Oz Politics Blog

This post is dedicated to the candidates in the Werriwa by-election. I will update it with the names of candidates and links to their websites as I become aware of them (hint: email me).

Candidates:

• Robert Vogler (Independent)
• Chris Hayes (Labor)
• Mike Head (Socialist Equality)
• Deborah Locke (People Power)
• Charles Doggett (One Nation)
• Ben Raue (Greens)

Alleged Candidates (people whose candidacy I have not been able to confirm through media reports):

• Sam Bargshoon (Independent)
• Joe Bryant (Independent)

Note: the Liberal Party will not be contesting the seat.

Update 25 February 2005: Full list of candidates here.

We are off and racing. The writ for the Werriwa by-election was issued today.

On a matter of pedantry, I would like to know which is correct. Is it by election, by-election or byelection? Your advice on this matter is appreciated. (Although my spell checker accepted the first two, it rejected byelection and suggested ‘bye lection’ - whatever that is).

Issue of writ: Monday 14 February 2005

Close of rolls: 8pm,Monday 21 February 2005

Close of nominations: 12noon, Thursday 24 February 2005

Declaration of nominations: 12noon, Friday 25 February 2005

Election day: 8am to 6pm, Saturday 19 March 2005

First some history. In 2001, Stephen Martin won the safe Wollongong seat of Cunningham with a sizeable two-party preferred margin: Labor 60.7 per cent to the Coalition’s 39.3 per cent. Seats do not get much safer than this. A year later, Stephen Martin retired from Parliament and a by-election was held on 19 October 2002. The Coalition did not contest the election and it was won by the Green’s candidate Michael Organ with a two-party preferred result of Greens 52.2 per cent to Labor’s 47.8 per cent.

Roll forward to 2005 and the seat of Werriwa. Mark Latham has just won the seat for Labor with a sizeable two-party preferred margin almost identical to that of Stephen Martin in 2001: Labor 59.3 per cent to the Coalition’s 40.7 per cent. Unfortunately for him, Latham got sick and decided to retire from Parliament. A by-election for Werriwa is pending.

It was then that things got interesting. First the Labor party released internal polling showing that the Liberals could win the seat of Werriwa (see earlier blog entries here and here). A strange move, and while I did not discern the hidden agenda at the time, it was obvious there was an agenda.

Then Kim Beazley made this pronouncement (sourced from ABC Online).

Federal Opposition Leader Kim Beazley has criticised the Liberal Party for not yet declaring whether it will contest the by-election for the western Sydney seat of Werriwa.

Labor has pre-selected its candidate for the by-election, which was brought about by Mark Latham’s resignation from politics.

Mr Beazley has told Channel Ten that Mr Latham needs to recover from his illness and he will not put any pressure on the former leader to help Labor’s campaign to retain the seat.

He says if the Liberals cared for the people of western Sydney they would contest the by-election.

“That is one of the great regions of Australia, the western Sydney region, one of the great engines of the Australian economy, one of the great battlegrounds of the political context, and they want to desert the battlefield in a by-election,” he said.

“I haven’t got much time for them if that’s what they’re doing.”

The hidden agenda is now clear. First the carrot, then the stick. Labor is trying everything to convince the Liberals to run in the by-election. Labor knows it can defeat the Liberals easily. But as Cunningham showed, fighting the Greens without the Liberals might be a whole lot tougher.

It will be interesting to see how the Liberals play this one.

The Australian is reporting and editorialising on the Werriwa by-election.

Labor Party insiders claim recent internal polling revealed a 10 per cent-plus swing against the ALP — a result that would have delivered the seat to the Liberal Party for the first time in 70 years.

“We are in big strife — we are behind,” one source familiar with the polling said.

This is the same polling the SMH released yesterday. As always, I am just a little suspicious when a political party “leaks” internal party polling. In this case I think the agenda is obvious – it is a call to Labor voters not to punish the party for Latham’s early exit.

Whereas I doubt the Coalition will pick up Werriwa, the editorial finishes with this purple prose.

After [the] Ryan [by-election], Mr Howard worked hard to reconnect to suburban Australia, and government members now represent once-safe Labor seats around the country. Labor’s decision to run a candidate in Werriwa who is acceptable to the factional barons, but is little known among the electors, demonstrates why. With Mr Beazley’s return to the leadership, the Labor optimists may hope they have seen the end of the beginning of their party’s resurrection. But to lose Werriwa could be the beginning of the end.

Really? Surely it is a too early for rumours of Labor’s demise.

The other theme in the story, internal party resentment at Latham’s decision to resign from Parliament, is more plausible. It was a decision that will cost the party money, and it exposes the party to political risk. It is not the sort of things that mates are supposed to do.