Batman by-election: Greens and Labor do battle to win over the 1 per cent
ABC News
February 22 2018
Nearly 40 per cent of those voting in next month's Batman by-election rent their homes, and the Greens believe talking about housing and renters' rights could be a major issue for voters.
On Thursday, the Greens will ramp up a plan to set up a multi-billion-dollar Federal Housing Trust to build 500,000 affordable and public housing homes over 15 years.
The party said the trust, a bond aggregator for investors, would commission developments in existing built-up areas to help reset the property market — in Batman this would see over 2,000 new, affordable homes built in a decade.
The trust would cost $7.3 billion over the forward estimates, and would be funded through savings in the budget.
The March 17 byelection, triggered by David Feeney's resignation over his dual citizenship, pits the Greens' six-time candidate Alex Bhathal against ACTU president Ged Kearney.
Labor's margin is just 1 per cent.
At last November's Northcote by-election, in the southern half of Batman, Victorian Labor focused its campaign on affordable housing and renters' rights, with a major emphasis on giving renters more power including having pets, putting up pictures and creating a blacklist of misbehaving landlords.
While the policy captured headlines, ultimately the party was trounced with some internal Labor critics saying that too much effort was put into winning over renters, with many people who choose to live in Northcote knowing that the rentals are higher than other parts of Melbourne.
The Andrews State Government also introduced a series of stamp duty concessions for first-home buyers.
Labor's Batman campaign is more focused on national and traditional ALP strengths — jobs, education and health — with Ms Kearney's track record as head of the nurses' union front and centre during the opening weeks of the campaign.
Already having senior left-wing frontbenchers on the hustings with her, including Anthony Albanese on Tuesday, Ms Kearney will be joined by Senator Penny Wong on Thursday to talk about foreign aid.
Labor will also promise to fund a new $2 million LGBTIQ health clinic as part of redeveloped Your Community Health Centre in Northcote.
The battle for the seat is tight, although many in Labor concede that holding the seat will be a very tough ask due to changing demographics and soaring house prices.
Neither party has a realistic chance of enacting their promises during this term of Parliament, with the Coalition holding government by a slim margin.
The Liberal party is not contesting the election, which will hurt Labor's chances but Cory Bernardi's Australian Conservatives will field a candidate and have indicated that it is likely to preference Labor ahead of the Greens.
Greens Melbourne MP Adam Bandt called on Labor to rule out doing a deal with the right-wing party for preferences.
"Voters in Batman deserve to know, a week out from when voting starts, what negotiations are taking place between Labor and Cory Bernardi," he said.
He said Labor needed to rule out preference negotiations with the far-right.
An ALP spokeswoman highlighted that nominations for Batman had not closed and said the party was not considering any deals with the Australian Conservatives.
"This is a premature and immature attempt by Adam Bandt to create a distraction from the momentum of Ged Kearney's campaign," she said.
"The Labor Party doesn't trade policy for preferences with anyone."
Ms Kearney said she would be focused on securing first-preference votes rather than doing preference deals.
"No we won't be doing any preference deals with the conservatives, I'm having fantastic conversations and I'm really confident that the campaign is going very well," she said.
Early voting begins next Tuesday.
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The Batman By-Election Battle (Read 2138 times)
