One Nation to run candidates in 2019 NSW election
Senior NSW Labor frontbencher and NSW Parliamentary Friends of Israel deputy chair Walt Secord has vowed to be at the forefront of the fight against One Nation and its divisive policies – in the forthcoming State election.
Walt Secord
This week, the NSW Electoral Commission confirmed it had accepted an application from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation to be an official political party in the March 2019 State election as reported in The Australian.
Mr Secord also demanded NSW Premier Gladys Berejiklian and Deputy Premier and Nationals leader John Barilaro make a clear and unequivocal statement that their Liberal-National Coalition would not enter into any preference deals with One Nation.
Mr Secord said Federal and NSW Labor had taken a “principled stand” – on preferences to One Nation – at both the State and Federal levels.
Pauline Hanson
Mr Secord with the formal entry of One Nation into NSW politics, all major political parties now had a duty and responsibility to put them last to put an end to her divisive policies.
Previously, One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson had made statements about parts of Australia such as the Sydney suburb of Hurstville being “swamped by Asians” .
Labor has a consistent position on One Nation – stretching back to the 1999 NSW State election, where the party had decided that they would not direct preferences to One Nation.
Mr Secord said: “Our political leaders – regardless of whether they are Liberal, Labor, or National Party – should be repudiating the divisive views of One Nation – not climbing into bed with them.
“Premier Gladys Berejiklian and Deputy Premier and Nationals leader John Barilaro must rule out preference deals with One Nation.”
“Sadly, the Liberals and Nationals and their supporters are cozying up to an extreme-Right wing agenda and this should worry all Australians.”
The NSW Labor Opposition is demanding Premier Gladys Berejiklian finally rule out striking a deal to direct Liberal preferences to One Nation in next year’s state election now that the far right party has registered to run candidates.
The NSW Electoral Commission confirmed today that One Nation would stand at the March 2019 election.
Ms Berejiklian has consistently refused to rule out striking any deal with One Nation, despite being given ample opportunity to do so.
Luke Foley
On at least seven occasions in the NSW Parliament Question Time Labor has asked both the Liberals and their Coalition partners, the Nationals, to rule out a deal, but on every occasion the Premier and her Ministers have avoided answering the question, often tendering the fact that the party had yet to register as an excuse.
Their failure to do so has only fuelled speculation that the Liberals in NSW would follow the lead of other state branches, namely Western Australia, where the party directed voters to preference One Nation in how to vote cards in last year’s state election.
As the leader of the Liberal Party in NSW Ms Berejiklian has the power to rule out directing voters to preference One Nation.
NSW Labor, which has a long and proud multicultural history, has pledged to not direct preferences to One Nation candidates
NSW Opposition Leader Luke Foley said: “Labor will not do any preference deals with One Nation and Labor will not give preferences to One Nation at the 2019 state election.I challenge Gladys Berejiklian and John Barilaro to make the same commitment on behalf of the Liberal and National parties.”
Mr Secord can ask parties to refuse preference deals, but I don’t think he is in any position to demand it. In a democratic country, it should be the citizens who decide who to vote for and who their second preference is. One Nation is not “devisive”: people should read their policies – online for all to see – before they make such a negative judgement.
All How to Vote (HTV) cards should be banned at poling places.
Voters should and do use there brains in deciding the preference order and increasingly dont take a HTV card on election day.
Some mainstream parties HTV cards place extreme right or left higher up on the HTV as well. For example Family First were higher on some Coalition HTV.
Anyhow so called preference deals are irrelevant in most cases as the last two candidates left standing after preference are distributed and Labor and the Coalition.
Preference of these two major parties will not be distributed in most cases but these parties want preferences from the others minor and independent candidates irrespective of their policies and the voters decide that not the major parties.