Palmer United Party

Palmer United Party
Leader	Clive Palmer
Founder	Clive Palmer
Founded	2013
Headquarters	380 Queen Street, Brisbane, Queensland
Colours	Yellow
House of Representatives	1 / 150
Senate	1 / 76
Website
palmerunited.com
Politics of Australia Political parties Elections

The Palmer United Party (PUP) is an Australian political party, formed by mining magnate Clive Palmer in April 2013. The party was formed as the United Australia Party, and brands itself as a revival of the historic party of that name. However, it adopted its current name a month after its founding to fast track registration and to avoid a conflict with similarly named parties.^[1]

The party fielded candidates in all 150 House of Representatives seats at the September 2013 federal election, with Palmer, the party's leader, elected to the Division of Fairfax. At the same time, two candidates (Glenn Lazarus of Queensland and Jacqui Lambie of Tasmania) were elected to the Senate, alongside Australian Motoring Enthusiasts Party candidate Ricky Muir, of Victoria, who later agreed to enter into an informal alliance with the PUP. Additionally, Dio Wang of Western Australia was elected to the Senate at a special election held in April 2014, after the original senate election in the state was voided by the Court of Disputed Returns. The PUP bloc thus had four senators when new members took their seats in July 2014. However, Lambie resigned to sit as an independent in November 2014, and Lazarus did the same in March 2015.

At state and territory level, Palmer United has previously been represented in the Parliament of the Northern Territory and the Parliament of Queensland. Two former Liberal National (and later independent) members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly joined the PUP in April 2013, while three former Country Liberal (and briefly independent) members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly joined the party in April 2014. Both of the Queensland members left to become independents again during 2014,^[2] while one of the NT members returned to the Country Liberals the same year.^[3] The party contested the 2014 South Australian, Tasmanian and Victorian state elections, but is yet to have candidates elected to any state or territory parliaments.

Background

Palmer announced in November 2012 he was considering reforming the United Australia Party, which had been folded into the present-day Liberal Party of Australia in 1945. He had been a longtime supporter of the federal National Party and the Liberal National Party of Queensland. Palmer's nephew, Blair Brewster, had applied to trademark the party name two months earlier.^[4] There was subsequent speculation it would join forces with Katter's Australian Party.^[4] A month following the party's founding, Palmer announced that the party would be renamed the "Palmer United Party" to avoid confusion with a separate party already registered with the Australian Electoral Commission, the Uniting Australia Party.^[1] It still brands itself as a revival of the old UAP; its website lists the three leaders of the original party—Joseph Lyons, Robert Menzies and Billy Hughes—as its former leaders.

Federal politics

Peter Slipper, the independent (formerly LNP) member for the Division of Fisher (and previously Speaker of the House of Representatives), joined the party on 11 May 2013.^[5] Hours after announcing his membership had been accepted, the party released a statement on its website announcing members had decided to revoke Mr Slipper's membership under clause D26 of the constitution of the party.^[6]

2013 election

In April 2013, Palmer announced he was relaunching the UAP with the goal of running candidates in the 2013 federal election and had applied for registration in Queensland.^[7][8] He told Lateline "It's a reformation of the original party".^[9] The party also endorsed candidates to run in the Senate.^[10] In the state of Victoria, two retired sportsmen were announced as Senate candidates; namely Australian rules football player Doug Hawkins and boxer Barry Michael.^[11]

In the 2013 election, Palmer won the Sunshine Coast-area seat of Fairfax with a 26.49 percent primary and 50.03 percent two-candidate preferred vote, a margin of 27 votes. Senate candidates Glenn Lazarus (a former player of the National Rugby League's Canberra Raiders, Brisbane Broncos and Melbourne Storm) and Jacqui Lambie were elected for Queensland and Tasmania on votes of 9.89 percent and 6.58 percent respectively. The nationwide vote in the Senate was 4.91 percent. The outcome of the Senate vote in Western Australia was disputed and the Australian Electoral Commission ordered a re-run of the vote for 5 April 2014.

2014 WA senate election

With a 12.34 percent vote, an increase of 7.33 percent, the party won a Senate seat at the Western Australian special Senate elections of April 2014.^[12] The Palmer United Party's candidate, Zhenya (Dio) Wang won the fifth of six available seats. The publicity for Wang was minor, while the party's advertising was prominent.^[13]

Following the April 2014 election, advertising monitoring company Ebiquity reported that PUP spent A$477,000 on 788 television commercial slots during the party's pre-election campaign. The amount exceeded the combined spending of the Liberal, Labor and Greens parties on campaign advertising.^[12]

Resignations

Resignation of Alex Douglas

On 11 August 2014, Queensland Palmer United Party MP Alex Douglas resigned from the party to become an independent citing cronyism: "When I resigned from the LNP in November, 2012, I publicly stated there was a culture in the LNP, and there still is, of looking after mates and relatives, and that I do not support these flawed ideas." ^[14]

Resignation of Francis Xavier Kurrupuwu

On 8 September 2014, Northern Territory Palmer United Party MP Francis Xavier Kurrupuwu resigned from the party and returned to the CLP, saying "there is no party structure in PUP and no help available". He said that Palmer had promised to give resources and staff to himself, Anderson and Lee, but had gotten "nothing" at all. He added that Palmer hadn't met with him at all since his initial defection. ^[15]

Resignation of Carl Judge

On 8 October 2014, Queensland's only remaining Palmer United Party MP Carl Judge resigned from the party to become an independent. ^[14]

Resignation of Jacqui Lambie

On 24 November 2014, Senator Jacqui Lambie resigned from the Palmer United Party, announcing that she would remain in the Senate as an independent.^[16] Lambie's resignation followed several weeks of disagreements with party leader Clive Palmer, culminating in her voting with a group of senators calling themselves the "coalition of common sense" in passing a disallowance motion on legislation supported by PUP to repeal the Future of Financial Advice reforms introduced by the previous Labor government.^[17]

Resignation of Alison Anderson and Larisa Lee

On 29 November 2014, Northern Territory MPs Alison Anderson and Larisa Lee announced they were resigning from the Palmer United Party to sit as independents. Anderson stated that she and Lee could no longer tolerate the "absolute chaos" in a party that had become a "national disgrace". She also accused the PUP of doing almost nothing to connect with them.^[18]

Resignation of Glenn Lazarus

On 13 March 2015, Queensland Senator Glenn Lazarus announced his resignation from the Palmer United Party, accusing Clive Palmer of bullying, swearing and yelling at people. Lazarus stated "I have a different view of team work. Given this, I felt it best that I resign from the party and pursue my senate role as an independent senator." His wife Tess Sanders-Lazarus joined in, saying "I did make it clear to Clive that I was not happy with being bullied and spoken to using foul language." Palmer responded by sacking her, and then denying their accusations. ^{[19] [20]}

State and territory politics

Northern Territory

In April 2014, three independent members of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly – Alison Anderson, Larisa Lee, and Francis Xavier Kurrupuwu – joined Palmer United, with Anderson becoming the party's leader in the territory.^[21][22] The trio had resigned from the ruling Country Liberal Party (CLP) during the previous month, leaving the CLP with a one-seat majority in the unicameral Northern Territory Parliament.^[23] After the MPs joined Palmer United, Campbell Newman, the Premier of Queensland, suggested Clive Palmer was attempting to "buy votes", which resulted in Palmer initiating defamation proceedings against Newman.^[24][25] The PUP is not registered with the Northern Territory Electoral Commission,^[26] but the party already meets the NTEC's eligibility requirements for registration because it is "registered under the Commonwealth Electoral Act".^[27][28] However, Francis Xavier resigned from the party to rejoin the CLP shortly after, and Lee and Anderson resigned to become Independents in November.

Queensland

The United Australia Party (UAP) was registered with the Electoral Commission of Queensland (ECQ) on 5 June 2013.^[29] Alex Douglas and Carl Judge, the members for Gaven and Yeerongpilly, respectively, in the Queensland Legislative Assembly, joined the party the following day, having announced their intention to join the week before.^[30] Both had been elected as Liberal National Party MPs at the 2012 state election, but fell out with the LNP and resigned from the party later that year, sitting as independents in the interim.^[31][32] The party remained registered with the ECQ under the United Australia Party name until 28 February 2014, when its registration was updated to reflect the change to Palmer United Party.^[33][34] The proposed name change had been announced late the previous year,^[35] with Douglas announcing it in parliament on 20 November 2013.^[36] Douglas quit the party and sat as an independent from August 2014, and Judge followed suit two months later.^[37]

PUP contested its first Queensland state election in 2015. Its state leader was John Bjelke-Peterson, son of former Queensland Premier Joh Bjelke-Peterson.^[38] PUP had a poor run-up to this election. Although actively stopping a number of unpopular federal education and health reforms in the Senate, Lambie's decision to leave the party following the departure of Carl Judge and Alex Douglas at a state level, made PUP appear to be in disarray. To many the selection of Bjelke-Peterson and a strange internet election advertisement featuring Palmer raised questioned about the sincerity of PUP. This was reflected in the pre-election polling that had PUP at less than 4%. To complicate matters, Clive Palmer was sick during much of the campaign missing the election launch. This left the inexperienced Bjelke-Peterson to do most of the electioneering. Despite these difficulties, PUP managed to field 50 candidates out of a possible 89 electoral districts in Queensland. PUP policies included; a First Farm Buyers Loan Scheme, Removing Pay Tax, Tightening Restrictions on Coal Seam Gas and a Rooftop Solar Package.^[39] The PUP received 5.1% of first preference votes.^[40] A final twist to the campaign was when the PUP candidate for Ferny Groves, Mark Tavener, was revealed to be an undischarged bankrupt.^[41] This meant that he was ineligible to run as a candidate.

South Australia

Two independent candidates at the 2014 South Australian state election were endorsed by Palmer United.^[42] Ngoc Chau Hunyh and Kristian Rees (a former soccer player who finished his career at the Clive Palmer-owned Gold Coast United) ran on a combined ticket for the Legislative Council, and polled 1.6 percent without either being elected.^[43] The party had failed to achieve registration by the required date, with the election held on the same date as the Tasmanian state election.^[44]

Tasmania

After an appeal against the party's registration was dismissed in the Supreme Court of Tasmania, Palmer United was registered with Tasmanian Electoral Commission (TEC) on 17 February 2014, and was subsequently one of seven parties to contest the March 2014 state election.^[45] The party polled 4.97 percent of first-preference votes in the House of Assembly, but did not win a seat. It achieved its best result in the Division of Braddon, where its candidates polled 7.18 percent to finish ahead of the Tasmanian Greens, and third overall, behind the Liberals and Labor.^[46] Kevin Morgan, a former public servant who stood in Braddon, was the party's leader during the election,^[47][48] while Barbara Etter, the former CEO of the Integrity Commission Tasmania and a former assistant commissioner of Western Australia Police, was deputy leader, standing in Denison.^[49][50] Palmer United and the Liberals were subject to TEC investigations over claims they had breached electoral advertising rules by publishing the name and photos of opposing candidates without their permission.^[51] The party reportedly spent "more than $1 million on saturation advertising" during the campaign.^[52]

Media relations

As of late 2014, Andrew Crook and his firm Crook Media were employed to handle media relations for the Palmer United Party and Clive Palmer. Crook has handled public relations for Palmer effectively full-time since 2013.^[53] Andrew Crook is now a person of interest in Queensland Police Taskforce Maxima investigations. Palmer and the party are not implicated in any way.^[54]

Policies

• Party officials should not be lobbyists, thereby taking a strong position on paid political lobbyists, saving tax payers dollars and introducing fair policies.^[55]
• Establish an emissions trading scheme, another form of carbon pricing, that will not come into effect until other countries – US, China, EU, Japan and Korea – also establish such a scheme.^[56][57]
• Revising the current Australian government refugee policy to ensure Australia is protected and refugees are given opportunities for a better future and lifestyle.^[55]
• Creating mineral wealth to continuously contribute to the welfare of the Australian community. This will be achieved by utilising mineral resources from Queensland and Western Australia, and incentives from the Commonwealth of Australia to establish downstream processing in the States of Victoria, New South Wales and South Australia; and exporting products at a higher dollar value, thereby creating more revenue, jobs, tax and more facilities.^[55]
• Establishing a system where people create wealth in various parts of the country and for that wealth to flow back to the community that generates the wealth.^[55]
• Closing down detention centres for asylum-seeker boat arrivals: "... abolish the detention camps, restore our navy to its traditional role, save the lives of children and families, keep families together and recognise the legitimate rights of those that have a lawful reason for entering Australia."^[58]
• Moving towards free trade and closer economic relations with Asia.^[58]
• Decentralisation and regional self-government, such as a new North Queensland state.^[59][60]
• Encouraging competitive markets by restricting monopoly and prohibiting unfair trading practices.^[58]
• Abolish higher education fees.^[61]

Electoral performance

House of Representatives

Election	Leader	Votes	%	Seats	+/–	Position	Government
2013	Clive Palmer	709,035	5.49	1 / 150	1	5th	Crossbench

Senate

Election	Leader	Votes	%	Seats	+/–	Position	Government
2013	Clive Palmer	658,976	4.91	3 / 76	3	4th	Crossbench

See also

• List of political parties in Australia
• Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party

References

External links

• Official website
• Memo of understanding between the Palmer and Motoring parties

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