Posted on 09/14/2010 5:33:58 PM PDT by naturalman1975
THREATENING phone calls to a local newspaper in Rob Oakeshott's electorate have forced a public meeting with the Independent MP to be cancelled.
The Port Macquarie News reported today a number of threatening calls had been made to the office of the newspaper on the NSW mid-north coast.
The Port Macquarie Panthers club, where a public meeting with Mr Oakeshott was to be held tomorrow night, had also received threatening calls.
The newspaper said the Australian Federal Police were understood to be investigating a series of threats made against Mr Oakeshott.
The paper cancelled the event "in the interests of safety".
"It's become apparent that there are some people who plan to use the night as a chance to vent their rage at Mr Oakeshott," Port Macquarie News general manager Janine Buesnel said in the paper.
"Based on advice, we have decided to postpone an audience with Oakeshott that was planned for tomorrow."
Mr Oakeshott told his local paper it was a pity the opportunity for a worthwhile local discussion about the past 25 days in politics had been lost due to the threats.
"Regardless of views, we've all got to live together and hopefully that can be remembered in the future," he told the paper.
The member for Lyne last week conceded there was "political heat" around the circumstances of an Independent MP from a regional area supporting a minority Labor government.
(Excerpt) Read more at news.com.au ...
Wasn’t there a Liberal candidate running in the constituency? He said he was an Independent, if they don’t want that they shouldn’t have voted for him.
Australia has a preferential voting system.
Oakeshott ran as a conservative independent (he’s a former member of the National Party - the second party in the conservative coalition - and served as a National Party MP in the New South Wales state parliament). He received 47% of the vote in this election.
Australia has a preferential voting system, and the National Party candidate received 34% of the vote. The Labor candidate received 13.5%.
In essence, the conservative vote in his electorate was around 81% - his own vote combined with that of the National party.
He’s chosen to back Labor in that climate.
Do you think that with this close of an election, that The Labor government will fail pretty quickly..? (I am American).
I think there’s a good chance it will, but there’s no certainty. The big issue is that two of the three independents giving Labor power pretty much know their careers are over if an election occurs quickly - they represent conservative constituencies that are unlikely to forgive them for supporting Labor. That gives them a real reason to continue to keep Labor in power.
What Tony Abbott is hoping for is a situation where both of them (possibly accompanied by the third) transfer support to the conservative coalition. If they did this smoothly, the Governor General might commission a new government without another election - normally Julia Gillard as Prime Minister wouldn’t allow this - she would have the right to recommend a new election to the Governor General and such would normally be granted - but she has made a commitment not to call an election, and depending on the electoral mathematics might have to go with that.
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