Well an interesting result the ALP got a flogging no other words to describe it.
I a Labor member and supporter know, without doubt the next one to fall is NSW.
Then QLD is a lost for sure South Australia without near instant leadership change.
Yet I am not unhappy. the flat lining of green vote, the bravery of Liberals in not prefferenceing gets my applause.
There, in one post both greens and conservative along with some on my side are unhappy with me.
Is it bad for Federal Labor?
Should be the stick they need to distance themselves from greens.
After they take balance of power all too soon, we could have rule by less than 12% of voters.
Both non green party's should bring about a double dissolution election and just maybe my party can win that AJ, after Julia we will make ground go Bill Shorten you good thing.
Sorry bloke could pretend I like her but no way love my party too much to be gutless.

It could be federal Labor wins from these defeats.
Heard Bill Shorten speaking about the greens, it is true like it or not, more intensely dislike the greens than vote for them.
I think that could safely be said of both sides of the house.
NSW and QLD will fall because of dreadful failures but that failure may lead to a rebirth.

Come on Belly,
Look positive, is a one seat majority really a convincing win agains an 11 year government. I think not.
Yes labor need to take a look at what is going on in the electorate. A 6.5 % swing is big and hurts but really the liberals in victoria have no mandate and will be weak when a bi-election raises its ugly head.
This is typical of recent elections, people are tired of their long term elected governments but have no faith in the oppositions offering weak alternatives. What a couple of thousand votes would have given labour the win.
SA long time to next election, QLD we will see when election time comes, NSW well they deserve what they get. GEEZ i sound like a party man.
Agreed on two points, Greens on the nose they will need to do great things after June or they will go and Bill Shorten is potentially a great leader. Don't push though Belly, let him develop and in a few years yes. Right now it would be a wasted tallent.

Nairbe know this I admire you, and love the ALP.
I also love the union movement.
We you and I,weaken our side of politics IF we put that miss used and abused word SOLIDARITY first.
Never cover our failures.
I think Victoria may have paid for my party's shaky response to this hung Parliament.
I am LABOR but not if its leaders and members betray my party.
We lost NSW the day Bob Carr left, only the conservatives kept us in power.
We are gone in QLD,nothing can save us.
Personal pride, and factional foolishness are taking SA from us, unless a new leader comes now.
But its not new it may well,should empower federal Labor.
A good farmer knows to renew a paddock that needs it first get rid of the weeds.
Renewal will after the wreck be good for me my party and the states.
I am afraid we have no choice, greens must be confronted [sorry]by both sides of the house.
My party lives or dies on its ability to combat them.
both party's, in every seat,should run sock puppets in an effort to control preferences.
Better still one vote one value.

Belly:

In my Victorian Electorate quite frankly there were no strong Labor candidates running for office. It didn't give people much of a choice. The Liberal candidate was very well known in the constituency, worked very hard campaigning, raised local issues of concern to people and rightly won. In state elections, local issues do matter, and people do want to see candidates that live in the area, and know their area and the issues involved. Still a one seat majority is not winning by a landslide by any means. I just wish that I could persuade my son not to vote for the Greens next time. It's not that he's crazy about them, he just finds the two-party system not very satisfactory and the Independent candidate in our area was a bit sad.

Hi Lexi

to help your son not vote Green(slime), you can see in this audio talk exactly how the socialist (green/labor) agenda to utterly destroy the nuclear family has played out in the UK.

This talk gives the year and the legislative change, step by step, and notes the social impact of such changes, all against a backdrop of a Christian perspective on the broader British political scene.

I don't know if ur Christian or not, but that won't matter in terms of the raw information. You don't have to agree with our ethics or faith, but if you value the nuclear family... this is GOLD information wise.

Labor/Left/Greens are all on the same page with this stuff and it is very very SCARY to see what has already happened in UK. Feminism is the driver along with the Gay lobby, both of which are expressions of neo marxism/communism.

http://www.christianheritageuk.org.uk/Media/Player.aspx?media_id=41713&file_id=44708

I recommend and encourage ALL to listen to this, because it is our own future if we are not vigilant.

Then.. aside from the morality based issues, there is the blatant corruption of people like myself (Gore) and how the Green Agenda is actually about Wealth redistribution. (see other thread about Climate truth)

Belly, your monocular approach to politics prevents you from being able to see clearly.

Not living in Victoria, I have a poor grasp of the local issues there, but it seems 'not a shock' to see the end of a long serving government.

But the replacement of one backwoods mob with another backwoods mob is hardly something to crow about.

The Greens at least inject some vaguely alternative thoughts that other politicians might be well advised to consider for a while, even if they reject them ultimately.

Shorten works from a script, so 'he would say that, wouldn't he?'.

The NSW ALP will be smashed, so it seems, and so will Bligh.

In NSW there may be a Green win, or two, but there is no chance of that in Qld.

So, we are to be lumbered with a bunch of rightwing pretend-xtians here in Qld once Bligh evaporates, although, frankly, the ALP is as bad as the Coalition when it comes to pretending to be xtian.

That is not a good recipe for the state, or the nation Belly.

While you gush adoringly over your rightwing chums in the ALP, and your equally rightwing chums in the unions, the nation is falling apart because our 'politics' has been thoroughly undermined by halfwits desperate to appeal to an absolute minority, as your Baptist PM shows.

Really Belly, we all need a few extra ideas in politics to prompt some 'debate'.

It would be good if you could bring a little light into your closed-off world, and think, for at least a 'moment', about your gleeful cackling over the Coalition win.

You encourage an ever closer relationship between the ALP 'policies' and the Coalition 'policies'.

Why not just join forces with your new friends in the Coalition, and stop pretending?

After all, your rank-and-file chums vote for the Liberals behind your back don't they?

Shorten would do really well in the new Liberal-ALP Party, and be able to take on Turnbull to become our next PM.

As for 'policies', none of us would be able to tell the difference.

AGIR:

Thanks so much for the link. I shall pass it onto my son (worth a try at least). Yes, I am a Christian, but I'm not sure what that's got to do with anything. After all, Greens Christine Milne's, rhetoric on climate change reflects her Catholic background. She's said that climate change "goes to the heart of questions of justice, equity, and the survival of human kind and the ecosystems on which all life depends."

You have to be kidding, Boaz.

A two hour lecture on "The Outworking of the New Sexual Agenda in Society and a Biblical Response"?

Why do you not simply précis the key points for us, rather than invite us to listen to an unknown speaker, on a dry-as-dust topic, over a period of time where we could actually be doing something useful. Like dyeing the hair in our ears.

As far as the defeat of Labour in Victoria is concerned, it wasn't actually much of anything, was it. Almost a repetition of the Federal scene, where the electorate simply couldn't pick the difference between two sets of equally unattractive politicians.

It will be the same in NSW next March. We will go to the polling booth to deliver the whack to a sleaze-ridden, incompetent and venal government, no doubt only to find ourselves saddled with a different bunch that is equally sleaze-ridden, incompetent and venal.

The most positive outcome of all this is that we will have an enhanced power vacuum at Federal level for a while, which will mean that very little actually gets legislated. Given the pathetic bumbling of all concerned, this can only be a Good Thing.

Aha Pericles, so you too dye your ear 'ole 'air, eh wot?

I think that is where AGIR goes wrong.

He's wasting his time with Bible College drones with dodgy academic letters from dodgy colleges as he searches for The Truth everywhere but where it exists.

If you want less legislation though, it is important to vote strategically in NSW to keep the two gorilla's on equal seats with a Green rump forcing them into compromises all the time.

I see General Jimbo from the ACL has a list of Rob Hull legislation that 'simply must go' now his drones are in government:
http://www.theaustralian.com.au/news/opinion/voters-are-looking-for-leaders-with-courage/story-e6frg6zo-1225962956881

Jimbo sounds more like that crazy-haired woman from Alaska every time he opens his gob. He'd only be happy if Pastor Nahlia was the premier.

The Blue Cross, not a bad post, none of the sometimes seen waviness in yours.
Let us get down to it, your post insulted me.
The question is did you intend to or just not understand me?
See I lived in the 23 years in opposition years for my ALP.
Yes DLP/Catholic right fear and lies helped keep us out of government.
We however while confronted with media , press mainly against us, did as much to keep our selves in opposition as all of the above.
Whitlam took a hidden virus in to power with him, the great man had some great fools under him, with yesterdays ideas.
Vic was best of the east coast I am afraid the new leader may do a good job, but in NSW after the train wreck they have very little going for them.
If you and I are going to continue to talk read my post history if you can not see my support is not without needing the best from my team you ,not me will be seen as not understanding and mate, one eyed?
Sorry a statement I can not respect, different than yours but that is my right.
You are a green I take it?

Insult you? No, not at all intended, I just respond directly to you because I see you as a very direct person, who writes what you think, so I assume you appreciate that approach.

You are quite right about the ALPs desire to remain in opposition for long periods of time, as when Keating lost and Beazley and crew carried on without changing a single policy setting for years, then raising a pair of total duds, Latham and Rudd, to the top position, and the same happens in states of course.

Whitlam was just another right winger, but he appeared to be a communist to many because Australia was such a backwater at the time. I know that for sure because I came here during the Whitlam years and saw someone who could have been a Liberal in the UK, but never a socialist.

His fame, mostly unearned, continues but this is really because he actually was, and remains, a highly intelligent politician which is in stark contrast to all those around and about today.

Also, because the middle-aged who were politicised during the Whitlam era have retained a cultish regard instead of reassessing the reality after the fact.

My assessment of those years, as I lived in many states, is that South Australia was the most advanced state, under Dunstan, coupled with the work of a liberal-ish predecessor from the conservatives prior to Dunstan.

Yes, I see you are monocular, but also expect greater things from the ALP. You will always be left hoping for more I fear. It's very much what-you-see-is-what-you-get with the ALP.

I did indeed sign up to the Greens, after many years in the ALP. Unlike you with the ALP, I have no hopes the Greens will be a glorious saviour political grouping. I just joined out of sheer desperation, and to assist with funding to get a Green Senator up in Qld.

Wot?

I have to agree with Belly twice in one day? What is OLO coming to?

While I am pleased with the removal of Victorian Labor, and anticipate their rout in NSW and QSL shortly, this is actually good news for Julia Gillard, as she will not have state labor poisoning the federal vote.

Whilst the coalition and the greens are politically at opposite ends of the spectrum, the reality is that Labor and the Greens are actually in direct competition for votes, and that in gutting the greens, the coalition is doing more for Labor than itself.

Labor should wake up and stop preferencing the greens in the senate as the greens are starting to strip away their old labor voters. Having the greens in the senate does more damage to labor than the coalition in the long term.

Belly,
Seems i have been a bit misleading in my posts. You are correct in saying that labor has copped some good beatings and that they need renewal across the state ranks. Being in NSW it is always difficult to gauge what is really going on in other states. It seemed all was well in QLD until they decided to sell off public assets to fix some damage caused by the GFC. I just don't get the problem, Howard did this and we all voted him back in so is it wrong when labor does it? I am sure i will hear from my cousin soon, he sits in the Vic upper house. The reasoning will be interesting. I would have thought that the base issues for the vic's was how long that government had been there and that they really never liked Brumby anyway. As for SA don't know have no contact with their politics.
My point was more that with labor on the nose all around the country, why is it that the conservatives can not secure a clear and defining victory. In Tas and federal people swung to the greens rather than hand the lib's victory, SA got back just and again one seat is no resounding victory in Vic. It would seem we have a problem all round, no one trusts the main parties anymore.
I have voted for the greens in the past for the senate because i do not believe it to be in the national interest to have either the government or the opposition controlling the senate. We need only look at what happened in the last term of the Howard gov. Unfortunately the only party alternative left is the greens. I am awaiting now to see whether they can operate as the balance as the democrats did for many years or whether the next election will be the end of them.

Nairbe it is my view many who are green supporters are the way I see deep blue.
Refugees from an ALP that no longer exists.
And never will again every day you find some one willing to lament the ALP surge to the right, The very thing that bought them to government again, no thought is given to one thing.
Voters live in that part of the political paddock.
My party got lost,hearing just how bad Rudd was,just how weak some who failed to act earlier, I think this Castor oil is a needed wake up.
We can not on one hand say we dislike independents having too much say.
Then contribute to the problem by putting greens in a balance of the senate.
Remember please, more people do not want a green in any house than want to vote for them.
Both party's have true conservationists in them, both do not hide a radical agenda under a save the planet front.
Nairbe we need not worry, Labor will be better for this defeat, Bill Shorten is on the rise.

Belly...precisely who, in either major party, leaving out the Nationals who have no idea what they believe, beyond everything for themselves, is the least bit environmentally aware?

And just how much 'castor oil' are you prepared to drink?

By the way, an independent is not the same as a Green. For a start, all the so-called independents are from the rightwing, mainly the National Party.

And the radically inane agenda is on full display within the Coalition and the ALP, at all levels of government.

I will agree however, that Shorten is probably going to dislodge Gillard, whereupon we will all no doubt discover that he too is a born-again nitwit with Baptist roots, and not a single policy objective beyond The Lodge, like all the rest of 'em.

Nairbe in a post you said one seat is not a landslide.
Sorry it is 13 or 14 in fact a task that looked far away.
TBC you persist in telling me I am fixed and focused only on my thoughts.
In a way the best evidence I could want that you in fact are guilty of that.
But at least here in print, you again show why greens are getting support.
The unattractive and wrong belief they are a conservation party.
They are a radical minority always and forever.
This mornings news includes Labor members wanting Nuclear power true conservation greens will say no.

Belly, every vote that goes to the Greens seems to be a crushing blow to the lib/lab camp. I just don't get it. Sure they have some ridicules policy but it is hardly hidden it is all on show on their web site. The whole socialist revolution theory.... well come now who is being paranoid about socialism a union official? My point was that i do not trust the senate to be majority held by either major party. For that matter i don't have any trust in either major party. They both lie and deceive the electorate to achieve agenda's they are never honest about. So to allow some bunch of crazies a few seats is a small cost to ensure compromise.
I am not fussed on the current state of the house but it is probably the best reflection of the distrust the electorate has of government. We were deceived in to going to war and tricked into hateful policy on asylum seekers, then labor after promising to resolve both have done nothing but hold on to power.
The behaviour of the current liberal leader is of the most appalling standard, demonstrating that they have little to offer bar more of the ultra conservative paranoid rubbish Howard fed the country for 11 years. So tell me, why are we sitting in a vacuum of meaningful policy where everyone seems scared to do anything of substance bar maybe the NBN despite the cost which will blow out. My biggest issue is that the detractors are the one's that will make hugh profit from it when next in government.

I am deeply disillusioned Belly, not just politic's but social attitudes are terrible now days. You told me not so long ago that everyone does not have to agree with me. Very true. But it still pains me when i see and here all these supposed democratically minded, free christian people expounding hate and fear. I am mean't to be the radical here, an atheist who votes for parties just to keep things divided. But some how when ever i defend common decency and the value of compassion over hate and mistrust i am run down by the good christian conservative lobby who don't realise that this is their territory.
I can not seem to get to the bottom of what all the fear is about. History shows that all great empires and civilisations fall under the weight of their own greed and self indulgence. Despite the signs being their we still seem determined to push toward oblivion. The greatest hope i have is in my children's generation, maybe there is a social revolution in them that will head in a better direction than the last one that gave us the "ME" generation.

nairbe:

Beautifully put. It's interesting. I was recently cleaning out a chest of drawers and came across an old copy of "A Saturday Reflection," (do you believe - reprinted from "The Age" 13/12/1980)entitled "She'll Be Right.") Why did I bother keeping it? Then I re-read it. "Among the Australianisms that strike visitors to this country is the much bandied cliche "She'll be right!" The expression, drops daily from the lips of easy-going optimists. When a daunting problem emerges, a forbidding prospect appears, or some other cause for anxiety threatens, the Harry Sullivans will airily wave a hand and assert "She'll be right mate." Their bland affirmation is really an expression of a hope that this situation, if left to itself will cease to exist. A cover-up for their blindness to the facts."

We all know that real problems don't simply go away: as long as effects arise from causes. Life's difficult circumstances are not easily side-stepped. A smell of gas, a lump in the breast, a child behaving "dopey," are like alarm bells signalling that something is wrong. Only those who've faced disturbing facts, accepted the reality of them, and shown ability to deal with them can affirm with any degree of credibility - "She'll be right!"

Belly, do read nairbe's posts. The sentiments therein are not so removed from what I am saying.

It was you who said you 'loved' the ALP and your union.

Frankly, that is a bit sad, to admit that you 'love' something like a political party, but at least you are honest. And in that honesty, I see your fixation which makes you somewhat blind to the failings of the ALP, of the unions, of the trust that political parties demand, like religions do, on 'faith'.

Now, there are similar people in the Greens too but as I have already explained to you, I vote Green for similar reasons to nairbe.... sheer desperation.

A lack of honesty within the ALP, a corruption of the union movement from the Kelty-Hawke era onwards, and a horribly rightwing shift right across politics from scared, and scary, politicians.

Nairbe, no one, least of all Howard, forced any Australian to abandon intelligence during his era. Like Lexi identifies, the old Donald Horne 'Lucky Country' syndrome is alive and well still, and 'she'll be right' suits rightwing politics because nothing is ever challenged under that model of 'thought'.

Australians loved Howard because he demanded nothing much from them, other than 'faith', and that suits the Australian mindset, which eschews thinking.

Rudd was just a failure in Canberra, just as he failed when with Goss in Qld, but no one wanted to look that 'far' back in history, with 'she'll be right' their motive force.

Gillard is just a total dud all round, failing first as a deputy PM allowing Rudd to go go berserk without ever challenging him to pull back. Naturally, she was not alone there, the entire caucus was in on 'the joke'.

OK challenge excepted, Gillard is a dud, said that the morning after she took over.
But said, may yet be right, she would govern well, do not trust her.
But Nairbe/TBC not all unions are socialist, not all are from the very left, in fact death is the future of extreme radical unionism.
Labor may call it self socialist, but the handful of true socialists stand up the back in town halls shouting 1950,s slogans to them selves.
Running a country, winning elections, is not about less than,A BEST, 12% of the populations wishes.
I am yesterdays man, no longer a union official, I put my union first, others will too one day, the bloke I informed of a place my job could go is ego driven and harmful to the movement.
Unions should use the power of its members for them, not blindly splashed out on bonds with any party.
The leader in NSW has turned on a great union leader, she has to go, has greatly damaged my party by saying she has unions in her pocket.
If so they will drown with her in the Titanic event to come.
PROUD TO BE UNION
And labor I target the greens for what they are dangerous radicals and on their way to seeing conservatives win many more elections.
A vote for the greens is a vote for Conservatives.
Tell me I am wrong, more in EACH main party dislike greens than vote for them.
Nairbe still respect you but I think you waste your vote TBC sorry you baffle me, I try to respect every ones right to think as they wish but have difficulty's when I run in to some one who thinks as you do.

Belly

Translating your writing is not an easy task.

Are we to understand that you have retired or resigned from your job as an organiser?

Bernie can hardly be called a great union leader. He's just another DLPer posing as an ALP member.

The 'nobodies guuuuurl' you have posing as a premier deserves to be sacked, although that has nothing to do with her spat with Bernie, which I find very amusing.

I am still to read what he said, but from scraps I've picked up he was simply stating the truth, that the working class are so stupid they vote Tory, as they have always done.

I'm not sure there is anything shocking or new in that 'revelation'.

Did she really say she has unions in her pocket?

How refreshingly honest for an ALP state premier, who does in truth have them in her pocket- just watch them pay for the election campaign and attack the Coalition as if they and the premier were best mates.

Actually Belly, a vote for the ALP is a vote for not-very-much, which is why people vote Green and independents these days. But a vote for the ALP is also a vote for backwoods conservatism too, so why not vote for real conservatives in the first place?

It's the Buckleys & Nunn syndrome writ large Belly.

Thanks for your comments Belly, I appreciate your fog and just hope your 'time off' allows you to look around a little more, not to start to think like me, but to reflect a little on just how poorly served we all our by the ALP these days.

You might see that your 'love' of the ALP and unions is not reciprocated by them to you.

Deep Blue, Gday bloke, your post convinced me you know less about politics than most.
You launch in to Bernie then say you have not read about it,
March out on that pirates plank talking about him that shows you are remote from knowing what it is all about.
I an Aussie would know, unless he had a heavy night, told my boss to take his job and plaqce it? I did this because he was ordering me to neglect my members., well you will understand, or will you.
No coward, but no fool, the forum comes before my pride, I intend to avoid you.
I see no point in talking to you, you both over estimate your understanding and under estimate me.
Now know, my members ex now are mates never comrades never would be, the word is tainted by the very left.
And I wear a watch they bought and paid for, but far more important they are my mates still .
good by TBC I refuse to debate a person who only values their point of view.

Come come Belly, that's a bit of an over reaction isn't it?

Bernie is not a well kept secret you know.

He comes from a long line of right wing unionists, from the Santamaria side of politics.

I have not read (precisely) what Bernie said, is what I said, clearly I know what others have said he said.

I admire your stance on supporting your members interests with your own job.

Not many people would do that.

We are not far apart there, I resigned when I realised the leaders were really only interested in their next career step, and our members interests were not being attended to properly, but that was during the Kelty era, and all unions were engaged in selling-out their members in those days.... as they are still.

Belly, read your posts again. you are wandering my friend.
What has happened is totally interlocked. you are union so you are labor. If a union crosses a labor government it is treason end of story. If you want independence then let go of your power at the national conference and be separate to the party. Honestly you would do them a favour. and as for socialism the union movement would do well to remember that that is what they stand for.
So i loose respect by using my senate vote to place the greens in the balance. well i find that entertaining. The last two times that there has been a majority in the senate by one of the two majors it has ended in disaster. 75 saw a government sacked and 2006 saw a government out of control. If you don't understand that it is better for the country to have the senate divided than to have the majors rule you are way out of touch.
If you missed it earlier, i don't trust either major party and the union movement has done little to encourage support for the last twenty years either. It 's time for the unions to drop labor and find their own ground again and represent the worker rather than support the battle for power that has come to be Australian politics.

I'll drink to that nairbe.

No wandering in state conference a couple of years ago Bernie led the union movement,I from an other union followed, sorry about calling TBC DB.
That was the power sell of conference, it had been decided to sell NSW power.
But first,without reason,to put electricity prices up, TOO MAKE IT BETTER TO SELL.
Bernie, not my union, led us.
We voted strongly not to sell Morris the usurper who had stopped natural progression to take the leadership put the rank and vile up against the rank and file.
We won, then he said our vote dd not matter.
My lone actions in my job and the whole anti power sell off are evidence
Standing by while wrong is done , being afraid to say no my party is better than that,is weak.
I will NEVER back down greens harm my party my class and if we let them country.
Middle class Lefty's remote from the truth.

Good to see you back Belly.

Yes, the ALP leadership works in mysterious ways, in all states and territories, never mind councils, and end up looking, sounding and acting identically to the people they pretend to oppose.

That is why people vote Green, Belly.

The ALP has abandoned 'the workers', who these days vote Liberal anyway.

Education, which the ALP have never really understood any more than the Liberals,is what marks out Greens from others today.

The ALP socialist-left used to be the 'think tank' of the ALP, but these days those who might once have joined that cultish group now join nothing, or the Greens.

Bernie was right to oppose the sale of electricity, just as Bligh is wrong to have implemented the Hawke-Keating-Howard policies of selling off QR and our ports, forests and everything else not nailed down.

Like your 'guuuuuurl' down there, Bligh will be gone next time around.

The ALP is not interested in 'the national interest' at all. Most ALP seniors dream of private health, private schools, private gated communities, jetaway holidays, jam-packed super benefits not attached to failing profits like ours are, and an invitation to join the Melbourne Club, or similar in other cities, topped off with a cushy job or three as a director of something easy and socially acceptable.

Some, out of sheer guilt, join up as a minister of some 'faith' but none would dream of 'taking up the tools' because, of course, most senior ALP tossers have no idea what a tool is for, do they?

hit's the mark just right TBC.

TBC ok sorry about the lost temper I take it back.
Can you be honest with me?
Did you not say in a thread, to shadow minister I think, you vote Liberal?
Now you also seem to think as I do about that union, is that the one you served?
They pay more than mine did, I was offered an interview for a job with them last week.
Could eaten from the best fruit in the world,revenge[ that meal will come without help from me] would have done it standing on my head, the interview and the job.
They never had a chance starve to death before working against the AWU, it is returning to its historic roots the best union in construction.
So you see I think Costa had it right Mr Bill Shorten too, Labor must distance its self from the greens.
Nairbe I still respect you, you are ok, but know this, without separation, in my view not possible under Gillard Labor is going to stay in opposition and greens will return to being marginalized.
PS had intended to continue working but a life time of fighting for workers rights would not let me back down to a self serving fool.

No apologies needed Belly, and none expected either.

I imagine your decision to leave so dramatically might be upsetting, so just take care of yourself and take it easy.

No, I have never, and would never, vote for the Coalition. I have been an ALP member, and voted for them.

I now vote Green, and exhaust my vote at the state level.

Unfortunately, because of the system, my preference ends up with the ALP federally.

During the Hanson era, I once gave Boswell (only Boswell)a tick above anyone else, fearing his own supporters would abandon ship and vote for Hanson, lifting her into the Senate for Qld.

It was not a vote from the heart at all, just an attempt to keep one clown in the Senate in order to keep a court jester out.

I worked for white collar unions, not blue.

I'm inclined to think the unions would do well to distance themselves from the ALP, in fact, cut all ties, and do what Bernie said, work with politicians who support union membership needs.

That would cut out most Coalitionists, many ALPers, and some Greens, but might include a few independents.

Good luck with getting the new job anyway.

TBC it must have been deep blue.
Let me be clear I am more than pleased with my last effort in supporting my union.
Leaving in the way we workers dream of, mid morning 4 hours work done before my office opened I yet again got both barrels.
From a bloke in the wrong job, he got my return salvo, I canceled the next 10 hours work, 200 klm trip and came home.
I am over 65 have bloomed at my choice.
Caring it a must in that job, if you can not do that you should not be there.
No stress no junk food no 3am start out and late home.
7 kgs lost and feeling 30.
Mate you will need to understand I think as I say it.
Bob Brown came out, and continues to, in the election saying he does not like preference deals.
I too do not want another one with your mob.
I will not dog on my party, until recently would have put your mob in front of them in NSW, not now not ever.
The ALP can not win if it becomes a servant of 12% of voters, my enemy is my enemy, my party's enemy is too.
In construction sheds all over this state it matters, unionists do not live in an ALP bag they share my fears about greens, my party must draw the line.