Victoria has been electing local councillors across the state.
We’ll update with comprehensive tallies of who’s who tomorrow but it looks like great results in Moreland council with the election of Labor moderate Lambros Tapinos who appears to have shamed leftard competitors in the territory once considered Socialist Left heartland.
In Melbourne council, it’s all too close to call, with former state Opposition Leader Robert Doyle looking very good in early counting (with 24-28% of primary vote) with Labor moderate Peter McMullin and Liberal running-mate Tim Wilson also right amongst it. The election will hang on the elimination order of Ng and Singer, who could either elect Doyle or McMullin.
The councillors have been counted though with Karl Jetter from Doyle’s group, Kathy Oke the Green, Kevin Louey from McMullin’s group, Liberal Peter Clarke from Morgan, Ken Ong from Singer’s ticket, Brian Shanahan from Ng and Socialist Lefty Jennifer Kanis from Fowles ticket.
In Banyule, most incumbents have won it seems, with the Greens snatching a position in Hawdon Ward and it appearing that Labor Unity cult-hero Dean Sherriff may have survived a searing campaign from nasty leftists in the local press. He might have been elected with the support of Labor moderate rising star Jess Paul, the daughter of local powerbroker Michael Paul. Optimists think this development might prompt the warring tribes of the Labor Right to kiss and make up.
In the Stonnington municipality, a patriotic correspondent reports:
The votes are in – and the biggest loser may well be self-styled “Independent” candidate for Stonnington, PR sleazebag Ken Davis, and his appalling former councillor wife Sally. Davis – a confessed liar and cheat – bombed out of contention at today’s opening of the ballot, while wifey Sally, acting as his scrutineer, had a meltdown, confronting a VEC official in an angry outburst as she watched her hubby’s campaign go up in flames.
Sally was given a sound dressing down by the official, after she defied an order not to talk with VEC staff opening the ballots. “She immediately went into ‘Don’t you know who I am!’ mode,” reports a startled observer. “She treated the official to a good old fashioned scolding. His crime? Doing his job and ensuring staff weren’t being harassed by the overbearing scrutineer.”
Sally, a former Stonnington councillor and mayor, was the “brains” behind the amateurish Davis campaign, which featured posters of a wooden-looking Davis (approximate age: 69) promising a “fresh voice” for East Ward. About as “fresh” as last week’s horse manure. Sally now works for the AEC as an “education officer”. She made sure during today’s proceedings at Malvern Town Hall that everyone knew she was the powerbroker in the building. After putting up with the Davis show for several hours, the frustrated official politely asked scrutineers to refrain from touching or conversing with workers.
Davis promptly engaged a worker in conversation, at one point appearing to touch a ballot paper – a verboten act which could have got her promptly frogmarched from the count. When the frustrated official asked her to stand back, she launched into a broadside, demanding to see the returning officer and loudly proclaiming her outrage at being properly called to account.
The Davis family meltdown is an embarrassing blow to his mate, Age gossip queen, Dirty Larry Money, who had plugged his old mate and lunch buddy Kenny Boy shamelessly in his mediocre daily column. At the height of the campaign two weeks ago, Money published a hearty plug for Davis, which included the saccherine lines:
“I feel like that Dutch kid with his finger in the dyke,” says candidate Davis who reckons that, as an independent, he is holding back the tide. “Party politics is getting involved in a Stonnington election for the first time and its ugly. Mysterious, dummy candidates have appeared in each ward.”
Davis’ claim to be “independent” is revealed as a sham by a cursory glance at his how to vote card; he directly preferenced Greg Hannan, a prominent local Young Liberal, and Hannan’s dummy candidates, Liberal members Mathew Knight and Sonja Van Buuren. At today’s opening of the ballot, Davis’s strong preference flow to Hannan has virtually assured the Young Liberals will get their man onto council.
So far from being an independent balwark against “ugly” party politics, Davis has turned out to be a blue ribbon Liberal dummy – a stooge of the first order. All the preference flows are here:
When all the ballots had been opened late today, the field for Stonnington East Ward had been narrowed to popular independent councillors Judy Hindle and Anne O’Shea, Young Liberal Hannan, and patriot challenger Nick Voulanas. Hindle, #1 on the ballot and a strong benificiary of the donkey vote, is close to a quota in her own right. But she has poor preference flows, and if she fails to get 25% primary vote quota, she could fall short.
STONNINGTON SOUTH WARD
Over in South Ward, popular former mayor Melina Sehr has stormed to a quota in her own right, and looks to have towed running mate, beefcake rower Tim Smith over the line with her. Fighting for the final third position were dreary Tory art dealer and reigning mayor Claude Ullin, and keen young lefty challenger Jake Clifton. Our money’s on Clifton kicking Ullin out of the council chamber in his pinstipe suits and spivvy shoes.
Back to east ward, and what of candidate Ken Davis’s background? Research reveals he is the same Ken Davis who admitted to writing bogus letters in false names in a smear campaign against a corporate rival while he was PR operative at Turnbull Porter Novelli. The following reports from 2001, below, tell a tale of a man whose credibility problems and family baggage have sunk his attempt to gatecrash council. But his Young Liberal mates are laughing:
Ken Davis is being sued by DMG Radio, a competitor of his client, the Austereo network. He has admitted that, in the lead-up to DMG’s successful applications for FM licences in Sydney and Melbourne, he used false names to send newspapers and politicians a series of letters critical of the British company.
Davis denies he wrote the letters on behalf of Austereo, which in turn denies any knowledge of the smear campaign. At the time, Davis was employed by Australia’s largest public relations firm, Turnbull Porter Novelli. Company chairman Noel Turner says he was shocked to learn of Davis’s activities. “There’s a myth that PR people go around burying stories and lying about things,” says Turnbull, who claims deliberate deception is in fact unusual. “Any PR person who tells a lie to anybody is dumb,” he says. “It’s wrong but it’s also dumb. Because inevitably, these days, you get caught.”
DMG wins after smear campaign
Maria Ligerakis
MONTHS after alleging it was the victim of a smear campaign by rival radio giant Austereo, Nova FM owner DMG Radio has emerged a winner.
DMG Radio late last year commenced legal proceedings against Austereo, claiming bogus letters were sent to the media, parliamentarians and other key groups in a bid to denigrate the station.
The matter, which was due to go to full trial next month, was yesterday settled with Austereo’s public relations consultant Ken Davis taking blame for a series of bogus letters.
“Ken Davis admits that he wrote and sent the bogus letters in false names,†a written statement released by DMG and signed by Ken Davis said.
“He also acknowledges that the various allegations contained in the bogus letters were without foundation.â€
DMG has received a “substantial paymentâ
€ in relation to damages and costs and legal proceedings have now been suspended.
17 August 2001
More to come, with very promising news about the pro corrupt CEO of Casey Mike Tyler forces facing a big problem in Casey and potentially very good results for patriot Councillor David Saunderson in Geelong.
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