From pies to sledgehammers.

[Gob]

From pies to sledgehammers: why the rest of Australia should care about the stunt-heavy ACT election
The ACT is the guinea pig of Australia – where it goes, the rest of the country often follows

In the shadows of the national spotlight, one of Australia’s most important elections is playing out.

No. Not that one. The other one. The Australian Capital Territory. Home to Australia’s most progressive electors, where, on Saturday, a mostly politically engaged population will learn who will lead them until 2024.

At 37 days, it’s been a long campaign. By the time its final hours rolled around, close to 60% of voters had already cast their vote. Another 10% opted for a postal vote. The result of the election may already have been decided by the time the major players made their final push on the hustings.

The ACT, it seems, knows what it wants. Voting before polling day is a growing trend across the country, and it’s one the ACT’s 302,630 or so enrolled voters have picked up with gusto.

It’s meant every one of the 888 hours the 137 candidates vying for one of the territory’s 25 unicameral parliament seats have had in this campaign has been vitally important.

But the campaign is important for other reasons. While the Northern Territory went first, the result there was never truly in doubt. Queensland’s campaign is important and has federal implications, but it’s still got some way to run.

But in the ACT the outcome is a harbinger of where progressive politics is likely to head in Australia. How important is climate policy or social infrastructure when weighed against the rising cost of living, particularly amid a once-in-a-century (hopefully) pandemic and the economic crisis that follows?

Where the ACT leads, policy tends to follow. Think of it as the guinea pig for the nation. The ACT election may never get that much attention outside the local press but, in terms of policies, it’s usually an augury for where things are heading across the entire political spectrum.

The system

First, a quick catch-up. Labor has led the ACT since 2001 but, for all but one of those terms, it has done so as a minority government. Those who tell you the Greens have never been in power forget the capital, where the party has held the balance of power for the last decade in a sometimes uneasy alliance. Labor holds 12 seats, the Liberals 11 and the Greens two.

The ACT has five electorates, with five representatives elected for each one through the Hare-Clark system, a little like the proportional voting system for the multi-member electorates (states) in the Australian Senate.

Candidates’ vote tallies are translated into quotas. Those that reach quota have their extra votes distributed according to preferences and, when no remaining candidates have a full quota, the candidates with the lowest tallies are eliminated.

Unlike the Australian Senate, the ACT uses Robson rotation, meaning candidates’ names appear in a different order on each ballot, even if they’re from the same party. So, as well as aiming to get more votes than other parties, candidates vie to win the most within their party group. Depending on the order of elimination, the result for the fifth seat in every electorate can be volatile.

What are the election issues?

While the territory has been ahead of the curve on environmental issues and the climate crisis – the ACT has been effectively powered by renewable energy since 2019 – and on social issues such as same-sex unions, its residents struggle with the rising cost of living and services. Healthcare and the ageing Canberra hospital have dominated local media coverage.

The pandemic and the recession have also had differing impacts on ACT voters. There are those who are now reflecting on the world at large and what they want the future to look like. For those, climate and environmental policies hit hard. As do social policies, such as increasing the amount of community housing. But for others, particularly those feeling economic pressure, lives have become a little more insular. Living costs matter. Jobs and budgets matter. The ACT may have a higher than average median wage but not everyone is on it. And that’s those who still have a job.

Voters’ biggest bugbear

Rates are a particular bugbear. Canberra has the highest rates in the nation, where, depending on your suburb and whether or not you rent out your house, you could be paying up to $10,000 a year. The territory is almost halfway through a 20-year tax reform program which has led to rate increases in the double digits. This year Labor has said rates would be limited to an average 3.75% increase, while the Liberals have vowed to freeze rates for four years, with the $160m in lost revenue to be made up by population growth.

Canberra operates on a leasehold rather than freehold land system. Even if you own a house, you don’t own the land – it belongs to the ACT government, which leases it to you for 99 years. The leases roll over, so no one is in danger of the government selling the land out from under them, but it also means that the government has almost complete control over land prices.

But if the government brings down land prices, it also brings down its revenue. Other taxes have been reduced in an attempt to offset the rising rates cost but they haven’t kept pace. The issue has formed the basis of the Liberal campaign, this time led by Alistair Coe. It’s not the first time the ACT Liberals have based an election platform on cutting the cost of living, but this year the party has been particularly focused on it.

The election stunts

Coe has fronted stunt after stunt. Making pies to demonstrate “growing the ACT’s pie”. Attempting to literally freeze a rates bill. Taking the media up a hill to point out where Canberrans have moved across the border to live in regional New South Wales, and promising to bring more of them back. Knocking down a wall of cardboard boxes with a mallet to show he’s serious about “smashing” the cost of living.

More...

[Econoline]

At 37 days, it’s been a long campaign.

[Sue U]

What he said.

[Gob]

Yeah, but, as I've long said; "Your system is fucked."