PODCAST: Haines rejects Liberal “Protection Commission” on #transitzone

Integrity in government and a robust Federal Integrity Commission is supported by a clear majority of Australian citizens including in those Liberal-held seats where centre-right independent candidates are targeting the incumbents across Australia. However, the Morrison Government is deeply reluctant to legislate for such an independent, robust federal body. Independent Member for Indi in regional […]

PODCAST: Bird’s eye view of #MackellarVotes for #transitzone

As the next federal election looms, there’s much more focus now on centre-right candidates running against Liberal incumbents in blue-ribbon seats across Australia, especially inner-urban seats in Sydney and Melbourne, but also more generally. In this latest edition of @transitzonepod we continue our side-bar series on grassroots democracy and the growing independents’ movement, modelled by […]

Haines declares war over Federal Integrity Commission

The independent MP for Indi, Helen Haines, has accused the Prime Minister of “pulling the wool over our eyes” on a Federal Integrity Commission (FIC) by proposing an MP “protection commission”, and pledged to force Coalition MPs to vote on her bill during parliamentary sittings beginning next week. She also linked climate policy with the […]

Igniting an independent backburn: Margo Kingston finds hope in the grassroots for #AusVotes

AS I CONSIDER how to contribute at the next federal election, I thought I’d republish, with permission, a chapter I wrote for the Fremantle Press anthology Women of a Certain Rage, in January 2020 after the failed 2019 ‘Climate Election’, amid the worst bushfires Australia had ever seen, before COVID changed everything.  #AustraliaBurns: Rage, A Climate […]

Steggall says ‘no alternative’: indies must stand up for sensible centre

Women are at the forefront of the ‘Voices for’ movement in safe Liberal seats because the Liberal Party’s pre-selection process is “absolutely patriarchal in nature” according to the independent MP for Warringah, Zali Steggall. A closed-door preselection policy designed to maintain the status quo to keep women out, is how Steggall described the process in […]

Just a complete train wreck: Transcript of Part 2 of the #transitzone interview with Malcom Turnbull

Peter Clarke: Let’s get back to the elephant in the room. Mr Turnbull, recently you said you can’t think of “a bigger black and white failure of public administration” than the Morrison government’s failures in procuring covid vaccines and their design and execution of the vaccination rollout. Now, as you well know, we in Australia […]

Turnbull takes to liberalism’s lifeboat as LNP ‘broad church’ blows up: Margo Kingston reports on #IndependentsDay

MALCOLM Turnbull would consider voting for a strong moderate liberal independent in the Sydney federal electorate of Wentworth, and has named NSW seats he believes could be vulnerable if ‘voices for’ groups nominate outstanding moderate liberal independents – Wentworth, Mackellar, North Sydney, Bradfield and Hume.  In an interview for the #transitzone podcast, the former prime minister […]

#QuestionableDeeds in action: @burgewords in conversation with @margokingston1

WHEN I asked Margo to help me launch my non-fiction debut Questionable Deeds: Making a stand for equal love and my first collection of short stories Closet His, Closet Hers, Tony Abbott was still Prime Minister and marriage equality remained on the never never. When we met this week at Avid Reader bookshop in West End, Brisbane, […]

A citizen journalist on finding her voice…@JanB_QLD reflects PART 2 ABC 612

In a sense, the ABC Community Correspondent experience started for me as a result of the No Fibs election project in 2013. Over the course of the Griffith by-election campaign in early 2014, I became a shameless self-promoter, and when attending launches and other campaign events I would send out live tweets. After participating in, […]

A citizen journalist begins to find her voice… @JanB_QLD reflects – PART 1 NoFibs and The Westender

Starting Out Reading good journalism is a vital part of my life, and like many I am fearful for its future. Now, having participated in citizen journalism projects over the past 18 months, I have somehow inadvertently inserted myself into the debate about whether citizen journalism threatens or complements professional journalism. I came to citizen […]