In this case, there is a similar but less pronounced tail of lopsided seats on the Coalition side but there is also one on the Labor side, and Labor slightly underachieves in its own 0-10% range. This would hurt it in 2010 where the 2PP in classic seats was 50.02 to Labor but the Coalition won two more classic seats than Labor did, although Labor should have had an advantage based on personal votes. Four of the lopsided Labor seats shown here have since become Labor vs Greens seats, but most of the rest are the Watson/Chifley/Calwell/Scullin type outer suburban seats that are now transitioning away from Labor (and in some of which Labor faces potential Muslim voter problems at the upcoming elections). Since 2007, Labor's spreading of its two-party vote in the seats it wins has become more efficient and the Coalition's has become less. A more extreme version of this pattern was seen in the 2022 Victorian state election.
ELECTORAL, POLLING AND POLITICAL ANALYSIS, COMMENT AND NEWS FROM THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CLARK. FIRST WE TAKE DRIP TWITTER ... HANG ON, WHO WOULD WANT DRIP TWITTER?
Sunday, July 21, 2024
Effective Vote Spreading: Labor's Hidden Hero At The 2022 Federal Election
In this case, there is a similar but less pronounced tail of lopsided seats on the Coalition side but there is also one on the Labor side, and Labor slightly underachieves in its own 0-10% range. This would hurt it in 2010 where the 2PP in classic seats was 50.02 to Labor but the Coalition won two more classic seats than Labor did, although Labor should have had an advantage based on personal votes. Four of the lopsided Labor seats shown here have since become Labor vs Greens seats, but most of the rest are the Watson/Chifley/Calwell/Scullin type outer suburban seats that are now transitioning away from Labor (and in some of which Labor faces potential Muslim voter problems at the upcoming elections). Since 2007, Labor's spreading of its two-party vote in the seats it wins has become more efficient and the Coalition's has become less. A more extreme version of this pattern was seen in the 2022 Victorian state election.
Wednesday, July 3, 2024
The Payman Suspension
Party-hopping is becoming a pretty common occurrence in Australian federal politics. The last time the Reps managed to complete a term without anyone quitting or being kicked out of their party in either house was way back in 1983-4, and that was a term with more than a year lopped off it by an early election. Since then there's been an average of three defections/expulsions per term, with the last four terms scoring four, eight, four and so far five, and the five seems about to be six.
Genuinely interesting policy defections aren't abundant among the 42 I found in the last 40 years. This roughly annual event seems to most often happen as a result of internal tensions, especially in minor parties. Deselection and/or misbehaviour are also common triggers. There was a Voice policy dimension to the recent departures of Andrew Gee from the Nationals and Lidia Thorpe from the Greens, but both were isolated cases that did not turn into broader breakaway movements from the party. We now have at least the prospect (it could well happen tomorrow) that WA Senator Fatima Payman will leave the ALP, which will be a first case for the Australian federal party of an issue that has plagued its UK counterpart for years - losing or deciding to lose MPs for their positions re the Middle East.
If Payman leaves the party this will be the first defection from the Government in this term. For comparison the Hawke/Keating government lost by my count just two MPs in 13 years, the first of them coming after ten years being Keith Wright who was kicked out after recontesting as an independent after being disendorsed. The Howard government had three defections even not counting Pauline Hanson in its first term, another in its third and an internal party-switch in its fourth. The Rudd/Gillard government's only casualty was Craig Thomson, while the Abbott/Turnbull/Morrison government had six in nine years (Jensen, Bernardi, Banks, Kelly, McMahon and tokenly Christensen).
Tuesday, June 25, 2024
"Freedom Parties" Did Not Cost One Nation A WA Senate Seat
Monday, June 17, 2024
Ralph Babet Was Elected Fair And Square. I Know It's Hard But Try To Deal With It
For the avoidance of any doubt at all, I'll start with my view of the subject of this article. Most of what I see of United Australia Party Senator Ralph Babet is his social media output, and it is awful. He delivers dumbed-down denser-than-even-Sky-News versions of what were in general stupid ideas to begin with (MAGA nonsense, supposed conspiracies against Christians and western culture, whining about "wokeness", gender, sexuality and multiculturalism, and baiting people who would rather at least try not to get COVID). Babet is perhaps our purest yet elected example of what happens when you spend way too long inhaling what Christopher Hitchens called "the exhaust fumes of democracy", and then attempt to breathe them out. His Senate career so far has been even cringier than very early Jacqui Lambie. As with Bob Katter, the concussed-sounding nuttiness of Babet's output frequently leads to debates about whether he's just harmlessly insane or whether some of what he's saying might dangerously affect a few impressionable chaps out there. Think you can tell I'm not a fan.
Saturday, June 15, 2024
The Draft Boundaries Would Not Put Labor On The Edge Of Minority
The current round of draft redistributions is complete with the release of the NSW proposal today, following the Victorian and WA proposals two weeks ago. While the Victorian redistribution led to an outbreak of unsound psephology with false claims that the Kooyong redistribution greatly favoured the Liberal Party (I wrote about this for Crikey), the NSW washup has been pretty sensible, for the first day at least. One thing I have seen that seems hard to credit is the idea that Kylea Tink, whose seat is proposed to be abolished, would win the now even more marginal Bennelong off two major parties fighting tooth and nail for it. This is a general article about the impact of the draft changes. A note that I am not a primary source for redistribution margin estimates, and am here largely relying on the work of Ben Raue, William Bowe and Antony Green for those.
The Victorian draft proposes that part of the boundary of Kooyong expands to take in part of Higgins. The key issue in the shortlived Frydenberg-comeback debacle was that there's no obvious way to project how an independent would have done if their seat is expanded into an area they didn't previously run in. One can use the 2022 preference flows from the present Kooyong to distribute votes for Labor and the Greens et al between the Liberals and Monique Ryan (IND) as if Ryan had been running in the new bits, but that means assigning Ryan a primary vote of zero in the new part. It's saying that voters who would vote 1 Ryan 2 Liberal, for instance, don't exist in the new bit, but we know they do exist in the old bit, or she would not have won the seat.
Wednesday, May 29, 2024
EMRS: The Election Chaos Hasn't Moved The Dial
Seat estimate for these primaries unchanged from election (14-10-5-3-3-0)
Better Premier Rockliff leads Winter 40-32 (lead up 5) but new leaders usually underperform on this score
Sunday, May 19, 2024
Budget Week Rolling Poll Roundup
Sunday, May 12, 2024
Why Does Suspending Standing Orders In The Tasmanian Assembly Require A Two-Thirds Majority?
UPDATE: Following this article - and I have been told this article had some influence - the House on 14 May suspended Standing Orders 358 and 359 for the current Session, replacing them with this:
Any Standing Orders or Orders of the House, except Standing Order No. 94, may be
suspended on a Motion duly made on Notice or without Notice, provided that such
Motion has the concurrence of a majority of the Members present."
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One thing that I have noticed in Tasmania's parliamentary debates that I find strange is that suspending standing orders without notice requires a two-thirds majority. In the Standing and Sessional Orders from the previous term this appears as item 358:
"358 Standing Orders not suspended without Notice.
In cases of urgent necessity any Standing Order or Orders of the House, except Standing Order No. 94, may be suspended on a Motion duly made without Notice, provided that such Motion has the concurrence of a two-thirds majority of the Members present.
359 Motion for suspension carried by majority.
When a Motion for the suspension of any Standing Order or Orders appears on the Notice Paper, such Motion may be carried by a majority of the Members present."
(Standing Order 94, for anyone wondering, is the procedure for rescinding previous votes, which requires three days notice and, if the decision is less than a year old, support of an absolute majority).
Saturday, May 4, 2024
Legislative Council 2024: Elwick, Hobart and Prosser Live
Hobart: CALLED 9:01 pm Cassy O'Connor (GRN) wins (final margin was 59.7-40.3)
Live comments (scrolls to top)
All numbers posted here are unofficial. Check the TEC site for current figures. Comments will appear here once counting starts - refresh every 10 mins or so for updates. Note that Green in Prosser is Bryan Green the Labor candidate not the Greens.
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Final Wrapup And The Road Ahead
It's all over bar a trivial number of votes to be added in the next week and these are the party standings in the new Legislative Council with the seat changes compared to the start of the year:
Saturday, April 27, 2024
The Tide Is Going Out For Queensland Labor
...and when the tide goes out in Queensland, they say that it goes out a long way ...
Yesterday's YouGov poll finding the Miles government trailing 44-56 led to a minor outbreak of poll denialism on social media (I've so far seen versions of A4, C4, C6, C8 and C9), but Steven Miles himself was not denying the polling at all, commendably admitting that it looked "most likely" that his government would lose in October. (Just whatever you do, Premier, don't actually concede before election day!) I haven't covered Queensland polling since I gave the Courier Mail a big roasting for some really bad poll reporting in December 2022 and a return to Queensland polls is overdue. It happens this time that the poll is so bad for Labor that even the Courier Mail can't spin it as much worse than it is.
It's worth noting that Queensland Labor during its nine years in power has often polled indifferently. In the 2015-7 term it trailed on 2PP in a third of the published polls, but never worse than 48-52. In the 2017-20 term there was less polling and there had been a few shabby looking numbers (again no worse than 48-52) before the COVID-19 pandemic arrived in 2020 and lifted all governing boats. The Palaszczuk government ended up slightly outperforming its final polling, but it was a very sparsely polled election. Going into the 2024 contest that is now just six months away, it looks like we might see a higher volume.
Sunday, April 14, 2024
Every Child Wins A Prize: Federal Seats With Swings To All Contestants
During last night's Cook by-election count there were a few comments about the swing column. All six parties/independents had recorded a positive swing from the 2022 election. In the case of Cook this was not at all surprising - three of the parties and the one independent had not even run in the seat in 2022, so their "swing" was automatically plus. The Greens were always going to get a primary vote swing with no Labor candidate and no prominent left/centre independent. That left the Liberals, and the question was whether they could gain enough primaries from the 34.6% who voted Labor, UAP or One Nation in 2022 to compensate for replacing a former Prime Minister and 17-year incumbent with some dude from outside the electorate. This they did with 7% to spare and lo and behold there's a neat little line of pluses in the swing column for the recontesting candidates:
This is a common event in by-elections where one major party doesn't contest. It has happened by my count in 9 of 21 such by-elections in the last 50 years, the others being Perth and Batman 2018, Higgins 2009, Isaacs 2000, Holt 1999, Blaxland 1996, Wentworth 1995, and Menzies 1991. Perth 2018 achieved this feat despite having 15 candidates, however only three parties were recontesting. Blaxland 1996 had five recontestants - I should note that I treat an independent as such only if it is the same person running and doing so as an independent both times.
Saturday, April 13, 2024
2024 Cook By-Election: Well I Don't Think I Should Call It "Live", But Anyway ...
Tuesday, April 9, 2024
Tasmania 2024: Is This Hare-Clark's New Normal?
Changes from 2021-based notional result: LIB -3 ALP -1 GRN +1 JLN +3
Saturday, April 6, 2024
Legislative Council 2024: Elwick
This is my guide for the May 4th election for the Legislative Council seat of Hobart. On Wednesday I released a brief survey of the Council's voting patterns. Links to other seats: Hobart Prosser . There will be live coverage on the night of May 4th.
At the start of this year the Legislative Council consisted of four Labor, four Liberal and seven independents, with three of the independents strongly left-leaning, one centrist, and three somewhat right-leaning albeit still left of the Liberal Party. Council voting has also seen a rapid increase in "Laborial" bipartisan voting patterns where the major parties combine against some or all of the indies. The 2024 Legislative Council elections follow hot on the heels of an extremely messy lower house election, and for the first time since 1909 three seats fall vacant on the same day. The three vacancies are one Labor, one Liberal and a left independent, so the elections are very important for both the left-right balance of the Council and the independent-major party balance.
The election for Elwick is a by-election. The winner will hold the seat for four years rather than the usual six, and will be up for their first defence in 2028.
Friday, April 5, 2024
Legislative Council 2024: Hobart
This is my guide for the May 4th election for the Legislative Council seat of Hobart. On Wednesday I released a brief survey of the Council's voting patterns. Links to other seats: Prosser Elwick. There will be live coverage on the night of May 4th.
At the start of this year the Legislative Council consisted of four Labor, four Liberal and seven independents, with three of the independents strongly left-leaning, one centrist, and three somewhat right-leaning albeit still left of the Liberal Party. Council voting has also seen a rapid increase in "Laborial" bipartisan voting patterns where the major parties combine against some or all of the indies. The 2024 Legislative Council elections follow hot on the heels of an extremely messy lower house election, and for the first time since 1909 three seats fall vacant on the same day. The three vacancies are one Labor, one Liberal and a left independent, so the elections are very important for both the left-right balance of the Council and the independent-major party balance.
Thursday, April 4, 2024
Legislative Council 2024: Prosser
This is my guide for the May 4th election for the Legislative Council seat of Prosser. Prosser gets to go first because it has the most declared candidates! On Wednesday I released a brief survey of the Council's voting patterns. Links to other guides: Elwick Hobart . There will be live coverage on the night of May 4th.
At the start of this year the Legislative Council consisted of four Labor, four Liberal and seven independents, with three of the independents strongly left-leaning, one centrist, and three somewhat right-leaning albeit still left of the Liberal Party. Council voting has also seen a rapid increase in "Laborial" bipartisan voting patterns where the major parties combine against some or all of the indies. The 2024 Legislative Council elections follow hot on the heels of an extremely messy lower house election, and for the first time since 1909 three seats fall vacant on the same day. The three vacancies are one Labor, one Liberal and a left independent, so the elections are very important for both the left-right balance of the Council and the independent-major party balance.
Seat Profile
Prosser is a fairly large rural and satellite-town seat in the midlands, east and south-east of Tasmania (see map). Its largest population centres are Brighton, Dodges Ferry and Sorell (all in the south) and other significant centres include Bagdad, Bicheno, Campbell Town, Swansea, Triabunna, Nubeena and Oatlands. Industries include farming, fishing and what remains of forestry, but around Sorell there has been a rapid increase in young commuting families.
Tuesday, April 2, 2024
Legislative Council Voting Patterns 2020-24
This article is part of my Tasmanian 2024 Legislative Council coverage. Coverage of the lower house election continues with postcount articles accessible as follows:
Bass Braddon Clark Franklin Lyons Summary
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In the last four years, Tasmanian Labor has voted more often with the Liberal government than with any of the seven independents in the Legislative Council. The Liberals have voted more often with Labor than with five of the seven.
I think those are important takeaways to put right at the top of this year's annual curtain-raiser for my Legislative Council coverage. There are a couple of important aspects at stake at this year's election: not only the overall left-right balance of the chamber but also the balance of major parties vs independents (and where an endorsed Green would fit into that mix). While such an assessment might fuel concern about the growing "Laborial" mood in our upper house, there are cases where the major parties in my view get it right while the independents don't. OK, one case - a recent attempt to greatly reduce the scope of Section 196 of the Tasmanian Electoral Act.
Sunday, March 24, 2024
Tasmania Embraces Chaos: 2024 Election Tallyboard And Summary
2024 Tasmanian Postcount: Lyons
Notional 2021 7-Seat Result 4 Liberal 2 Labor 1 Green
SEATS WON: 3 Liberal 2 Labor 1 Green 1 JLN
2024 Tasmanian Postcount: Franklin
Notional 2021 7-Seat Result 3 Liberal 3 Labor 1 Green
SEATS WON: 3 LIB 2 ALP 1 IND 1 GRN
2024 Tasmanian Postcount: Clark
Notional 2021 7-Seat Result 2 Liberal 2 Labor 1 Green 2 IND
SEATS WON: 2 ALP 2 Lib 2 Green 1 IND
CALLED WINNERS: Ella Haddad (ALP), Josh Willie (ALP), Kristie Johnston (IND), Vica Bayley (Grn), Simon Behrakis (Lib), Helen Burnet (Grn), Madeleine Ogilvie (Lib)
2024 Tasmanian Postcount: Braddon
Notional 2021 7-seat result 4 Liberal 2 Labor 1 IND or 5-2
SEATS WON 3 Liberal 2 Labor 1 JLN
CALLED WINNERS Jeremy Rockliff (Lib), Felix Ellis (Lib), Anita Dow (ALP), Shane Broad (ALP), Roger Jaensch (Lib), Miriam Beswick (JLN)
EXPECTED: Craig Garland (IND) to beat Giovanna Simpson (Lib) after preferences. Greens eliminated.
2024 Tasmanian Postcount: Bass
2024 Tasmanian Election: Late Night Live
This is the late night live blog that fills the void between me finishing my Mercury coverage and unrolling all the seat pages. It will be used for quick updates over the next hour or so.
(Updates scrolling to top - refresh now and then)
1:30 Bass is final for night and I nearly have my page for it done.
12:54 An update in Franklin where the Liberals and O'Byrne have moved further ahead of the Greens.
12:48 Finally action in Bass where a first tranche of postals has done very little to the picture and improved JLN's chances but we need to see what the big prepolls do there.
12:30 An update is through in Clark and Labor have almost matched the Greens total - this is going to be an interesting one! Note that Helen Burnet has a high personal vote and a high profile and might do well off independent preferences.
12:25 The count in Bass appears to be stuck or have stopped with no web updates since around 10 pm. A small update in Lyons with Labor just in front of JLN on notional quotas. The Greens have dropped back a little but only need to beat one of these two.
12:10 A note on count progress: Provisionally the TEC will finish tomorrow whatever it doesn't get done tonight as concerns prepolls and early postal batches. After tomorrow it does not expect to post new figures until Thursday, and then it will be working Easter Monday prior to the start of the preference distribution the day after.
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Saturday, March 23, 2024
Tasmanian Election Day 2024
Live link to Mercury coverage here: https://www.themercury.com.au/news/politics/tasmanian-state-election-blog-with-political-expert-kevin-bonham/live-coverage/62c78a2ed4172adcfe9aa5ad77236ab9
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Well we're here again, wherever here is. What a weird ride this has been.
Tonight the Rockliff Liberal government chases history, for never in Tasmania has a government won four majorities at elections in a row. Four governments including the current one have won three*. If the polls are right, history is unlikely to be caught. One piece of history will be made today with the restoration of the house to 35 MPs.
Tonight I will be doing live coverage for The Mercury. The link will be edited in to this article when available. It may be paywalled but there is usually a cheap introductory subscription for non-subscribers. My live blog for the Mercury will probably start somewhere around 6:30 and go until not later than 11; it may be wound down late at night as I do interviews and if I need to file an article. I will be based at the tally room. I ask media outside of the Mercury not to contact me by phone or email between 5:30 and about 11 tonight; once I have finished the live coverage I should be available quickly for other interviews (feel free to say hi in the tally room when I don't look too busy to arrange). Scrutineers are very welcome to send me news and figures by phone or email.
There may be a "late night live" thread. My plan, energy permitting, is to post postcount threads overnight (between 1-4 am) for all five Assembly electorates. I will be home tomorrow and available for interviews but no calls or texts before 9 am except if booked tonight. Also no interviews between 3-5 pm.
My main guide page is here with links to individual electorate guides and effective voting advice. For those seeking voting advice, I recommend to number all the boxes or at the least to number every candidate who you think is OK or better. This may make your vote more powerful and it cannot harm your preferred candidates. If you vote 1-7 for a party and stop, your vote can play no role in determining which other parties are successful. Check that you have not doubled or skipped any numbers, especially not between 1 and 5. Do not use ticks or crosses.
Thursday, March 21, 2024
2024 Tasmanian Polling Aggregate
Tasmania 2024: Yet Another Mystery Poll
This article is part of my 2024 Tasmanian state election coverage. Click here for link to main page with links to effective voting advice and seat guides.
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UPDATE 22/3: The Mercury has revealed that this poll was by high-quality pollster Freshwater Strategy and taken about a fortnight ago, and the Fontcast has announced it was THA-commissioned, New details are also that the Greens are on 13 and Independents 11 in Lyons, the Greens are on 10 in Bass (apparently leaving about 13.7 for independents and others), independents are on 10 in Braddon (leaving about 13.8 for Greens and others) and 28 in Clark (Greens on 20), and in Franklin the Greens are on 13 and independents on 17.
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Original article
After a reasonably polling-rich start to the 2024 Tasmanian campaign, little polling has been seen recently, with the youngest public poll 16 days out of the field as I write. This creates a fair amount of uncertainty regarding whether anything has happened with voting intention in what has been a noisy and bumpy campaign. In particular, has the fact that the Liberals are ahead and are the only party that any poll has had within, say, 5% of a plausible majority result, caused any late bandwagon effect to their side? (I should note that bandwagons to a party capable of forming majority government don't always happen. The two elections where conspicuous bandwagons did occur were 2006 and 2018 but for both these elections other factors could be cited.)
Today Sky News has released some figures from a poll by an unnamed pollster and source and have said they have been asked not to name. As is too often the case Sky have failed to report on the polling dates. What we have is a purported seat breakdown probably by someone with not much of a clue about how Hare-Clark works (14-9-4-4-4) and primary votes for the majors and JLN only.
The primary votes reported are:
Bass Lib 40.28 ALP 25.87 JLN 10.2 (leaving 23.68)
Braddon Lib 49.24 ALP 14.65 JLN 12.28 (leaving 23.83)
Clark Lib 25.35 ALP 21.37 (leaving an enormous 53.28)
Franklin Lib 33.23 ALP 27.4 JLN 8 (leaving 31.39)
Lyons Lib 38.46 ALP 23.26 JLN 11.2 (leaving 27.18)
Sunday, March 17, 2024
There Aint No Stability Clause
This article is part of my 2024 Tasmanian state election coverage; main page includes a link to effective voting guide and candidate guides and other articles.
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I feel somehow responsible, but it is probably coincidence. A few days ago I decided to put a bit of low-level Hung Parliament Club propaganda back in its box by explaining why I do not support four year fixed terms for Tasmania. Among other things they infringe undesirably on the Premier's ability to seek a fresh mandate when the Parliament goes pearshaped. I explained at the bottom why I do not consider New Zealand style party hopping laws to be an alternative solution. Days later, along comes the government with a policy for ... New Zealand style party hopping laws. What hell is this?
For those who came in late, we are here in part because the former Gutwein Liberal Government preselected one Lara Alexander to run as a candidate for Bass in 2021. She wasn't seen in the campaign except for her campaign manager complaining that she was being muzzled. She got next to no votes but was later elected on a recount. It has subsequently transpired that Alexander is a very odd politician - in particular her talent for inscrutable and apparently self-contradictory comments about confidence in government. Had the Liberals allowed her to speak for herself before nominations closed this would probably have been obvious within minutes and they could have disendorsed her and picked somebody else. But they didn't. We are also here because - for some reason that has never been explained though I've wondered if it was anything to do with this - the Government later decided to make a former TV presenter Primary Industries minister instead of a career farmer, and the latter started or continued accumulating grudges.
This is not the first time the Liberals have had unity problems - in the previous term Sue Hickey nabbed the Speakership against her party's nominee Rene Hidding and then voted against party policy on gender birth certificate reforms and mandatory sentencing. However Hickey remained a Liberal until she was disendorsed, precipitating the 2021 election.
Saturday, March 16, 2024
Ipswich West and Inala Live
Ipswich West (ALP 14.4% - resignation of Jim Madden (ALP)
Labor loses seat with 2PP swing of around 18%
Inala (ALP 28.2% - resignation of Annastacia Palaszczuk (ALP)
Labor retains with 2PP swing in low 20%s.
Comments scrolling to top - refresh every 15 mins or so during counting for new comments
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11:30 End of night wrap: Although the ABC haven't called this seat yet for some reason, I want to make it clear there is no coming back for Labor in Ipswich West and why I called it hours ago. They are currently over 1300 behind on 2PP counted votes, but adding in primary votes yet to be added that jumps out to over 1500, and it will probably be more (or at least not substantially less) after preferences. And then, apart from the pretty standard Yamanto booth that has not reported yet (assuming it will do so) there are only about 3000 postals to come and there would have to be a swing to Labor on them, which there will not be (though they may not swing nearly as badly as the booths). There is nothing in the booth counts to suggest any errors either. [UPDATE 12:00 Many postals have now been added and have been similar to the booth swing.]
I expected both of these to go over the historic swing averages (in the case of Inala as adjusted for a Premier retirement) but they have done so by close to 10%. They are reminiscent of the famous Stafford and Redcliffe beltings suffered by the Newman government on the way to the enormous swing against it in 2015. I am not expecting the Miles Labor government to suffer anything like so large a swing at this year's election but I have for a long time been expecting Labor to lose in October and to probably do so decisively (but it might yet be close). This is simply what is to be expected given that it will be a nearly ten year old government that is the same party as the party in power federally.
Aside from the LNP, tonight's other winner is Legalise Cannabis who have again done very well in a by-election, including beating One Nation in a seat where One Nation was finishing second at a general election as recently as 2017.
Thursday, March 14, 2024
Why I Don't Support Fixed Four Year Terms For Tasmania
Tuesday, March 12, 2024
uComms: Labor Just 23: How Much Stock Should We Put In This?
Seat estimate if poll was accurate Lib 14 ALP 10 Green 4 JLN 2-3 IND 4-5
Poll should be treated with caution.
Tuesday, March 5, 2024
Redbridge Says It's A Multi-Party Mess As Voters Flee Liberals
My estimate 13-14 Liberal 10-12 ALP 4-5 Green 2-3 JLN 2-6 IND
The second Tasmanian campaign poll by an established and known pollster is out, with Victorian-centred outfit Redbridge releasing its first ever public poll of Tasmanian voting intention. The sample size is smallish (753 voters) and the sample is spread out over two weeks (Feb 14-28).
They have also released these combined breakdowns: Bass/Braddon/Lyons Liberal 35 Labor 27 Green 11 JLN 14 Other 14, Clark/Franklin Liberal 30 Labor 31 Greens 18 JLN 4 (ie 8 in Franklin as not running in Clark) Other 17
There is more to come on this poll, including one of the most amusing crosstabs you will ever see, but for now just a quick note on the voting intention numbers. The Redbridge numbers are significantly worse for the Liberals than both the EMRS public poll and the huge-sample mystery poll of unknown veracity and quality, and very similar to the YouGov poll from January, except that they have treated the Lambie and IND/others votes more normally. (They've only listed parties in seats they are running in.)
Redbridge have released a seat estimate of 12 Liberal 11 Labor 6 Green 3 JLN 3 Independent based on modelling off mini-samples. I would expect off these state primaries (based on testing them against my model of the recent EMRS breakdowns) that the Greens would not do quite so well; six seats off 14% would be very lucky. I got estimates of 13-14 Liberal, 10-12 ALP, 4-5 Green, 2-3 JLN and 2-6 IND for these numbers.
Sunday, March 3, 2024
How To Best Use Your Vote In The 2024 Tasmanian Election
This piece is part of my Tasmanian 2024 election coverage - link to main guide page including links to my electorate guides and other articles.
This piece is written to explain to voters how to vote in the 2024 Tasmanian election so their vote will be most powerful. It is not written for those who just want to do the bare minimum - if you just want to vote as quickly as possible and don't care how effective your vote is then this guide is not for you. It is for those who care about voting as effectively as possible and are willing to put some time into understanding how to do so.
Please feel free to share or forward this guide or use points from it to educate confused voters. Just make sure you've understood those points first! I may edit in more sections later.
Please do not ask me what is the most effective way to vote for a specific party or candidate as opposed to in general terms.
Oh, and one other thing. Some people really agonise about their votes, spend many hours over them and get deeply worried about doing the wrong thing. Voting well is worth effort, but it's not worth that. The chance that your vote will actually change the outcome is low.
Effective Voting Matters!
I'll give a recent example of why effective voting matters. In 2021 the final seat in Clark finished with 10145 votes for Liberal Madeleine Ogilvie, 9970 votes for independent Kristie Johnston and 8716 votes for independent Sue Hickey. As there were no more candidates to exclude at this point Hickey finished sixth while Ogilvie and Johnston took the last two seats. Had the two independents had 1606 more votes in the right combination, Ogilvie would have lost instead, and the Liberals would not have won a majority. But during the count, 2701 votes had been transferred from Labor and Green candidates to "exhaust". All these were voters who did not number any of Ogilvie, Johnston and Hickey. Many would have voted 1-5 for Labor and Green candidates (mostly Labor) and then stopped. There were enough votes that left the system because voters stopped numbering that the outcome could have been different.
Making Seats "Marginal" At By-Elections Is Meaningless
Last night saw the Labor government get the good end of the stick in the Dunkley by-election, easily retaining a seat that was precariously above the long-term average swing for government vacancy by-elections. It's no disaster for the Liberals who have got a modest swing with some mitigating factors but they (especially Jane Hume) were out in force last night spinning the outcome as a triumph. Together with the usual nonsense about first-term governments not in recent decades losing seats and governments not losing by-elections caused by deaths (both based on trivially small sample sizes) I heard a lot about how they had turned Dunkley marginal and they were coming for the seat.
Marginal seat status where a seat is retained is determined by general election results not by-elections (so Dunkley is no more a marginal seat than it was before), but this made me wonder, does getting a seat inside the marginal range at a by-election predict anything at all? I've found that such seats have historically almost always been retained by the government at the next election, although on average the election-to-election swing has been worse than the national average in such cases. The idea that the Liberals have put Dunkley in serious danger next time with a swing that is not even bog-average for a government vacancy by-election has no basis.
Saturday, March 2, 2024
Dunkley By-Election Live
By-election caused by death of Peta Murphy (ALP)
Friday, March 1, 2024
Mystery Poll: Why Are We Still Playing This Game?
(This is part of my 2024 Tasmanian election coverage. For main page with links to all other pages go here.)
Today's Mercury carried a front-page report of a "phone poll" of Tasmania with a massive sample size of 4000 voters. Unfortunately the newspaper report did not state who the poll was done by or for, making it impossible to immediately assess how useful it was. I have been told (officially unconfirmed) that it is for the Tasmanian Hospitality Association and do not yet know the pollster, though the large sample size is most often seen with automated polls like uComms. (I should also add that Community Engagement was reported in the field by some people early in the campaign, but the issues questions I was told about were different.)
Anyway, at the risk of sounding like a broken record or even more like a polling analyst with severe frustration management issues, it should be required by law for all media reports of polling to state the pollster and the commissioning source. (Or if not known, all details should be published as this often makes the poll easy to identify). Media frequently express frustration with governments that are not being transparent. They must lead the way by reporting basic polling details better and refusing to allow sources to supply polls on the condition that the pollster should not be named. This is especially so when they run Your Right To Know campaigns. As for sources who try to prevent media from publishing the details of polls they supply, those should be classified as "juvenile career criminals".
For what it's worth, this looks like neutral polling by someone who actually wants to know the answer, and not a loaded poll released for political purposes. That doesn't mean it's necessarily good in quality terms, but it's worth checking out especially if we get clearer details.
Wednesday, February 28, 2024
EMRS: Liberals Have Big Lead But Still Well Short Of 50
Liberals would clearly be largest party
Advance Comments
A quarterly poll by Tasmania's most experienced state pollster EMRS, which has a rather good track record, has just dropped. It shows a complex scenario that is also, if correct, a sorry one for Labor. This poll will have the Liberals happy in that it has them as the only party within reach of a majority while Labor are bleeding votes to independents and JLN. It follows a YouGov poll that differed mainly in having the Liberals in the low 30s and a much higher Lambie vote. The poll suggests that if there is a hung parliament, it will be one where Labor will only be able to govern deeply in minority with multiple partners, while the Liberals may have simpler paths to government if anyone will help them.
Sunday, February 25, 2024
Liberal Agrees Tasmanians Are Ostriches
It's been widely expected that when Tasmania's supposed AFL team name is unveiled days out from the election (hmmm) the name will be the Devils, Warner Bros' outrageous trademark nonsense based on their cartoons about our animal notwithstanding. Just in case "Devils" isn't available, I've been scratching my head for an alternative, and I've found one. We can follow the lead of Liberal Bass candidate Julie Sladden and we can call our team the Tassie Ostriches! Here is a jumper mockup.
Saturday, February 17, 2024
2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide: Lyons
This is the Lyons electorate guide for the 2021 Tasmanian State Election. (Link to main 2024 election preview page, including links to other electorates.) If you find these guides useful, donations are very welcome (see sidebar), but please only donate in these difficult times if you can afford to do so. Note: if using a mobile you may need to use the view web version option at the bottom of the page to see the sidebar.
Lyons (Currently 2 Liberal 2 Labor 1 IND).Friday, February 16, 2024
2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide: Franklin
This is the Franklin electorate guide for the 2024 Tasmanian State Election. (Link to main 2024 election preview page, including links to other electorates.) If you find these guides useful, donations are very welcome (see sidebar), but please only donate in these difficult times if you can afford to do so. Note: if using a mobile you may need to use the view web version option at the bottom of the page to see the sidebar.
Franklin (Currently 2 Liberal 1 Labor 1 Green 1 IND)2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide: Clark
This is the Clark electorate guide for the 2024 Tasmanian State Election. (Link to main 2024 election preview page, including links to other electorates.) If you find these guides useful, donations are very welcome (see sidebar), but please only donate in these difficult times if you can afford to do so. Note: if using a mobile you may need to use the view web version option at the bottom of the page to see the sidebar.
Clark (Currently 2 Liberal 1 Labor 1 Green 1 Independent)Thursday, February 15, 2024
2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide: Braddon
This is the Braddon electorate guide for the 2024 Tasmanian State Election. (Link to main 2024 election preview page, including links to other electorates.) If you find these guides useful, donations are very welcome (see sidebar), but please only donate in these difficult times if you can afford to do so. Note: if using a mobile you may need to use the view web version option at the bottom of the page to see the sidebar.
Braddon (Currently 3 Liberal 2 Labor).Wednesday, February 14, 2024
2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide: Bass
This is the Bass electorate guide for the 2024 Tasmanian State Election. (Link to main 2024 election preview page, including links to other electorates.) If you find these guides useful, donations are very welcome (see sidebar), but please only donate in these difficult times if you can afford to do so. Note: if using a mobile you may need to use the view web version option at the bottom of the page to see the sidebar.
Bass (2021 Result 3 Liberal 2 Labor, as at election 2 Liberal 2 Labor 1 IND)
North-east Tasmania including most of Launceston
Mixed urban/small-town/rural
2024 Tasmanian State Election Guide Main Page
POSTCOUNT
No party has won a majority but the Liberals are the largest party.
Seat postcount pages will be linked here when written.
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Welcome to the main page for my 2024 Tasmanian state election coverage. This page will carry links to all the other articles about the election that I write prior to the close of polling, and will contain general big-picture stuff and links to all the specialised articles (once these are written). It will be updated very frequently. Each electorate will very soon have its own guide page. Note that these are my own guides and I reserve the right to inject flippant and subjective comments whenever I feel like it; if you do not like this, write your own. This guide and all the others will evolve over coming weeks.
I will be covering the election counting night for the Mercury from the tally room; all post-count coverage will occur on this website.