Midnight Oil

[Powderworks] PG branch-stacking

Kiri W screaminblue88 at hotmail.com
Fri Jun 11 21:39:28 MDT 2004


Hi all,

Pardon my ignorance, but what exactly is branch-stacking?

Cheers,
KW

Garrett shrugs off stacking claim

12jun04

LABOR'S star recruit, Peter Garrett, today came under fire for allegedly 
branch stacking in a bid for a New South Wales Senate seat in 1984.

Anti-nuclear campaigner Michael Denborough told a newspaper the former 
Midnight Oil frontman branch-stacked his way into the top spot for the 
Nuclear Disarmament Party (NDP) 20 years ago.
However, a spokesman for Mr Garrett said today the former rock star was 
democratically elected to hold the top spot on the party's Senate ticket in 
1984.
"He was elected as the number one candidate and nobody seemed to have any 
objections at the time," the spokesman said.
"In any case, Australians don't want to be going into the past, they want to 
look to the future."
Dr Denborough said: "I had the top spot and when Peter saw how much interest 
the Nuclear Disarmament Party was receiving and decided to run, he wanted to 
be number one so he stacked the branch with Socialist Workers Party 
Trotskyites and got what he wanted."
Mr Garrett yesterday officially joined the Labor Party and is expected to be 
preselected for the safe Sydney seat of Kingsford Smith this month.
Challengers have until June 17 to nominate, but if no nominations are 
received, Mr Garrett will be declared the ALP candidate.
If there are challengers, Labor's national executive will vote on June 21.
In an interview with the Canberra Times Dr Denborough said Mr Garrett was 
egotistical and would have trouble maintaining the Labor line.
The NDP founder also accused Mr Garrett of hurting the party after he failed 
to win the Senate seat.
Mr Garrett was behind the formation of a breakaway group Peace and Nuclear 
Disarmament Action in 1985 which split the party.

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