This post is also available in: French

This past Saturday, 8 February 2014, there was a by-election for the House of Representatives in the electorate of Griffith in Australia. The Pirate Party of Australia (PPAU) managed to place fourth out of the eleven candidates with 1.5% of the votes. With 1055 votes achieved it was a good first appearance by PPAU in this election. The results for PPAU were between 0.9% and 2.5% in all areas apart from Mount Gravatt East (0%) and West End (3.4%).

On the 13 November 2013, Kevin Rudd announced his retirement from the House of Representatives in Griffith. Kevin Rudd was previously Australia’s 26th Prime Minister and held office from 3  December 2007 to 24 June 2010, and for 11 weeks in 2013. The two party system made this by-election primarily a contest between the two main candidates Bill Glasson for LNP and Terri Butler for ALP.

Top 5 candidates by votes
Bill Glasson – 29752 votes 43.6% (LNP)
Terri Butler – 26582 votes 39.0% (ALP)
Geoff Ebbs – 6910 votes 10.1% (GRN)
Melanie Thomas – 1052 votes 1.5% (PPAU)
Ray Sawyer – 693 votes 1.0% (KAP)
(counting is still taking place with postal votes and few others not yet added but the final result will not differ significantly from the above)

Melanie Thomas ran for the Senate in Queensland in 2013, reaching 0.5% of the vote for PPAU. She is committed to raising awareness of civil and digital liberties, and helping to guide Australia towards a future that is free and inclusive for all — not just a few. Melanie hopes to offer strong representation for those seeking change in the areas of free culture, government transparency, participatory democracy and civil liberties.

“Australian politics is in an appalling state at present. It has become mired in issues that shouldn’t be politicised: asylum seekers, climate change and same-sex marriage are just three major issues that have been taken by the current Government and distorted for political gain.

Matters that are of major national importance are being kept secret from the public — the Trans-Pacific Partnership Agreement is being negotiated with disturbing secrecy, and the Government hides behind “national security” to avoid answering difficult questions about the extent of surveillance in Australia. We have a Government that is proving itself to be both reckless and self-serving.” – Melanie Thomas

Image: CC-BY, Pirate Party Australia
Featured image: CC-BY, Electronic Frontiers Australia

About Josef Ohlsson Collentine

I’m a dual citizen (American/Swede) and try to integrate my reflections from a more global perspective if possible. I’m the organizational leader for Pirate Times and work actively to strengthen the pirate movement through this work as well as being the international contact for Piratpartiet (PPSE). Elected board member of PPSE for 2015-2018.
If you would like to ask me something I speak English, Swedish and Spanish. Find me on the links below

 

• 
• 
• 
• 

 

This post is also available in: FrenchThis past Saturday, 8 February 2014, there was a by-election for the House of Representatives in the electorate of Griffith in Australia. The Pirate…