It’s in five days’ time and I haven’t had a single flyer or how-to-vote card through the postbox yet. The government’s re-election campaign wasn’t officially launched until yesterday.
Is this the lowest profile state election we’ve ever seen?
Quite possibly.
Good though, eh what?.
I was rather surprised that the pundits verdict seems to be if it wasn’t for Baird being a nice guy that the Libs might get turfed out. Have the general populace forgotten/forgiven the last two LAB terms when there were too many snouts and not enough room in the trough for all the front trotters?
I decided to register for iVote to get it done without the queues. Unfortunately it is set up so that you can’t vote informal.
I’m going to vote tonight after work. It’s much easier than queueing up at the local church hall on Saturday morning.
Oh indeed yes.
The Legislative Council ballot paper is the usual ‘tablecloth’ size. But there was one new aspect: pens rather than pencils in the voting booths.
#1 son has a job as polling staff with the AEC on Saturday.
Believe they have allowed him to work in the local booth which is in his old primary school.
Will be a buzz for him and the pay isn’t bad either. Is also the first ekection where he’s been eligible to vote.
The NSW Electoral Commission, surely?
Doh! Yes of course.
Wandered up a bit after 9. The early voters rush had abated so no queue.
Was directed to collect my ballots by a well dressed and obviously well brought up young man. 
Did the LA ballot first. Put “1” against the incumbent who’s a nice guy and harmless enough. Then the fun begins. Locate Fred Nile’s protege and put him last. Locate my newest pet hate, the Motor Enthusiasts Party and he gets 2nd last. Fill in the other 3 spots. The order of the balance doesn’t matter cause my #1 is going to be going to be either 1 or 2 after determining the two party preferred vote.
Then on to the upper house with the 1.02m long ballot paper and 394 candidates.
I usually prioritise the whole ballot. This year you can stop after 15 which is a good improvement. But there are Fred’s 15 sock puppets, and the AMEP’s 15 socks who don’t merit the pencil mark and literally hundreds barely more deserving so I admitted defeat and voted above the line … with Fred last and AMEP 2nd last.
All done in 10 minutes, caught up with my neighbors, had a chat with one of my kids school teachers. Back home within 30 minutes of leaving. Why shouldn’t voting be mandatory?
For the first year ever, I didn’t number every single box below the line. Just didn’t have the energy, so went above the line. Feeling very apathetic about it all - honestly the choices are crap and crap IMO.
But on the bright side, I remember queueing at Hornsby for at least 15 minutes last time but now I’m living in a rural area, our local hall was a breeze. Strolled in, said g’day, voted and strolled out. And it’s like that any time of the day
I went below the line, but didn’t number them all. In NSW elections the minimum number of preferences required for a valid Legislative Council ballot is only 15. Much easier than the Senate.
And the result was pretty consistent with polls: the current government returned with a reduced, but still healthy, margin.
When you were seeing some swings of over 25% to LAB and nobody is getting excited because it is just the bounce back to from the election blood sport that was 2011.
We are better served when there’s 3-5% between them. Enough to govern, thin enough to not get complacent.
Then you get East Hills, a LAB safe seat since inception in 1953, won by the LIBs last time with a swing of 14.1%, is held by just 0.2% and then you get a swing to the LIBs?
[QUOTE=penultima thule]
Then you get East Hills, a LAB safe seat since inception in 1953, won by the LIBs last time with a swing of 14.1%, is held by just 0.2% and then you get a swing to the LIBs?
[/QUOTE]
There’s probably a really good local member who’s been working extra hard to solidify his position since 2011.
If you really don’t want someone to have a chance of being elected, shouldn’t you just leave them off your preferences?
That depends on whether exhausting preferences are allowed. They are in NSW, they aren’t Federally. So it’s just to be sure, to be sure.
My #1 finished with over 60% of the primary vote, almost 70% two party preferred so Fred wasn’t getting my vote even if I’d only voted #1.
But I’m not trying to save ink, I’m making a statement (for whatever little good it does apart from my amusement) that even if I was the only person who voted for my #1, and all preferences were distributed, Fred still wasn’t getting my vote.
This helps convince me that my brilliant plan to get an upper house seat could work. It is all based on the almost universal contempt in which Nile is held.
I would run as the Anti Fred Nile Party. My only policy would be, “If Fred votes for it, I am against it. If Fred is against it I am for it. My presence in the parliament nullifies Fred’s and means he no longer has any influence.”
I only want a percentage of the voters that the major parties get to put me before their chosen party, I don’t need many. I know I would vote for a party like that.
Certainly our Fred is a piece of moralizing work but give the odious reptile his due at a committee level, on matters outside the moral cant that gets him elected he’s been an effective parliamentarian.
Which doesn’t in any way exclude him for the due derision for standing on Oxford Street at the commencement of Mardi Gras each year and praying for rain. You’d have to concede that he hasn’t been very successful at slowing the city’s slide into apparent moral depravity. Which is a good thing.
And also, he’s no Fred Phelps.
Neither is Fred Phelps any more.