Australia fails to rise up for Danny Nalliah

Rise Up Australia PartyBartholomew’s Notes on Religion reports that, contrary to their grandiose claim that the support they received in the general election would mark a “history making day for Australia”, Danny Nalliah’s rabidly Islamophobic Rise Up Australia Party received a mere 38,856 first pretence votes, representing 0.37% of the electorate.

However, as Richard Bartholomew points out, “the real point of such parties is to gain publicity and to nudge the mainstream parties in a particular direction rather than to win lots of votes; Nalliah is doubtless very happy with how the election went”.