Liberals bow down to members pressure and save Victoria from Gang Greens

Source: The Age

THE Liberal Party will direct preferences to Labor ahead of the Greens at the state election, virtually destroying the minor party's chances of winning seats in the lower house and seizing the balance of power in Victoria.

Liberal heavyweights including Opposition Leader Ted Baillieu, party president David Kemp and state director Tony Nutt last night resolved to ''put the Greens last'' in all 88 lower house seats".

The shock move means Labor is almost guaranteed to retain a suite of inner-Melbourne seats it feared would fall to the Greens, and reduces to almost zero the prospect of the election producing a hung parliament.

The decision to put the Greens last will boost Ted Baillieu standing in the electorate.

Bronwyn Pike is now the only seat under question but the vote is now back in her court with the game still in play


 Table below Source Poll Bludger

				GRN 2PP
	ALP	GRN	LIB	LIB PREF	NO PREF
2006 STATE
Melbourne	45%	27%	22%	48%	40%
Richmond	46%	25%	20%	46%	39%
Brunswick	48%	30%	17%	45%	40%
Northcote	53%	27%	15%	42%	37%
2010 FEDERAL
Melbourne	36%	37%	22%	57%	49%
Richmond	39%	37%	20%	55%	48%
Brunswick	46%	31%	19%	48%	41%
Northcote	46%	33%	17%	49%	42%

Socialist extremists dressed in Green costumes.

Liberal leader Kevin Andrews, exposes the real truth about the Victorian Greens and their hidden socialist agenda that lurks behind the slick advertising and sloganeering  that is sold to the general public.

The real faces behind the Green advertising fund raisers - Public funding has made them rich

Source VEXNEWS

Despite the emphasis on the environment, “the Greens are not a single issue party.”[1] Their objective is clear: “to transform politics and bring about Green government.”[2] The Australian Greens are part of a worldwide movement that is actively engaged in the political process.[3] As their writings state, this objective involves a radical transformation of the culture that underpins western civilization.

As a political party, [the Greens] should be treated like any other political party and subjected to the same scrutiny.

In order to fully comprehend the Greens’ political ideology, it is necessary to understand the historical roots and foundations of both our own western, liberal democratic culture – and that of the Greens. It this address, I propose to explain the Greens agenda, as set out in their own documents and writings.[4] The paper has three parts: First, a brief examination of the roots of western culture and the origins of the Greens; secondly, an analysis of the Greens ideology; and thirdly, a discussion of the Greens economic, social and other policies.

Kevin Andrew's concerns are also express by Monash University politics lecturer, Narelle Miragliotta, who says that "while the Greens are seen as inspired by a desire to preserve wilderness areas, this is strictly only true of the Tasmania and Queensland branches."

''The thing about Tasmania and Queensland, they did mobilise around charismatic individuals [Bob Brown and Drew Hutton],'' she says. The Greens in Victoria and New South Wales came from a broader social justice movement, creating a sort of pan-left party.

Sophie Mirabella, the federal member for Indi (Victoria), has distributed a leaflet in her seat in which she details "just some of the loopy Green policies". She expresses a view widely held within the Liberal Party membership.

"It would be negligent of me to stand by and watch my constituents get screwed over by an extreme party hiding behind warm fuzzy green trees," she told the Herald Sun.

 "Any state preference deal is a matter for (state Liberal leader Ted Baillieu and state director Tony Nutt), but my view and the view of many in the Coalition is that the Greens are extreme and their policies are bad.

The Green bag men

The Age November 9, 2010

The Greens' fund-raisers have kept the party afloat, often by dipping into their own pockets. But now that the party coffers are full, their money is their own.

Ian Munro reports on a party cashed up and confident.

HEADQUARTERS is a cramped, sub-standard office space above a shop on Little Bourke Street. The past is a hand-to-mouth existence where survival depends on turning members into lenders of last resort. The future looks a whole lot better.

Check the public record for electoral donations to the Victorian Greens and the same individual members appear having given five-figure, interest-free loans. Stephen Luntz - who describes himself as ''asset rich and income poor'' - remembers the sense of trepidation when he first wrote a personal cheque for $10,000 to keep the operation afloat. He has since written at least two more five-figure cheques to the party.

Between them, Luntz and former parliamentary candidate, now local councillor, John Middleton have loaned the Greens a total of $115,000 over three years. Another member, Julie Bain, tipped in a $30,000 interest-free loan in 2007, a year when disclosed supporter loans to the party totalled $160,000.
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For the better part of two decades the Victorian Greens have continued to exist by relying on the financial indulgence of its cashed-up members. Following a strong federal vote in August, it has received about $2 million in public funding and is likely to qualify for a further $1.3 million if its vote holds up as expected in the state poll. As a comparison, public funding to the Greens after the 2006 state election totalled $788,000.

It will be no comfort to the established political parties, but the Greens are about to become a self-sufficient, on-going political machine. Indeed, the Greens have a growth trajectory unmatched by any minor party in Australian politics. The party will remain a machine dependent on public funding and an army of volunteers, but the days of tapping individuals for bridging finance appear to be over.

The Biggest Story of the Election Campaign

If the Greens do issue a split ticket, we will know on Sunday and it will be the biggest story of the election campaign. - Antony Green, ABC Electoral Analyst. 

November 10, 2010 at 02:16 AM

Inner city Greens (make me wanna holler)

Source: Poll Bludger


The Victorian election is living up to its billing as the latest battlefield in new paradigm politics, with the Liberals finding themselves shunted from the front pages by a stoush between Labor and the Greens. At issue are the professional activities of the Greens candidate for Melbourne, Brian Walters, SC, who has been targeted over his legal work for accused war criminal Konrad Kalejs and a company associated with coal mining. After a furious response from the legal fraternity and the liberal end of the Melbourne media (The Age playing a tellingly distinct role in the controversy from the Sunday Herald Sun), most have concluded Labor’s attack has badly misfired, with Andrew Crook of Crikey going so far as to argue it has doomed Melbourne MP Bronwyn Pike to certain defeat. The correctness of this view depends largely on the resolution of the campaign’s other Greens-centric controversy: the split in the Liberal Party over whether to continue placing the Greens ahead of Labor on how-to-vote cards.


The fact is The Greens can not direct preference in the lower-house  and as such they can not offer an exchange with the Liberal Party in order to gain Liberal party Preferences.  Without Liberal Party support the Greens are unlikely to win any Lower house seat.  They only won the Federal seat of Melbourne on the Back of Liberal Party whose candidate came in third place with only 19% of the vote

VEXNEWS reports on the growing dissent at the prospect of the Liberal Party electing Green Candidates in the lower house who could realistically hold the balance of power in a hung parliament. Something that many Liberal Votes do not support.  The first week of the State Campaign has been overshadowed by Green Preference deals. Liberal Party leader Ted Baillieu lost the ABC election debate on the basis of his attempt to avoid this pertant and pressing question. Will the Liberal Party do a deal to reference the Greens in Inner City seats?


The only deal the Greens can do is to exchange preferences in the upper-house where the Greens can direct preferences thanks to the "above-the-line" group voting ticket.  In 2006 The  Greens relied on Liberal surplus vote preferences in order to get elected. The tide has turned and the Greens are likely to have a surplus of their own.  Analysis of the 2010 Senate vote indicates that the Greens can determine who will win in two to four upper house seats.


So we are facing a situation where the Greens will try and trade preference deals upper-house for lower-house seats.  If the Greens preference the Liberal Party or submit a split ticket they are likely to suffer a backlash from the voters. Even those Green supports who vote below-the-line will still contribute to a Green surplus which will fuel the Green Ticket vote and flow on to the Liberatl/National Party. The only way it wont be transfered is if the Greens fall below the 16.67% quota.