Not-A-Poll Reset: Palaszczuk Resigns

It's time to reset the Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll in the sidebar after the resignation of Queensland Premier Annastacia Palaszczuk and her replacement by Steven Miles.  Yet again there was the appearance of a Labor leadership contest that could in theory have gone to a lengthy ballot but for the third time this year the potential contest evaporated.  Member ballots in the Labor Party have been effective in putting a stop to coup culture but far from giving members a much greater say in leadership contests they have instead resulted in there hardly being any contests!

Palaszczuk won the 2015 Queensland election from opposition in a stunning result after her party had been reduced to just seven seats in the 2012 landslide.  Initially governing in minority, she won a majority in 2017 and increased it in the 2020 pandemic election.  Palaszczuk's was in general a steady, middle of the road, almost apolitical government that did not arouse passions either way in the manner of its Victorian counterpart.  If politics in Queensland was not wildly exciting since 2015, Palaszczuk at least deserves credit for restoring it to sanity and stability after the chaos of the Bligh and Newman years.  She is also the only Australian female Premier thus far to win two elections, let alone three, and is still the only female Opposition Leader state or federal to lead her party into government. 

Palaszczuk's ratings were at times mediocre.  She had a -7 netsat in the final 2017 Newspoll, though this was far better than her opponent's.  She slipped to a net -15 in YouGov in early 2020 before being boosted into the low +30s by her handling of the lockdown phase later that year.  She was quite popular towards the end of 2022 but started recording her worst ratings in 2023, especially from mid-year on.  Voters perceived that she had been a good Premier but was no longer in touch.  

Not-A-Poll Gets One Right!

For the third time in its nine runnings so far Not-A-Poll has successfully predicted the next leader to depart, though it wasn't a majority.  

Tips for Palaszczuk to go next became more common as this round went on, with 28 out of 43 votes in December picking the right winner.  

Looking ahead to the new round, the Labor governments of Natasha Fyles and Steven Miles will be eight and nine and a half years old respectively at elections this year; both are federally dragged and behind in polling.  (NT Labor got abysmal numbers from a recent Redbridge, but polling in the NT is often hard to get even nearly right).  The ten year old Jeremy Rockliff government is not federally dragged but has lost its majority to defections and had at least one near escape from going to an election this year.  The federal election shouldn't be until after ACT, NT and Queensland at least but if all the leaders of those jurisdictions survive (which I'm not expecting) then one of Anthony Albanese and Peter Dutton might not be there come mid-2025.  

It will be interesting to see how Miles goes as a replacement with a relatively short run into the election.  For an incumbent Deputy he was not an overwhelming pick to take over the leadership when I ran opt-in Twitter soundings of my followers. Negative perceptions from the lockdown phase may still be affecting him and there have been some very critical comments about his political personality on social media sites.  (The most common I have seen suggest that he is smug and that he is too easily baited by journalists and opponents.)  It is interesting that Miles has flagged climate change as a priority - the Palaszczuk government was never conspicuously green and Labor will be under the pump from Greens hoping to gain a number of inner city seats at the election.  

As usual voting continues until someone goes, but a note that when people vote after an announcement that a leader is about to resign, I will delete those votes.