Election hangover

2:24 PM, 22/3/2010 .. 0 comments .. Link

Ok so the State Election is over, and the blog posts will continue. It looks like I will need to come up with a new name, however. State Election 2010 seems a little dated now, much like Mike Rann’s leadership. In my opinion Jay Weatherill has made a carefully considered move, which will ensure that he ends up the leader of the ALP eventually. There is much water to go under the bridge before then, however. A discussion of the election result is required first.

A few of the outcomes of Saturday’s election result may have emboldened Jay Weatherill. Firstly, members of his left faction performed surprisingly well, notably, Leon Bignell, Tony Piccolo and probably Grace Portolesi. On the other hand, the right lost Lindsay Simmons and may well lose the star candidate in Chloe Fox and fail to win Mitchell. This gives the left an improvement in their caucus numbers, although ultimately not enough to give them the advantage. The AMWU’s failure to gain anything out of its alliance with the right (another lost opportunity) may result in recent right converts (e.g. Robyn Geraghty) to jump ship towards Jay. The loss of J-Lo as a potential leadership rival was also key in forcing Jay’s hand. I want to point out that I predicted her demise last week. Irrespective of any of these factors, the right will not allow Jay Weatherill to roll Foley in the upcoming leadership dispute. He has, however, made a very crafty political move, which the ham fisted right clowns will respond to in their overbearing and typical manner.

Jay Weatherill will lose the upcoming challenge, and I am sure that he knows it. What his challenge has done, however, is shown his clear intention to lead the party. He has assured that he will not challenge Rann, an assurance I would love to hear Foley make. He knows that at some point during the next four years, someone is going to try to bring Rann down, most likely a member of the right. Before that occurs, the ongoing Rann/Foley team will continue its downward spiral towards electoral oblivion. As the next election draws near, and the new Rann Government staggers from scandal to scandal, internal conflict to internal conflict, nervous backbenchers will look for a saviour. Jay has made sure that he will be the first place that those backbenchers look. He always knew that he would never be ALLOWED by the right to take the leadership. He was forced into his risky venture this week. The unpalatable nature of all the right leadership contenders, however, will ensure that they will have to go to him eventually.

This all assumes that the ALP will ultimately win Government. The enormous number of postal votes could mean, however, that seats like Hartley, Bright and Newland still will fall to the Liberal party. This is increasingly unlikely, especially with Newland. The most likely outcome is the ALP will emerge with a one seat majority. This is a particularly risky position to be in, especially in the environment where by-elections are an outside possibility. Atkinson has already resigned from front bench. Who knows what kind of movements we may see, caused by scandal or rejuvenation. With a Government on the slide, we may see a hung parliament at some point over the next few years.

Another possible outcome is a challenge to the election result on the grounds that the ALP were misleading with their “Put Your Family First” election how to vote cards. At first glance, there seems to be some very strong grounds for this challenge, despite the fact that the Electoral Commission had already approved them. Chloe Fox, on 891 radio today, clearly gave her opinion on her view on the integrity of the plan. The fact that she is on the verge of losing AND she didn’t use them, and other seats with smaller margins are on the verge of winning AND they did use them could suggest that the role they played was important. Only time will tell. With the ALP on the verge of a full blown factional war, however, no dirty tricks will help in four years time.