The Save our Senate ad that GetUp have produced (and was discussed in the email from them) has been up on YouTube for a while now. Given that we may not really see it on TV, I thought I'd put it up here.
This actually ties in nicely with something I want to post about anyway.
I finished reading Still Not Happy John during the week. I'll post more on it later, but there is something that was in the book that I think people need to be aware of.
As you know, Howard currently has control of the Senate. The election gives you the power to change this. You can ensure that Howard loses control of the Senate. The Senate that voted in WorkChoices. The Senate that has slowly had its accountability eroded by the current government.
Canberra in particular, we're looking at you. Why? Well, let's let Margo explain:
...you have the ability to empower the Senate on your own. You'd have to do something amazing, but it can be done. The ACT elects two senators who, unlike senators representing the states, take their seats immediately, not on 1 July next year. Labor always gets one ACT senator; the Libs the other. But if 9,000 Liberal voters transfer their Senate vote to the Greens or Labor, Howard's Senate control is over.
Margo Kingston, Still Not Happy John, p 438
How many people are aware of that? Not too many, I'm willing to bet.
Something I found out about from TAMS about a month or so ago (and I'm still not sure why I didn't already know), the NSW seat of Eden-Monaro is considered to be the bellwether seat* of the election. For the past 30-odd years, whoever wins Eden-Monaro, generally wins the government. Interesting, huh?
What is also very interesting is that Labor is running Mike Kelly as the candidate in the seat. Mike Kelly is the Colonel who assisted in exposing the corruption that formed the AWB scandal.
Very interesting indeed.
UPDATE: Peter Martin writes about the possibility of the government losing the Senate seat.
*The Poll Bludger did a post about the seat back in June. I swear I found the post after I wrote that it was a bellwether seat (as it is also described by William). It is, after all, the perfect word to describe it.
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