Tasmanian Election Day 2025

Live coverage at this link on election night

This article is part of my Tasmanian 2025 election coverage.  Click here for link to main guide page including links to effective voting advice and seat guides.

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We're here again Tasmania.  It seems like only yesterday that I was writing such a piece, because it almost was.  Today ends the shortest gap between elections in any Australian state since Vince Gair's Labor government destroyed itself in Queensland 1957 and started 32 years in the wilderness.  

The 11-year old Rockliff Government is chasing history that it seems to be struggling to achieve yet again.  Not since 1921 in any Australian jurisdiction has a government been forced to an election by losing a no-confidence motion and survived.  Not since 1959 has a Tasmanian government that served a whole term without a majority survived, and not since 1964 has a government elected in minority done so.  (The Reece government gained a majority for a chunk of its term on a 1961 vacancy recount).  

Tonight I will be doing live coverage for Pulse Media which will be at the link below the picture above, unless advised otherwise.  There will probably be an intro comment up around 6-ish depending on logistics but expect the real action to start around 6:30 and go til around 11 or possibly later.  I will be based at the tally room.  I ask media other than Pulse not to contact me by phone or email between 5 pm and the end of the live coverage.  I may be available quickly after that for a few 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 here.  I may start postcount threads late tonight or they may be left til tomorrow morning.  For tomorrow, I will be available for interviews mostly though I will be pretty busy through to 4 pm and unavailable for up to an hour at times.  Media are not to call or text me between 1 am and 9 am unless booked tonight.  

Not-A-Poll Reset 1 of 2025: Dutton Loses Seat

This morning Sussan Ley became the first female federal leader of the Liberal Party, elected 29-25 over Angus Taylor.  Taylor was running on a ticket that included the insane proposition that Jacinta Nampijinpa Price, a member of the Liberal partyroom for five earth minutes, should become deputy leader.  This was especially crazy because Price was such a totemic candidate for the toxic idea that the Coalition should be more Trumpy (making her a shadow minister for government efficiency when they already had one was one of the Coalition's many mistakes).  

All this is not to say I would have been remotely keen to vote for Ley if I was a Liberal party room member either, in fact, given this choice, I could not have possibly voted for either.  While Taylor generally seemed to be making very little effort in the previous term, Ley on the other side struck me as trying too hard and serially out of her depth.  Most notably so when she criticised the AEC over voting interpretation rules for the Voice Referendum during the ticks and crosses beatup, when the Coalition had not made any attempt to change the legislation, but there were many other examples.  

The good news for the Liberals is it probably doesn't matter.  If Ley is a success well and good, and if she fails they can tick and flick the box of having had a female leader and use it as an excuse to not do that again in a hurry.  Their two-term strategy for winning in 2028 is a crash scene (in part because they tried to turn it into a one-term strategy and wasted seats like Menzies in the process) and realistically this term is about rebuilding, trying to finish off the teals with help from the new donations regime (if it survives the High Court) and seeing how they go thereafter.  

Not-A-Poll Reset 2 of 2024: Miles Defeated

Following Labor's heavy defeat in the Queensland election (and no it wasn't close) it's time to start another round of the sidebar Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll, which includes the six Premiers, the two Chief Ministers, the PM and the federal Opposition Leader.

Inheriting the job after Annastacia Palaszczuk resigned, Miles served for less than a year, the first Premier to not make it to a year in office since Rob Kerin (SA) in 2002.  This is the longest gap between cases with Premiers with such short tenures in history.  Leading a government that was federally dragged and almost a decade old, and coming to office with mixed personal perceptions, Miles was always at long odds to retain.  He did, however, not die wondering in his attempt to hold on to as many Labor seats as he could, and in my view the result could have easily been worse.

David Crisafulli scores the Coalition's first win from opposition in a state election since SA 2018 and takes over with the potential to be Premier for a long time.  My metaphorical advice to him to secure that longevity would be to install a ten-foot high portrait of Campbell Newman in his office and write across it "JUST DON'T BE THIS GUY".  

Not-A-Poll voters overwhelmingly got this one right.  The totals after deleting votes cast after 6 pm on election night (as I always do when the incumbent loses) were:

The new round is more interesting.  Albanese and Dutton go to an election in the next seven months, though it's possible that they could both survive it in their current roles; if Albanese does win will he go a full second term? Rockliff won an election earlier this year but his government has had a bumpy ride.  Barr just won another election and might retire sometime in the next 20 years, or lose an election in the next 60.  The rest are four first-termers elected from opposition (none facing elections before 2026) and two replacement Premiers.  Cook faces an election next year but is against a very weakened opposition, while Allan could be at risk in 2026 given the age of the government at that time.  

Not-A-Poll Reset 1 of 2024: Lawler Defeated

The Northern Territory election is over bar the odd seat in doubt with the CLP winning a crushing victory, the first loss by an incumbent Labor government since they won the 2022 federal election.  Lia Finocchiaro is the new Chief Minister and Eva Lawler has become the third NT Chief Minister to lose her seat (following Goff Letts who managed to still win the election and Adam Giles whose CLP was reduced to two seats - one of them Finocchiaro).  Finocchiaro follows Labor's Clare Martin (2001) as only the second female state or territory leader to win a majority from opposition in one go.  

Lawler was Labor's hospital-pass leader after Natasha Fyles succumbed to repeatedly having no idea what a conflict of interest was.  Historically the fate of third leaders in a term is grim, as was covered off in the poll launch article when Fyles resigned.  Lawler probably deserved better for her efforts to clean up the mess than being dumped from her seat with a 21% swing but Palmerston had had a gutful, as had north-east Darwin, and the NT's history of turbulent electoral swings continued.  Can Finocchiaro put a lasting end to the chaos?  

How did the sidebar Not-A-Poll go at predicting that Lawler would be next to get the boot?  This was one where the historic federal drag based argument that she would lose was pretty strong, but there were more votes overall for Steven Miles, who is up in a couple of months.  There were also more for Jeremy Rockliff, who had to deal with two hostile crossbench defectors then called an election that many people probably thought he was going to lose.  Because this site has a lot of Tasmanian readers, if some portion of the Tasmanian readers think the Tasmanian Premier is doomed then the Tasmanian Premier is likely to dominate the voting.  But Rockliff survived.

Looking at votes cast solely after the March 23 Tasmanian state election, Miles led with 91 votes to 70 for Lawler and just 40 for Rockliff and 15 for Dutton.  However late in this Not-A-Poll run awareness grew that Labor was at high risk of losing in the NT first, and from mid-June onwards Lawler received a plurality of votes, getting 44% of votes cast in August.   Not-A-Poll might have done better had the middle of this year not been a pretty quiet time for the site in terms of events that attract high interest levels.  

(A note that in theory Not-A-Poll should be closed during elections but I often forget.  So votes cast after the polls close for an election where the incumbent loses are deleted.)

Not-A-Poll did not do brilliantly re the NT election result either with a narrow plurality only tipping a CLP majority.

The way ahead

It's only two months before the ACT (on Oct 19) and Queensland (Oct 26) have their elections. The Miles government is generally expected to fall (and probably even more likely to do so off the NT's reassertion that federal drag is a theory and a fact).  There is no polling for the ACT where it is historically very difficult for anyone but Labor to win, so it would be brave for anyone to vote for Andrew Barr to be gone before Queensland, but maybe it could happen.  None of the others appear likely to succumb in the next two months though Rockliff has encountered some instability with two crossbenchers who were supporting him kicked out of their party, and the probably forced resignation of the Infrastructure Minister (who is also the Treasurer) from that portfolio.  

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 7. Do not use ticks or crosses.

Can Twitter "Polls" Predict Newspoll Changes? (Interim Results)

It's an almost annual tradition on this site to release something every Christmas Day. Click the Xmas tag for previous random examples.  Why do I do this?  Partly it's a present for those who like Christmas, which in a very low-key non-religious fashion includes your host, but it's also a present for those who don't want to deal with this particular Christmas or even generally cannot stand Christmas and just wish it was a normal day when normal things happened.  And what could be more normal than niche meta-psephology?  Therefore, the campaign against compulsory Christmasing brings you ... whatever this is.  

Over the past few years I've been running opt-in Twitter "polls" for the amusement of my followers there, similar to the Not-A-Polls in this site's sidebar. 

This started with the October 2020 Budget, because Budgets attract speculation about Budget bounces in party polling, but these bounces only rarely actually occur.  

The "poll" got this one wrong.  The Morrison government's 2PP rose by one point from 51 to 52.  

Not-A-Poll Reset 5 of 2023: Fyles Resigns

The most recent sidebar round of the Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll did not last very long!  It had been up just four days when NT Chief Minister Natasha Fyles followed Annastacia Palaszczuk out the door.  Fyles started her Chief Minister career as a popular choice to replace Michael Gunner and seemed for a while to be going well, with her party retaining a couple of loseable by-elections on her watch.  But early this year I started to hear anecdotally that stuff was going weird up there.  Again.

The government was under the pump for failing to control a sharp rise in crime (particularly property offences and assault including domestic violence).  It also appeared to be very unpopular, though a Redbridge poll implying something like a 40-60 drubbing across most of the Territory was likely to be on the harsh side.  (Somehow, even that poll didn't by itself move betting odds that had Labor at $1.25 vs $4!) But the killer was that Fyles herself came under criticism for a string of conflict of interest scandals involving mining and gas industry interests.  The news of undisclosed mining industry shares in the last week was one "I've declared everything ... oops no I haven't" too many and Fyles had to go.

Fyles is a rare case (in modern times) of a head of government who was neither elected at nor faced a general election; other examples in the last 50 years are Tom Lewis and Nathan Rees (NSW), Mike Ahern (Queensland), Ian Tuxworth (NT) and Trevor Kaine (ACT).  Lewis, Rees and Ahern were all rolled and their parties lost the next election (in the last two cases heavily and after the previous Premier was rolled as well).  Kaine's government came and went on the floor of parliament and he faced elections as Liberal leader at both ends of the term.  The only prior NT example, Tuxworth (CLP), quit to start the NT Nationals who soon sank without trace.  In that case the government survived the election, but with a 3.8% swing against it and the loss of three seats to defectors (one of them Tuxworth, barely).  

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 Reset: Andrews Resigns

After a brief appearance that there could be a challenge from Ben Carroll, Jacinta Allan has been anointed unopposed as the new Premier of Victoria, replacing Daniel Andrews who announced his resignation yesterday.  It's therefore time for another reset of the Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll, voting for which has commenced in the sidebar.

Andrews has given little reason for resigning other than that he just felt that it was time to move on after nearly nine years as Premier and before that four as Opposition Leader.  Andrews led his party back to Government in 2014 in a single term after a narrow shock loss in 2010.  He was massively re-elected in 2018 despite polls that had a merely comfortable victory, and won again in 2022 with a modest swing against him and no net seat loss.  The opposition might not have beaten him in 2026 either and will be greatly relieved that he has gone.

Not-A-Poll Reset: McGowan Resigns

Roger Cook was elected unopposed as the new WA Labor leader today as expected and is about to be sworn in as the new WA Premier following the resignation of Mark McGowan.  This means it's time to reset this site's Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll, voting for which is open in the sidebar.

McGowan resigned citing exhaustion after just over six years as Premier and almost eleven and a half years as party leader.  His electoral legacy is a thumping win from Opposition in 2017 followed by turning WA for the time being into a one-party state in 2021.  Influenced as the latter result was by COVID politics, federal drag with a potent sprinkling of Palmer dust and a remarkably hapless state Opposition, I don't expect to see a 69.7% 2PP in a state election again in my lifetime.  It's surreal to realise that it was not always such - not only did Labor lose the 2013 election heavily (for which McGowan was generally not blamed) but in 2016 there was a semi-serious push to not have him as leader at all despite polling evidence showing that his numbers were such that few Opposition Leaders could even dream of.  

Not-A-Poll Reset: Perrottet Defeated

 Chris Minns will be sworn in as the 47th Premier of New South Wales on Tuesday after decisively defeating Dominic Perrottet's Coalition.  It was a thumping win for Labor on a two-party basis, especially given the disadvantage of optional preferencing, but it seems a difficult pendulum has seen Labor unexpectedly pull up just short of a majority.  It's therefore time to reset this site's next-leader-to-go Not-A-Poll, which includes the Premiers, Chief Ministers, Prime Minister and federal Opposition Leader.   Voting in the sidebar is open.

Perrottet was the fourth Premier in a twelve-year government and ruled for just under one and a half years.  Expected to be an arch-conservative, he reinvented himself remarkably quickly.  He governed and campaigned with great energy, and was quite popular except for a mediocre reading in the final Newspoll, but no New South Wales government lasts that long without its share of scandals.  In the end the time factor, internal instability and probably a failure to deliver pay rises in the face of inflation cost him, as did his party's record on privatisation.  

Perrottet was the overwhelming pick on this site as the next leader to depart with nearly 70% of the vote.

It will be interesting to see what voters make of the new round though I suspect plenty of readers will vote for Peter Dutton as the obvious baddie in the field alone.

If nobody is rolled, Fyles, Barr and Palaszczuk have elections coming up scheduled for late 2024, while the federal election and Tasmanian election would both fall in the first half of 2025 if those governments went full term.  Dutton has a big by-election test next weekend and first-term opposition leaders don't always get to be around for more than two years, though he has no obvious leadership opponent at this stage.  There are also a few leaders who have been there for a while and might potentially retire during this term.   

Not-A-Poll Reset 4 For 2022: Morrison Defeated

With the announcement that Peter Dutton has been elected unopposed as Opposition Leader, it's time to reset this site's Not-A-Poll for the next leader to depart.  Scott Morrison resigned as Prime Minister after his government was defeated.  The defeat was probably a fairly narrow one in 2PP terms, but in seat share terms it was a disaster, with the Coalition crashing to its worst seat share in the history of the Liberal Party (very slightly worse than 1946 and 1983).  

Morrison's "miracle" win in 2019 gave him a reputation as a great marketer but the 2022 election showed both that this wasn't the case and that he had made himself and his party far less marketable.  Such was the extent of this that even a relatively gaffe-riddled campaign by Anthony Albanese and Labor's difficulties in inspiring primary voting enthusiasm from the left couldn't save him (in part because the gaffes were not about anything that voters cared about).  Morrison joins Andrew Fisher, Joseph Cook, Robert Menzies, Ben Chifley, Paul Keating and Kevin Rudd as leaders who won their first elections as leaders but lost their second. Keating is the most similar since he also took office as PM mid-term through a leadership contest (albeit a more straightforward one) and won an apparently unlikely victory, before being dumped in round two.  Recent PMs who have lost have tended to leave politics soon into their terms; at this stage Morrison intends to stick around but that may not be so welcome in his party.

Anthony Albanese joins Fisher, Cook, Joseph Lyons, Malcolm Fraser sort-of but technically not, Bob Hawke and Rudd as winners from Opposition at their first election as party leader.  But Albanese is the first of these to have served a whole term as Opposition Leader before winning - all the rest took over the job at some stage during the term.

These are the results of the recent (very brief) voting round.

Unsurprisingly Morrison was the crowd tip as the next leader to go, after four cases in which he was heavily backed but not the first to go.  Given that Peter Dutton is likely to last a while in the absence of an obvious rival (unless things go badly enough for Labor for even Morrison to be viable again), it will be interesting to see who voters in this round tip and whether they will be correct.  Only Daniel Andrews (this November) and Dominic Perrottet (next March) have elections coming up anytime soon.  Andrews no longer has the tailwind of a Liberal federal government, which could make the Victorian election more interesting, while Perrottet is no longer disadvantaged by Canberra factors but is the fourth leader of a government that will be 12 years old.  No one else currently looks at risk of being ousted, so the most likely scenario for other leaders would be retirement. 

Not-A-Poll Reset: Dropping Like Flies (Gunner Resigns)

Just over a month after Peter Gutwein resigned and under two months since Steven Marshall was defeated, we've lost our third Australian leader for the year with NT Chief Minister Michael Gunner checking out after just under six years in the role.  Gunner has thrown in the towel for family reasons without being the subject of any significant controversy (at least, nothing significant by NT standards).  He goes out with a fine electoral record, having led his party to a huge win against the chaos of the Giles regime in 2016 then retained government easily with a modest swing against in 2020.

These were the previous round's results.  Even less surprisingly than last time, hardly anyone expected that a state or territory leader would go before the federal election, though the percentage tipping a federal leader to be next to go did fall slightly from 93.3% to 90.4%.  

Just two voters managed to successfully pick that Gunner would be the next to depart, the same number as but an even lower percentage than picked Gutwein in the previous edition.  The winning votes were lodged on April 26 and May 5.

Surely this time one of the federal leaders will be next?  Well, maybe not surely, but the only ways this doesn't happen is if (i) someone else goes before the outcome of the election is clear or (ii) Morrison wins the election and Albanese stays on as opposition leader.  Note that in the event of Albanese winning and becoming PM, he is not deemed to have gone for poll purposes, while Morrison is deemed to have gone as PM even in the event of him losing but remaining for any meaningful length of time as Opposition Leader.  I expect the turnover will set some kind of record with the impending likely loss of a fourth leader in little over two months, and perhaps more later this year, but I'll cover that after the federal election.

Natasha Fyles' elevation to the position of Chief Minister means the NT is the only current jurisdiction with female government and opposition leaders.  The NT is also the first jurisdiction to have had two separate spells of this being the case (Clare Martin/Jodeen Carney being the other).  The ACT had Follett/Carnell followed by Carnell/Follett, NSW had Berejiklian/McKay and Queensland had Palaszczuk/Frecklington.  

The current round of voting closes at 5 pm on election day, and will be reopened after the election if it dislodges neither leader.   

Not-A-Poll Reset Time (Again!): Gutwein Resigns

Less than three weeks after the last change of state Premier we've had another one with Tasmanian Premier Peter Gutwein resigning just under a year since the last election, and being replaced by long-serving Deputy Jeremy Rockliff.   And so here we go again.

These were the previous round's results.  Unsurprisingly, almost nobody expected another leader at state or territory would go before the May federal election.  

Eagle eyes may have noticed that Gutwein originally had four votes.  I was out without access to my computer when the news came through and could not immediately close the poll.  I have determined that two votes for Gutwein were cast after the news that he was resigning and these votes have been removed.  Likewise, the current round has been set to close at 6:30 pm on the expected federal election day.

Gutwein's departure marks the fifth time in the past six terms that the Tasmanian Premier elected at an election has not served out the term.  However, thanks to Will Hodgman's full term 2014-2018, Tasmania is still slightly more stable than New South Wales, which has had a change of Premier five terms in a row (in one of those cases two changed).  

Can we get to the federal election and (presumably) get one of Morrison and Albanese out of this poll before another one drops?  

Not-A-Poll Reset Time: Marshall Defeated

Following the emphatic defeat of the Marshall Liberal government in South Australia it is time to again reset the Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll.

These were the previous round's results.

Steven Marshall was a distant but substantial second in the round in which he was eliminated, so the Not-A-Poll is now batting 0/2 in terms of the plurality picking the next to depart.    

Scott Morrison led very strongly out of the blocks in this round.  Through much of February Marshall was getting around 40% of votes, which jumped to over 80% immediately following the release of the late February SA Newspoll.  This continued through the campaign but Morrison had too many votes in the can already to be caught.  Whatever the result of the next round, it will suprise me greatly if Morrison does not top the next round as well; indeed I expect he will get an outright majority.  (Weirdly on SA election day there were still five votes for Morrison and one for McGowan.)

Steven Marshall's defeat has resulted in an unusual piece of political trivia.  His is the first Australian state, territory or federal government to leave office since the previous South Australian election that brought him to office in 2018.  For one jurisdiction to see two changes in government without any other jurisdiction seeing one in between is actually very unusual.  There was a case of sorts in the ACT with the relatively short-lived Kaine Liberal Government in 1989-1991.  However even that is debatable because Trevor Kaine came to office after the fall of the Follett Labor Government on the floor of the house on 5 Dec 1989.  The Russell Cooper led dregs of the Joh era had lost the Queensland election on 2 Dec 1989, but the new government under Wayne Goss did not take office until 7 Dec.  For cases before that debatable one, we have to go back to instability in Victoria 1950-1952, Victoria 1943-1945 and NSW 1920-1922.  (In all those cases the government of one state changed multiple times without any intervening changes federally or in other states.)  

Marshall's demise also ends the fifth longest spell in the last 100 years without a change of government anywhere in the country. There were longer gaps in 1935-41, 1959-65, 1983-8 and 2002-7.  (For the records at leadership level see the previous post.)

At the time of writing it is not clear Marshall will even retain his seat in the parliament; he is a shaky favourite to overhaul Labor's present lead once prepolls and postals are added.  However if he does, and if he then resigns and causes a by-election, there would have to be a serious chance of Labor winning it.  

After implementing a Whitlam Clause for the previous edition (ie a defeated PM staying on as Opposition Leader doesn't count) I've decided this was too counter-intuitive and to take a more populist road in future.  So now if a PM loses then the poll pays out at that point, and even if they become Opposition Leader, they still count as having been the leader to go.  However if an Opposition Leader ceases to be such by becoming Prime Minister, that doesn't count.  

Not-A-Poll Reset Time: Berejiklian Quits

With Gladys Berejiklian resigning as NSW Premier to be replaced by Dominic Perrottet, the sidebar Next Leader To Go Not-A-Poll has been reset.  These were the previous results:

The Not-A-Poll was started in November 2020, at which time Berejiklian had just appeared before ICAC and testified about her former relationship with Daryl Maguire.  As a result Berejiklian was the early leader but as time went on readers may have believed she would survive the crisis at least long enough for one of the federal leaders to lose the election and depart.  She was overtaken by Albanese on 15 April 2021 and he was overtaken by Morrison on 10 Aug 2021. 

Not-A-Polls: Best And Worst Senator Collections

Things are somewhat quiet in Australian psephology at the moment and for a bit of general amusement I thought I'd start some Not-A-Polls in the sidebar to give readers the opportunity to rank which states have the best and worst collections of 12 Senators.  The Not-A-Polls will run for three months but I will extend them for if the number of votes received at that time for one or other is less than 100.  In each case I have allowed an option of vetoing the premise of the question by declaring that all the Senator lineups are either good or terrible (but I haven't allowed an option to rank slates equally).  

Do readers tend to like their own Senator slates, or despair of them?  

Given the number of Senators who are well known not to exist, I provide a list below of the current Senator lineups.  I've omitted the territories because two Senators is hardly a basis for an assessment, but Territorians both Northern and Australian Capital get to be neutral judges of these lineups!

New South Wales

Tim Ayres (Labor), Andrew Bragg (Liberal), Perin Davey (National), Mehreen Faruqi (Green), Concetta Fierravanti-Wells (Liberal), Hollie Hughes (Liberal), Kristina Keneally (Labor), Jenny McAllister (Labor), Jim Molan (Liberal), Deborah O'Neill (Labor), Marise Payne (Liberal), Tony Sheldon (Labor)

Victoria

Kim Carr (Labor), Raff Ciccone (Labor), Sarah Henderson (Liberal), Jane Hume (Liberal), Kimberley Kitching (Labor), Bridget McKenzie (National), James Paterson (Liberal), Janet Rice (Green), Scott Ryan (Liberal), Lidia Thorpe (Green), David Van (Liberal), Jess Walsh (Labor)

Scott Ryan has brought forward his retirement and will resign his seat prior to the scheduled October resumption of Parliament.  

Queensland

Matt Canavan (LNP), Anthony Chisholm (Labor), Nita Green (Labor), Pauline Hanson (One Nation), Susan McDonald (LNP), James McGrath (LNP), Gerard Rennick (LNP), Malcolm Roberts (One Nation), Paul Scarr (LNP), Amanda Stoker (LNP), Larissa Waters (Green), Murray Watt (Labor)

Western Australia

Slade Brockman (Liberal), Michaelia Cash (Liberal), Dorinda Cox (Green), Pat Dodson (Labor), Sue Lines (Labor), Matt O'Sullivan (Liberal), Louise Pratt (Labor), Linda Reynolds (Liberal), , Ben Small (Liberal), Dean Smith (Liberal), Jordon Steele-John (Green), Glenn Sterle (Labor)

(Dorinda Cox replaces Rachel Siewert who has resigned having decided to retire before the end of her term.)

South Australia

Alex Antic (Liberal), Simon Birmingham (Liberal), Don Farrell (Labor), David Fawcett (Liberal), Stirling Griff (Centre Alliance), Karen Grogan (Labor), Sarah Hanson-Young (Green), Andrew McLachlan (Liberal), Rex Patrick (Rex Patrick Team), Anne Ruston (Liberal), Marielle Smith (Labor), Penny Wong (Labor)

(Karen Grogan replaces Alex Gallacher who passed away on 29 August).  

Tasmania

Eric Abetz (Liberal), Wendy Askew (Liberal), Catryna Bilyk (Labor), Carol Brown (Labor), Claire Chandler (Liberal), Richard Colbeck (Liberal), Jonathon Duniam (Liberal), Jacqui Lambie (Jacqui Lambie Network), Nick McKim (Green), Helen Polley (Labor), Anne Urquhart (Labor), Peter Whish-Wilson (Green) 

Enjoy! Comments welcome if non-defamatory and clean.  

FINAL RESULTS (added Nov 22)

Not-A-Poll: Next Leader To Go!

 Introducing a new rolling Not-A-Poll series that will appear on the sidebar (scroll down).  The aim of the game is to predict who will be the next to leave office out of:

* The Prime Minister

* The federal Opposition Leader

* The six state Premiers

* The two territory Chief Ministers

I haven't included state opposition leaders as they are too low profile outside their own states.  

Every time one of the leaders leaves office, the poll will be closed, we'll see if the plurality were right, and it will then reset and start again!  

By the way readers may have noticed an annoyance with the new Not-A-Poll format in that words do not show in full when showing votes back to voters.  I have emailed CrowdSignal about this and I hope that they will fix it soon.  

Not-A-Poll: Best State Premiers Of The Last 40-ish Years - Final Stage 3

Over a year ago I started a new series of Not-A-Poll voting for this site's choice of Best State Premier in every state and, eventually, the whole country.  It's been going so long that some of the original contestants, including the current leader, are no longer in the original 40 year window, but just retitled it and ignored that.

For the last round in an attempt to cull the field faster in what looks like an inexorable run to the crowning of Don Dunstan, I set a threshhold of 15%.  It turned out that for this round the threshhold was 17 votes, and the also-rans were very tightly packed around it, with Neville Wran and the last surviving current Premier Daniel Andrews just falling short.

Having been miraculously saved from elimination in the previous round, Jim Bacon came second in this one and goes through to the next stage, together with Dunstan and the Coalition run-off winner Greiner.  Voting on this stage (possibly the final stage) is open in the sidebar and goes to 6 pm New Year's Eve.  If one candidate gets an absolute majority this round that's the end, otherwise there will be a final between the top two (after any necessary tiebreaks).

Result 31 Dec: Don Dunstan has won with an outright majority in this round.  Results were:

Don Dunstan  54.55%  (60 votes) 

 

Jim Bacon  24.55%  (27 votes) 

 

Nick Greiner  20.9%  (23 votes) 

 

Total Votes: 110

Not-A-Poll: Best State Premiers Of The Last 40-ish Years - Final Stage 2

A very long year ago today I started a new series of Not-A-Poll voting for this site's choice of Best State Premier in every state and, eventually, the whole country.  It's been going so long that some of the original contestants, including the current leader, are no longer in the original 40 year window, but I'm going to just retitle it and ignore that.

The votes are in for part 1 of the final for the state winners and the Coalition winner (the latter being an open-primary consolation prize on account of the roughly 80-20 left-right bias in readers on psephology websites).  And here they are:

Don Dunstan 34.83%  (70 votes) 

Nick Greiner 18.41%  (37 votes) 

Daniel Andrews 11.94%  (24 votes) 

Neville Wran 11.44%  (23 votes) 

Jim Bacon 8.96%  (18 votes) 

Wayne Goss 7.96%  (16 votes) 

Katy Gallagher 3.98%  (8 votes) 

Clare Martin 1.49%  (3 votes) 

Geoff Gallop 0.99%  (2 votes) 

Total Votes: 201