IS DIVERSITY MAKING BENNELONG MARGINAL?
ABC Local, Australia
Aug 20 2013
By Danuta Kozaki
Posted 10 hours 47 minutes ago
The Federal seat of Bennelong on Sydney’s lower north shore is
classified as a marginal Liberal seat, currently held by a 3.1 per
cent margin by former tennis great John Alexander, who claimed the
seat back for the Liberal party in 2010.
Dr Richard Stanton, a senior lecturer of political communication at
Sydney University says the Chinese vote – which makes up 18 per cent
of the Bennelong electorate – was widely seen as a driving force
behind Labor’s Maxine McKew’s win in 2007.
Dr Stanton says Labor has parachuted in Chinese-Australian businessman,
Jason Yat-Sen Li, after its original candidate, Ryde Councillor Jeff
Salvestro-Martin, was disendorsed in mid-July due to allegations
before the Independent Commission Against Corruption.
Mr Salvestro-Martin says he was the victim of vexatious claims and
should have been allowed to continue in the race for Bennelong.
Dr Stanton says the introduction of a Chinese background candidate
has made the race interesting, as the Chinese community in Bennelong
is widely seen as very pragmatic.
“The real issue is do they go with the Labor party because of the
ethnic candidate, or do they look to the Liberal party because they
may be in government,” he said.
Mr Li says his Chinese background is important, but he is running
for the whole electorate.
“Look I think it’s helpful in some ways and its not helpful in other
ways,” he said.
“It’s helpful in the sense that people of Chinese background are very
supportive of having the first Chinese-Australian as a member of the
House of Representatives in this seat.
“It’s also been unhelpful in the sense that some people regard me as
a Chinese candidate, which is completely untrue given I was born and
raised in Sydney.”
Incumbent John Alexander says he has been working closely with both
the Chinese and Korean communities to involve them in sport, through
the setting up of a local table tennis program.
“The motivation for the table tennis in schools program came about
because we could see that there were students, Chinese and Korean
students, who weren’t participating with other students in what you
might call traditional Australian sports.”
Dr Stanton says Mr Alexander has been clever in counteracting Mr Li’s
appeal with his own strategies for the Asian vote.
“I think a number of tactics on the ground have worked for John
Alexander and will continue to work,” he said.
“One of them of course is having his electoral banners in Eastwood
and other places in Chinese and Korean, as well as in English.”
Melissa Monteiro from the Community Migrant Resource Centre office
in Eastwood says Bennelong is much more diverse than just the Chinese
and Korean communities, with a well-established Armenian population,
along with people from the Indian sub-continent, Iran and Afghanistan.
Vache Kahramanian from the Armenian National Committee of Australia
says the local Armenian community is very important in Bennelong.
“The Armenian community in Bennelong is the largest Armenian community
in Australia, and therefore Bennelong is a very important seat to
the Armenian community,” he said.
“The Armenian community represent about five per cent of the voting
population in that electorate.
“If we look back at the last election when the current member,
John Alexander, challenged the sitting member Maxine McKew, the
Armenian vote had a considerable influence in deciding the outcome
of that seat.”
Mr Kahramanian says many of those families have experience in fleeing
violence, and that could have an impact on their voting patterns.
“Many of those families are direct descendants of the Armenian
Genocide,” he said.
“Their grandparents or great-grandparents would either have been
killed or would have somehow survived and managed to flee and come
to Australia.”
Dr Stanton says history shows the longer a community is established
in Australia, the more conservative they can become.
“It depends whether the Armenian population again is a conservative
population or what you might call progressive,” he said.
“That conservatism comes into play second or third generation.
“So that may be the case with the Chinese and the Korean populations
or voters in Bennelong, but it also may be the case with the Armenians
that they may feel warmer to a Liberal conservative candidate than
they would to a Labor candidate.”
Dr Mark Rolfe, politics lecturer from the School of Social Sciences
at the University of New South Wales says the Liberal Party of New
South Wales has spent the last few years nurturing the so-called
ethnic vote in Bennelong.
“I think it points to a larger strategy by the NSW branch of the
Liberal party about multiculturalism and the attempt to build bridges
with various sections of the community,” he said.
“In particular, say, the Muslim community in western Sydney.
“But back to Bennelong, the Liberal party learnt that they need to
get involved at the grassroots of Bennelong, so in early 2010 they
formed the Liberal Party Chinese Council, in order to build bridges
with the Chinese community.”
Dr Rolfe says there has also been a reaction against the Labor party
on a New South Wales basis after all the corruption allegations.
“So I know that there was a big reaction against the NSW Labor
government in 2011, but I think the Liberals have been working at
both a federal and state level to consolidate the multicultural vote
in Bennelong,” he said.
Local Korean newspaper owner Jason Koh, who is also part of the
Korean Chamber of Commerce in Eastwood, Epping and Ryde says the
Korean community is just as interested as the broader community in
the economy, parking and law and order.
Mr Koh says it is a shame Labor’s candidate, Jason Li, has had such
a short time to get established.
“Bennelong Chinese vote roughly 18 per cent, Korean vote around an
estimated four per cent, so around 23 to 25 per cent which is quite
a big number,” he said.
“So if he is supported by a majority of Asian voters, he may have a
chance in general.
“We think it will be a very difficult fight for him, maybe three
years later may be different.”
Mr Alexander says Bennelong is unique.
“It is a very diverse community and I often think it’s interesting
that Bennelong was the first Aboriginal man to engage with the white
settlers,” he said.
“It’s so appropriate that this electorate would be named after him
when there’s such a mix of people from all around the world.”
Mr Li agrees, and says his vision for the area is to be like Silicon
Valley in America.
“I completely agree that Bennelong is a an extremely important seat,”
he said.
“It’s not just because of its ethnic mix, it’s because of the really
unique set of infrastructure that exists here such as Macquarie
University, Macquarie Park, the CSIRO and the range of professionals
and the make up of the population.”
Dr Stanton says Bennelong’s cultural diversity, with about a third of
its residents born in a non-English speaking country and the impact
of that ever-changing demographic, could make the seat a bell-weather
seat, changing with what voters believe to be the winning side.
“In the past, every election campaign has been won and lost in
Eden-Monaro,” he said.
“That’s a distinctly different seat with a high country population
and a coastal population, which has changed radically over the last
few years.
“So Bennelong could in fact become a bellwether seat.”
http://www.abc.net.au/news/2013-08-21/is-diversity-making-bennelong-marginal3f/4900026