Friday, January 26, 2007

Andrew Landeryou: the Anti-Midas?

It's the weekend, and we thought we would leave you with an article to ponder over the weekend. Here it is.

Could the author be writing about the same Andrew Landeryou?

The author uses colourful descriptors such as:

- "To be criticised by one so evidently suffering from the anti-Midas touch, who seemingly lacks the ability to manage student union affairs, business affairs, or any other affairs for that matter"

- "his vitriolic ranting and watching the unfolding of chaotic financial management"

- "Mr. Landeryou strikes me as a very confused individual, or at least one who is patently unaware of basic political definitions"

You decide!

21 Truth On Comments:

Anonymous said...

The reference to me in the article (I think it was Jan Tendys of the Sydney Unitarian Church and not Lev Lafayette who made the reference) is a reference to something I co-authored in what Mr Landeryou calls The Aged in January 2005. It was actually the Sunday Age which published the article. There have been a number of critical references to it, and a member of the Victorian Multicultural Commission was so critical of the article in a subsequent issue of the Sunday Age that she claimed it had a racist tone to it, which of course I totally deny. For the benefit of Slanderyou readers it is republished below, and they can make up their own minds about it. Here it is:

Loss in any language.

The ALP's diminishing voter base is increasingly concentrated along ethnic lines. Lyle Allan, Ernest Healy and Bob Birrell examine the trend.

It is obvious that after last year's electoral defeat, Labor must reach out to new voters. But few commentators realise the extent of the task. Labor is now heavily reliant on metropolitan voters. Thirty of its 60 seats are in Melbourne and Sydney. More ominously, Labor's victory in these seats was mainly due to its strong support among voters from non-English-speaking birthplaces.

This was true in Melbourne and Sydney despite the different outcomes in the two cities since 1993. Labor lost four seats in Sydney between 1993 and 2004, leaving it with 14. Over the same period, it lost only one seat in Melbourne. It now holds 16 Melbourne seats.

Some commentators like to think the reason for Labor's relatively strong performance in Melbourne is that its citizens are more in sympathy with Labor's social and cultural vision. This is not the reason. Labor's share of the two-party preferred vote in Melbourne and Sydney was similar in 2004.

The explanation requires a brief review of voting patterns since 1996. Labor suffered a devastating loss in 1996, especially in regional Australia. But it hung onto a kernel of seats in Canberra, Sydney and Melbourne. This result prompted a widely held view that these voters supported Labor's globalising policies because they were the beneficiaries and, perhaps, because they were indoctrinated by the metropolitan media, which generally advocated these policies.
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But these ideas do not stand up to critical scrutiny. In 1996, a main reason for Labor's collapse was that, for the first time, more blue-collar voters supported the Coalition than Labor. However, an examination of the post-election survey by ANU in 1996 showed that the blue-collar vote in Melbourne/Sydney/Canberra was split according to voters' birthplace. Those born in Australia and other English-speaking countries gave majority support to the Coalition, while those born elsewhere supported Labor - by a wide margin. There was a similar split among professional and other occupational groups.

But the blue-collar division was particularly important because of the number of blue-collar voters in Melbourne and Sydney from non-English-speaking birthplaces (NESBs).

Most of the seats Labor held after 1996, at least in Melbourne and Sydney, had high concentrations of such voters. Thus an alternative explanation for Labor's survival in these cities was that they were the locations of a core Labor constituency.

This outcome was crystal clear for Sydney, where Labor's remaining seats were all in the west and south-west. In every case, high proportions of NESB voters lived in these seats, with most coming from the relatively low-income component of Sydney's NESB population. Election booths in these areas invariably gave Labor more than 60 per cent of the two-party preferred vote. Some 25 per cent of Sydney's population is NESB-born, with the less affluent component heavily concentrated in the west and south-west. Typically, half or more of voters in these seats were NESB-born. On the other hand, Labor lost almost all of the outer-suburban seats in Sydney it had previously held, none of which included high NESB concentrations.

Labor's survival in Sydney depended on its ethnic constituency. Nothing has changed since 1996. In last year's election, Labor lost another outer-suburban seat, Greenway, to the Coalition. However, it won Parramatta, which had a rapid growth of NESB voters during the 1990s and an exodus of other voters.

Like Sydney, Melbourne's population is also about 25 per cent NESB-born, most of whom are blue-collar workers or blue-collar retirees. If they are concentrated in particular electorates and favour Labor, they could have similar electoral impact. One indicator that they do is Labor's dominance of the federal seats in the city's north and west, where there are high concentrations of NESB-born voters. But Labor in Melbourne is holding on to more suburban seats than in Sydney.

The reason for this lies in electoral geography. The notable feature of Labor's achievement in Melbourne is that, since 1993, it has held onto a belt of seats in south and south-eastern Melbourne, including Chisholm, Bruce, Hotham, Isaacs and Holt. These seats adjoin the blue-ribbon Coalition seats of Kooyong, Higgins and Goldstein. They include the moderately affluent local government areas of Monash and Kingston as well as the outer-suburban area of Casey. This is home-owner territory, with a high proportion of households mortgaged to the hilt. If the post-election pundits were correct that suburban voters were terrorised by the prospect of interest rate rises, how is it that Labor held on to these seats?

The mortgage factor may well have come into play, because there were solid swings against Labor in these five seats, particularly in Holt and Isaacs. Labor, nonetheless, hung on. The main reason was that each of these seats contained significant NESB communities. All incorporate a chunk of the NESB community along the south-eastern railway corridor extending from Oakleigh through to Clayton, Springvale, Noble Park, Dandenong and, in recent years, into Endeavour Hills and Hampton Park. It is a growing community because it is the main first-settlement point of less-affluent, newly arrived NESB migrants. In Springvale and Dandenong, nearly 70 per cent of adults were born born overseas, most in NESB countries.

In the booths in and around these NESB neighbourhoods, Labor received 60 per cent or more of the two-party preferred vote. This was enough to overcome the closeness of the vote elsewhere, particularly in Chisholm and Bruce, where Labor usually won marginally in the older, less affluent areas, while the Coalition prevailed in more affluent newer areas. Hotham was never in doubt because it includes parts of the high NESB communities of Oakleigh, Clayton and Springvale.

ISAACS and Holt are different. Isaacs covers the southern suburbs of Mentone and Parkdale, where the Coalition does well, and the battler territory of Aspendale to Carrum, where, despite quite strong swings to the Coalition, Labor narrowly won. The reason Labor held on was that there was an electoral redistribution in 2003 that added several NESB areas around Noble Park and Springvale to the seat, all of which voted heavily for Labor.

Without this redistribution, Labor would have lost. These areas were taken from Holt, thus removing one source of its previous status as a safe Labor seat.

Labor won in Holt - marginally - because it polled well in the Endeavour Hills, Hallam and Hampton Park areas, all zones of relatively high NESB concentration.

Some of the results elsewhere in Holt were stunning. Holt includes the predominantly Australian-born, modest-home-owning areas around Cranbourne and Narre Warren. In class terms, this is vintage Labor territory. Yet, in the four booths in Cranbourne town, there was a 50-50 split, and, in Narre Warren, the Coalition won nearly 55 per cent of the two-party preferred vote. Perhaps the mortgage scare factor came into play here because there were large swings against Labor.

There was a similar remarkable result in the seat of Aston, which adjoins Holt to the north and Bruce to the west. Aston, too, is modest-home-owner territory. Like Narre Warren, there is very little NESB presence. The Coalition achieved a massive swing, winning all 30 booths, making Aston an even safer Coalition seat than Kooyong.

For readers who think these are exaggerations, the experience on the north-western suburban frontier of Melbourne offers a good test. The booths in modest, recently built housing estates delivered massive majorities for Labor. An example is Delahey in Keilor, which is part of the safe Labor seat of Gorton. The two-party preferred vote for Labor at this booth was 72.5 per cent (even after a swing of 7.9 per cent against it). It is hard to understand this result other than by the high NESB concentration of voters.

This evidence indicates that Labor does well in Melbourne because the NESB impact has been magnified in south-eastern Melbourne by the generosity of the Electoral Commission in spreading the benefit for Labor over five federal seats.

Why does Labor enjoy such strong support from the NESB constituency? It is partly a matter of class. The voters in question are blue-collar and often welfare-dependent. It is also partly cultural. Bob Hawke, and, before him, Gough Whitlam worked hard to cultivate the ethnic constituency. Labor's strong support for migration and multiculturalism makes it the obvious political home for voters who feel threatened by the Coalition's strong nationalist stance on these issues.

Does this mean that Labor's political salvation lies in increasing the immigration intake? Perhaps, but only if the focus is on the family reunion and refugee programs. Skilled migrants from Asia seem much less interested in Labor, to judge from recent voting patterns.

For example, in Melbourne, the Coalition won decisively in booths in high NESB concentrations in Doncaster (in the seat of Menzies).

The danger with such pro-migration policies is that they would probably alienate many non-NESB voters. The ever-increasing number of outer-suburban voters that Labor must attract if it is to win more seats in Melbourne and Sydney are unlikely to be impressed by policies that appeal to sectional NESB interests or to gentrifying inner-city electorates.

Unfortunately for Labor, the reliance on its NESB constituency makes the party vulnerable to accusations it is a narrowly based organisation. Its preselection processes leave it open to branch-stacking built around mobilisation of NESB members. Winning candidates have to be attentive to this constituency in their public statements. In these circumstances it is hard to change perceptions that the party has lost touch with the broader electorate.

Lyle Allan and Ernest Healy are researchers with, and Bob Birrell is the director of Monash University's centre for population and urban research.

Anonymous said...

I always thought you were a moron Lyle. You were only mentioned in passing by that reference to Landeryou on Lev Lafayette's contribution to anti-Landeryou material. Why get so upset about it?

Who gives a hoot about your views on the ALP.

I'm more interested in Landeryou than I am about whether your views are racist or not. I don't think they are but so what?

Anonymous said...

Lev Lafayette is not saying very nice things about my friend Andrew Landeryou.

I say the same about Lev as I said about Slanderyou. You never won a blog award and neither did Slanderyou. Stop being so jealous of Andrew, who won the inaugural Walkely blog award for publishing the best blog on the net.

Answer that Lev.

Anonymous said...

Well said Cait

Anonymous said...

Hey guys, you might want to put up a note, I've update the Charge Landeryou site
www.chargelanderyou.blogspot.com

it now updates the progress of prosecutions under each heading.

Anonymous said...

catt (landeryou) you write shit

Anonymous said...

4.11.37 you tell lies. The site has not been updated since 10th December 2006 and contains material that I read in a dirt sheet circulating around Melbourne Uni around October 2006. Nothing in it is new. There are no allegations worth any substance in the shit blog.

Leave Andrew alone. His blog is fantastic. I have always found him to be an ethical and honest man. All of the claims made in that blog are totally false.

Anonymous said...

your name wouldn't be catt would it? Not Andrew this time but too good in its defence of him.

Anonymous said...

Anonymous Friday, January 26, 2007 1:03:21 PM
said... "4.11.37 you tell lies. The site has not been updated since 10th December 2006 and contains material that I read in a dirt sheet circulating around Melbourne Uni around October 2006. Nothing in it is new. There are no allegations worth any substance in the shit blog.

Leave Andrew alone. His blog is fantastic. I have always found him to be an ethical and honest man. All of the claims made in that blog are totally false."

Who else but landeryou would write this. His fingerprints (ie writing style) is all over this.

Who else for eg uses the phrase "you tell lies" plus the rest reads a little too personal

Anonymous said...

Would you employ either Lyle or Andrew to clean your dunnies?

Anonymous said...

No. They wouldn't clean them well enough. I'd employ a cleaner who isn't lazy.

Anonymous said...

What about Cait Catt? Do you think she'd make a good dunny cleaner?

Anonymous said...

If she's really Andrew the answer is NO.

If not I don't know. I'd ask Kevin Andrews to word an AWA for her, and put in a clause that if she didn't clean them well enough I could sack her. I'd be worried she might sue me for unfair dismissal. The text of her contributions to this blog suggests she could be a bit bolshie.

Anonymous said...

Play safe. Don't employ her in the first place. Get a Filipino woman who can't speak English very well. They clean the best.

Anonymous said...

What about a Filipino bride for Andrew?

Anonymous said...

Do you think any of them would have him?

Anonymous said...

Cait Catt and Catter8, don't you think it's slightly moronic to post under both names and agree with each other?

Anonymous said...

It's a good tactic. I understand its a giveaway of Masonic Lodge influence.

Is Landeryou a freemason? If Catt was a male I'd ask that question about her, but the Masonic secret society will not admit women.
Freemasons were behind the Knights Templar in Jerusalem, the English Civil War, the French Revolution, World War I, the Russian Revolution, World War II, the Korean War, the Vietnam War, and George Bush. They are also behind Landeryou and Catt.

Thank you Catts for the giveaway. Now we know there is a Masonic influence behind Landeryou. Thank you thomas for making the connection. I never picked it up but I'm very gateful Thomas that you did so. Now we know there is an evil influence at work behind the Landeryou blog. The evil influence of freemasonry.

Anonymous said...

crap

the claim that Freemasons control the world is as stupid as the claim that Jews control the world in the book protocols of the elders of zion which was a forgery of the Tsarist secret police in pre revolutionary Russia

did 7.03.53 go to the recent holocaust deniers conference in Tehran?

Anonymous said...

If 7.03.53 didn't go to the holocaust deniers conference then he should have. Dr Toben of the Adelaide Institute went. No one takes him seriously.

Anonymous said...

I have been checking out Sheriff and it seems he has interests in the following companies -

PACIFIC INSIGHT PTY LTD
BRIGGS & STRATTON AUSTRALIA PTY. LIMITED
DOTMAR EPP PTY LTD
SCAN OPTICS PTY. LTD.
PALMER TECHNOLOGIES PTY LTD

Does anyone know what these dodgy companies do? How much money do they make etc?