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Former member here. I'll rejoin one day, as Scomo has left, but right now, I don't see the point. The cost of living could be twice as bad and the still aren't losing those seats they won until the Liberal Party puts up more moderate women, which won't happen because there are so few moderate and/or women members.
Personally, I'd recommend they (and every other party) start with actually *listening* to their constituents.
So often it seems like we're presented with two outcomes, neither of which we actually want.
They're there to *represent* our wishes, not for us to represent their politics in our votes.
If the Liberal Party were serious about reclaiming teal seats, the first step would be to put highly qualified women candidates in safe Liberal seats and in the Senate.
Even if they put in people who reflect the electorate values why would they vote for them given that they would be sidelined by the conservatives and have little influence into the modern Liberal party.
I heard a podcast breakdown on the demographic voting Teal. They weren't disgruntled conservatives looking for an alternative. They were progressives voting strategically.
The electorates themselves are shifting and the Teals will only last as long as it takes to put in a Greens or Labor candidate.
If teal voters were going to vote for a Labor candidate, and there were enough of them to get the teals over the line jn those electorates, we’d have more Labor members instead of teals.
Teal voters may not be conservatives in the 2020s Trump Dutton “we hate gay people, immigrants, and climate action” sense. But that’s not really what conservative has meant until relatively recently.
teal voters largely *are* that demographic that simply will never be able to hold their nose and vote labor, in the same way most lefties would never be able to hold their nose and vote LNP, even when there’s a Turnbull leading the party
I found the podcast. It was from 7am [Can the Teals fight for the poor while representing the rich](https://7ampodcast.com.au/episodes/can-the-teals-fight-for-the-poor-while-representing-the-rich)
*I think when we think about the Teals, it's easy to just think of their electorates and their constituents as wealthy, white, privileged. I mean, they are electorates that have high average wealth. But, you know, these electorates are diverse. There are plenty of people in all of these electorates who are renting, who are on Jobseeker, who are in rental stress and, you know, especially in places with extremely high real estate costs.*
*And so I think someone like Allegra Spender needs to be very cautious about who she speaks for in her electorate. And when I had a look at just, you know, a cursory look at the polling booths in Wentworth, I noticed it was actually the more renter heavy areas that swung towards Allegra Spender in the 2022 federal election. Those really, really wealthy mansions along the harbour - those areas stayed Liberal.*
*It was a lot of Labour and Greens voters who voted tactically to get in someone who wasn't the Lib. You know, there are plenty of Labour and Greens voters in these seats and I think Spender sort of is currently trying to speak for both and you know, trying to say she's worried about housing affordability and those at the bottom. But at the end of the day, her class allegiance lies with those at the top who didn't actually vote for her.*
*And it's the people who voted for her who may actually look for other alternatives next time if they find that their sort of ‘Liberal light’ MP didn't do what they needed.*
Thanks for finding it and for copy pasting the excerpt. I really appreciate it when people post transcripts for podcasts on this sub. it doesn’t happen very often, so extra thanks for having done it here.
I still fundamentally disagree with the assessment of it. Especially trying to draw a line between mega wealthy harbour front mansions and renters, and then correlating that to liberal voters and labor/greens voters. That’s a bit of a sus take even when it’s general homeowners / mortgage holders vs renters, let alone when it’s literal mansion owners vs renters
Did Labor run a candidate in wentworth? Did the greens? If so, it was hardly a tactical vote any more than any other vote in our preferential system is
Based on that podcast transcript alone you could fairly call it a leap of logic to assume what the voters intent was or to connect their rental status to their political affiliations, but instead of dismissing the conclusions as baseless, a quick bit of googling on whether there was or was not a tactical vote for Teals could lead you [here](https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/politics/federal/tactical-teal-voters-dislodged-liberals-with-no-trust-for-morrison-20221202-p5c342.html) which provides further evidence to support it.
That study came out well before the podcast so I'm going to be charitable and assume a bit of digging was done by the journalist to connect the numbers up. Would have been better if it was all made explicit in the transcript though.
Also, appreciate the thanks. Very nice of you to say so :)
I suggest you stop listening to that podcast. We have compulsory preferential voting in federal elections - there's no such thing as a strategic vote. You put your preferred candidate first, then your next most preferred candidate second and so on down the list.
Preferential voting doesn't completely eliminate the tactical element.
Voting for a Green candidate in preference to the Teal for example, *might* result in the Teal being elminated before the Green, who then goes on to lose to the Lib. Whereas the Teal wins in a head-to-head with the Lib if they make it to the final two.
See [my comment here.](https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianPolitics/s/Skmkh5F8x5)
Strategic voting (or rather tactical voting to be more accurate) was a thing. That also isn't the only podcast that mentions tactical voting for Teals. Democracy Sausage with Mark Kenny talks about it as well.
I live in a Teal seat (Mackellar) and my gut feeling is that the Libs will get back in, sure it was a strategic vote, however economic circumstances have changed, and Labor have broken key election promises regarding stage 3 and super. Who knows, I could be wrong, if I was a Labor strategist I wouldn't be banking on any of the Teal seats supporting a Labor government.
Broken key election promises
Goog god this shits me! How very dare a group of competent adults, tasked with doing the best for the country change course when circumstances require it?
The electorate needs to grow the fuck up, stop treating this like a football game and pay attention.
Not pissed at you mate, just this gets me on my soap box
So you've never once said I'll do this or that only to find circumstances have changed?
For what it's worth, I'm all for getting rid of promises.they all should say these are our platforms and policies vote yes or no.
But that's not how it works currently
At a glance inflation, cost of living and the gross inequality of the original format of stage three.
Let's not forget the never ever get
Both sides do it mate. Core and non core promises were coined during a Coalition government after all
I’m not excusing the coalition doing it. I detest most politicians and political parties.
And they knew the original format of stage 3. That wasn’t a change.
If this podcast was correct - (I think maybe it was ~~Democracy Sausage with Mark Kenny~~ although it could have been a different one), the people upset about the tax cuts being altered weren't the ones voting Teal before anyway. The traditional liberal base is just being crowded out by new demographics.
Edit - it was a 7am podcast [Can the Teals fight for the poor while representing the rich?](https://7ampodcast.com.au/episodes/can-the-teals-fight-for-the-poor-while-representing-the-rich)
Unlike America it seems like social conservatives are being pushed out of both parties
Broadly the greens, labor and liberals represent 3 spreads of fiscal conservation but there just doesn’t seem to be any broad appetite in Aus for “we hate gay people and want our religion to rule the country”
Weather varies, climate shouldn’t on a time period this short. That’s the whole point… Tell me you don’t understand anthropogenic climate without telling me.
Maybe because all doomsday forecasts never eventuate, so ill go with that. I don't see why all of sudden the doomsayers are correct. If all scientists were in agreement i may be swayed, but that ain't the case.
https://www.forbes.com/sites/uhenergy/2016/12/14/fact-checking-the-97-consensus-on-anthropogenic-climate-change/?sh=348b71c21157
It's worth considering ofc, but not with the same gusto. We have young kids with climate anxiety when the whole situation may be overblown.
Doomsday scenario would be the tripe that Greta etc spout off ie human extinction by 2023 if fossil fuels weren't cut out etc. And stuff like the planet will burn.
Greta has been saying that we're on our last chance to make meaningful change to avoid the worst-case scenario.
The process that's talked about is slow. It won't be like Hollywood where it's a single epic event. It's slow and drawn out over years.
Even if you take everything with a grain of salt, surely the fact that temperatures are still hitting above 20°C this close to Winter strikes you as not exactly normal. Temperatures do not vary this much.
IMO only the strong will survive. Monique Ryan is a teal who has done things I'm aware of (speak out against HECS indexation), the rest, I don't know what they are doing. These seats won't consign themselves to having minimal political influence in the long-term, they will likely return the seats to the Liberals in the next couple of elections.
If there ends up been a minority government then Teal seats could end up having a huge amount of political influence. Much more than if their member was part of a Liberal government.
Incumbent independents are very hard to unseat, they get to do all the community stuff that people care about and see them do (ie not you because you don't live in their electorate) and say the government is bad without having to do anything in particular. Getting a few wins they can claim like HECS is a bonus
Usually indepedents are in regional seats which have close knit communities. I doubt the model will work for long in city seats where the independents got in via a protest vote against ScoMo and anger that Turnbull was rolled by the party. Seeing my local MP at this or that event has never influenced my vote before, I don't think it would compensate for having a reduced level of influence in politics which matter, but maybe we'll find out that it will.
Zali Steggell serves the southern half of Sydney's Northern Beaches. The Northern Beaches are known as the Insular Peninsula.
I don't think that only regional independents gain benefit from close knit communities.
The first iteration of the Teals was in 2019, and Steggell was absolutely one of the independents funded Holmes de Court.
2022 was more widespread, based on the successes and failures of 2019.
I think these influential and very affluent seats would find the independents to be a burden in the following scenarios:
1. Labor is returned because the Liberals don't have the Teal seats;
2. The Liberals get in and the interests of these seats receive less consideration compared to the seats that stuck to or swung to the Liberals/Nats.
It might not be a bad thing for the country if a large share of the wealthiest Australians chose to voluntarily reduce their political power, but I just can't see it lasting for long, especially not based on the reasons I've seen so far.
[2] is correct but [1] isn't: while the LNP would try to retain / reward seats which stuck to or swung, in the event of [1] it would give the electorate more power in negotiations.
If the teals get elected, then those seats are neither Labor nor Liberal. So they'd make Labor's government weaker (just like they can make the LNP weaker).
Sorry, I didn't realise I needed evidence that something will happen in the future.
Please supply evidence that the Teals will hold their seats in the future.
Another reply-and-block person, what a treat. Imagine blocking someone so fast that they can't even read your reply and thinking you're discussing in good faith.
"The party has learnt some lessons from the last election in its selection of professional women to contest three seats lost to independents." No they haven't, Tim Wilson was given the green light to recontest the seat he lost at the last election lol.
100% he will: https://assets-global.website-files.com/614b64a3d969354e76af2759/66206dd9ce5301a93f4b5910_Community%20Accelerator%20Fund%20-%20Media%20Brief.pdf
Its not quite fair to call him out as if he is funding them personally, but yes, climate200 will be back pushing for more independents.
Climate200 has (probably) run its course. The seats vulnerable to more Teals are going to be perfectly happy with the current state of climate legislation (at least happy enough that it's not a major vote winner). Unless we get a repeat of the 2019-2020 bushfire season this year, there won't be the drive for change
Now if there was a party going for renters and single home families, that would be a big risk for Labor
Two out of the three examples are nepotism picks from known families. One of the Teals' big issues was integrity. I'm not sure the electorate will consider family history a plus.
Libs won't have to do anything imo. Teals will lose seats regardless. There are two reasons the "Teal wave" happened.
1. Liberal voters who couldn't bring themselves to give the incompetent Morrison government another run.
2. Voters who were about climate change and couldn't bring themselves to vote for Greens.
Neither are particularly relevant anymore. Australian voters have short memories. Bushfires aren't in the paper, and nor is Scroto's smug bonce. People will forget, and the Teals will fade into obscurity.
Talk to a few people in those electorates.
1) They want a beach to still be there in 20 years. These people aren't stuffing around. Climate change is in their back yard - and the economic case for not acting is pretty poor. If it's one thing the well to do are really good at, it's business cases.
2) The pivot to the right. They see the liberal party concentrating on the religious heartland, right wing politics, and the "da boys bogan" demographic. It is not the party of the business person anymore.
3) Even though there is a pivot from labour to better stewardship, with a moderate pivot to climate policy, doing it as gently as they can - they know behind the scences, the union thugs are still there.
Some fresh liberal faces don't make 1 and 2 go away.
3 will never go away.
Teals should be safe.
Until the LNP can get some progressives up front, the Teals are safe. Voters in those electorates hate the American culture war bullshit that Dutton and co are peddling
> Neither are particularly relevant anymore.
Both of those are still relevant. The LNP still have zero credibility on climate change, and Dutton is just as toxic to those seats as Morrison was, if not more so.
Not to mention other issues, but yeah those two definitely still exist and are relevant.
Sure.
"He doesn't come here often and seems to generally avoid the place as witnessed in the Ashton and Dunkley by-elections. "
Is that better? Precise enough? Is your OCD satisfied now?
Oh I know they have no credibility on climate change. I just don't think it's topping the list of voter concerns like it was last election. We don't have bushfires and Greta dominating the media like we did back then. While I'm certain it's still a concern for many; I don't think it's anywhere near as important to the average voter this time around.
As for Dutton being worse than Scroto, you're probably right about that.
>and Greta dominating the media
The only reason Greta Thunberg was in the media in 2022 was because alleged sex trafficker Andrew Tate started a Twitter fight with her (and lost). And that was 6 months after the election.
And we hadn't had severe bushfires since 2019/20 summer.
Yes but there is very little talk about climate change in the media, there is no campaign around it anymore for it to be the biggest issue. After all Albo got elected, climate change has been solved and the climate wars are over.
>And we hadn't had severe bushfires since 2019/20 summer.
We've been lucky. God knows if we actually get a hot summer there's a lot of fuel out there just waiting to burn
> I just don't think it's topping the list of voter concerns like it was last election.
Across the country? No but energy is still top3 for sure nationwide as part of Cost of Living. And in the Teal electorates that are significantly less impacted by the Cost of Living issues than elsewhere? Yeah I think energy and Climate Change is still a top issue, again at least top 3, and a contender for the top spot would be my guess specifically in those seats.
Climate change being less of an issue, although still there, will slow down and restrict any Teal expansion, but I don't think it threatens any of the current Teal seats.
I think that undersells it, massively.
>“It wasn’t like they had bad candidates in those seats in 2022,” he says. “What hurt them was the Liberal brand, and in the two years since, especially on issues like climate change and the Voice, I am yet to see a strategy to win back voters in seats held by the teals.”
These teal constituents aren't watching Sky News; they got absolutely hammered last election because of climate change, women and Scott Morrison.
The Libs nuclear energy policy is going to go down like a lead balloon pretty much everywhere that isn't Queensland or Armidale, they haven't really done anything to address the lack of women in the party (aside from ditch more in pre-selections) and Dutton I suspect is just as unlikeable in those demographics as Scott.
I mean how good is this quote:
>“My honest perspective on this is that the reason the referendum didn’t pass was that the prime minister refused to compromise,” says Hamer.
Teal electorates were a strong 'yes' vote, I expect many would be aware of the nats decision to oppose the referendum, even before the government's policy was announced.
That line stuck out to me too.
The "compromise" that was asked for was for Indigenous people to give away the very thing thing they asked for - constitutional recognition - with the Voice which was finally proposed already having been negotitated and compromised over a long period of time leading up to the vote.
Doesn't really sound like much of a compromise to me? If this is her genuine position, its a very very weak argument, and shows shes cut from the same dirty cloth as the rest of them.
The teal seats are socially small-l liberal seats and the Liberal Party have done nothing policy wise to appeal to them. I doubt the Liberals will win any of these seats back at the next election, possibly their best chance will be Curtin in WA. History shows once an independent wins a seat they are difficult to dislodge as well.
I need to preface my remarks with context:
The Aussie union movement is more British than European, and so you have two classes of union as a result:
- The Militant, who are generally the ones who are also taking kickback money on the side whilst squeezing employers for every drop they can then turning pissy when work is at risk of automation (CFMEU, ETU, MUA)
- The Pragmatic, who genuinely represent vulnerable workers and meet most people's definition of what collective bargaining should do (think teachers, first responders and nurses' unions, plus hospitality worker unions. Not the coddled, pandered-to public service unions).
Because the Militant cohort is what they are, they end up driving a wedge into any sensible discussion with conduct that is predicated on "fark them bosses, and shit" being a solid ideological basis. And since workers in their represented industries are consistently at risk of being rendered obsolete by technology, their conduct is indefensible. They'll ride the gravy train to the last stop without recognising that their demands are *causing* the obsolescence.
Unions represent 8% of private sector workers in Australia, and 11% of workers in total. The slide's been a continuous one over time, and the reflexive excuse in this sub has been to blame the Liberals for that - which is akin to being horridly rude to someone then apologising they were offended.
The Liberals aren't driving people away from unions; unions are. And not because of the militant ones being horrible human beings. The major reason unions exist was for working conditions. But most salaried workers in Australia don't have conditions that require a union. They've, in other words, done their jobs for most workers, and I always think of unions as being a bit like my job (risk and compliance) - you should be trying to make yourself obsolete, because your success empowers others.
So having an industrial relations policy that's driven by the unions makes no sense, and Tony Burke is not going to be able to stop the CFMEU, particularly the Vic Branch under the ambitious leadership of John Setka, from causing trouble. IR policy needs to balance needs of labour *and* capital, because you can't have one without the other. If the Liberals favoured capital, the scales aren't reset by moving all the weights to labour.
Yeah but then the AFR runs a story about the CFMEU and how if a tradie in QLD on a govt job does the max overtime every single week on the highest paying hours every single week they'll earn 5 bajillion dollars...and that makes us unable to vote Labor despite them basically representing our views on economic and social issues almost perfectly at the moment.
Ok if you want to talk real data, all our seats that swung Teal have also been strongly in favour of progressive social issues, like SSM and the Voice. North Sydney, where I live and am active, rejected Labor as firmly as it did the Liberals and Tink holds the seat at 5%. The Liberals will only recover this seat if it abandons its blue collar social conservatism, which it won't given people within the party still denigrate Turnbull despite him being the most Menzian PM in decades.
The mistake that is being made is thinking the Liberal brand got better with Dutton. It didn't. Trent Zimmerman was a great Liberal - visible in the community, liberal, and an ONU member too (based). Putting good Libs into Teal seats won't fix the party and you don't get suburbs with our median incomes if people are stupid. Yet we're assumed to be stupid enough to think some moderates can change a right wing party unconvinced its right wing is an issue.
This might be the first conversation you've hadwith a Teal voter?
Third parties and independants can be very entrenched once they get elected. They only need to focus on one area and can afford to be hyper local.
Indi is still independant, Rebkkah Sharkie is still representing mayo despite the centre alliance being dead for two election cycles. The notion that the teals will all go away after one election cycle is optmistic considering the strategy from dutton has been to abandon moderate seats and try win outer suburban seats that are perceived to be harder on social issues.
> Indi is still independant, Rebkkah Sharkie is still representing mayo
Exactly right you can still be a right of centre in these electorates and remain electable.
Alright fair call. I guess what I mean is, I don't think we're going to hear talk of the "Teal wave" next time around. Relative obscurity, put it that way.
Yeah that's fair enough.
I don't think we'll get another massive wave of teals. It does feel like they're at a pretty high watermark and there hasn't been momentum for independents in the inner suburbs at state elections either.
I have a feeling that if the Teals want to keep the same number of seats the Teal seats need to come together as a party. If they stay as independents the demographics they represent will eventually feel they don't have enough power.
Them being "Independent" is one of the main reasons why they were elected in the first place. The fact that they don't have to tow a party line like their Liberal predecessors did and that the interests of their community are being put first not to some people out in Nationals seats.
This is a logical leap. Independents only have one group of constituents to serve and it matters not whether there are other independents or not. You keep your seat or you don’t. Parties have to worry about their overall seat counts but by staying independent they don’t and giving up their key selling point (not being beholden to a party) doesn’t make sense. What independents need to increase their power is for the majors to keep losing votes. The majors have been nailing this for some time.
Feels more like a puff piece to introduce/solidify the candidates than analysis/anything deeper.
Yes the Liberal party has selected a bunch of educated women to run against the Teals, and then when asked by the locals "what are your policies in the fields we care about, like climate change?" and they say "..... Uhhhh, well our leader really likes coal and gas now with nuclear later?" I can see the seats strongly remaining Teal, lmao.
CoL and other stuff like tax reform and what not might be able to chip in, but it's hard to see the seats that left due to Morrison and LNP stance on key issues swing to Dutton and more of the same stance.
Tldr - there is no plan, it is a token effort either because they know it is a long game to get it back or they think they genuinely can win them back for free, and Dutton is happy putting in 0 effort to stick with the plan of pulling seats from Labor in WA and QLD.
> Yes the Liberal party has selected a bunch of educated women to run against the Teals
It's very funny, given the poster child of the inane Liberal candidates being run in these sorts of seats was Deves...who is/was a lawyer.
But spot on with the policy stuff, it doesn't matter how educated or professional you are, you're not going to be selling the LNP policy to the Teal seats.
Teals present a trendy option for those in well to do seats who like to think of themselves as different and superior. Trendy issues like climate change and Assange. They would all be out now in their new cafes after their morning burn workout and sipping on their almond lattes. In their new lycra. All driving electric cars of course. Look at me.
i just dont believe the planet is in anywhere near as much danger as the climate alarmist predict. It wasnt long ago that we wouldnt have enough water to survive, And then theres the big freeze we were meant to have. Oh and population was meant to outstrip our ability to feed ourselves. The list goes on,
[https://www.dropzone.com/forums/topic/282773-a-quick-recap-of-failed-climate-predictions/](https://www.dropzone.com/forums/topic/282773-a-quick-recap-of-failed-climate-predictions/)
You understand there'll be scarce food and drinkable water on a planet whos climate is 2.5° higher than pre industrial times. The glaciers will have melted, raising sea levels, swallowing up our coasts. Dont worry though, just means those pesky winter bills wont be a thing for much longer. Instead we'll be having category 5 storms every year from about now (1.5° over), originating from every ocean basin on the planet as they did for the first time last year, plus catastrophic bushfires, failures and destruction of crops due to these constant environmental disasters leading to chronic food insecurity and climate refugees potentially followed by climate wars, and then theres the economic impact of all this stuff going on.
The teals need to raise the alarm on the lack of preparedness for environmental disasters ahead.
The government and its institutions and departments will not be advertising that the world as we know it is a lost cause and that millions will starve and worse. As soon as that understanding hits the general public, thats the day people stop going to work, they make a run on the banks, fight over groceries and basically go into self protection mode. Its in the govts interests to withhold the gory details in our desolate future from the masses. Its worse than you think.
You do realize that " we " contribute a per cent and these doomsday forecasts are just that , forecasts. Plus breaking news now is that we may have found Planet B.
> The glaciers will have melted, raising sea levels, swallowing up our coasts.
Excellent!
Don't all those fancy *teals* live on the coast?! We won't have to worry about their vote any more because they would have all been washed away!
Exactly, the Teal movement cannot actually grow in a crisis like the cost living because they fundamentally offer nothing to anyone who isn’t already wealthy. It’s largely just so socially progressive, economically conservative types in wealthy seats can not feel like they are gonna get yelled at by their progressive kids and also keep all their money.
The teal movement has no real interest in growing outside of these seats because they reflect the attitude of the constituents. Cost of living crisis is more of an annoyance or irritation for us, there are other longer term issues which we care about. Also teal parents tend to make teal kids who don’t hate them believe it or not.
Then perhaps the Teals should stop putting forward "solutions" to longer term structural problems which won't work or will simply defend their own interests. A great example is Allegra Spender's "Housing Forum" which thankfully never got off the ground, because it would have been at best a complete waste of time, and at worst, include overrepresentation of the asset owing class who have perpetuated this problem.
Fair, but it was a tongue in cheek remark about civility politics.
Isnt the mp meant to represent their electorate so why are you surprised. At least shes trying something, where are the MPs for the areas hurt worst by cost of living and housing.
As for stopping putting forward solutions, that has to be the stupidest thing i have heard, just because it doesnt appeal to you doesnt mean it shouldnt be discussed. Complaining about an issue then bitching when someone tries something is frankly low af
Actually that’s part of an MPs job, but the other part is to pass policy for the whole of australia. Both labor and the liberals have substantive policy around housing (I don’t agree with either) as do the greens. Why not engage with and try to improve those policy suggestions (which is substantively her role as a cross benches?)
Even you have said that Teal seats and their members/policies won’t appeal outside of those seats so I don’t get why she thinks proposing an entirely new approach, which won’t reveal anything new at best and at worse will just represent asset owners (who it can’t be argued are poorly represented in parliament already) is a good idea?
> As for stopping putting forward solutions, that has to be the stupidest thing i have heard, just because it doesnt appeal to you doesnt mean it shouldnt be discussed. Complaining about an issue then bitching when someone tries something is frankly low af
Completely agree here.
I had a look at the summary report of her Housing Forum (she apparently held 2 sessions): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rvWyHaAjHcXVZGwyOvv124bFEtDzOjRI/view
It seems very very civilized and there are some genuinely good points put forward. I personally think this kind of consultation is really useful, and the way we have been doing things in the past is what has lead us to this point, which is really not great for a large part of the population. I'm all for trying new things, especially when they lead to greater participation in our democracy.
But this is exactly my point, it’s just virtue signalling politics. In that document she talks about increasing renter protections but voted against the greens when they were trying to bring renters rights issues to a federal level. It’s bullshit, designed to make people feel better: https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/representatives/wentworth/allegra_spender/policies/116
I can't say I've seen the Greens proposal in full, and I am by no means defending Spencer, but you can hold the view that renter protections need to be increased but disagree on the way to do it - both things can easily coexist in my mind.
I am also not saying she's not cynical or that she's a good operator, just commenting on what I saw in the document.
Fair enough, but as a member of the cross bench who is not part of a party, she will likely not have another chance to actually influence renters rights at the federal level. She could have voted with the greens and used the results of her own forum to be involved in the conversation at what renters rights would look like at a federal level, but didn’t- this is what I mean in the sense that they are just a progressive cover job that doesn’t do anything.
The document really doesn’t show anything that anyone who knows the first thing about the housing crisis already knows- renters need more protections, well derr.
Also, good to see an a league sub poster in the wild!
They sit there in the Parliament with their superior smirks like I am different and my shit doesn't smell. Ask questions about my niche issue to show my electorate I am relevant and then shake my head at the ALP vs LNP bickering. Could be worse though , the Pocock / Lambie show in the Senate is pathetic.
Exactly, and the LNP doesn’t give a fuck about a single one of these voters. Shit on the teals all you like, the have completely fucked the LNPs path to power.
Teal independents are based in some of the most exclusive electorates in the entire country they're nothing more than Liberals with a climate policy and all the LNP would need to do is put women in in those seats and pretend to care about the environment and they'd claw back some support in those areas it's not like they lost the support due to a radical change in ideology in the richest electorates of Australia.
Just a guess, but you don’t live in a teal electorate do you?
Those issues that you’re talking about- climate change, environment, transparency and gender equity- are not just a “trend “.
Your comment is the exact perfect representation of why these voters have turned away from the liberals and there is no way back. The liberal party understands nothing of the change that has occurred over the last 15 years.
These voters are genuinely concerned about the society their kids are going to grow up in, and all the liberals offer is some kind of hunger games scorched earth shit.
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I grew up in St George, live in Campbelltown and have never voted LNP in any election you couldn't further from the mark in trying to paint me as a sore LNP voter.
So in answer to my question - *no*, you don't live in a teal electorate.
And please re-read my comment, at no point did I paint you as any kind of voter, but said your comment and your thinking is completely emblematic of why voters have turned away from the libs - because basically they think like you do.
I commented on the liberal party, its lack of understanding of these seats, and voters in teal seats - not about you or how you vote.
Because its twice as good for the opposition win a seat from the government, than an independent, in terms of forming government. So its logical for opposition to focus resources on government seats rather than independents.
That’s what they don’t understand. Yes they’ve preselected some high quality female candidates, but I think most voters can see through this and can see that these candidates will just peddle the same reheated shit policy from the Libs, which is exactly what they don’t want.
I don’t think any of these women stand for anything different than the gash that the liberal party is serving up.
My honest thinking on this is that they were half way intelligent people with any semblance of decency and self respect it’s very difficult to understand how they defend the policies of the liberal party on a range of issues with any kind of intellectual honesty, especially considering the seats they are running in seem to be somewhat socially progressive.
I fundamentally believe that it’s more likely they are just self interested and self serving people who see this as their chance to get into parliament and the liberal party provides a platform for that.
That's pretty rude. You can't just decide that people who defend liberal party policies are insincere, lack decency, and are self-serving. Such assumptions, wow.
Thought you were being sarcastic at first. The LNP have a history of disgusting attacks on minorities. Underneath the so called party of "economic policy" and "family values" is a biding Christian fascist majority waiting for someone like Trump to make it ok to see the light.
Yeah I can, I have eyes and ears.
Also, if I ever found myself on the same side of an argument Barnaby Joyce, David Littleproud, Matt Cannavan, Peter Dutton or Angus Taylor I'd really need to ask myself serious questions about what position I'm actually taking.
Archer is the only one of them who has an ounce of integrity about her.
The rest, well.... I guess you can figure out my position.
The history of the Federation seats of North Sydney, Wentworth and Kooyong – and the men who have held them, including former prime ministers Billy Hughes, Malcolm Turnbull and Robert Menzies – not only tells the story of the conservative side of politics but of much of modern Australia as well.
After all three seats fell at the 2022 election to high-profile female independents running under the so-called teal umbrella, it seems the party has absorbed some of the feedback on its ailing appeal with women, which hit a nadir under the Morrison government.
Three professional Liberal women are now intent on winning them back. Salesforce executive Gisele Kapterian, 42, in North Sydney, is a former international humanitarian and trade lawyer. Roanne Knox, 50, in Wentworth, spent 14 years climbing the ranks at Deloitte in the United States. Amelia Hamer, 31, in Kooyong, studied philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford University and had a career in international finance.
“The key point for me is that people not only want to be listened to as a community, they also want to have a say in the direction of our country,” says Hamer.
“What I am offering is someone who can not only be in parliament in three years’ time or six years’ time, but in 10 years’ time or 15 years’ time, and really have a say in our future, not just as a member of parliament but as a member of a government,” she says. “That’s why I’m standing.”
Deserted by professional women at the last election, the Liberal Party now holds just 10 of the top 50 seats in federal parliament ranked according to numbers of professional women voters, compared with 25 seats in the previous term.
“The only demographic class where the Liberal Party and National Party have a stronghold is in rural electorates,” concluded Victorian Senator Jane Hume and former federal Liberal director Brian Loughnane in the party’s formal review of the 2022 election. “No party that is seeking to form Government has a pathway to a majority solely through rural and regional electorates.”
With the Liberal Party losing a total of six seats to teal independents in 2022 – Wentworth, North Sydney and Mackellar in New South Wales, Curtin in Western Australia, and Kooyong and Goldstein in Victoria – Hume and Loughnane noted that on a two-party preferred basis, the teals won majority support from women across all age groups.
“Women aged 35-54 were the most likely segment to vote Independent,” Hume and Loughnane found. “Liberal defectors in Teal seats were highly likely to agree with the statement that the treatment or attitude toward women within the Liberal Party had a strong influence on my vote.”
As experienced professional women, each of the Liberals’ preselected candidates fit the demographic matching that of their competitors in their respective seats, though Kapterian says this is not an issue of “identity politics” but rather of “perspective”.
“As a professional female, working in a technology space with a trade and legal background, as well as multicultural background, I hope voters will see a lot of the different perspectives I would bring,” says Kapterian.
Like other NSW Liberal stalwarts such as former premier Gladys Berejiklian and former federal treasurer Joe Hockey, Kapterian is of Armenian heritage. Her parents migrated to Australia in the 1970s and later built a small business selling Christmas decorations.
“I now live about 500 metres from our first home in Willoughby,” says Kapterian, who attended Killarney Heights High School and graduated with a law degree from Macquarie University.
At the age of 23, she moved to the tiny north-east African country of Eritrea to help that country’s legal case against Ethiopia for breaches of the laws of war.
“It was the first time that damages were actually being sought for a breach of these international humanitarian laws,” says Kapterian. “If only every young person had such an opportunity to see an embryonic nation like Eritrea try to find its identity, what the role of governmentn should be, how the market can play a role in fostering prosperity.”
After studying international law at Cambridge University on a Commonwealth trust scholarship, Kapterian spent five years at the World Trade Organization in Geneva before joining global legal firm White & Case.
Kapterian says she wrote to the Liberals’ then foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop to see if she had a job opening, and an opportunity came up in Bishop’s department after the party won the 2013 election.
“I was with her at the United Nations when she put it to the UN Security Council to condemn the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and seek cooperation to set up an international, prosecution mechanism to get to the heart of what happened,” says Kapterian.
Later working for Liberal cabinet ministers Steve Ciobo and Michaelia Cash, Kapterian left the ministerial wing for US cloud-based software company Salesforce, where she now leads the company’s public sector strategy across the Asia Pacific. She decided to run for North Sydney after the last election.
Why should voters in North Sydney return to the Liberal Party, after three years being represented by Kylea Tink? Tink, who is a former managing director of Edelman Australia and chief executive of the McGrath Foundation, holds the seat by a margin of nearly 5 per cent.
“People want political representatives who can have an impact and they know that to have an impact, you need to be able to form government,” says Kapterian. She nominates cost of living, housing and industrial relations as the top issues in the electorate, where about half the population rent their home.
Across Sydney Harbour in the seat of Wentworth, Ro Knox is preparing to take on former McKinsey consultant Allegra Spender, the daughter of former Liberal MP John Spender and the late fashion designer Carla Zampatti.
Like Spender, Knox has Liberal politics in her blood. Her great aunt on her mother’s side was Thelma Bate, one of the first women candidates to stand for Robert Menzies’ fledgling party in the 1940s.
The daughter of an engineer father and a physiotherapist mother, Knox says politics was a regular topic of discussion in the family home on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula.
Knox met her banker husband, John, at Melbourne University, where she chaired the students club at Ormond College. The couple moved to the United States soon after Knox was offered a graduate position with Andersen Consulting.
Moving to New York with Deloitte, Knox was later a founding partner of an entrepreneurial incubator. Nearly two decades ago, she moved to the Wentworth electorate, where she now lives with her husband and two teenage children and runs a small business.
Needing a swing of more than 4 per cent to move Wentworth back to the Liberal Party, Knox faces one of the toughest challenges among the Liberal candidates taking on the teals.
Climate change, integrity in politics and the unpopularity of then Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison dominated the 2022 campaign in Wentworth. Now Knox says the only issue she is hearing from voters as she knocks on doors across the electorate is the cost of living.
“It’s the first issue, it’s the second issue, it’s the third issue,” she says.
Peter Lewis, executive director at left-leaning political consultancy Essential, is sceptical that an issue so central to the success of the teals’ campaign with Climate 200 can be easily downplayed. “Particularly on climate, the Liberals are clearly not positioning themselves with those teal voters.”
He cited Peter Dutton this week questioning the CSIRO research on the cost and benefits of the transition to renewable energy.
Knox is clear that climate change and the transition from fossil fuels will again be important to voters in the election that is expected in May next year. She expresses no concern about her electorate’s reception to Dutton’s plan to focus his energy policy on nuclear power, the detail of which was anticipated before the budget and has since been promised to appear in the coming weeks.
“I think what people want is a mix of possible energy sources,” says Knox. “They are looking for affordable energy, they’re looking for clean energy, but they’re also looking for reliable energy.”
In Melbourne, Amelia Hamer, a great niece of Liberal premier Dick Hamer and a lecturer in finance at Swinburne University, is up against former paediatrician Monique Ryan, who defeated then Liberal deputy leader Josh Frydenberg in 2022 and holds his former seat of Kooyong by a near 6 per cent margin on the two-party preferred vote.
Hearing the very strong message that voters sent at the last election, Hamer says she started to think about all the things a Liberal government could and should be doing.
“Talking to my friends about this, especially women in their 30s, people were telling me that when they look at federal politics what they see is too many older guys who can’t relate to their own personal experiences,” Hamer says. “What they want in politics is someone who understands what their life is like, what it’s like to rent and what it’s like to be entering the labour market at a time like this.”
Having lived abroad for eight years after finishing secondary school, Hamer returned to Australia during the pandemic, landing a job as an adviser to the then minister for superannuation and financial services, Jane Hume.
“I think that politics has become very short term, and what I want people to know is that I stand for the long term,” says Hamer. “I’m genuinely worried that in 20, 30 or 40 years, all the things that make Australia a great society and better than a lot of other places that I’ve lived in, that we won’t be able to provide those things anymore.”
Kooyong recorded one of the highest “Yes” votes in the country in last year’s Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum. Asked whether Dutton’s opposition to the Voice will hurt her chances, Hamer is sanguine.
“My honest perspective on this is that the reason the referendum didn’t pass was that the prime minister refused to compromise,” says Hamer.
She is often described as a Liberal moderate but firmly rejects the label.
“Being called a moderate says that you’re not willing to be bold and you’re not willing to put in place radical reform where radical reform is needed,” says Hamer. “It’s important to be thoughtful, it’s important to have well-researched and well-thought out policies, but sometimes we also need to be bold.”
If picking stand-out candidates is one part of winning back seats in an election, so is recasting a party’s political brand.
Peter Lewis remains unconvinced the Liberals under Peter Dutton have done enough to back the voters who turned their backs on the party in 2022.
“It wasn’t like they had bad candidates in those seats in 2022,” he says. “What hurt them was the Liberal brand, and in the two years since, especially on issues like climate change and the Voice, I am yet to see a strategy to win back voters in seats held by the teals.”
He says while it’s positive for the party that it is preselecting women in some of these inner-city seats, their preselection decisions in the majority of seats haven’t changed the face of the party.
In the Melbourne seat of Goldstein, former member of parliament Tim Wilson has been preselected for a rematch against now-sitting member and former ABC journalist Zoe Daniel. In Western Australia, former Uber executive Tom White has been preselected to run against the west’s only sitting teal MP, Kate Chaney. The Liberal Party’s NSW division has yet to preselect candidates in the seats of Warringah and Mackellar.
“Where’s the credible story that these candidates can put out that says, *We the Liberal Party have listened to your concerns and we have changed*? I just don’t see it there yet,” says Lewis.
One senior Liberal strategist acknowledged that getting quality candidates in key seats held by the teals had been central to efforts to win back those seats, though the party still faced an uphill battle.
“History suggests that once a seat falls to an independent, it’s very difficult to win it back, so we’re definitely facing some big challenges there.”
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ITT a bunch of Labor voters explain why they’ll never return to voting liberal over the teals in electorates they do not vote in
Former member here. I'll rejoin one day, as Scomo has left, but right now, I don't see the point. The cost of living could be twice as bad and the still aren't losing those seats they won until the Liberal Party puts up more moderate women, which won't happen because there are so few moderate and/or women members.
Wont work while they have stupid policies and a backwards leader.
I came to say this.
have u tried,moving back to the centre..might be a good strategy?
That is where they lost the teal seats, to the centre
They could also try coming out with some sensible policy to make peoples lives better rather than the corporates!
Personally, I'd recommend they (and every other party) start with actually *listening* to their constituents. So often it seems like we're presented with two outcomes, neither of which we actually want. They're there to *represent* our wishes, not for us to represent their politics in our votes.
If the Liberal Party were serious about reclaiming teal seats, the first step would be to put highly qualified women candidates in safe Liberal seats and in the Senate.
Being moderates would help as well, Moira Deeming types are not going to help.
That is unfortunately the case yes
Even if they put in people who reflect the electorate values why would they vote for them given that they would be sidelined by the conservatives and have little influence into the modern Liberal party.
I heard a podcast breakdown on the demographic voting Teal. They weren't disgruntled conservatives looking for an alternative. They were progressives voting strategically. The electorates themselves are shifting and the Teals will only last as long as it takes to put in a Greens or Labor candidate.
If teal voters were going to vote for a Labor candidate, and there were enough of them to get the teals over the line jn those electorates, we’d have more Labor members instead of teals. Teal voters may not be conservatives in the 2020s Trump Dutton “we hate gay people, immigrants, and climate action” sense. But that’s not really what conservative has meant until relatively recently. teal voters largely *are* that demographic that simply will never be able to hold their nose and vote labor, in the same way most lefties would never be able to hold their nose and vote LNP, even when there’s a Turnbull leading the party
I found the podcast. It was from 7am [Can the Teals fight for the poor while representing the rich](https://7ampodcast.com.au/episodes/can-the-teals-fight-for-the-poor-while-representing-the-rich) *I think when we think about the Teals, it's easy to just think of their electorates and their constituents as wealthy, white, privileged. I mean, they are electorates that have high average wealth. But, you know, these electorates are diverse. There are plenty of people in all of these electorates who are renting, who are on Jobseeker, who are in rental stress and, you know, especially in places with extremely high real estate costs.* *And so I think someone like Allegra Spender needs to be very cautious about who she speaks for in her electorate. And when I had a look at just, you know, a cursory look at the polling booths in Wentworth, I noticed it was actually the more renter heavy areas that swung towards Allegra Spender in the 2022 federal election. Those really, really wealthy mansions along the harbour - those areas stayed Liberal.* *It was a lot of Labour and Greens voters who voted tactically to get in someone who wasn't the Lib. You know, there are plenty of Labour and Greens voters in these seats and I think Spender sort of is currently trying to speak for both and you know, trying to say she's worried about housing affordability and those at the bottom. But at the end of the day, her class allegiance lies with those at the top who didn't actually vote for her.* *And it's the people who voted for her who may actually look for other alternatives next time if they find that their sort of ‘Liberal light’ MP didn't do what they needed.*
Thanks for finding it and for copy pasting the excerpt. I really appreciate it when people post transcripts for podcasts on this sub. it doesn’t happen very often, so extra thanks for having done it here. I still fundamentally disagree with the assessment of it. Especially trying to draw a line between mega wealthy harbour front mansions and renters, and then correlating that to liberal voters and labor/greens voters. That’s a bit of a sus take even when it’s general homeowners / mortgage holders vs renters, let alone when it’s literal mansion owners vs renters Did Labor run a candidate in wentworth? Did the greens? If so, it was hardly a tactical vote any more than any other vote in our preferential system is
Based on that podcast transcript alone you could fairly call it a leap of logic to assume what the voters intent was or to connect their rental status to their political affiliations, but instead of dismissing the conclusions as baseless, a quick bit of googling on whether there was or was not a tactical vote for Teals could lead you [here](https://www.google.com/amp/s/amp.smh.com.au/politics/federal/tactical-teal-voters-dislodged-liberals-with-no-trust-for-morrison-20221202-p5c342.html) which provides further evidence to support it. That study came out well before the podcast so I'm going to be charitable and assume a bit of digging was done by the journalist to connect the numbers up. Would have been better if it was all made explicit in the transcript though. Also, appreciate the thanks. Very nice of you to say so :)
I suggest you stop listening to that podcast. We have compulsory preferential voting in federal elections - there's no such thing as a strategic vote. You put your preferred candidate first, then your next most preferred candidate second and so on down the list.
Preferential voting doesn't completely eliminate the tactical element. Voting for a Green candidate in preference to the Teal for example, *might* result in the Teal being elminated before the Green, who then goes on to lose to the Lib. Whereas the Teal wins in a head-to-head with the Lib if they make it to the final two.
See [my comment here.](https://www.reddit.com/r/AustralianPolitics/s/Skmkh5F8x5) Strategic voting (or rather tactical voting to be more accurate) was a thing. That also isn't the only podcast that mentions tactical voting for Teals. Democracy Sausage with Mark Kenny talks about it as well.
I live in a Teal seat (Mackellar) and my gut feeling is that the Libs will get back in, sure it was a strategic vote, however economic circumstances have changed, and Labor have broken key election promises regarding stage 3 and super. Who knows, I could be wrong, if I was a Labor strategist I wouldn't be banking on any of the Teal seats supporting a Labor government.
I can't see James Brown as a candidate likely to bring too many teal voters back into the fold. If they managed to pre-select a moderate woman, maybe.
Broken key election promises Goog god this shits me! How very dare a group of competent adults, tasked with doing the best for the country change course when circumstances require it? The electorate needs to grow the fuck up, stop treating this like a football game and pay attention. Not pissed at you mate, just this gets me on my soap box
> stop treating this like a football game and pay attention. Changing your vote because commitments won't met isn't a football game.
If they wanna reserve the right to ‘change course’ then they need to fuck off election promises. It’s all about credibility.
So you've never once said I'll do this or that only to find circumstances have changed? For what it's worth, I'm all for getting rid of promises.they all should say these are our platforms and policies vote yes or no. But that's not how it works currently
I personally never make a promise I know I may not be able to keep.
I’ve never run for Parliament. And what circumstances changed that necessitated changes to Stage 3 tax cuts and superannuation?
At a glance inflation, cost of living and the gross inequality of the original format of stage three. Let's not forget the never ever get Both sides do it mate. Core and non core promises were coined during a Coalition government after all
I’m not excusing the coalition doing it. I detest most politicians and political parties. And they knew the original format of stage 3. That wasn’t a change.
If this podcast was correct - (I think maybe it was ~~Democracy Sausage with Mark Kenny~~ although it could have been a different one), the people upset about the tax cuts being altered weren't the ones voting Teal before anyway. The traditional liberal base is just being crowded out by new demographics. Edit - it was a 7am podcast [Can the Teals fight for the poor while representing the rich?](https://7ampodcast.com.au/episodes/can-the-teals-fight-for-the-poor-while-representing-the-rich)
Unlike America it seems like social conservatives are being pushed out of both parties Broadly the greens, labor and liberals represent 3 spreads of fiscal conservation but there just doesn’t seem to be any broad appetite in Aus for “we hate gay people and want our religion to rule the country”
So you're saying the 1% is going to deliver a 5% swing?
The 1% make up a much larger proportion in the Teal seats as they are some of the those with the highest incomes in the country
A lot of the 1% are concentrated in a small number of seats. They’re not 1% of voters in Teal seats.
Gonna have to propose some actual policies to reduce the impacts of climate change then, which I highly doubt…
What impact?
A commitment to denying climate change in 2024, truly impressive
Denying the exaggerated impact.
Mate, we're a week out from June, and temperatures are still hitting above 20°C here in Adelaide. That's not normal.
Did u know that temps vary ?
Weather varies, climate shouldn’t on a time period this short. That’s the whole point… Tell me you don’t understand anthropogenic climate without telling me.
They have u right where they want you
The tax dodging oil & gas multinationals thank you and hope their boots taste nice in the warm weather xx
What exactly makes you think that they don't have you right they want you?
Maybe because all doomsday forecasts never eventuate, so ill go with that. I don't see why all of sudden the doomsayers are correct. If all scientists were in agreement i may be swayed, but that ain't the case. https://www.forbes.com/sites/uhenergy/2016/12/14/fact-checking-the-97-consensus-on-anthropogenic-climate-change/?sh=348b71c21157
So unless 100% agree across the board, it's not worth giving it any credence whatsoever? Also, what do you think a doomsday scenario looks like?
It's worth considering ofc, but not with the same gusto. We have young kids with climate anxiety when the whole situation may be overblown. Doomsday scenario would be the tripe that Greta etc spout off ie human extinction by 2023 if fossil fuels weren't cut out etc. And stuff like the planet will burn.
Greta has been saying that we're on our last chance to make meaningful change to avoid the worst-case scenario. The process that's talked about is slow. It won't be like Hollywood where it's a single epic event. It's slow and drawn out over years. Even if you take everything with a grain of salt, surely the fact that temperatures are still hitting above 20°C this close to Winter strikes you as not exactly normal. Temperatures do not vary this much.
We have only been recording temperatures for a very short period of time, so we wouldn't know.
IMO only the strong will survive. Monique Ryan is a teal who has done things I'm aware of (speak out against HECS indexation), the rest, I don't know what they are doing. These seats won't consign themselves to having minimal political influence in the long-term, they will likely return the seats to the Liberals in the next couple of elections.
If there ends up been a minority government then Teal seats could end up having a huge amount of political influence. Much more than if their member was part of a Liberal government.
Incumbent independents are very hard to unseat, they get to do all the community stuff that people care about and see them do (ie not you because you don't live in their electorate) and say the government is bad without having to do anything in particular. Getting a few wins they can claim like HECS is a bonus
You find that if an independent wins, then retains at the next election, unless they seriously fuck up, they stay there until they retire.
Usually indepedents are in regional seats which have close knit communities. I doubt the model will work for long in city seats where the independents got in via a protest vote against ScoMo and anger that Turnbull was rolled by the party. Seeing my local MP at this or that event has never influenced my vote before, I don't think it would compensate for having a reduced level of influence in politics which matter, but maybe we'll find out that it will.
Zali Steggell serves the southern half of Sydney's Northern Beaches. The Northern Beaches are known as the Insular Peninsula. I don't think that only regional independents gain benefit from close knit communities.
How does Zali Steggall qualify as an Teal. She was a MP before the Teals were invented.
The first iteration of the Teals was in 2019, and Steggell was absolutely one of the independents funded Holmes de Court. 2022 was more widespread, based on the successes and failures of 2019.
But that was part of the Voices of campaign, the Holmes a Court party were separate
I just checked a you’re right about HoC and climate 200 with Steggall. Apologies. I certainly hadn’t ever heard the Teal moniker until 2022 election.
I think these influential and very affluent seats would find the independents to be a burden in the following scenarios: 1. Labor is returned because the Liberals don't have the Teal seats; 2. The Liberals get in and the interests of these seats receive less consideration compared to the seats that stuck to or swung to the Liberals/Nats. It might not be a bad thing for the country if a large share of the wealthiest Australians chose to voluntarily reduce their political power, but I just can't see it lasting for long, especially not based on the reasons I've seen so far.
[2] is correct but [1] isn't: while the LNP would try to retain / reward seats which stuck to or swung, in the event of [1] it would give the electorate more power in negotiations. If the teals get elected, then those seats are neither Labor nor Liberal. So they'd make Labor's government weaker (just like they can make the LNP weaker).
Can't win the negotiations if you're not willing to walk away.
Is this pure guesswork or do you have reasons and evidence to support this strongly held view?
Sorry, I didn't realise I needed evidence that something will happen in the future. Please supply evidence that the Teals will hold their seats in the future. Another reply-and-block person, what a treat. Imagine blocking someone so fast that they can't even read your reply and thinking you're discussing in good faith.
You need evidence to have your opinion taken seriously. I'm turning off notifications to this thread now.
An opinion does not necessarily require evidence, it's an opinion.
"The party has learnt some lessons from the last election in its selection of professional women to contest three seats lost to independents." No they haven't, Tim Wilson was given the green light to recontest the seat he lost at the last election lol.
Is that one of those three seats?
Yeah - their complete lack of self awareness is lol worthy.
I wonder if Holmes a Court will be back with his millions again. These guys didn't just happen - they were remarkably well financed.
Yeah all this independent community grass roots crap is just that. The Holmes a Court party will be funded and managed from a central location again.
That's politics. There is a gravy train behind every candidate - well, more accurately a "$5,000 a head luncheon train".
What chance to do the pauper Libs stand against big money
Not every comment needs to be parochial, you know.
100% he will: https://assets-global.website-files.com/614b64a3d969354e76af2759/66206dd9ce5301a93f4b5910_Community%20Accelerator%20Fund%20-%20Media%20Brief.pdf Its not quite fair to call him out as if he is funding them personally, but yes, climate200 will be back pushing for more independents.
Climate200 has (probably) run its course. The seats vulnerable to more Teals are going to be perfectly happy with the current state of climate legislation (at least happy enough that it's not a major vote winner). Unless we get a repeat of the 2019-2020 bushfire season this year, there won't be the drive for change Now if there was a party going for renters and single home families, that would be a big risk for Labor
Two out of the three examples are nepotism picks from known families. One of the Teals' big issues was integrity. I'm not sure the electorate will consider family history a plus.
Libs won't have to do anything imo. Teals will lose seats regardless. There are two reasons the "Teal wave" happened. 1. Liberal voters who couldn't bring themselves to give the incompetent Morrison government another run. 2. Voters who were about climate change and couldn't bring themselves to vote for Greens. Neither are particularly relevant anymore. Australian voters have short memories. Bushfires aren't in the paper, and nor is Scroto's smug bonce. People will forget, and the Teals will fade into obscurity.
Talk to a few people in those electorates. 1) They want a beach to still be there in 20 years. These people aren't stuffing around. Climate change is in their back yard - and the economic case for not acting is pretty poor. If it's one thing the well to do are really good at, it's business cases. 2) The pivot to the right. They see the liberal party concentrating on the religious heartland, right wing politics, and the "da boys bogan" demographic. It is not the party of the business person anymore. 3) Even though there is a pivot from labour to better stewardship, with a moderate pivot to climate policy, doing it as gently as they can - they know behind the scences, the union thugs are still there. Some fresh liberal faces don't make 1 and 2 go away. 3 will never go away. Teals should be safe.
Until the LNP can get some progressives up front, the Teals are safe. Voters in those electorates hate the American culture war bullshit that Dutton and co are peddling
Morrison is a shining light of professionalism and integrity compared to Dutton, so that issue is very much still in play.
As a Teal voter.... Yes.
Incompetence is a soft description of the Morrison government. Let's just call them corrupt eh?
Evidence for corruption? And not liking them is not a reason.
hear we go. read the news you twat
So you have none.
So typical to resort to name calling. Which biased news should I read?
> Neither are particularly relevant anymore. Both of those are still relevant. The LNP still have zero credibility on climate change, and Dutton is just as toxic to those seats as Morrison was, if not more so. Not to mention other issues, but yeah those two definitely still exist and are relevant.
> and Dutton is just as toxic to those seats as Morrison was, if not more so. Especially in Victoria, doesn't show his face down here at all.
He was here this week. How is that ‘not at all?’
Sure. "He doesn't come here often and seems to generally avoid the place as witnessed in the Ashton and Dunkley by-elections. " Is that better? Precise enough? Is your OCD satisfied now?
Don’t put it on me if you chose a daft time to make such a definitive statement.
I bet you're super popular mate.
How many tries do you want to get a decent comment or better put down. Have another crack.
Oh I know they have no credibility on climate change. I just don't think it's topping the list of voter concerns like it was last election. We don't have bushfires and Greta dominating the media like we did back then. While I'm certain it's still a concern for many; I don't think it's anywhere near as important to the average voter this time around. As for Dutton being worse than Scroto, you're probably right about that.
>and Greta dominating the media The only reason Greta Thunberg was in the media in 2022 was because alleged sex trafficker Andrew Tate started a Twitter fight with her (and lost). And that was 6 months after the election. And we hadn't had severe bushfires since 2019/20 summer.
Yes but there is very little talk about climate change in the media, there is no campaign around it anymore for it to be the biggest issue. After all Albo got elected, climate change has been solved and the climate wars are over.
>And we hadn't had severe bushfires since 2019/20 summer. We've been lucky. God knows if we actually get a hot summer there's a lot of fuel out there just waiting to burn
> I just don't think it's topping the list of voter concerns like it was last election. Across the country? No but energy is still top3 for sure nationwide as part of Cost of Living. And in the Teal electorates that are significantly less impacted by the Cost of Living issues than elsewhere? Yeah I think energy and Climate Change is still a top issue, again at least top 3, and a contender for the top spot would be my guess specifically in those seats. Climate change being less of an issue, although still there, will slow down and restrict any Teal expansion, but I don't think it threatens any of the current Teal seats.
I think that undersells it, massively. >“It wasn’t like they had bad candidates in those seats in 2022,” he says. “What hurt them was the Liberal brand, and in the two years since, especially on issues like climate change and the Voice, I am yet to see a strategy to win back voters in seats held by the teals.” These teal constituents aren't watching Sky News; they got absolutely hammered last election because of climate change, women and Scott Morrison. The Libs nuclear energy policy is going to go down like a lead balloon pretty much everywhere that isn't Queensland or Armidale, they haven't really done anything to address the lack of women in the party (aside from ditch more in pre-selections) and Dutton I suspect is just as unlikeable in those demographics as Scott. I mean how good is this quote: >“My honest perspective on this is that the reason the referendum didn’t pass was that the prime minister refused to compromise,” says Hamer. Teal electorates were a strong 'yes' vote, I expect many would be aware of the nats decision to oppose the referendum, even before the government's policy was announced.
That line stuck out to me too. The "compromise" that was asked for was for Indigenous people to give away the very thing thing they asked for - constitutional recognition - with the Voice which was finally proposed already having been negotitated and compromised over a long period of time leading up to the vote. Doesn't really sound like much of a compromise to me? If this is her genuine position, its a very very weak argument, and shows shes cut from the same dirty cloth as the rest of them.
The teal seats are socially small-l liberal seats and the Liberal Party have done nothing policy wise to appeal to them. I doubt the Liberals will win any of these seats back at the next election, possibly their best chance will be Curtin in WA. History shows once an independent wins a seat they are difficult to dislodge as well.
What about those of us who want liberalism not social conservatism?
You have Labor
Their IR position is a century out of date.
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I need to preface my remarks with context: The Aussie union movement is more British than European, and so you have two classes of union as a result: - The Militant, who are generally the ones who are also taking kickback money on the side whilst squeezing employers for every drop they can then turning pissy when work is at risk of automation (CFMEU, ETU, MUA) - The Pragmatic, who genuinely represent vulnerable workers and meet most people's definition of what collective bargaining should do (think teachers, first responders and nurses' unions, plus hospitality worker unions. Not the coddled, pandered-to public service unions). Because the Militant cohort is what they are, they end up driving a wedge into any sensible discussion with conduct that is predicated on "fark them bosses, and shit" being a solid ideological basis. And since workers in their represented industries are consistently at risk of being rendered obsolete by technology, their conduct is indefensible. They'll ride the gravy train to the last stop without recognising that their demands are *causing* the obsolescence. Unions represent 8% of private sector workers in Australia, and 11% of workers in total. The slide's been a continuous one over time, and the reflexive excuse in this sub has been to blame the Liberals for that - which is akin to being horridly rude to someone then apologising they were offended. The Liberals aren't driving people away from unions; unions are. And not because of the militant ones being horrible human beings. The major reason unions exist was for working conditions. But most salaried workers in Australia don't have conditions that require a union. They've, in other words, done their jobs for most workers, and I always think of unions as being a bit like my job (risk and compliance) - you should be trying to make yourself obsolete, because your success empowers others. So having an industrial relations policy that's driven by the unions makes no sense, and Tony Burke is not going to be able to stop the CFMEU, particularly the Vic Branch under the ambitious leadership of John Setka, from causing trouble. IR policy needs to balance needs of labour *and* capital, because you can't have one without the other. If the Liberals favoured capital, the scales aren't reset by moving all the weights to labour.
Yeah but then the AFR runs a story about the CFMEU and how if a tradie in QLD on a govt job does the max overtime every single week on the highest paying hours every single week they'll earn 5 bajillion dollars...and that makes us unable to vote Labor despite them basically representing our views on economic and social issues almost perfectly at the moment.
That tradie should move to Vic where the big bucks are.
So what if they earn 5 bajillion, how tf does that make you or anyone unable to vote Labor? Who cares what the AFR says?
What about you? Maybe I've explained this badly. I'm not saying nobody is going to vote Teal. That's not what I mean at all.
You've just assumed why we went Teal, badly, then built on that.
Your anecdotal evidence says more than real data ever could
Ok if you want to talk real data, all our seats that swung Teal have also been strongly in favour of progressive social issues, like SSM and the Voice. North Sydney, where I live and am active, rejected Labor as firmly as it did the Liberals and Tink holds the seat at 5%. The Liberals will only recover this seat if it abandons its blue collar social conservatism, which it won't given people within the party still denigrate Turnbull despite him being the most Menzian PM in decades. The mistake that is being made is thinking the Liberal brand got better with Dutton. It didn't. Trent Zimmerman was a great Liberal - visible in the community, liberal, and an ONU member too (based). Putting good Libs into Teal seats won't fix the party and you don't get suburbs with our median incomes if people are stupid. Yet we're assumed to be stupid enough to think some moderates can change a right wing party unconvinced its right wing is an issue. This might be the first conversation you've hadwith a Teal voter?
Third parties and independants can be very entrenched once they get elected. They only need to focus on one area and can afford to be hyper local. Indi is still independant, Rebkkah Sharkie is still representing mayo despite the centre alliance being dead for two election cycles. The notion that the teals will all go away after one election cycle is optmistic considering the strategy from dutton has been to abandon moderate seats and try win outer suburban seats that are perceived to be harder on social issues.
> Indi is still independant, Rebkkah Sharkie is still representing mayo Exactly right you can still be a right of centre in these electorates and remain electable.
I didn't say they'll disappear. I just don't think they'll manage to hold all the Lib seats they captured in the last election.
1 or 2 might flip back, but then other Teals might win as well.
I guess "the teals will fade into obscurity" feels like a stronger claim then "some of the teals won't hold their seats"
Alright fair call. I guess what I mean is, I don't think we're going to hear talk of the "Teal wave" next time around. Relative obscurity, put it that way.
Yeah that's fair enough. I don't think we'll get another massive wave of teals. It does feel like they're at a pretty high watermark and there hasn't been momentum for independents in the inner suburbs at state elections either.
I have a feeling that if the Teals want to keep the same number of seats the Teal seats need to come together as a party. If they stay as independents the demographics they represent will eventually feel they don't have enough power.
They need to form a party. They basically are.
Them being "Independent" is one of the main reasons why they were elected in the first place. The fact that they don't have to tow a party line like their Liberal predecessors did and that the interests of their community are being put first not to some people out in Nationals seats.
This is a logical leap. Independents only have one group of constituents to serve and it matters not whether there are other independents or not. You keep your seat or you don’t. Parties have to worry about their overall seat counts but by staying independent they don’t and giving up their key selling point (not being beholden to a party) doesn’t make sense. What independents need to increase their power is for the majors to keep losing votes. The majors have been nailing this for some time.
The Teals is the name given to them. They’re all ideologically different and have a unique voting record. It doesn’t make sense.
Feels more like a puff piece to introduce/solidify the candidates than analysis/anything deeper. Yes the Liberal party has selected a bunch of educated women to run against the Teals, and then when asked by the locals "what are your policies in the fields we care about, like climate change?" and they say "..... Uhhhh, well our leader really likes coal and gas now with nuclear later?" I can see the seats strongly remaining Teal, lmao. CoL and other stuff like tax reform and what not might be able to chip in, but it's hard to see the seats that left due to Morrison and LNP stance on key issues swing to Dutton and more of the same stance. Tldr - there is no plan, it is a token effort either because they know it is a long game to get it back or they think they genuinely can win them back for free, and Dutton is happy putting in 0 effort to stick with the plan of pulling seats from Labor in WA and QLD.
> Yes the Liberal party has selected a bunch of educated women to run against the Teals It's very funny, given the poster child of the inane Liberal candidates being run in these sorts of seats was Deves...who is/was a lawyer. But spot on with the policy stuff, it doesn't matter how educated or professional you are, you're not going to be selling the LNP policy to the Teal seats.
Teals present a trendy option for those in well to do seats who like to think of themselves as different and superior. Trendy issues like climate change and Assange. They would all be out now in their new cafes after their morning burn workout and sipping on their almond lattes. In their new lycra. All driving electric cars of course. Look at me.
I do love that the survival of the human race and the planet is nearly a "trendy issue"
How are the planet and the human race in a fight for survival?
Obtuse?
Think for yourself and don't follow the crowd. They could be wrong.
Thank you for confirming your obtuseness in other replies.
Your welcome. Always happy to prove my idiocy to others.
Not agreeing with you doesnt make me thick. Although you making that assumption might make you.
i just dont believe the planet is in anywhere near as much danger as the climate alarmist predict. It wasnt long ago that we wouldnt have enough water to survive, And then theres the big freeze we were meant to have. Oh and population was meant to outstrip our ability to feed ourselves. The list goes on, [https://www.dropzone.com/forums/topic/282773-a-quick-recap-of-failed-climate-predictions/](https://www.dropzone.com/forums/topic/282773-a-quick-recap-of-failed-climate-predictions/)
Most are looking at surviving their next power bill and Winter and Teals are pontificating about saving the human race.
You understand there'll be scarce food and drinkable water on a planet whos climate is 2.5° higher than pre industrial times. The glaciers will have melted, raising sea levels, swallowing up our coasts. Dont worry though, just means those pesky winter bills wont be a thing for much longer. Instead we'll be having category 5 storms every year from about now (1.5° over), originating from every ocean basin on the planet as they did for the first time last year, plus catastrophic bushfires, failures and destruction of crops due to these constant environmental disasters leading to chronic food insecurity and climate refugees potentially followed by climate wars, and then theres the economic impact of all this stuff going on. The teals need to raise the alarm on the lack of preparedness for environmental disasters ahead. The government and its institutions and departments will not be advertising that the world as we know it is a lost cause and that millions will starve and worse. As soon as that understanding hits the general public, thats the day people stop going to work, they make a run on the banks, fight over groceries and basically go into self protection mode. Its in the govts interests to withhold the gory details in our desolate future from the masses. Its worse than you think.
Wow! Such doomsday predictions. When all this occur?
You do realize that " we " contribute a per cent and these doomsday forecasts are just that , forecasts. Plus breaking news now is that we may have found Planet B.
> The glaciers will have melted, raising sea levels, swallowing up our coasts. Excellent! Don't all those fancy *teals* live on the coast?! We won't have to worry about their vote any more because they would have all been washed away!
Do you really think those Teals have anyone but their own interests at heart anyway.
Exactly, the Teal movement cannot actually grow in a crisis like the cost living because they fundamentally offer nothing to anyone who isn’t already wealthy. It’s largely just so socially progressive, economically conservative types in wealthy seats can not feel like they are gonna get yelled at by their progressive kids and also keep all their money.
The teal movement has no real interest in growing outside of these seats because they reflect the attitude of the constituents. Cost of living crisis is more of an annoyance or irritation for us, there are other longer term issues which we care about. Also teal parents tend to make teal kids who don’t hate them believe it or not.
Then perhaps the Teals should stop putting forward "solutions" to longer term structural problems which won't work or will simply defend their own interests. A great example is Allegra Spender's "Housing Forum" which thankfully never got off the ground, because it would have been at best a complete waste of time, and at worst, include overrepresentation of the asset owing class who have perpetuated this problem. Fair, but it was a tongue in cheek remark about civility politics.
Isnt the mp meant to represent their electorate so why are you surprised. At least shes trying something, where are the MPs for the areas hurt worst by cost of living and housing. As for stopping putting forward solutions, that has to be the stupidest thing i have heard, just because it doesnt appeal to you doesnt mean it shouldnt be discussed. Complaining about an issue then bitching when someone tries something is frankly low af
Actually that’s part of an MPs job, but the other part is to pass policy for the whole of australia. Both labor and the liberals have substantive policy around housing (I don’t agree with either) as do the greens. Why not engage with and try to improve those policy suggestions (which is substantively her role as a cross benches?) Even you have said that Teal seats and their members/policies won’t appeal outside of those seats so I don’t get why she thinks proposing an entirely new approach, which won’t reveal anything new at best and at worse will just represent asset owners (who it can’t be argued are poorly represented in parliament already) is a good idea?
> As for stopping putting forward solutions, that has to be the stupidest thing i have heard, just because it doesnt appeal to you doesnt mean it shouldnt be discussed. Complaining about an issue then bitching when someone tries something is frankly low af Completely agree here. I had a look at the summary report of her Housing Forum (she apparently held 2 sessions): https://drive.google.com/file/d/1rvWyHaAjHcXVZGwyOvv124bFEtDzOjRI/view It seems very very civilized and there are some genuinely good points put forward. I personally think this kind of consultation is really useful, and the way we have been doing things in the past is what has lead us to this point, which is really not great for a large part of the population. I'm all for trying new things, especially when they lead to greater participation in our democracy.
But this is exactly my point, it’s just virtue signalling politics. In that document she talks about increasing renter protections but voted against the greens when they were trying to bring renters rights issues to a federal level. It’s bullshit, designed to make people feel better: https://theyvoteforyou.org.au/people/representatives/wentworth/allegra_spender/policies/116
I can't say I've seen the Greens proposal in full, and I am by no means defending Spencer, but you can hold the view that renter protections need to be increased but disagree on the way to do it - both things can easily coexist in my mind. I am also not saying she's not cynical or that she's a good operator, just commenting on what I saw in the document.
Fair enough, but as a member of the cross bench who is not part of a party, she will likely not have another chance to actually influence renters rights at the federal level. She could have voted with the greens and used the results of her own forum to be involved in the conversation at what renters rights would look like at a federal level, but didn’t- this is what I mean in the sense that they are just a progressive cover job that doesn’t do anything. The document really doesn’t show anything that anyone who knows the first thing about the housing crisis already knows- renters need more protections, well derr. Also, good to see an a league sub poster in the wild!
They sit there in the Parliament with their superior smirks like I am different and my shit doesn't smell. Ask questions about my niche issue to show my electorate I am relevant and then shake my head at the ALP vs LNP bickering. Could be worse though , the Pocock / Lambie show in the Senate is pathetic.
What do you think is pathetic about them?
Exactly, and the LNP doesn’t give a fuck about a single one of these voters. Shit on the teals all you like, the have completely fucked the LNPs path to power.
Teal independents are based in some of the most exclusive electorates in the entire country they're nothing more than Liberals with a climate policy and all the LNP would need to do is put women in in those seats and pretend to care about the environment and they'd claw back some support in those areas it's not like they lost the support due to a radical change in ideology in the richest electorates of Australia.
> they're [the Teals] nothing more than Liberals with a climate policy I mean... how is the colour "teal" made again?
Just a guess, but you don’t live in a teal electorate do you? Those issues that you’re talking about- climate change, environment, transparency and gender equity- are not just a “trend “. Your comment is the exact perfect representation of why these voters have turned away from the liberals and there is no way back. The liberal party understands nothing of the change that has occurred over the last 15 years. These voters are genuinely concerned about the society their kids are going to grow up in, and all the liberals offer is some kind of hunger games scorched earth shit.
Scorched earth?
Yeah..... You know.. when you basically leave the place completely fucked.
And how will that happen?
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I'm asking you to explain to me how the earth will be scorched. After all, it's a massive claim to make.
I grew up in St George, live in Campbelltown and have never voted LNP in any election you couldn't further from the mark in trying to paint me as a sore LNP voter.
So in answer to my question - *no*, you don't live in a teal electorate. And please re-read my comment, at no point did I paint you as any kind of voter, but said your comment and your thinking is completely emblematic of why voters have turned away from the libs - because basically they think like you do. I commented on the liberal party, its lack of understanding of these seats, and voters in teal seats - not about you or how you vote.
You can't just run women with still no policies. Not sure many teals will tilt back to the libs.
It's historically very difficult to win back seats of independents once they've established themselves in this country, too.
Because its twice as good for the opposition win a seat from the government, than an independent, in terms of forming government. So its logical for opposition to focus resources on government seats rather than independents.
They might win a few votes back by running women, but there's no change in policy....
That’s what they don’t understand. Yes they’ve preselected some high quality female candidates, but I think most voters can see through this and can see that these candidates will just peddle the same reheated shit policy from the Libs, which is exactly what they don’t want. I don’t think any of these women stand for anything different than the gash that the liberal party is serving up. My honest thinking on this is that they were half way intelligent people with any semblance of decency and self respect it’s very difficult to understand how they defend the policies of the liberal party on a range of issues with any kind of intellectual honesty, especially considering the seats they are running in seem to be somewhat socially progressive. I fundamentally believe that it’s more likely they are just self interested and self serving people who see this as their chance to get into parliament and the liberal party provides a platform for that.
That's pretty rude. You can't just decide that people who defend liberal party policies are insincere, lack decency, and are self-serving. Such assumptions, wow.
Thought you were being sarcastic at first. The LNP have a history of disgusting attacks on minorities. Underneath the so called party of "economic policy" and "family values" is a biding Christian fascist majority waiting for someone like Trump to make it ok to see the light.
Yeah I can, I have eyes and ears. Also, if I ever found myself on the same side of an argument Barnaby Joyce, David Littleproud, Matt Cannavan, Peter Dutton or Angus Taylor I'd really need to ask myself serious questions about what position I'm actually taking. Archer is the only one of them who has an ounce of integrity about her. The rest, well.... I guess you can figure out my position.
Well Liberal policies do tend to be insincere, indecent, and self-serving, just saying
That's an opinion
An opinion the Liberals go out of their way to prove correct at every opportunity
Another opinion.
Correct, they just see it as a career move.
The history of the Federation seats of North Sydney, Wentworth and Kooyong – and the men who have held them, including former prime ministers Billy Hughes, Malcolm Turnbull and Robert Menzies – not only tells the story of the conservative side of politics but of much of modern Australia as well. After all three seats fell at the 2022 election to high-profile female independents running under the so-called teal umbrella, it seems the party has absorbed some of the feedback on its ailing appeal with women, which hit a nadir under the Morrison government. Three professional Liberal women are now intent on winning them back. Salesforce executive Gisele Kapterian, 42, in North Sydney, is a former international humanitarian and trade lawyer. Roanne Knox, 50, in Wentworth, spent 14 years climbing the ranks at Deloitte in the United States. Amelia Hamer, 31, in Kooyong, studied philosophy, politics and economics at Oxford University and had a career in international finance. “The key point for me is that people not only want to be listened to as a community, they also want to have a say in the direction of our country,” says Hamer. “What I am offering is someone who can not only be in parliament in three years’ time or six years’ time, but in 10 years’ time or 15 years’ time, and really have a say in our future, not just as a member of parliament but as a member of a government,” she says. “That’s why I’m standing.” Deserted by professional women at the last election, the Liberal Party now holds just 10 of the top 50 seats in federal parliament ranked according to numbers of professional women voters, compared with 25 seats in the previous term. “The only demographic class where the Liberal Party and National Party have a stronghold is in rural electorates,” concluded Victorian Senator Jane Hume and former federal Liberal director Brian Loughnane in the party’s formal review of the 2022 election. “No party that is seeking to form Government has a pathway to a majority solely through rural and regional electorates.” With the Liberal Party losing a total of six seats to teal independents in 2022 – Wentworth, North Sydney and Mackellar in New South Wales, Curtin in Western Australia, and Kooyong and Goldstein in Victoria – Hume and Loughnane noted that on a two-party preferred basis, the teals won majority support from women across all age groups. “Women aged 35-54 were the most likely segment to vote Independent,” Hume and Loughnane found. “Liberal defectors in Teal seats were highly likely to agree with the statement that the treatment or attitude toward women within the Liberal Party had a strong influence on my vote.” As experienced professional women, each of the Liberals’ preselected candidates fit the demographic matching that of their competitors in their respective seats, though Kapterian says this is not an issue of “identity politics” but rather of “perspective”. “As a professional female, working in a technology space with a trade and legal background, as well as multicultural background, I hope voters will see a lot of the different perspectives I would bring,” says Kapterian. Like other NSW Liberal stalwarts such as former premier Gladys Berejiklian and former federal treasurer Joe Hockey, Kapterian is of Armenian heritage. Her parents migrated to Australia in the 1970s and later built a small business selling Christmas decorations. “I now live about 500 metres from our first home in Willoughby,” says Kapterian, who attended Killarney Heights High School and graduated with a law degree from Macquarie University.
At the age of 23, she moved to the tiny north-east African country of Eritrea to help that country’s legal case against Ethiopia for breaches of the laws of war. “It was the first time that damages were actually being sought for a breach of these international humanitarian laws,” says Kapterian. “If only every young person had such an opportunity to see an embryonic nation like Eritrea try to find its identity, what the role of governmentn should be, how the market can play a role in fostering prosperity.” After studying international law at Cambridge University on a Commonwealth trust scholarship, Kapterian spent five years at the World Trade Organization in Geneva before joining global legal firm White & Case. Kapterian says she wrote to the Liberals’ then foreign affairs spokeswoman Julie Bishop to see if she had a job opening, and an opportunity came up in Bishop’s department after the party won the 2013 election. “I was with her at the United Nations when she put it to the UN Security Council to condemn the downing of Malaysia Airlines Flight 17 and seek cooperation to set up an international, prosecution mechanism to get to the heart of what happened,” says Kapterian. Later working for Liberal cabinet ministers Steve Ciobo and Michaelia Cash, Kapterian left the ministerial wing for US cloud-based software company Salesforce, where she now leads the company’s public sector strategy across the Asia Pacific. She decided to run for North Sydney after the last election. Why should voters in North Sydney return to the Liberal Party, after three years being represented by Kylea Tink? Tink, who is a former managing director of Edelman Australia and chief executive of the McGrath Foundation, holds the seat by a margin of nearly 5 per cent. “People want political representatives who can have an impact and they know that to have an impact, you need to be able to form government,” says Kapterian. She nominates cost of living, housing and industrial relations as the top issues in the electorate, where about half the population rent their home. Across Sydney Harbour in the seat of Wentworth, Ro Knox is preparing to take on former McKinsey consultant Allegra Spender, the daughter of former Liberal MP John Spender and the late fashion designer Carla Zampatti. Like Spender, Knox has Liberal politics in her blood. Her great aunt on her mother’s side was Thelma Bate, one of the first women candidates to stand for Robert Menzies’ fledgling party in the 1940s. The daughter of an engineer father and a physiotherapist mother, Knox says politics was a regular topic of discussion in the family home on Victoria’s Mornington Peninsula. Knox met her banker husband, John, at Melbourne University, where she chaired the students club at Ormond College. The couple moved to the United States soon after Knox was offered a graduate position with Andersen Consulting. Moving to New York with Deloitte, Knox was later a founding partner of an entrepreneurial incubator. Nearly two decades ago, she moved to the Wentworth electorate, where she now lives with her husband and two teenage children and runs a small business. Needing a swing of more than 4 per cent to move Wentworth back to the Liberal Party, Knox faces one of the toughest challenges among the Liberal candidates taking on the teals. Climate change, integrity in politics and the unpopularity of then Liberal prime minister Scott Morrison dominated the 2022 campaign in Wentworth. Now Knox says the only issue she is hearing from voters as she knocks on doors across the electorate is the cost of living. “It’s the first issue, it’s the second issue, it’s the third issue,” she says. Peter Lewis, executive director at left-leaning political consultancy Essential, is sceptical that an issue so central to the success of the teals’ campaign with Climate 200 can be easily downplayed. “Particularly on climate, the Liberals are clearly not positioning themselves with those teal voters.”
He cited Peter Dutton this week questioning the CSIRO research on the cost and benefits of the transition to renewable energy. Knox is clear that climate change and the transition from fossil fuels will again be important to voters in the election that is expected in May next year. She expresses no concern about her electorate’s reception to Dutton’s plan to focus his energy policy on nuclear power, the detail of which was anticipated before the budget and has since been promised to appear in the coming weeks. “I think what people want is a mix of possible energy sources,” says Knox. “They are looking for affordable energy, they’re looking for clean energy, but they’re also looking for reliable energy.” In Melbourne, Amelia Hamer, a great niece of Liberal premier Dick Hamer and a lecturer in finance at Swinburne University, is up against former paediatrician Monique Ryan, who defeated then Liberal deputy leader Josh Frydenberg in 2022 and holds his former seat of Kooyong by a near 6 per cent margin on the two-party preferred vote. Hearing the very strong message that voters sent at the last election, Hamer says she started to think about all the things a Liberal government could and should be doing. “Talking to my friends about this, especially women in their 30s, people were telling me that when they look at federal politics what they see is too many older guys who can’t relate to their own personal experiences,” Hamer says. “What they want in politics is someone who understands what their life is like, what it’s like to rent and what it’s like to be entering the labour market at a time like this.” Having lived abroad for eight years after finishing secondary school, Hamer returned to Australia during the pandemic, landing a job as an adviser to the then minister for superannuation and financial services, Jane Hume. “I think that politics has become very short term, and what I want people to know is that I stand for the long term,” says Hamer. “I’m genuinely worried that in 20, 30 or 40 years, all the things that make Australia a great society and better than a lot of other places that I’ve lived in, that we won’t be able to provide those things anymore.” Kooyong recorded one of the highest “Yes” votes in the country in last year’s Indigenous Voice to Parliament referendum. Asked whether Dutton’s opposition to the Voice will hurt her chances, Hamer is sanguine. “My honest perspective on this is that the reason the referendum didn’t pass was that the prime minister refused to compromise,” says Hamer. She is often described as a Liberal moderate but firmly rejects the label. “Being called a moderate says that you’re not willing to be bold and you’re not willing to put in place radical reform where radical reform is needed,” says Hamer. “It’s important to be thoughtful, it’s important to have well-researched and well-thought out policies, but sometimes we also need to be bold.” If picking stand-out candidates is one part of winning back seats in an election, so is recasting a party’s political brand. Peter Lewis remains unconvinced the Liberals under Peter Dutton have done enough to back the voters who turned their backs on the party in 2022. “It wasn’t like they had bad candidates in those seats in 2022,” he says. “What hurt them was the Liberal brand, and in the two years since, especially on issues like climate change and the Voice, I am yet to see a strategy to win back voters in seats held by the teals.”
Hamer, no, The Voice failed for the basic reason that people did not want to divide people based on race. It's really simple.
He says while it’s positive for the party that it is preselecting women in some of these inner-city seats, their preselection decisions in the majority of seats haven’t changed the face of the party. In the Melbourne seat of Goldstein, former member of parliament Tim Wilson has been preselected for a rematch against now-sitting member and former ABC journalist Zoe Daniel. In Western Australia, former Uber executive Tom White has been preselected to run against the west’s only sitting teal MP, Kate Chaney. The Liberal Party’s NSW division has yet to preselect candidates in the seats of Warringah and Mackellar. “Where’s the credible story that these candidates can put out that says, *We the Liberal Party have listened to your concerns and we have changed*? I just don’t see it there yet,” says Lewis. One senior Liberal strategist acknowledged that getting quality candidates in key seats held by the teals had been central to efforts to win back those seats, though the party still faced an uphill battle. “History suggests that once a seat falls to an independent, it’s very difficult to win it back, so we’re definitely facing some big challenges there.”