Michael Atkinson

$56,000 to be precise

You’ve been in Parliament 16 years, have few volunteers, have the advance public funding & are running again with the aim of losing & trousering the five-figure severance payment. I’ve never seen a voter take one of these from the single-use plastic caddy.

Would you like to buy a dodgy opinion poll from @greensSA’s Katie McCusker ? Her poll put her party in first place in the State District of Heysen. In fact, her party finished in third place, will be eliminated & its preferences distributed.

@MayneReport The National Party was never a thing in SA. From 1973-1993 it held one seat on Eyre Peninsula & from 1997-2010 held one seat in the Riverland, that M.P. becoming a Minister in the Rann Labor Government in 2004. The Country Party was subsumed into the Liberal & Country League.

If this SA upper house vote is repeated in Victoria in November, One Nation will win 8 upper seats securing a quota in each of the 8 regions. Libs will likely be on 8 as well. Amazing to see One Nation on 23.3% in SA and the SA Nats securing just 0.5% state wide.

@TammyMLC told @Staceylee_ she had changed her mind & was running for re-election because she wanted to stop @corybernardi. At the close of counting, @corybernardi had 47 votes for every one for @TammyMLC. You weren’t running to trouser the $56,000 severance payment then Tammy ?

@Gus_Macdonald_ @miclensink I was managing Enfield & scrutineering a 7000-vote booth. You’re sore I called you out about your advertorial-style coverage of Chris McDermott’s candidacy & your missing the story there. 0.3% at close of counting. Go back & look at @miclensink’s risible commentary on 7 in 2022.

@MickAtko @miclensink She’s one of the most senior Parliamentarians … there since 2003 Michael … are you upset you weren’t asked?

It’s hard to believe a TV station could put @miclensink on an election-night panel. In 2022 she continued to campaign on air as though viewers had not already voted & it was plain she didn’t understand the Electoral Act or the voting system.

By the way, Frances Bedford’s vote has fallen to 4.5 p.c. Any more and she’ll lose her deposit.

Adelaide journalists ought to find out the man behind atypicalthinking.com, which hosted Frances Bedford’s campaign website. Atypical thinking indeed. IMO she must have known.

@CharlesSturtSA councillor Merlindie Fardone has taken the @LiberalSAHQ vote in State District of Lee from second place (it was once held by the Liberal Party) to fourth place. Historic. Former Grange councillor Sarah McGrath polled less than one per cent & forfeits her deposit.

@kevinbonham Frances Bedford has lost. She is running fifth on about 6.5 p.c.

Frances Bedford running fifth in Florey with 6.5 p.c. of the vote. And that’s without its being revealed who hosted her campaign website.

For all the @vic_socialists trash-talk on the booths about winning Croydon & Enfield, they don’t have a scrutineer in the largest booth. In fact, it’s only me & my consort here for Lawrence Ben. Alas, it ain’t Dixville Notch here.

Who in the State Labor Government devised the electoral regime whereby every elector is first asked at the polling-booth desk if he or she is voting for the First Nations Voice or the State Election. I was a Yes vote but, IIRC, 60% in SAcvoted No. Why would you remind them ?

@SAElectoralCom @idahanks8 What it doesn’t have is the registered voting tickets that formalise votes that place a mark in one box & no other. Thousands of votes will be cast that way by the authors of these tickets & their work is kept secret until after polls close. What is the statutory justification ?

@idahanks8 Our website has all the information you may need clearly layed out on our homepage - ecsa.sa.gov.au

@AndrewHunterAUS @vic_socialists I has always assumed that the kind of conduct we have seen from @vic_socialists was unlawful under the Electoral Act. Perhaps we need a @SAElectoralCom staff member outside to stop cold-canvassing & trash-talking. Our booths are like the Hogarth paintings about 18th C elections.

@MickAtko @vic_socialists It seemed to be a hard sell on display in Enfield pre-poll; not certain that was winning many hearts and minds.

@Vic_Socialists have flown in people from Melbourne & are making voting an ordeal in State Districts of Enfield & Croydon, buttonholing people as they go in & confronting & trash-talking volunteers for other parties. Need to rethink the Electoral Act to restore calm & goodwill.

@BBoyerMP Good to see you both together.

In 2018, at my first election, it was a contest between Liberal candidate Luigi Mesisca and me in the marginal seat of Wright I was fortunate enough to be elected in what was a very hard fought campaign. At the declaration of the polls where the Commission declares the winner of the seat, Luigi attended by himself to congratulate me. He even stood up and gave a speech thanking the Commission’s staff and acknowledging the support my family and volunteers had given me. I knew at that moment that he was a very decent human being and we have been friends ever since. Eight years on and he is supporting me at this campaign. It’s a great sign, I think, of how civil and respectful politics can be in South Australia.

@Prakky Can vanish be a transitive verb ?

Have any SA voters sighted Aio / Trent Baxter IRL? Even the website has vanished him: sa.onenation.org.au/aoi_baxter

The actual historical analogue would be “why didn’t the Japanese tell the Germans about Pearl Harbor?” And it’s worth noting that the Japanese didn’t tell the Germans, and the Germans were furious.