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Labor eyes Mount Gambier success

Posted on December 5, 2009, 8:08am and updated on January 29, 2010 at 11:29 am

The Australian Labor Party yesterday warned its political rivals in the seat of Mount Gambier that it was planning to run the best possible candidate in next year’s state election.

While a candidate will not be announced for a few weeks, Labor has declared the race for the seat is now wide open because of the looming retirement of independent MP Rory McEwen.

At polling booths within the boundaries of the state seat in the last federal election, Labor came within 2.2pc of the Liberal Party on a two-party preferred basis.

The party hopes to claw back support in Mount Gambier, which was a Labor seat before 1975 when the vote fell away on the back of an anti-Whitlam backlash.

School teacher Harold Allison won the seat for the Liberal Party in 1975 and held it until he retired in 1997.

But in a change of fortunes for both mainstream parties, Mr McEwen narrowly snatched the seat in 1997 and has won comfortably at two subsequent elections.

Australian Labor Party SA spokesperson Kyam Maher said the election for the seat of Mount Gambier was shaping up to be “very interesting”.

“A Labor, Liberal or a high-profile independent candidate could win it; it will be wide open,” Mr Maher said.

“It will be very interesting given the sitting member is retiring.”

Mr Maher said previous elections had shown a swing back towards Labor.

“We plan to make an announcement about our candidate in the next few weeks,” he said.

“We have been canvassing a number of options and talking to people.“
Mr Maher said the party would run a strong campaign and believed the seat was winnable.

“We will be running the best possible campaign we can,” Mr Maher said.

But he would not be drawn into making any statements whether the candidate would be a high-profile local identity.

He said there were a number of seats across the state where the Labor candidate had yet to be announced.

Meanwhile, returning officer for the seat of Mount Gambier Bill Russon told The Border Watch yesterday there was still plenty of time for parties and independents to nominate before the March 20 election.

He said candidates had up to 24 days after the election was called to nominate.

Liberal candidate Steve Perryman, independent Nick Fletcher and Henk Bruins for Family First are the declared candidates so far.

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Comments

8 Responses to “Labor eyes Mount Gambier success”

  1. Robert Stewart on December 5th, 2009 2:15 pm 1

    The Anti Whitlam backlash? It may well be repeated by the Anti Rann/Foley backlash having run the state into a $10 billion hole from which this generation and possibly the next will not recover. With $2.9 billion lost from “investments, failure to rein in the $174 million from 500,000 unpaid fines, the $22 million contract for the software system that has now blown out to $45 million and the quite astonishingly arrogant assumption that we cannot add up to have us believe that the $8 billion unfunded liability to the Public Service “would be on track by 2034″ or that the Work Cover $1.34 billion fiasco is well managed by Labor appointments should deflate such self indulgence. The 88 Boards and Committees that are instruments of the Labor administration are another matter and fancy spending $52 million for the Gerard Clipsal property for glitzy Tuscany boutiques and concrete gardens and then complaining that Geoff Gerard did not support the location of the new hospital. There is nothing that Labor can say that will change a shocking record over the past 7 years in the time available to the next election. I have saved a bit more for later and the $6 million dollar second hand trams? They could have been built at Tonsley and restored the skills and dedication of the employees for the total infrastructure and rolling stock of electric rail at the same time.

  2. H on December 5th, 2009 3:00 pm 2

    at 27, I wasn’t around for Whitlam.. But I’m with Robert — under the current Labor Government so many things have fallen in a hole that a massive change of Government is needed… Just don’t think the Liberals are the right option either!!

    Whoever is in power after the next election… Please remember.. You’re the STATE Government.. And the state extends beyond the Lofty’s!

  3. Robert Stewart on December 5th, 2009 7:19 pm 3

    Now that I am fired up after reading the quite preposterous notion that Labor would expect success in Mt. Gambier, it is appropriate to suggest that we could have advanced the State enormously if the ruling junta told the truth or were prepared to face the truth instead of the $20 million a year duckers and weavers because no one has the courage to tell it as it is.

    As a constant subscriber to The Menda City Monitor for the past 5 years.I can see that both political parties have lost their sense of community while switching their interests to themselves..Now for pre election theatrics. Just where has the Opposition been in all this?…Over 2000 questions remain unanswered in the Parliament. which is taking 3 months off on full pay…

  4. Jason on December 5th, 2009 7:47 pm 4

    The Liberals want to spend $800 million on a stadium in the Adelaide City and under Liberal candidate for Mount Gambier the city’s rates have gone up because of increased spending.. I think I know who the real spenders are.

  5. Christopheles on December 5th, 2009 8:48 pm 5

    Hey, Mr. Stewart — it doesn’t matter who you vote for, because the Govt. always gets in. And BTW, we have democratiocally elected Governments in this country, not juntas. Evidence being, you’re not arrested yet

  6. Robert Stewart on December 5th, 2009 9:22 pm 6

    It is the perception that indeed it is a junta where it blocks by delay, questions in the Parliament and wants to remove the Legislative Council for the community checks and balances. Is there anything to hide where it wants to block the creation of an ICAC? supported by one of the highest judicial officers of the State, the DPP and a junta where it creates a block to FOI by requiring $150,000 up front in one instance to release the documents and it would take more than a year to collate. This is indeed a democratic society.where perception is often more powerful than the facts and mice can feed among the elephants…it just takes a little care. Come March it will matter very much who one votes for., not only for Mt. Gambier, and this is the only part the community can play for change. — the only chance we get to influence those big decisions, and we should exercise it, after all, this is a democracy — not too many exist in the world as I have known it.

  7. H on December 6th, 2009 12:35 am 7

    There’s an old quote (and I can’t attribute it, so I won’t..).. That we get the leadership we deserve.. So the question becomes.. Do we want a change of leadership, and what do we do to earn it? I’m a bit rusty, but I’m pretty sure that the Liberals and the Labor party aren’t in the constitution.. Yes, there’s a two party preferred system, but it’s gonna be hard for either of those parties to become government if they don’t have the representatives in the chamber. So do we want the lesser of two evils, or a whole new system?

    Just something to think about in the time to the next election… If you always do what you’ve always done, you’ll always get what you’ve always got… And as they say, the definition of insanity is doing the same thing and expecting different results.. ;)

  8. Robert Stewart on December 6th, 2009 6:40 pm 8

    Well, Christopheles, we do not have democratically elected Governments. What we have is democratically elected politicians who then form a Government.. If, and only if, the independents have the numbers that deny both Labor and the Liberals a majority to form a Government we will have a most interesting outcome. Thereby, a Government formed by the lesser of the other two evils. Namely,the coalition of independents not yet tainted by party politics from one election to the next..

    However, to keep focused on the issues that have surfaced by the Menda City Monitor the past 7 years,the Government has more than 8000 cars with over 2,400 accidents a year costing over $1.7 million for repairs.

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