How to vote card advice and background for volunteers
August 19, 2010
Dear how to vote card volunteers for Stephen Mayne's independent anti-pokies tilt at the Senate,
Firstly, a very big thank you for agreeing to hand out this DL card on Saturday.
Unless arrangements have been made for hand delivery, we've mailed various bundles of the cards to your postal addresses today so they should arrive by Friday at the very latest.
Paula has also emailed everyone with details of the individual booths and if you need any more information please email her on Paula@maynereport.com or check for information here on the AEC website.
The Bureau of Meteorology is currently forecasting a minimum of 8 degrees on Friday night rising to 14 degrees on Saturday in this first winter federal election since the 1987. It is predicting "partly cloudly weather and isolated showers contracting to the southeast during the evening with winds averaging up to 30 km/h".
It might be worth rugging up and the cooler weather should help sales at the sausage sizzle and perhaps delay the normal tendency of voters to hit the polls early.
What to say to voters
You should expect to find about half a dozen volunteers handing out and they will be observing the rule which requires booth workers to remain at least 6 metres from the entrance to the polling station.
Simply stand with them and offer up the card to voters as they arrive. It is often handy to be the first or last card accepted and try to make one of the following comments, or a variation that works for you, whilst doing so:
"Stephen Mayne - no pokies"
"Stephen Mayne - independent for the Senate"
"Stephen Mayne - no pokies independent for the Senate"
"Something different, Stephen Mayne for the Senate"
I often try to have some fun to break up the play. For instance, you could try:
"How about a married couple for the Senate?"
"Stephen Mayne - tallest candidate for the Senate"
Details on the platform
If you get quizzed by voters or other booth workers about the no pokies platform, here are some basic facts in addition to those mentioned on the HTV:
* No pokies South Australian senator Nick Xenophon is supporting Stephen's campaign.
* The Federal Government should roll out the maximum $1 bet on the pokies recommended by the Productivity Commission. Victoria is currently at $5 and NSW remains at the old Victorian level of $10.
* There should also be mandatory pre-commitment whereby players set their maximum loss at the start of play.
* These two measures alone would significantly reduce the $2.6 billion lost by pokies players in Victoria last financial year.
* Why does Australia have the lowest smoking rate in the world and the highest gambling rate in the world when both cigarettes and pokies are dangerous and addictive products? It's a failure of regulation.
Stephen has been campaigning against the pokies for five years and this has included tilts at the board of Woolworths, Australia's biggest pokies venue operator, plus the 2006 Victorian election, the 2007 federal election and the 2008 Manningham election.
What are his other policies?
Support for immigration and multi-culturalism.
Believes in climate change.
Strong advocate for regulatory intervention to improve the notoriously low female representation on Australian public company boards.
Cleaning up governance with things like improved transparency of political donations and a federal anti-corruption commission.
Where are his preferences going?
There are two separate preference tickets so 50% go to the Greens and 50% to Family First because both have very strong policies against the pokies?
After that there is support for other smaller parties before the tickets go 50% each to the major parties. This strategy mirrors what Nick Xenophon did in 2007.
CEC, Climate Sceptics and One Nation are the last three on both tickets.
Background on the candidate
Age: 41
Married to running mate Paula Piccinini and we have three children.
20 years in business journalism.
Founder of Australia's best known independent ezine www.crikey.com
Spent 18 months as press secretary for Kennett Government before becoming a critic over governance issues such as attacks on auditor general and DPP.
Manningham councillor for past 20 months.
Australia's best known shareholder activist having asked questions at 370 AGMs and run for 40 boards.
Never run for Senate before but got 2% against Peter Costello in Higgins at the 2007 federal election and has run twice before in state elections (Burwood by-election in 1999 when got 6.7% and beat the Green and upper house in 2006.) This is my sixth political election.
Once again, thanks very much for helping out. Reply to this email if you have any queries and we'd love to hear back from you on how the day goes.
Best wishes, Stephen Mayne
Firstly, a very big thank you for agreeing to hand out this DL card on Saturday.
Unless arrangements have been made for hand delivery, we've mailed various bundles of the cards to your postal addresses today so they should arrive by Friday at the very latest.
Paula has also emailed everyone with details of the individual booths and if you need any more information please email her on Paula@maynereport.com or check for information here on the AEC website.
The Bureau of Meteorology is currently forecasting a minimum of 8 degrees on Friday night rising to 14 degrees on Saturday in this first winter federal election since the 1987. It is predicting "partly cloudly weather and isolated showers contracting to the southeast during the evening with winds averaging up to 30 km/h".
It might be worth rugging up and the cooler weather should help sales at the sausage sizzle and perhaps delay the normal tendency of voters to hit the polls early.
What to say to voters
You should expect to find about half a dozen volunteers handing out and they will be observing the rule which requires booth workers to remain at least 6 metres from the entrance to the polling station.
Simply stand with them and offer up the card to voters as they arrive. It is often handy to be the first or last card accepted and try to make one of the following comments, or a variation that works for you, whilst doing so:
"Stephen Mayne - no pokies"
"Stephen Mayne - independent for the Senate"
"Stephen Mayne - no pokies independent for the Senate"
"Something different, Stephen Mayne for the Senate"
I often try to have some fun to break up the play. For instance, you could try:
"How about a married couple for the Senate?"
"Stephen Mayne - tallest candidate for the Senate"
Details on the platform
If you get quizzed by voters or other booth workers about the no pokies platform, here are some basic facts in addition to those mentioned on the HTV:
* No pokies South Australian senator Nick Xenophon is supporting Stephen's campaign.
* The Federal Government should roll out the maximum $1 bet on the pokies recommended by the Productivity Commission. Victoria is currently at $5 and NSW remains at the old Victorian level of $10.
* There should also be mandatory pre-commitment whereby players set their maximum loss at the start of play.
* These two measures alone would significantly reduce the $2.6 billion lost by pokies players in Victoria last financial year.
* Why does Australia have the lowest smoking rate in the world and the highest gambling rate in the world when both cigarettes and pokies are dangerous and addictive products? It's a failure of regulation.
Stephen has been campaigning against the pokies for five years and this has included tilts at the board of Woolworths, Australia's biggest pokies venue operator, plus the 2006 Victorian election, the 2007 federal election and the 2008 Manningham election.
What are his other policies?
Support for immigration and multi-culturalism.
Believes in climate change.
Strong advocate for regulatory intervention to improve the notoriously low female representation on Australian public company boards.
Cleaning up governance with things like improved transparency of political donations and a federal anti-corruption commission.
Where are his preferences going?
There are two separate preference tickets so 50% go to the Greens and 50% to Family First because both have very strong policies against the pokies?
After that there is support for other smaller parties before the tickets go 50% each to the major parties. This strategy mirrors what Nick Xenophon did in 2007.
CEC, Climate Sceptics and One Nation are the last three on both tickets.
Background on the candidate
Age: 41
Married to running mate Paula Piccinini and we have three children.
20 years in business journalism.
Founder of Australia's best known independent ezine www.crikey.com
Spent 18 months as press secretary for Kennett Government before becoming a critic over governance issues such as attacks on auditor general and DPP.
Manningham councillor for past 20 months.
Australia's best known shareholder activist having asked questions at 370 AGMs and run for 40 boards.
Never run for Senate before but got 2% against Peter Costello in Higgins at the 2007 federal election and has run twice before in state elections (Burwood by-election in 1999 when got 6.7% and beat the Green and upper house in 2006.) This is my sixth political election.
Once again, thanks very much for helping out. Reply to this email if you have any queries and we'd love to hear back from you on how the day goes.
Best wishes, Stephen Mayne