Thank you to everyone who contributed to our outstanding result in the Higgins by-election. It was a massive effort, and was the result of an extraordinary commitment by hundreds of Greens members and supporters.
The Greens primary vote of 33% is by far our highest primary vote in a federal election– the previous highest was 28% in the Kooyong by-election in 1994.
This is a 22% swing to the Greens – the biggest swing to the Greens ever also, with The Greens vote increasing from 10% at the 2007 general election.
This strong vote sends a powerful message to both the Government and the opposition that people want real action for a safe climate – not political posturing.
The percentage of people voting Liberal pretty much stayed the same. Given Labor weren’t standing this is not a good result for them – they effectively didn’t manage to pick up any Labor votes.
In contrast many many people voted Green for the first time – and we are going to work hard to keep those people as Greens voters in the future.
It is notable that the low turnout means that far fewer people voted Liberal this time compared to the federal election. In the 2007 federal election 43,761 people voted for Peter Costello. On Saturday only 71% of the electorate voted, and only 32,779 people voted for O’Dwyer.
This vote is an inspiring lead in for The Greens to next year’s federal election. It’s another significant step towards Greens winning seats in the House of Representatives.
Thank you
This has been your campaign: undertaken by hundreds of people, supporting Clive Hamilton who was inspiring and hardworking as our candidate. He drew so many people into the campaign who previously hadn't been involved with The Greens. Thank you Clive for representing us so well, and for turning your life upside down for the campaign, for the Greens and for our fight for a fairer and more sustainable world.
Clive has written to me this morning saying:
"For me, what was so impressive was the efficiency, dedication and comradeship of the campaign. I was bowled over by the numbers of volunteers and their enthusiasm. Working with the campaign team was a pleasure from start to finish, and getting to know many of the volunteers was a life experience I shall not forget.
So my deepest thanks to you all; I think we did something special in Higgins, and the outcome truly will be a watershed in the march of the Greens' political advance."
It was my privilege to lead the campaign staff, and I want to sincerely thank the massive contributions made by other staff - Szilvia Csanyi, Radhika Satkunanathan, Rohan Leppert, Gabrielle Aleksandrs and the other staff in the Greens office in Melbourne, Ebony Bennett in Canberra and Leanne Minshull from Bob Browns office.
Sue Plowright, Victorian Greens convenor was as generous and committed as always, and lead the support from the party.
The contribution of the Stonnington and Boroondara Greens was incredible. Bob Hale convened the campaign committee and worked incredibly hard, along with Michael Henry, Jenny Henty and Bill Hampel in particular.
Colin Smith made an enormous contribution organising the staffing of the three weeks of prepolling at the two prepolling booths. Andrew Newton deserves special thanks for the work he put in staffing these booths.
Teams of volunteers were the backbone of the campaign. Melissa Donchi, Jeremy Porter, Guy Dollman, Jane Farago, Sarah Morton and the others who helped in the office and helped prepare our impressive campaign materials deserve huge thanks. The teams of people - too many to name but you know who you are - who doorknocked, ran stalls, staffed railway stations at 7 every morning put in an extraordinary contribution. Then of course there were the hundreds of people who walked the streets letterboxing,. This was an amazing effort. We letterboxed the electorate four times in six weeks - the final time getting out 30 000 leaflets in just over 24 hours, with only a days notice. Finally the huge team that staffed the polling booths on the day - we had a great turn out with three, four and more staff at every booth throughout the day. Thank you every one of you.
I also sincerely thank everyone who made a donation- we raised around $25 000 during the campaign including an incredible $10 000 in one day when we made a call out for money to pay for our 'How hot does it have to get?' ads in The Age in the last days of the campaign.
Our professional support team also were great to work with- Tash Jerrard our designer, and John Hinkson and his team at Arena Printing came through every time.
FInally I want to thank the long suffering families, friends and colleagues of all of us involved in the campaign - they put up with the long days and nights, early starts, and not having time for anything else other than the campaign for the last six weeks.
It was an incredible team effort that achieved remarkable results.
Janet Rice
Campaign Manager