Marrickville – NSW 2011

ALP 7.5% vs GRN

Incumbent MP
Carmel Tebbutt, since 2005. Previously Member of the Legislative Council 1998-2005.

Geography
Inner Western Sydney. The district of Marrickville covers most of the Marrickville local government area, with the exception of a small part at the western end of the council area and the southeastern corner of the area. The seat also covers a part of the City of Sydney. Suburbs covered include Darlington, Newtown, Stanmore, Enmore, Petersham, Lewisham, Dulwich Hill and Marrickville.

History
There has been an electoral district named Marrickville since 1894, with the exception of three elections in the 1920s when the seat was merged into the multi-member district of Western Suburbs. The seat has continuously elected Labor members since 1910.

The original district of Marrickville covered a smaller area, with the other seats of Newtown-Camperdown, Petersham, Darlington, Newtown-Erskine and Newtown-St Peters covering parts of the modern seat.

The seat was won in 1917 by the ALP’s Carlo Lazzarini, who defeated Thomas Crawford, a former Labor member who had joined the Nationalists over the issue of conscription.

In 1920 Lazzarini moved to the multi-member district of Western Suburbs. He briefly served as a minister from 1921 to 1922, and in 1927 he returned to the seat of Marrickville.

Lazzarini was opposed to Jack Lang’s leadership of the NSW Labor Party, and he was expelled from the ALP in 1936. He rejoined in 1937, but later joined the dissident Industrial Labor Party. Following Lang’s departure he served as an assistant minister in the new Labor state government from 1941 to 1944. He held Marrickville until his death in 1952.

Marrickville was won at the February 1953 election by the Mayor of Marrickville, Norm Ryan. He served as a minister in the state Labor government from 1959 to 1965, and retired in 1973.

Ryan stepped aside in 1973 in favour of Tom Cahill. The son of NSW Premier Joseph Cahill, Tom had won his father’s seat of Cook’s River after his father’s death in 1959. Cook’s River was abolished at the 1973 election, and he moved to Marrickville. He held that seat until his death in 1983.

The 1983 by-election was won by Andrew Refshauge. Following the ALP’s election defeat in 1988 he was elected Deputy Leader. He served in this role until 2005. Refshauge became Deputy Premier when the ALP gained power in 1995. He served in a variety of ministerial roles over the next decade.

In 1995, the Liberal Party was pushed into third place behind the No Aircraft Noise party, who polled over 23% of the primary vote. The Greens came second after preferences in 1999, and the Liberals have never again come in the top two in Marrickville.

When Premier Bob Carr announced his retirement in 2005, Refshauge also announced his retirement, along with senior minister Craig Knowles. The Marrickville by-election was held alongside by-elections in Maroubra and Macquarie Fields.

The ALP ran Carmel Tebbutt, a former Marrickville councillor who had been a Member of the Legislative Council since 1998 and a minister since 1999. The Greens ran Deputy Mayor of Marrickville, Sam Byrne. The ALP’s 10.7% margin was cut to 5.1% in the by-election.

Tebbutt was re-elected in 2007, winning with a 7.5% margin, less than in the 2003 election, but more than in the 2005 by-election.

Candidates

Political situation
Marrickville is a marginal Labor seat. In the current environment, a 7.5% swing is certainly achievable for the Greens.

2007 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Carmel Tebbutt ALP 19,683 46.6 -1.1
Fiona Byrne GRN 13,735 32.5 +4.1
Ramzy Mansour LIB 5,305 12.6 -0.2
Angus Wood IND 716 1.7 +1.7
Martine Eve-Macleod DEM 688 1.6 -0.8
Pip Hinman SA 666 1.6 -1.0
Joseph Tuiletufuga CDP 634 1.5 +1.5
Grace Chen UNI 557 1.3 -0.8
Patrick O’Connor IND 216 0.5 +0.5

2007 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Carmel Tebbutt ALP 21,073 57.5 -2.6
Fiona Byrne GRN 15,588 42.5 +2.6

Booth breakdown
Booths in Marrickville have been divided into five areas based on key suburbs. The ALP won large majorities of 65-70% in the Marrickville and Dulwich Hill areas. They won a slim 53% majority in Petersham-Stanmore, but the Greens won majorities in the Newtown and Camperdown-Darlington.

 

Polling booths in Marrickville at the 2007 state election. Camperdown-Darlington in yellow, Newtown in red, Petersham-Stanmore in orange, Marrickville in blue, Dulwich Hill in green.
Voter group LIB % ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
Marrickville 11.9 70.8 11,179 26.5
Newtown 8.9 44.2 9,156 21.7
Petersham-Stanmore 15.0 53.2 6,535 15.5
Dulwich Hill 14.8 65.4 4,877 11.6
Camperdown-Darlington 12.3 48.0 2,553 6.0
Other votes 14.5 54.5 7,900 18.7
Two-party-preferred (Labor vs Greens) votes in Marrickville at the 2007 state election.
Liberal primary votes in Marrickville at the 2007 state election.

140 COMMENTS

  1. Ben, surely it’s not just about a boycott “being effective”, it’s about asserting a principle, isn’t it?

    Boycotting China may not “work” in that sense, but if you’re going to take such drastic action against Israel you HAVE to assert the same principle against the plethora of countries that are demonstrably so much worse that they aren’t even in the same ballpark.

    Or, if you don’t, then you have to accept that people will ask hard questions, and raise all sorts of uncomfortable talking points about your personal beliefs and your true motivations (and your political stupidity). As seems to be happening with Byrne.

  2. The Greens would be happy to talk about BDS, except it distracts from issues that are relevant to a state election. If you look at the Greens’ election material, there isn’t any mention of the carbon tax or aircraft noise either, because neither are relevant.

    Fiona is correctly pushing this to one side to focus on the failures of Carmel Tebbutt and NSW Labor.

    As for BDS against other states, the fundamentals elsewhere are different as Ben says so a BDS campaign will not be effective. The fact that it has been so contentious goes a long way to explain why a BDS campaign against Israel specifically is so effective.

  3. I believe the South Aftrican boycott had very little effect, the Whites still remained rich, the boycott probably kept the Black South Africans poorer for longer.

    In my opinion, there are a lot of regimes who are a lot worse then China and Isreal. Which includes most of the middle east, where Shiite muslim rules over Sunni. North Korea, a large part of africa have regular ethnic cleansings, Libya is another prime example. Even on our doorsteps, Fiji decided to kick the Chinese off their land and take their shops recently, and Malaysia and Indonesia are hardly beacons of giving rights to its people.

    I would just like to know why the Greens wants to demonise the Jews and Chinese, while letting other and worse human right violation stands without any issue.

  4. I may be an old-fashioned leftie, but I thought local councils were supposed to zone land, fix roads, mow the nature strips, manage the cricket grounds, fund local libraries and collect everyone’s crap every monday, instead of wasting taxpayers money on a boycott that won’t have any effect whatsoever.

    As the ABC rightly pointed out yesterday – it is official greens policy to support Israel BDS. Fiona Byrne said a month ago that she’d bring the Israel BDS to state parliament. Now she’s saying she won’t, the moment someone questioned her about it. Which is it?

    And Ben – it’s wrong to link the Burma boycott to Israel BDS. The burma boycott exists because way over 50% of all trade done with Burma goes DIRECTLY to the Junta, who then spend that money repressing their own people. The Israel BDS aims to punish ordinary Israeli citizens for the actions of their democratically elected government, whether they agree with it or not. It will also harm Israeli businesses that employ palestinian workers. As much as I am appalled at what Israel’s government does to the palestinians, this BDS will not work so long as the Americans continue to give political and moral cover. It’s a waste of time.

  5. No, that’s rubbish.

    If we boycotted every thing that has a connection to something we object to, society would grind to a halt.

    I drink Coca Cola because I don’t believe me individually boycotting it would have an effect on their abuses.

    On the other hand, boycotts can work in certain circumstances. It is a tactic that can be used in certain circumstances, but not in others, so should only be used in those circumstances.

    The idea that you can only deploy a tactic if you deploy it against every possible target is absurd.

    Is it immoral for workers to only go out on strike when they think they can win?

  6. re: BDS – I think we should consider that it precisely because Israel is often held up as some exemplar of democracy in the middle east that the boycott is an appropriate measure. If it is to be recognised, as is continually asserted it is, as a western-style democracy then surely the human rights of Palestinians need to be protected – otherwise Israel is just another pariah state like Burma or Libya, covering its action with the thin veil of elections. I think those Councillors who supported the motion (including the ALP and Independent Councillors) should be congratulated for their courage in making the decision, even when they might otherwise have realised that opprobrium would have been heaped upon their heads by some.

  7. Moving back to the seat numbers – although I’m sure the BDS is popular with many voters in this area, I actually think this media circus may spook some voters back to Carmel Tebbutt. Whether it’ll be enough is anyone’s guess.

  8. @dovif – What trade do we have with Libya that you propose we boycott? There are many Jewish activists opposed to the Israeli government’s occupation who support BDS. Indeed they initiated the movement, which the Greens NSW are supporting.

    @Lachlan – I doubt BDS has cost Marrickville much money at all, certainly not as much as has been claimed by hysterical Labor hacks. I think the role of local councils is to do whatever the local residents want them to do and they can do within their power. This is something they can do easily within their role. Seems perfectly reasonable to me.

  9. Lachlan – the ABC was wrong. The BDS is not Greens NSW state election policy, despite big bold “The Greens have decided to support the BDS campaign” press release in the ABC news story. I challenge you to find it on their comprehensive policy pages – it’s not a state election issue.

    Here’s the actual press release.

    The SA ALP decided to support gay marriage but the state government hasn’t made it so. Why? It’s a federal issue, not a state issue.

    This is a nuanced issue which is hard to present in media reports like the aforementioned ABC news story, and especially over the clamouring of the Anti-BDS lobby.

  10. The SA branch of the ALP decided to pass motions supporting same-sex marriage to put pressure on the federal government and the factional delegations to get behind that campaign at federal conference next year. It’s also to force existing MP’s from south australia to support that policy. The ACT also passed similar motions, as have many Young labor conferences (including NSW).

    Now back to BDS – so you state that it wasn’t state election policy. But your own motion says “That the Greens NSW call upon all Australians and the Australian government to boycott Israeli goods, trading and military arrangements…” etc

    So you would support the federal government doing it, and a number of greens councils have decided to do it on local government. But you’re now saying you’d exclude the state government from this policy? This despite Fiona Byrne originally saying she’d bring it to state government?

  11. It would be great to see on Saturday Night as like in the Victorian Election last year no Greens Lower House Candidates win seats in the NSW State Election.

    The one & only policy I support is same sex marriage, but you do not have to be Green to support this, voters & members of all Political parties in australia are in favour of this.

    Carmel, I will be praying for both verity & yourself Friday Night that come Saturday Night, Antony Green announes that Carmel Tebutt has been re elected as member for Marrickville & Verity Firth re elected as member for Balmain. Labor needs both qualified & quality members re elected to help re build towards the next election in 4 years.

    C’Mon Carmel, you are married to not only an Italian, but an Italian named Anthony! All Anthony’s should have Sir before there first name!

  12. ALO, I’m pretty sure Carmel husband has no Italian blood. He’s half lebanese, half anglo I think… To my knowledge, no one has ever suggested a knighthood for Albo. Anyhoo, BDS is a pretty lively issue and not only in Marrickville, and my post last night has taken many tally-roomers away from their work this morning (oh, blogging IS work, sorry…)

  13. Ben

    Actually we sells a lot of wheat and live animal to Libya and we import Oil from Singapore, which are purchase from Saudi Arabia and Libya

  14. Knighthood was for anyone with the name Anthony!

    Reality Check, what do you think both Carmel & Verity’s chances are on Saturday?

  15. Hi ALO. Verity is gone, her own card is preferencing the Greens via Sheehan (who will run 4th at best), and I doubt that anyone expects her primary vote will beat the Libs and the combined might of all that Greens advertising. I’m astonished by that, amazed that they could so blatantly flout the caps. So are many outsiders, it may even backfire on them as it most certainly has been noticed.

    Balmain is a Greens vs Liberal battle, always has been. Labor are the straw man target.

    With Carmel, I’m more confident. The BDO is absolute poison amongst almost everyone in Marrickville (except the bubble-land of Tallyroom posters), and Byrnes has been astonishingly inept at dealing with it.

    There are a couple of stories in todays Australian on Bob Brown’s “problem” with his inner west candidates, for anyone interested. Well, that’s Rhiannon’s faction, Brown knew what was coming…

  16. The Australian being well known for its even handed and disinterested approach to reportin on the Greens.

    The paper announced I believe that they were out to destroy the party or words to that affect.

  17. It’s ashame for Verity, hopefully then the Libs beat Parker in Balmain!

    Lets all hope that people are clever enough to realise that The Greens are a radical party that will not do good by anyone! My father (who is a staunch Liberal) said to me that KK should have been campaigning hard in both Balmain & Marrickville as The Greens are a major threat to Labor in these 2 seats.

    What do you think Nathan Rees’s chance is in Toongabbie? I will be helping him out on Saturday for a couple of hours. He is one of the true hardworking & likeable Labor members! Should still be the Premier!

  18. Greens are radical? Compared to what? Anything outside of centre right is regarded as “radical” these days.

  20. That is an assertion not an argument. The only point I was wanting to make, is that twenty years ago views equally critical of the taken for granted policy assumptions were held within the ALP as it was then.

    We are worse off for having drastically narrowed the range of what can be thought about and debated in the public forum.

  21. I don’t see how Israel’s relationship with the West therefore justifies a BDS compared to other states that have an equal relationship in terms of trade and nearly everything bar defence.

    I appreciate the points supporting the BDS, but I must say that I strongly disagree. I consider it ridiculous that Israel is picked out from all the states out there that fail at one way or the other. Surely the exact same circumstance could be applied to Indonesia re: West Papua (plus far more). Indeed, I would argue that Australia has far greater reason because we have a regional responsibility.

    I maintain that many of the Green’s views on Israel view are cultural hangovers of the left’s associations over the past 40 years (pretty well since the 6-Day War). To me, it’s illogical and unfortunate that Israel is targeted in such a way (and the PLO and equivalents are glamorised in such as way) when compared to other equally bad and mostly far worse states. I honestly think that it will cost middle-class votes in Marrickville (and believe it should too). I still expect Byrne to win, but this will give some hope to Tebbutt yet…

  22. @ Doug, 1.54pm. Yes, I know about the world wide News Ltd Zionist conspiracy. I hope that’s a big consolation to everyone when the voters of Marrickville reject Byrne’s idiocy. They were all duped by the local media, a newspaper which the Greens purchased a full page ad in today (and in return, ran NO attempt “to destroy” the Greens at all!) Fiendishly clever ploy, eh wot?

  23. @ALO: All Italians named Anthony should be knighted? Send one up to Manly than ALO :p

    @RealityCheck: Albanese is an Italian surname. Very popular surname around Calabria (where my family came from). I think Anthony Albanese is 1st Generation Australian/Italian (but will need to double check).

    @Doug: I don’t think radical is the right word, as you can say the same about the radical right. But I certainly don’t agree with some of the Greens policies (like decriminalisation of drugs and the introduction of an inheritance tax). The BDS against Israel is moronic and un-necessary and I agree with Lachlan’s post about the role of local councils. I’ve already ranted about this so I won’t go into it again, for Ben’s sake.

    What I will say is that this seat is slowly becomming a coin flip (i.e. Tebbutt is clawing her way back into the competition). The lastest Essential Poll confirmed a drop in Greens Support shown by Newspoll from 14% to 11%. This gives Tebbutt a chance.

  24. All Anthony’s expect Watmough! Sicilian’s are the smartest Italian’s (where my family comes from)

    C’mon Carmel bring it home, keep the Radical looney running Marrickville (poor residents in Marrickville Municipality)

  25. Here;s the proof Anthony Albanese is Italian (paragraph from a newspaper article from 2009)

    And 40 Australian politicians of Italian heritage — among them Anthony Albanese, the federal Minister for Infrastructure, former NSW planning minister Frank Sartor, and NSW Finance Minister Joe Tripodi — are also lobbying the Italian leader.

    Forza Italia & Forza Carmel!

  27. Does that mean that the southern European half of the NSW Labor Party makes it more like a European-style Christian Democrat/Social Democrat hybrid than a classic UK “Labour” Party?

  28. @ALO: LOL no you crazy idiot! try again! 😛

    @Morgeib: You gotta love what the union movement do. Pick-up the ethnic voters as soon as they get off the boat 😛 I can just see Mark Arbib and John Robertson standing at the docks with a booth and saying “Welcome To Australia. Here, we celebrate democracy so when you go to vote, remember to vote for the guys whose name is Labor. Yes, we know its the American Spelling but that is because we don’t like England as well.”

    @Hughie. Southern Europeans in general tended to vote towards the DLP early on (following the teachings of B.A. Santamaria), especially considering that a lot of them left Europe to get away from the Communist Movement. The DLP tended to reflect that Christain Democrat/Social Democrat-style party. There was a very heavy Catholic following within the DLP for the entire period.

  32. Many Migrants from southern Europe were catholic and socially conservative. In Victoria many of them used to voted for the DLP. Since there was no split in NSW, the Labor party was able to absorb them very successfully into its electoral coalition. Labor has had a structural majority in NSW for ages, by winning the votes of workers, migrants, and the progressive middle class.

    One of the problems the NSW liberal party has had for ages has been their inability to attract the votes of migrants, particularly in western sydney. It got even harder after John Howard’s Tampa affair and bashing of multiculturalism. They never realised that on the question of social values, many of these voters would otherwise vote liberal.

  33. That is part of the reason why this election might become very interesting. As those migrants are now settled in, there is a genuine opportunity for the votes to swing (potentially both ways, anyone playing with aces?) as they start to develop a better understanding of politics, especially from the younger generations. A big migrants swing could set the scene for the next state (and possibly, federal) elections as these voters now have a history of changing their votes.

  35. Lachlan – “One of the problems the NSW liberal party has had for ages has been their inability to attract the votes of migrants, particularly in western sydney. It got even harder after John Howard’s Tampa affair and bashing of multiculturalism. They never realised that on the question of social values, many of these voters would otherwise vote liberal”.

    Let’s just clarify that one. That is, until tomorrow. They are voting Liberal tomorrow, except for the Islamic community.

  36. Tebutt is very capable – she’d be a big loss for Labor, but I guess Fiona O’Bryne is a favourite to win this seat(even though her anti-Israeli sentiments would turn me off).

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