For a long time it looked like The Nationals Jamie Chaffey would have little competition to replace the retiring Mark Coulton in Parkes, but the ballot draw held in Dubbo on Friday has revealed a full field of ten candidates.
The Pauline Hanson’s One Nation candidate, Mark Carter, was likely to pick up a few votes from have a name similar to the former member, but he’s near guaranteed a few percentage points from securing the donkey vote position at the top of the ticket. We can’t tell you anything else about him though.
WHAT’S A DONKEY VOTE?
A ‘donkey vote’ is when a voter numbers the candidates on the ballot paper 1, 2, 3, 4, 5, 6 and so on in the same order that they appear on the paper. A reverse donkey vote is when a voter numbers from bottom to top, instead of top to bottom. It is a well studied phenomenon that around 2-3% of voters in Australia’s compulsory voting system will vote this way. However, in contrast to leaving the ballot paper blank, donkey votes are formal votes and will be counted.
Mr Carter, Stephen Pope from the Shooters Fishers and Farmers, and Bob Wilson from the Indigenous – Aboriginal Party currently have no information about their candidacies on their respective party websites.
The lack of information about those candidates is a stark contrast to the repeat campaigners Trish Frail, Petrus van der Steen and Stuart Howe, who all contested the seat at the last election. Trish Frail is the Greens candidate and secured 4.73% of the vote in 2022. Mr van der Steen contested the seat for the United Australia Party last time and is the Trumpet of Patriots candidate this time, and attracted 2.66% of the vote, while the Independent Howe was close behind with 2.46%. The trio are three of the bottom four candidates from 2022, with the anti-vaxxer Independent Medical Options Party, who came last with 1.7% in 2022, not contesting this election.
Parkes Ballot Draw
Position Candidate Party 1 Mark Carter Pauline Hanson’s One Nation 2 Stephen Pope Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party 3 Trish Frail The Greens 4 Petrus van der Steen Trumpet of Patriots 5 Bob Wilson Indigenous – Aboriginal Party of Australia 6 Nathan Fell Labor 7 Jamie Chaffey The Nationals 8 Maurice Favey Family First 9 Stuart Howe Independent 10 Sally Edwards Libertarian
While Jamie Chaffey is strongly expected to hold the seat for the National Party, the redrawn boundaries, and the pincer movement of the credible Nathan Fell, a miner from Broken Hill, on his left, and Libertarian Sally Edwards who has become politically activated in opposition to the renewable energy transition taking some ground on the right, may make the seat of Parkes a closer contest than expected. Chaffey has been supported by a number of campaign events with National Party leadership, including most recently appearing with leader David Littleproud and Senator Bridget McKenzie.
The election is being held on March 3 with early voting beginning on April 22.
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See more about the race in Parkes here