There were no problems with sufficient voting material or display hardware and after a short shower in the morning, the weather stayed fine. As you would know by now, I received 20% of the primary vote, much the same the vote recorded at the State election four years ago. I polled substantially higher in the Byron Shire than in Ballina Shire, which was much as we expected. Such a result is only possible with the willing assistance of our Greens members and other committed people in the community who value Greens principles.
It is wonderful that our booth organisers can call on so many willing people. I also thank those of you who participated in our pre-election events, and gave your time and your donations to this campaign. If the Greens are to be a real chance of toppling the Nationals, we must make a sustained effort to spread the Greens message in Ballina, Alstonville and Wollongbar. We have already begun this process. The Greens now have a small but committed group of members and supporters in Ballina Shire which we did not have when the campaign started.
Overall the Greens vote in NSW was the highest it has ever been. The really good news is that we gained two Greens members of the Legislative Council, Lee Rhiannon and John Kaye. They now join Ian Cohen and Sylvia Hale to make four Green representatives in the Upper House. We also polled over 30% in Marrickville and Balmain, over 20% in another three (Coogee, Ballina and Peter Debnam's seat of Vaucluse), and over 15% in another 10. Greens outpolled the Labor candidate in Vaucluse, Pittwater, Manly and North Shore.
While we did not break through into the Lower House and some local campaigns were expecting bigger swings, Greens everywhere can be proud of a massively successful campaign. We have built an excellent base for the Greens federal election campaign, coming on top of last year's breakthrough with the first Greens MPs taking their seats in the South Australian and the Victorian Upper Houses. It was a great honour and pleasure to be your candidate for the 2007 state election.
The campaign committee was ever cheerful, efficient and fun.
I look forward to working with you on the hustings in a few month’s time when we will be supporting our candidate in the seat of Richmond and working to get Senator Kerry Nettle re-elected.
Thank you again.
Cheers John Bailey
