We are going to close off the blog, having learned a lot about early marks, chain saws, POETS and other things that divide this supposed nation, and not a lot from the campaign.

Thank you so much for spending your time with us – you can catch my musings in the New Daily this weekend (I am just finishing the column, I promise you’ll have it soon Neil!) and of course we will have more fact checks for you on Monday.

The economists are currently arguing over data sets, so that bodes well for what’s coming.

Make sure you take those moments to yourself this weekend. We are coming into the dark times of the campaign – things will only get worse. The ballot draw means there will be wheelbarrows of shit about to be hurled in all directions (that sound you hear is the dirt units winding up) and that tends to make things even more insane.

So take some of that joy where you can.

We’ll see you back on Monday – until then, take care of you. Ax

Vaughan asked: is there a benefit to coming first on the ballot?

Today the AEC promised “bingo cages, blindfolds and balls” – in other words, they finalised the candidates for the upcoming federal election, and randomly decided which order they will be displayed on the ballot paper.

Randomising is an improvement on how we did it before 1984 – which was by alphabetical order of surname. Parties preferred “Andersons” and “Brownes” in those days!  

When someone numbers 1, 2, 3, etc all the way down the ballot, that’s called a “donkey vote”. It is a valid vote – but not a very thoughtful one.

So do donkey voters give candidates at the top of the ballot an advantage?

Yes – topping the ballot is worth about 1 percentage point. Maybe a little more in electorates with younger voters and where fluency in English is lower.

That’s according to research by academics Amy King and Andrew Leigh – the same Andrew Leigh who is now a federal Labor MP.

If you think this is unfair, there is an alternative – called “Robson rotation”. In Robson rotation, the order of candidates rotates so a random ballot paper could have any candidate at the top of the paper. Liberal Senator James McGrath has pushed unsuccessfully for Robson rotation to be used in House of Representatives elections.

When there is a risk of confusion, the advantage of coming at the top of the ballot may be greater than 1 percentage point. In 2013, there were 45 columns on the NSW Senate voting paper – and the “Liberal Democrats” minor party drew first place. They won 9.5% of the vote, and a Senate seat for Senator David Leyonhjelm. Some of those voters likely saw “Liberal” and assumed it was the Liberal Party.

Unfortunately, the major parties responded with heavy-handed restrictions on party names, including a ban on ‘frivolous’ party names, instead of finding a middle ground. As I said at the time: “Words like ‘liberal’, ‘labour’ and ‘green’ describe ideologies and interests found across multiple parties, not just the parties that got there first. Australia has a long history of splinter parties, like the Democratic Labor Party and the Liberal Movement, whose names represent their background and concerns.”

Considering Peter Dutton’s promise to be the mining industry’s “best friend”, the Coalition’s mining policy is a bit…I dunno, unremarkable.

I mean, there’s some big contenders for ‘mining’s best friend’. Julia Gillard gutted the mining tax. Tony Abbott axed the carbon tax. Bob Hawke and Hu Yaobang are probably up there too.

Anyway, I read/skimmed all 3,738 words, and also checked the Minerals Council press release, and here’s what I got out of it.

The most interesting big was how much is framed around security alliances – “The Coalition will commission a taskforce to design a FIRB Fast-Track process for trusted investors from our Quad, Five Eyes, and AUKUS partners”. The Quad includes Japan and India – so is Adani a trusted investor?. This all sounds a bit China-not-welcome to me, without mentioning China.

The rest is pretty standard, or had already been released.

• Lots of emotion – “stand unwaveringly”, “pump wages directly into families pockets”, “unique blessings”, “our nation is a global envy [sic]”.
• Subsidies for exploration. The $3.4 billion program sounds big…but it’s over 35 years. Under $100m per year for exploration programs over the entire continent isn’t that much. The bigger problem is that we tend to give that valuable information away later.
• They keep talking about ‘windfalls’ – “Labor has blown almost $400 billion in extra windfall revenue”. I have no idea where this number could come from. It’s out of all proportion with tax windfalls from mining in recent years….because we axed the mining windfall tax, didn’t we!!? Whoops.
• The usual talk about making approvals faster, but no real detail other than “Never revive Labor’s destructive ‘nature positive’ environmental regulations”. This is actually kind of funny seeing Labor not only failed to do anything to strengthen environmental laws, but the Coalition supported Labor’s only change to federal env laws – weakening them for the salmon industry.
• I wonder if the landholders of New England and Parkes are excited that the Coalition will “unleash investment in new gas – like [Santos’ controversial] Narrabri project”

Senator Sarah Hanson-Young was in Wills today to launch live performances policy, but she also had a bit to say about the Coalition plan to add to our emissions by scraping the vehicle emissions standard.

Neither major party is addressing climate change in this campaign, but the Coalition do want to make things even worse, by scraping some of the small, bare minimum actions we are taking, so that’s nice.

Hanson-Young:

What a train wreck of a policy this will be for Australia’s climate, and for households who want cheaper forms of transport and want to find each and every way to reduce their household bills.

“This policy slams the brakes on clean, efficient cars and is going to push prices up, increase pollution, and is nothing more than a Trump-light policy.

“It’s a culture war election for Peter Dutton, that’s all he’s got. He’s copying Donald Trump. He’s copying Elon Musk. He’s copying the oligarchs in the US. And he thinks that that type of politics will work here in Australia? Well, it just won’t. Australians are smarter than that.”

I have just learned that not everyone knows the term ‘early mark’ means and honestly, my mind is blown.

It means finish up early. I assume (I am not looking this up) it dates back to when we used to have to punch out of work with time cards and you were literally allowed to get an early mark on your time card.

I had no idea this is not a commonly used phrase!

In Perth today Dutton said

“Anthony Albanese has already introduced a tax to tax an unrealised capital gain in superannuation. They’re proposing to tax an asset in your self-managed super fund, even though you haven’t sold it, if the value has gone up. It doesn’t make any sense. It gives an indication of how anti-business and how anti-people who are working hard, the Labor Party has become.”

What he’s talking about is the bill that has now lapsed that would have increased the tax on earnings in a super fund for those with $3 million or more in super funds – around 80,000 people (or about 0.5% of everyone who has a super balance). This bill not been introduced, and the ALP seem to have actually dumped the policy.

The tax would have reduced the tax concession by 15% and that only would apply to increases in the fund above $3 million. So you still would get a tax break, just a 15% lower tax break than for all your super earnings coming from your first $3m of your fund.

It does not matter what investments those increases came from – most of which would be dividends, interest and the like.

Why is Dutton saying this is “Anti-business”? Super is meant to provide money for retirement. You would only run a business through the super fund in order to get a tax advantage. Super should not be for tax avoiders.

He also says it is “Anti-people who are working hard” The measure Dutton refers to only applies to super funds after they exceed $3 million. Surely Dutton is not suggesting that only those who can amass $3 million are those who are “working hard”. And surely Dutton does not think the government should continue to heavily subsidise retirement vehicles for those with $3 million or more in super.

Superannuation in Australia is broken. Governments have made small inroads into the rorts but super remains a tax avoidance vehicle for many people outside the compulsory super system who use it for succession planning rather than meeting their genuine needs in retirement.

Super lurks for the rich should be addressed with the proceeds going to those with genuine need in Australia. 

The campaigns are starting to wind down from their official business today – and it is Friday and life is too short to spend watching the Australian election campaign.

We are going to keep the blog open, but only post if something happens, so feel free to switch off and go do something fun. It looks like a glorious day in most of Australia, so I hope you have felt some sunshine on your face.

For those leaving us now – thank you for coming by for another week and helping us get through the mess of the second campaign week – you kept us all going. Please send some love to Grogs who watched all three debates.

The campaigns are both having their official launches this Sunday – Labor will be in Perth and the Liberals will be in Sydney. No one is quite sure why the Liberal party thought it would be a good idea to have their campaign on the same day as Labor, when they could probably do with having some space, but I guess that’s just another example of the “crack campaign team” former Morrison advisor turned fossil fuels shill Andrew Carswell wrote about a few short weeks ago.

We’ll pop in a post if anything happens this afternoon, but otherwise – enjoy your peace!

Take care of you, Ax.

Anyone still confused as to why Dutton is running a mile from any Trump comparisons, this might help.

Here is the official mining policy from the Coalition:

Today, the Coalition has released its detailed and fully costed “Plan for a Strong Resources Industry”, including the expansion of the official critical minerals list to include uranium along with zinc, bauxite, alumina, aluminium, potash, phosphate and tin. 

The Coalition will also refocus our critical minerals strategy to better align with the defence and strategic needs of Australia and its allies.  

This follows the release of the Coalition’s National Gas Plan with independent economic analysis confirming it will deliver more Australian gas for Australians. Our balanced energy plan with more gas, more renewables and zero-emissions nuclear will bring down prices for families and industries.  

Over the last three years, the Albanese Labor Government has demonised and neglected the mining and resources sector by slowing approvals and wrapping the industry in excessive red and green tape in an attempt to please inner-city Greens voters. In fact, around $120 billion in coal, iron ore and gas projects have been stalled or cancelled in the last year alone putting 48,000 Australian jobs, and the nation’s prosperity, at risk.  

A Dutton Coalition Government will unlock exploration and drive a new wave of investment in the mining and resources sector. That’s why we will:  

·                Unlock exploration and the next wave of investment in our resources sector 

·                Invest $3.4 billion in a 35 year exploration program to map all of Australia 

·                Invest $100 million in the Junior Minerals Exploration Incentive 

·                Preserve our commodity windfalls as a national asset to invest in nation building initiatives and drive growth in the regions 

·                Fix the broken approvals process for projects and cut red and green tape 

·                Attract new investment and rebuild business settings through Investment Australia 

·                Encourage growth of new opportunities in critical minerals and uranium 

·                Expand the Critical Minerals List and Strategy 

·                Accelerate investment through ‘FIRB Fast-Track’ 

·                Deliver more gas for Australians 

·                Upgrade mining roads to get resources to market faster and safer. 

AAP has a little more on Peter Dutton’s appearance at the West Australian newspaper campaign event he attended this morning:

Mr Dutton was courting voters at an event hosted by The West Australian on Friday when the paper’s editor-in-chief Chris Dore delivered an unconventional introduction that contrasted a “match-fit, super confident” prime minister against a “punch-drunk” opposition leader.

But Mr Dutton did not take that lying down and used the comments from the Perth gathering – which included the West’s owner billionaire businessman Kerry Stokes, 84 – to show he could handle challenges.

“You’ll deal with all the slings and arrows and the derogatory comments and editors trying to be funny and not succeeding,” he told reporters in Perth on Friday.

“That has steeled me for anything this job has thrown at me – or what could be thrown at me if I’m given the immense pleasure of being prime minister.

“I don’t need to attack the character of the prime minister to win the next election … what I want to offer the Australian people is a much more positive future.”

Mr Dutton started the year with the wind at his back, driven by Australia’s cost-of-living crisis amid a worldwide turn against incumbent governments.

But since the May 3 election was announced, the coalition has been bleeding support.

Fresh YouGov polling released to AAP reveals Labor has forged ahead, 52.5 per cent to 47.5 over the coalition in the two-party preferred vote.

The result is Labor’s best in months and slightly higher than its polling of 52.1 per cent at the 2022 election, putting the party in pole position for a majority government rather than a widely forecast minority.

By contrast, the coalition’s primary vote is now down to 33.5 per cent – lower than at the 2022 election.

Mr Dutton’s work-from-home policy had sparked the fall and taken his party from “being in the box seat to win the federal election in February to struggling to hold onto the seats they won in 2022”, YouGov director of public data Paul Smith said.

“The coalition’s support has fallen so far that they now risk losing seats,” he said.

While Mr Dutton walked back his work-from-home stance, Mr Smith said it had done “enormous damage” because voters now believed the coalition failed to understand their working lives or support people’s workplace rights.