Nationally
Liberal: 7
Nationals: 4
Labor: 4
Independent: 1
Queensland is the bogey state. If things continue at this rate then Labor will need to win the majority of seats in Queensland to win the election. Otherwise, unless WA swings heavily, things look good for the coalition.
November 24th, 2007 at 07:08pm
The Liberals are leading Labor in Canberra 43-36 votes.
Labor are leading the Liberals in Fraser 341-242
The Liberals now lead Eden Monaro by 1914-1593. If the gap keeps up at this rate this good be a good bel–whether omen for the Liberals.
The Liberals lead Hume 2293-1652
No votes currently counted in the ACT senate
The only states yet to close their polls are the Northern Territory and Western Australia.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 07:03pm
No votes counted in Canberra or Fraser yet, but Eden Monaro is showing a swing to Labor of 6%, but the Liberals are leading by 42 votes.
Hume is showing a 4% swing to Labor, but the Liberals have nearly double the votes of Labor.
My point here is that the swing is not going to mean a thing for at least another hour when we actually have a reasonable percentage of votes counted…unless the swing is at least ten percent.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 06:49pm
With 0.1% of the vote counted, and only in Tasmania, Victoria, New South Wales and the ACT, Labor have a 1.68% swing towards them.
Exit polls predict a Labor win in the seat of Eden Monaro.
However with only a Newspoll or thereabouts of votes counted, there really isn’t enough to go on.
More updates to follow.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 06:35pm
Welcome to the Samuel’s Blog Election 2007 coverage of overall results, and the results from the seats of Fraser, Canberra, Eden-Monaro and Hume, plus ACT senate seats.
Due to not having enough available disk space on my streaming computer to record the election coverage, I am unable to provide a webstream of this election. That being said, if you’re in Canberra, the best place for election coverage in my view is 2CC (1206 on the AM dial).
We won’t start to see results until about 6:30, but I will strive to keep you updated through the night.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 06:09pm
Happy election night Stuart, John and Steve
I just thought you might like to know that I have three songs on standby tonight.
If it's a Labor victory, then for Kevin and Julia I've got "We've only just begun" by The Carpenters
If the coalition win and John Howard keeps his seat, then for John Howard it's "Still the one" by Orleans
And if the coalition win but John Howard loses his seat, then for Peter Costello it's "It's My Party" by Lesley Gore (with lyrics such as "Nobody knows where my Johnny has gone" it was hard to choose anything else).
Have a great night, I'll be tuning in right through until midnight!
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
November 24th, 2007 at 05:30pm
As it is now after 1pm and I have to start my afternoon newsreading duties for AIR News shortly, I am not going to have time to have an episode of Editorial Echoes today. The planned episode is probably a tad out of date by now anyway as it was really a Saturday morning script (not that I finished the script, it’s just notes at this stage).
Suffice to say I have cast my vote. I doubt many people here will be surprised to hear that I have voted for the Liberal party in the House of Representatives and the Senate. I have a number of reasons for deciding to do that, and I have to admit that the smear tactics used by certain members of the Liberal party during the week nearly made me change my vote, but I was satisfied that it had backfired badly enough for them and they had taken action against a certain group of people, so they managed to hang on to my vote, as I see other issues as being far more important right now.
I’m sticking to my earlier prediction of the Coalition by two seats, even though the polls are against me. I was pleased to hear a commentator who I have a lot of respect for, 2GB current affairs director Jason Morrison, reach the same conclusion as me yesterday on the 2CC breakfast show…seeing as mine is a hunch and his is the result of careful analysis, I think that’s a good sign…or at least I hope it is.
That being said, I am but one in a poll of millions, and whilst I have cast my vote, every vote counts. Please, if you have not already voted, fill out the form properly, cast a vote based on what you believe in your head, not your heart, and may the most favoured candidates win!
I’ll be back from 6pm or thereabouts with half hourly updates. I’m also going to see about getting a webstream of 2CC’s election coverage online. Capital Radio can sue me if they want…but the Canberrans who are not in Canberra deserve better than a webstream from 666 ABC Canberra in my view…or at the very least, deserve a choice. I more or less have everything ready at this end…I’ll just have to double check everything. If it does happen, the webstream will be online from 6pm to midnight only.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 01:22pm
Here are the results from this week’s election poll.
Total Votes: 58
Started: November 17, 2007
Interestingly it more or less mirrors the result of a lot of larger polls, especially when you compare the two major parties. It also, much like some larger polls, noticed a swing back to the Liberal party towards the end of the week, but not enough to get them over the line.
When you turn that in to a 150 seat figure, you get the following results:
Labor: 56.89655172
Liberal: 51.72413793
Greens: 20.68965517
Democrats: 15.51724138
Other: 5.172413793
Obviously you can’t have partial seats, so the numbers then get wound back to:
Labor: 56
Liberal: 51
Greens: 20
Democrats: 15
Other: 5
Total: 147
This leaves three seats to fill, so we use the original figures and see which three groups were closest to reaching another full seat, and give them those seats. Those groups are Labor, Liberal, Greens.
So, the Samuel’s Blog Election Poll final result says this will be the makeup of the new House of Representatives.
Labor: 57
Liberal: 52
Greens: 21
Democrats: 15
Other: 5
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 01:07pm
I will get the results of the weekly poll online shortly.
Tonight I will providing half hourly or thereabouts updated on the election, and in particular, the results of Fraser, Canberra, Eden Monaro and Hume, and the overall result in the House of Representatives. I will also be providing updates on the ACT senate election.
I have decided not to rely on the commentary of the ABC, Nine or Seven, and instead will probably have Nine’s coverage muted, and be listening to 2CC all night. 2CC will be using 2UE’s coverage which will be anchored by people I can actually put up with for an entire night, namely Steve Price and John Stanley in the national tally room, and Stuart Bocking in the Sydney studio.
Naturally they will be joined by various political figures, and will have reporters in key locations.
2CC will be running their own half-hourly local updates from the tally room. From what I can gather, they will have their full contingent on news and current affairs staff on hand and in various locations to cover the local seats.
I believe that this coverage will be far better than any other broadcast coverage.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 12:03pm
Good morning John,
I would like to join you in wishing Graham a very happy 60th birthday today. I look forward to hearing Graham's calls every weekend, and I hope he has a great birthday.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
November 24th, 2007 at 02:00am
As it has now passed midnight, the election poll has been closed.
I will post the results and some analysis in the next few hours.
Samuel
November 24th, 2007 at 12:16am
Good evening Stuart,
This email contains electoral content…you might want to hold it over seeing as you're not discussing the election (much) tonight.
Well over the last few nights you really have heard all the reasons for voting against people:
Vote against John Howard because Work Choices introduced an unpacking fee on fridges
Vote against Kevin Rudd because he will jeopardise marriages.
The thing that worries me is that these people are able to vote!
Have a great weekend, I'll be listening to you tomorrow night…far better than the television coverage I hope.
Regards,
Samuel Gordon-Stewart
Canberra
1 comment November 23rd, 2007 at 10:30pm
A couple emails from listeners to start the show off, and then Samuel explains why the electoral advertising blackout should be a blanket ban, not just for broadcast media.
Tomorrow: Poll analysis and predictions
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/EditorialEchoes/015.mp3]
Download link
You are more than welcome to respond to anything you hear on the show by sending an email to echoes@samuelgordonstewart.com. Emails may be read and responded to on a future episode.
The episode can be played in the MP3 player above or by downloading the MP3 file. You can also subscribe to Editorial Echoes. The RSS Feed can be found at https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/EditorialEchoes/echoes.xml and you can subscribe through iTunes by clicking here.
As this episode is an interview and therefore not scripted, the transcript follows.
Samuel
Welcome to Editorial Echoes for November 23, 2007, I’m Samuel Gordon-Stewart.
A couple emails to start us off today.
Josie writes, “Another smear campaign in the Liberal party, surely enough is enough”. Well Josie, if it’s enough to turn you against the coalition, then so be it, but in my view the pamphlet farce has been appropirately dealt with. Three people have been expelled from the Liberal party over the juvenile smear campaign, and I don’t believe the Liberal MP who is the wife of one of the people behind the pamphlets deserves to be punished for her husband’s actions…but that’s for her electorate to decide tomorrow, and I wouldn’t be surprised if she is a bit nervous.
Tom writes “I thought you said the journalist you were going to have on the show was on Four Corners last week. I didn’t spot James Goodwin on Four Corners.” Tom, I knew someone would say that. There were hundreds of Journalists on Four Corners last week, most of them in the background. James had a short spoken role, he was filmed on the Kevin Rudd media bus talking on a mobile phone to somebody, presumably reporting on the day’s events for 2GB. It was only a small spot, but I can assure you that he was there.
On to the editorial for the day and this political advertising blackout that started yesterday. But I got it wrong, I thought it was a real political advertising blackout…but it’s not, it’s only a blackout on the so-called licenced spectrum, the broadcasters, radio and television. Newspapers, the Internet and letterboxes can continue to be deluged by political ads, whilst the broadcasters miss out on three days of lucrative advertising dollars.
I think the advertising blackout is a great idea, it gives people the two days before the election, and the day of the election itself, to allow the dust to settle and decide for themselves without the vapid promises and noisy ranting of the advertising getting in the way. It’s a good chance to separate fact from fiction, but to limit it to only the broadcasters is utterly ridiculous.
Admittedly the broadcast ads are more intrusive as they just sort of pop in to your life and make annoying noises about why all the other candidates are horrible and nasty and awful, and the advertised candidate is wonderful, and almost without fail they are followed by three competing ads with the same content but the names in a slight different place. It may be harder to get rid of broadcast ads when they appear than it is to throw a pamphelt away or scribble over an ad in the newspaper, but they are still as annoying…and in the case of some Internet ads, even moreso, because you might be trying to read an online article and all of a sudden a politician starts dancing around your screen. It’s just downright annoying.
I support the advertising blackout, but it needs to be regulated properly. Quite simply, no political advertising should be allowed on the two days prior, and the day of, the election. Not on TV, radio, printed media, in your letterbox, on the Internet, sky writing, billboards or any other way they can think of. The two exceptions to this would have to be the how to vote cards, unless we ban them too, and the websites of the politicians. Those websites, technically at least, are advertising for electoral purposes, but they’re an important resource for policy information, and should not be banned.
Everything else is a mere annoyance in the days leading up to the election, it makes the analysis of the election more diffcult for voters, and should be banned.
Regardless of who gets in to power, if they are serious about the democratic process, they will make the advertising blackout a true blackout, by banning it from more than just the broadcasters.
This has been Editorial Echoes for November 23, 2007, as usual the email address is echoes@samuelgordonstewart.com for any feedback, and join me tomorrow for an analysis of the polls, who I think will win, where I will be turning for election coverage on the night, and if I decide to reveal it, who I will be voting for.
I’m Samuel Gordon-Stewart, enjoy your day, if you’re still unsure of your vote then please consider it very carefully, and I’ll talk to you again tomorrow. Until then, tada.
November 23rd, 2007 at 03:02pm
For some reason I still have a Google alert set up for “Dickson College”, it doesn’t usually provide much of interest, but it did provide me with some amusement tonight.
Somebody named Molika, who has just submitted her enrolment application for Dickson College, wrote an article on her blog about some shopping she did in Civic. Whilst in Civic she was bombarded with people handing out political pamphlets…I’ll let her explain.
I went into the city today & you know how it is nearly the election day, there was so many people handing out pamphlet & yelling out of the top of their lungs how we should vote this party & so on. Well anyways, as i was walking this lady with a heap of pamphlet stopped me & i knew that she was about to give me one of those useless pamphlet so i said to her “I am not old enough to vote yet”. Which she replied with a smart arse comment “Oh what a shame, take one anyway & give it to someone you know”. I was gobsmacked! I was thinking, “does she have a hearing problem or something? I just told her that i was not old enough to vote! & now she’s giving me one of these crap pamphlet about how I should be voting for the greens?”. So i just walked off & gave her a dirty, whilst giving her the attitude i ripped up the pamphlet to bit & pieces and threw it out the bin! LOL!!! Should have seen her face, priceless
That story arrived at just the right time. I needed a good laugh, and Molika provided it. Thank you Molika.
Samuel
November 23rd, 2007 at 01:25am
Today Samuel discusses the election campaign with 2GB political correspondent James Goodwin. James, like many press gallery journalists, has spent the last five and a half weeks following the various political leaders around the country.
Samuel and James discuss the performance of the leaders, the likely outcome of the election, and how disruptive an election campaign is for a press gallery journalist.
[audio:https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/EditorialEchoes/014.mp3]
Download link
You are more than welcome to respond to anything you hear on the show by sending an email to echoes@samuelgordonstewart.com. Emails may be read and responded to on a future episode.
The episode can be played in the MP3 player above or by downloading the MP3 file. You can also subscribe to Editorial Echoes. The RSS Feed can be found at https://samuelgordonstewart.com/wp-content/EditorialEchoes/echoes.xml and you can subscribe through iTunes by clicking here.
As this episode is an interview and therefore not scripted, the transcript follows.
Samuel
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Welcome to Editorial Echoes for November 22, 2007. I’m Samuel Gordon-Stewart and joining me from somewhere on the campaign trail is Radio 2GB, political correspondent James Goodwin. James, welcome to the program.
James Goodwin: Thank you.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Now you’re obviously very busy covering the campaign so I thank you for sparing a few minutes for us. Where have we found you today?
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Well today, I’m following Mr Rudd but we haven’t done any events, any campaigning just yet but yesterday, I was … I spent the day with John Howard. As we do on the campaign, we tend to alternate between the different leaders but yesterday, I was with Mr Howard in Sydney. He’s had quite a busy day. He’s certainly ramping up the campaigning in the final days of this campaign. He was in Sydney to start off with. He went to have a coffee with some workers just on George Street in the Sydney CBD. He spoke to the business owner. He sat down and had a cappuccino and then quite oddly decided that he’d walk back to his parliamentary office … back to his government offices.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Really?
James Goodwin: So he walked down along Pitt Street and up George Street, down Martin Place and then back to Phillip Street, down towards Circular Quay where the Commonwealth Parliamentary Offices are. So it was one of those moments where only in Australia can the Prime Minister just go for a walk and much to the amazement of many of the workers along that they were just seeing … did a double take, who was that and he was quite friendly and shaking hands with people and chatting with people as he waited to cross the road. But then it was off to quite a formal speech where he laid out his key priorities for the first 100 days if he is elected to government. The economy, keeping unemployment low was his key priorities. That’s quite a dig at Mr Rudd who didn’t mention the economy in his first five priorities. I mean he was interviewed by a newspaper a couple of days ago.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: So I do have to ask the question. Did the Chaser team turn up for Mr Howard’s little walk?
James Goodwin: Certainly not yesterday. The Chaser has tried to turn up a number of times for the morning walks, the ones that Mr Howard does about 6:00/6:30 in the morning. Security was very tight yesterday and it’s been fairly tight throughout most of the campaign. The Chaser do try to make an appearance but they usually will have a bit of a go but they know their limits as well. If they see that security is particularly tight or if that the journalists … it’s a very serious issue for the day, they usually respect our job as well. So …
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: That’s good.
James Goodwin: … they know when to give up.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Okay, that’s good. So you’ve spent some time with both leaders. What’s your … what’s been your impression of the campaign so far? Do you think either leader or any of the leaders for that matter have done better than other ones in terms of presenting themself?
James Goodwin: I think early on in the campaigning, Mr Rudd was presenting himself to the public in a better light. He was just doing a lot more campaigning. It was very busy being with him. You were on a bus, you were on a plane, you were in a different motel every night and he’d do a number of events during the day. The Prime Minister in contrast would largely just do one event for the day and then an opportunity for the journalists to ask him questions, so that was certainly a difference. I think Mr Rudd did a lot of ground work early on and that may serve him quite well but the Prime Minister is certainly now decided to “up” his campaign momentum and he’s doing a number of events during the one day. So I think that’s where Mr Rudd got off to a good start by doing that, just getting out there and meeting a lot of people in a lot of different places and if we think back to it, there was another … (chuckle) that was quite a while ago now but the Prime Minister virtually spent the first week of the campaign still in Canberra. He did announce the good … a very large tax relief package. That went down well for the Prime Minister. It did take … it did perhaps sure up some votes with that sort of announcement but Mr Rudd has certainly been out there campaigning and meeting more people and that’s been what the difference has been between the two parties.
But they certainly just have different strong suits. Mr Howard has been campaigning on the economy and keeping unemployment low. The interest rate issue has been bubbling away and despite having another interest rate rise within the campaign, the first time that’s ever happened, he still maintains the line that interest rates would certainly be higher under a Labor Government and just being out on the road with people and listening to the people that they were meeting in shopping centres but certainly one of the main concerns for anyone that has a mortgage is they do fear whether they actually had a mortgage during the last government, they certainly fear having very high interest rates.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Right. So amongst the journalists and I suppose also amongst the public that you’ve seen, do you think there’s been a consensus as to who is going to win the election or who people will rather vote for?
James Goodwin: It’s still a little bit close to call and I know we’re only a couple of days out from the election but it is very close. I don’t quite believe that the polls are … as the opinion polls give … I believe that it’s still very tight. It’s not perhaps the 10% that we’re seeing in most of the opinion polls, that the gap will be much tighter than that, that people on election day may decide different things to what they’ve been thinking if they’ve been opinion polled. So I’m not sure, I can’t really speak on my colleagues’ behalf but there’s been a lot of discussion that possibly Mr Rudd will scrape over the line but possibly only by a couple of seats. He does have to win 16 seats. It will be difficult for him and it looks like Queensland will be one of those key states. Both of them just don’t spend a lot of time in Queensland. Mr Rudd, it’s his home state. He needs to pick up a number of seats and that will be one of the clenches for him if he’s going to win this election.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Okay. Just finally, obviously the campaign has seen you ferried all over the country. It’s probably been quite tiring for you. Are you looking forward to Sunday when it’s all over?
James Goodwin: Yeah but Sunday, it won’t be all over for me, particularly if Mr Rudd is elected. I’m sure he’ll be straight on the campaigning, getting into the mode of being the Prime Minister. So (chuckle) yes, I would like a day off. I’m up to day 40 something. I did get to go home one day of the campaign but that was the day of the debate, so I didn’t really spend much time there. It certainly wasn’t a day off. I am looking forward to having some time off but it’s been a lot of fun. Just not knowing, having this magical mystery tour is a lot of fun.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Yeah, I suppose a lot of people in the public probably don’t appreciate the amount of work that everyone in the press gallery does following all of the leaders around throughout the debate. It’s obviously a very big interruption to your life.
James Goodwin: It is. I’m sure there’s a lot of bills stacking up in my mailbox …
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: (Chuckle). I hope not.
James Goodwin: … and those sort of issues. Yeah, I hope not as well but yeah, all those sorts of factors and packing for six weeks is an interesting task and never knowing when you’re able to do a load of washing and those sorts of thing.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Yeah. Alright James, well thank you very much for your time. It’s been great talking to you.
James Goodwin: Thank you.
Samuel Gordon-Stewart: Thank you. James Goodwin, political correspondent for Radio 2GB, 873 on the Sydney AM dial and on the web at 2GB.com. This has been Editorial Echoes for November 22, 2007. As usual, the email address is echoes@samuelgordonstewart.com for any feedback. I’m Samuel Gordon-Stewart, enjoy your day and until tomorrow. Tada.
Transcript produced by Coralie Faulkner, Audio.net.au
November 22nd, 2007 at 01:16pm
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