch terrorist attack, it is from bigoted and idiotic clash-of-civilisations rhetoric like this. The CDP are just one of the numerous groups with blood on their hand. I am absolutely not exaggerating or being emotive for effect.

You can take as read their opposition to abortion, euthanasia, fairness or equality for the LGBT community, etc., etc. Sound environmental policy does not live here. They have curious ideas of “Biblical principles concerning economics” and are impossible to take seriously when they yabber on about the alleged goodness of free enterprise or on economic policy more broadly. You often wonder if they have actually read the Bible.

Also, their “ten good reasons” to join the CDP are just bizarre. It’s a pitch that pretty much explains what the party gets out of you, rather than offering an attractive vision for society that you might want to participate in if you are ideologically inclined. Take, for example, reason 7: “You will be assisting Head Office with its administration and employment expenses.” In other words, you should join the CDP because it means you will be giving them money! Yeah! I always find it persuasive when I am encouraged to join something because it means I will be poorer!

This is way more than I intended to write, but if we are lucky the crowded field of candidates this year might mean the CDP’s Paul Green will fall short (Fred Nile himself, alas, has four years left on his current term). The CDP has no place in any serious parliament.

Website: https://www.cdp.org.au/