Jodie Belyea (ALP) vs Nathan Conroy (Lib) and others
Cause of by-election: Death of previous incumbent Peta Murphy
Outlook: interesting; seat margin is just above average swing for government vacancies
ELECTORAL, POLLING AND POLITICAL ANALYSIS, COMMENT AND NEWS FROM THE PEOPLE'S REPUBLIC OF CLARK. YES THE LORD'S PRAYER SHOULD BE REMOVED FROM THE TASMANIAN PARLIAMENT, IF YOU WANT A RELIGIOUS OBSERVANCE AT THE START OF EVERY SITTING DAY HAVE ONE TO THE CLUE FAIRY INSTEAD.
Populist minor party bubbles often happen in state elections. In the late 2017 SA Newspoll, Nick Xenophon's SA-Best was polling 32%, ahead of both major parties, and Xenophon himself was 5% ahead of both major party leaders combined as Better Premier. Was South Australia heading for Premier Xenophon? Just a few months and one of the worst ads in political history later, the juggermaut had ground to a halt, with the party polling 14.2% on election day and winning zero lower house seats.
And while One Nation did manage 22.7% in Queensland 1998, there have been plenty of other bursting bubbles: One Nation Queensland 2017, Palmer United Tasmania 2014 and Queensland 2015 and yes Jacqui Lambie Network Tasmania 2018 are other cases where minor parties that threatened to win several seats ended up with one seat or nothing. (Another one is Territory Alliance in the NT 2020 but that is a weaker example since the only poll that pointed to success there was an internal poll.) Campaigns often result in fourth parties being exposed as rabbles full of terrible candidates and contradictions. They can be outspent by big parties or simply sidelined from media debate because they won't be governing.