On election night and the following day, the best bet seemed to be that Labor would emerge with between 86 and 88 seats. After that, Labor watched leads disappear in one seat after another. Liberal candidates took the lead in McEwen and La Trobe on the Monday after polling day, followed by Dickson and Swan on Tuesday, Herbert on Friday and Bowman on Wednesday of this week. Corangamite, Flynn and Robertson were also on the critical list at various stages after looking secure for Labor on election night: Robertson arguably still remains there. In Solomon, Labor’s Damian Hale watched nervously as his 860-vote lead on booth votes was whittled down to 89 on Wednesday, before he was saved by a late rally yesterday that widened the gap to 194. The entirely one-way nature of this traffic raises the question of what has happened and why. Here at least I will limit myself to the first half of the equation.
The first table shows the size of the swings to Labor for each type of vote in all seats which look to have margins of less than 1 per cent, barring the new seat of Flynn where any swing calculations would be hypothetical (an unfortunate omission as it would have cut the Labor swing on postals still further). Provisionals are excepted because too many of them are still to be counted, and they are few in number in any case. The outstanding feature is the Coalition’s strong performance on postal votes, which cost Labor dearly in McEwen, Dickson, Herbert and La Trobe. I read one newspaper report (I can’t remember where) suggesting this was because most postal votes were cast before the Lindsay pamphlet scandal broke, but the pattern would surely have been reflected in pre-polls if this was the case.
| Ordinary | Absent | Pre-Poll | Postal | Total | |
| Corangamite | 6.43 | 7.42 | 6.20 | 5.00 | 6.10 |
| Solomon | 3.06 | 1.87 | 4.77 | 2.88 | 3.00 |
| Robertson | 7.35 | 7.00 | 6.51 | 6.14 | 7.06 |
| McEwen | 6.19 | 9.44 | 8.78 | 4.21 | 6.38 |
| Bowman | 9.17 | 8.34 | 9.95 | 9.36 | 9.09 |
| Dickson | 9.30 | 8.69 | 8.07 | 6.13 | 8.99 |
| Herbert | 6.18 | 2.41 | 8.21 | 1.86 | 5.92 |
| Swan | -0.08 | -2.81 | 1.21 | 0.61 | -0.32 |
| La Trobe | 5.78 | 6.20 | 6.05 | 0.58 | 5.31 |
| Macarthur | 11.04 | 8.63 | 8.51 | 11.29 | 10.58 |
| TOTAL | 6.65 | 6.15 | 6.79 | 4.57 | 6.39 |
The second table shows the number of votes cast for each type over the past three elections. Here as elsewhere it must be remembered that a small number of 2007 votes still remain to be counted. It can be seen that this election has maintained a trend of sharply increasing numbers of postal votes, exacerbating the impact of the Coalition’s strong performance, along with the more neutral pre-polls.
| 2007 | 2004 | 2001 | ||
| Provisional | 167,167 1.32 |
180,878 1.46 |
165,238 1.37 |
|
| Absent | 856,407 6.75 |
853,571 6.91 |
851,945 7.07 |
|
| Pre-Poll | 1,105,948 8.72 |
754,098 6.10 |
610,107 5.06 |
|
| Postal | 820,946 6.47 |
660,330 5.34 |
516,458 4.28 |
|
| Turnout | 12,681,332 92.94 |
12,354,983 94.32 |
12,054,664 94.85 |
The final point to note is how lucky the Coalition has been. Present indications suggest it will win five of seven seats determined by margins of less than 0.3 per cent. Assuming no further changes, the bottom end of the Mackerras pendulum will look as follows:
| Corangamite | 0.8 | ||
| 0.7 | Macarthur | ||
| 0.5 | La Trobe | ||
| Flynn | 0.3 | ||
| Solomon | 0.2 | 0.2 | Swan Herbert |
| Robertson | 0.1 | 0.1 | Dickson |
| 0.0 | Bowman McEwen |
Elsewhere, the chances of a National Party boilover in O’Connor have been reduced as the slowly progressing late count has widened the gap between Labor and the Nationals from 2.08 per cent to 2.70 per cent. It will take an extremely high level of obedience to the how-to-vote card from Greens voters if that gap is to be closed, which seems an unlikely prospect in a sparsely populated electorate where the party would have had a hard time finding volunteers to cover each of the booths. Any vague chance that independent Gavin Priestley might win Calare has probably been laid to rest by late counting which has increased Nationals candidate John Cobb (formerly member for Parkes) from 47.71 per cent to 48.47 per cent, close enough to an absolute majority that the question of who comes second out of Priestley and Labor is probably academic. In the Victorian Senate, the Greens’ hopes rested on what would have been an out-of-character boost from declaration votes, which have in fact reduced their vote from 10.1 per cent to 9.7 per cent. The Labor vote has also faded enough that third Liberal candidate Scott Ryan has overtaken Labor’s number three David Feeney, so that Ryan looks likely to take the fifth seat and Feeney the sixth. Greens candidate Richard di Natale is 1.67 per cent behind Feeney after preferences CORRECTION: I wasn’t factoring in the Liberal surplus, which actually makes the gap more like 0.9 per cent.
UPDATE: One other thing – it is clear that dramatically fewer provisional votes are being allowed through this year. In 2004, any given electorate ended up with about 400 to 600 provisional votes counted. This time it’s more like 100 to 200. I suspect the answer to this mystery lies somewhere in the Electoral and Referendum (Electoral Integrity and Other Measures) Act. Can any wise heads out there point me in the right direction?
UPDATE 2: Comments respondents note that provisional voters must now show photo ID either at the booth or by emailing or faxing a copy to the AEC in the following week. Peter Brent: “Presumably the number of people who took ID to the AEC in the next week was about zero”. Grace Pettigrew: “Many voters who are likely to need a provisional vote do not carry ID around with them (aboriginal voters, the homeless, for example) are also most likely not to vote for the Coalition”. Adam Carr also takes issue with my description of O’Connor as “sparsely populated”: I would argue that this is sort of accurate, but Carr says the real point is that O’Connor is “the most agricultural seat in Australia, where most people live in or near small farming towns”, and consequently has “more booths than any other seat”.
Bailey loses McEwen by 7 votes!
http://www.theage.com.au/news/national/bailey-loses-mcewen-to-labor/2007/12/08/1196813080945.html
All is not lost for the Liberal Party and its fellow travellers – the ABC news website is currently carrying a report ‘Coalition ‘making progress’ in Taliban stronghold’.
Bull Butter about McEwen, a recount will get Bailey across the line.
And you say the Tories fudged the postals system well how come so many postals came in so late!
The next person who writes “McEwan” will be required to donate $10 to the William Bandwidth Fund. Even The Age does it in the above article!
MelbCity: Re Russia: Bollocks. Re Ukraine: Go Yulia! But there’s no point in arguing these matters further here.
Now if you think 130% of all the minor party vote will mysteriously flow to the Greens in some mystical transformation. family first voters turning Green I guess anything is possible.
SNIP: Please, MelbCity, for the final time: no more allegations of professional misconduct against named individuals. Whether or not you agree with my ruling, please respect that this is my website, and do not repeatedly and wilfully ignore what you know to be my wishes – PB.
Already been counted twice, with the same result, Glen. 😉
Cheers
Rod
Sorry Melb city (@ 530), that’s just nonsense. The Greens don’t need 130% of anything, they (plus the Coalition) just need a sufficiently large share – say 70% – of the 120-odd thousand votes still to be counted. No, I don’t think they’ll get it, but there’s no earthly way you can say it’s impossible.
Well they are counting it for a third time.
And even if we lose it, we’ll get it back in 2010, this nobody will be a one termer.
Thanks again Poss. If the advice coming from Crosby Textor was anything like the denial-filled dribblings that Mr Crosby poured onto the pages of the GG during the campaign, then Im thinking that the only ones who benefitted from their advice was the ALP. The “if you change the government…” line didn’t work for Keating in 96 and I’d need to see some solid evidence to believe it stemmed the flow this time. As with all these things the reasons for the ‘narrowing’ (in spite of the hellishly embarrasing coalition campaign) will be many and varied. Some of it will, I suspect, lie in the methodoiogy of polling, some in the attitude of the respondents to the pollsters, some on the Australian reluctance to change governments, some in wet Libs deciding dry is better than Labor, some in what voters had for breakfast and the fact that it was a full moon – hence a percentage of voters were insane at the time (clearly such insanity only afflicted conservative voters). It would take some very complex and lengthy research to know the reasons so I suspect we’ll be left to speculate – which we all enjoy so much.
Fran Bailey in opposition is a nobody
Fran Bailey was a minister, oh well i guess the people of McEwen wanted some pork before they vote out bugerlugs in 2010.
Melb I’m fascinated by your numbers and would love to know where they come from. I lay no claim to being an insider and am referring only to the aec website that you yourself have linked to.
My numbers from http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenateStateFirstPrefsByGroupByVoteType-13745-VIC.htm are as follows:
ALP – 1,252,278 (41.78%)
Lib/Nats – 1,188,532 (39.65%)
Greens – 296,264 (9.88%)
Total count – 3,107,129 (90.27%)
As I stated before my calculations are based on the assumption that there will be about 95.43% counted by the end (as there was in 2004), which would mean that there are about 171,350 votes unaccounted for. I’m not sure why you are so certain that the only votes left are BTL – I have seen several Postal & Provisional votes yet to be counted in my electorate’s counting centre.
Maybe I’m following the wrong link or my site is not updated, but your numbers and mine simply don’t match up. Can you perhaps link me more directly to the count to which you are referring?
Glen, a government MP is never a nobody. The Howard government greatly increased backbench members’ staff numbers and their printing and postage allowances, all designed to help sitting members entrench themselves. Of course that didn’t save 24 of them from defeat, but without those extra resources even more of them would have lost. Now all those entitlements belong to us, for which we thank you. You can sure that Rob Mitchell will use them very effectively to dig himself in in McEwen.
dam Yulia represent 30% of the Ukrainian electorate she has made some pretty outrageous promises that she can not meet. Most people voted for her under the belief that she will open the doors to Europe. The main problem as I see it is the Our Ukraine bloc (Yulia’s Coalition partners) whose main agenda is for Ukraine to join NATO.. Yulia with Ou Ukraine has a parliamentary majority of 2. there is constant blackmail and disputation with the governing coalition with ongoing threats of members of parliament being expelled if they do not tow the line.
It really is a mess and more unstable then it was before Ukraine’s president unconstitutionally dismissed the parliament. (a parliament that had a working majority and was stable) if Yulia can not secure tech support of the Lytvyn block then Yulia’s government will not survive. Most of this of course plays into the hands of President who constantly;y undermine Ukraine’s democracy in the hope that he can reverse Ukraine’s recent transition to a parliamentary democracy and restore a presidential dictatorship subordinate to the interests of the USA.
I do not know about you but I fully support a parliamentary democracy over a presidential dictatorship any day. I would even like to see Russia become a parliamentary democracy and would it not be nice if the USA also became more democratic. I have no doubt that Ukraine is best suited to a European parliamentary system. I am beginning to think you know very little about what is going on in Ukraine. Sorry… I like Yulia in part but I am not sure she can or will provide stable government for Ukraine. Time will tell.
I stated before I am opposed very much of what Our Ukraine stands for. And most certainly opposed to the restoration of a presidential dictatorship which you and the Amercian adminsitration seam to support.
Scaper I used to like you but now it becomes clear that you are just a lib stooge.
all your bleating about im a business man and empty threats to expose some non -exsistant drivel and start a new politiical party is just empty b=shit.you threatend to bring stuff up during the election campagin but never did. you are a fake poser and probably takes yourself in hand to get your name mentioned on a blog.loser
Adam, hasn’t Kevin reduced the allowances and staff allocations significantly?
Glen, I’m sensing your pain. Kubler-Ross’ stages of grieving are coming vividly to life in your posts.
I believe Labor is committed to reducing the number of ministerial staffers, which also expanded enormously under Howard. I don’t recall any mention of backbenchers’ entitlements.
MelbCity, things in Ukraine might be a bit more stable if it wasn’t for Putin’s constant bullying and interference, don’t you think? Do you think trying to poison a presidential candidate in another country is a legitimate way for a great power to behave? Putin is a KGB trained thug and bully, and it shows in everything he does.
Glen is still in stage 1, though, I think , Ferny. 😉
Cheers
Rod
What exactly IS the “Unapportioned” vote. I had assumed that it is BTL not yet entered on the system, but does it also include Ticket votes that have been removed from the count while they’re being recounted.
In Victoria, the distribution based on Tickets alone put the ALP3 over the line by fewer than 4,000 votes when FFirst get cut-up. There appear to be about 128,000 “Unapportioned” ALP papers. If these really are BTLs, it wouldn’t take much leakage from them to strip that excess away.
In SA, Xenophon doesn’t get elected on primaries on the current Tickets and Greens do not get in on his coat-tails. On the Group votes, it looks the same as Saturday night, though the Xenophon excess is smaller.
http://vtr.aec.gov.au/SenateStateFirstPrefsByVoteType-13745-VIC.htm
Look at the total column on the right.
Allocate the group total for
ALP: 1252278
Liberals: 1188532
Greens 296264
They are locked in.
Look donw the total column and record the Ticket vote for each of the minor parties (We know how they will be distributed) allocate them to the three parties under contention ALP/ Liberals and Greens)
When distributed
ALP 1287790
Liberal 1295308
Green 372427
The remaining vote (42123 is unknown BTL minor party votes…
Total number of votes equals
2,997,648
Quota is 428236
Liberal 43.211%
ALP 42.960%
Green 12.424%
Others (BTL) 1.405%
Quotas
Liberal 3.024756743
ALP 3.007200979
Green 0.869678161
Others BTL 0.098363888
Add the others to the Greens ASSUME 100%. NOT ENOUGH VOTES
please check maybe I have made a mistake in my spreadsheet calculations/. I am fallible and I only have a laptop not millions of dollars and a host of staff.
When all else fails, Read the Instructions
Doh… “Unapportioned”- it says this on the AEC First Preferences by Candidates page.:
Above the Line Votes are entered for each group (ticket only). These are referred to as ‘Ticket Votes’. Below the line votes for individual candidates are also counted. A derived figure ‘Unapportioned’ is calculated which equals ‘Group Total’ minus ‘Ticket Votes’ minus ‘Below the line votes’.
Not COMPLETELY clear, but I assume therefore Unapportioned is BTL, though the site does say that numbers may fluctuate during a recount.
One thing Howard got right was that he was more popular than the party when he said the problem was with them and not him.
The nation wide swing against the coalition was 5.6% whilst in Benelong the swing was only 5.53%
Defintely stage 1 Rod….though I’ve always argued the stages are often concurrent – and oft repeated. But yes, stage 1 is certainly clear in this case.
FG said
“if you change the government…” line didn’t work for Keating in 96.
There is a significant difference in this campaign (and ’04) – the overall increase in wealth during Howard’s term. Increased property prices, share prices and net real wages may have made the many voters feel they had a few more chips on the table than they did in ’96.
I still find the extent of the swing back to the coalition in the last week remarkable. Given the context of an ordinary campaign and the leaflet scadal in the dying days.
It seems to be of a similar size to the one acheived against Latham in 2004. Maybe its an effect that is exgoneous to how the campaign is perceived to have gone. Maybe there was no hand-shake moment it was just an ex-post rationalisation.
If the ALP is leading 54/46 leading into the last week of the next election – I bet we’ll be debating if the coaltion can muster the same last minute swing from oppostion – I’m guessing no.
Geoff, they just enter a group total on election night. In the following days these are recounted. Under the old system used until 2001, at the re-count, only the group ticket (ATL) totals for each booth were entered, and all below the line votes went to zero until the BTL votes were data entered. However, this could distort the count, as the major parties have the highest proportion of ATL votes, so this old method made it seem like minor parties could not win, as their vote fell two days after the election, and did not rise again until data entry was well under way. So for instance, under the old counting system in 2001, Bob Brown had won just short of a quota in Tasmania, but once the BTL votes were excluded, his vote was way less than a quota. It only came back towards a quota when BTL votes were includd.
Now they keep the election night total as a batch total, and show unapportioned below the line as the difference between the group totals and data entered BTL votes. When all BTL vote for each booths is entered, the orginal group total for the booth is ditched.
Geof what I did weas take the total and deduct the ticket vote. That way I dod not have to add up the votes allocated to individual candidates. total gorup votes minus ticket votes equals BTL votes…
I used the total votes as a check
We know where ticket votes end up. We do not know the BTL votes for minor parties. Any BTL vote for the ALP, Liberals and Greens we can safely assume will stay within the group. …
The ungrouped candiates I have lumped into the BTL minor partioes voters list..
The numbers add up and equal the total number of cotes
You don’t need millions of dollars or any staff – you just need Antony Green’s wonderful Senate calculator.
Preferences cannot be allocated accurately until you have a proper primary count – which we don’t.
You cannot measure the requirements of the swing for future votes against preference allocations that you’ve already made – the way preferences are allocated changes depending on what the primary vote ends up being – this seems to be why our interpretations are confoundingly different.
As I state in an earlier post my calculations are based on the required swing in the remaining primary votes to allow the Greens to get up. I realise this is made more complicated by the fact that BTLs comprise the majority of the uncounted votes and the preference allocation is therefore skewed. BUT, as a basic guide, if you imagine a swing of .4% away from the ALP directly to the Libs, then the Primaries would be 41.38% to 40.6%. Leave the others the same, including the Greens. Such a result would see di Natale defeat Feeney for the sixth seat.
For this result to happen, the ALP need to receive less than 34.6% of the vote including their preferences.
As stated earlier, I realise the extreme unlikelihood of this happening, but your continued assertion that the Greens need 130% of the remaining vote is based on a bizarre and blatantly wrong reading of the Senate count. You are working from quotas that are simply irrelevant because they are based on a preference allocation that will not happen if there is a dramatic shift in primaries in the final part of the count.
To be honest I’m ashamed of myself for following this argument through to its ridiculous conclusion but for some reason I couldn’t reisist your particular brand of keyboard mangling and firebrand logic. For now, though, I’m going to get drunk with my friends at a pub. Please enjoy the rest of the night.
I am essentailly only interested in the ALP.Liberal and Green group vote and the minor party ticket votes. The rest is in the unkown basket. Not enough to see the Greens over quota
Sorry, for ‘34.6% of the vote’ please read ‘34.6% of the remaining vote’.
WTR: Good point re the chips on the table. The electorate may have felt more exposed than in 96. Nonetheless, that late swing to the Coalition will remain a “Bermuda Triangle” type mystery to me for a long time. It just made no sense at all in the circumstances.
Possum back at 547.
The last few weeks of the Lib campaign were aimed purely at holding onto the traditional Lib voter – to minimise the losses. Textor has acknowledged this. He had already conceded defeat. And it seems it was successful. The best explanation of the “narrowing” is that previous Lib voters eventually decided there might be some risk in a Labor Govt.
Stephen are you talking about the senate or the house of reps. The senate does not work on swings it works on percentages..
Group votes, Ticket votes and BTL minor party votes. The first two we know how they will be distributed, It is the last quanative number we do not know. BUT in Victoria case it does not matter as 100% of them will not make a difference to the outcome. It is all decided on the ALP, Liberal/Green group vote and the minor party ticket vote.
We know the total number of votes therefor the quota. We know the quota percentage anyway the number is just a little more accurate.
Geoff can you confirm in Antony’s absence. I need to go shopping. I need more champagne 🙂 I do not normally drink…
Antony you on line I thought you took a qwell deserved break.
On election night they allocate the vote into groups (above the line and Below the line) and then slowly break it down into ticket votes and primary votes for each candiates.
We do not need to worry about the BTL vote much as it does not come into play.
We only need to look at the group vote for the ALP. Liberal and Greens (Assume they are locked in very few will leave teh group and most are ticket votes anyway)
We already know the breakdown ot the tiket vote for the other minor parties we can assume the rest are BTL votes for individual candidates.
The calcluator assumes 100% ticket vote. If we eclude the BTL minor party votes we can calculate the total ticket vote allocation as we know how they will be distributed. IN VIC;s case the number remaining is too small to make a difference.
Enough said I need to go…,
If 2 subsequent recounts confirmed Rob Mitchell’s win by 7 votes, what is the point of another one? I’m sure the Liberals, Fran Bailey and Glen will huff, and puff, and take this to the Court of Disputed Returns. And if a byelection is ordered, Rob Mitchell will bolt it in.
Re #585
“We will huff and puff and blow your house down!”
Progressive, they’d need to mount a case to take it to disputed returns. A small margin isn’t enough of a reason. I guess they could borrow the “Republican Book of How to Steal an Election” and plough through every ballot till they find something, no matter how trivial.
If anyone wants to discuss McEwen specifically, I have a new post up which is mostly about that.
I agree with Work to Rule at 475. The circumstances were diefferent back in 1996. Keating in 1996 was hated, if that is the right word, more than Howard was in 2007. Whether that was Keating’s fault or not could be debated at great length. I’m personally of the opinion that the media had more to do with Keating’s defeat than Keating himself. I also think that the coalition’s advertising in the last week of this election together with the “If we change the Government etc” had more resonance with waverers at the end and consequently some narrowing occurred. Next time round given sound management by the ALP I wouldn’t expect say a 55-45 poll two weeks before the election to narrow very much at all
There seems to be an assumption that there was a late swing back to the government. This has now happened two elections running. Personally I feel ripped – off by the published polls. To be putting out crap about 55-57%++ all year and then come out with the (correct) result the day before as Newspoll, Galaxy & Morgan did…and then claim that they got it right…yeah try the other one. In future I’ll only take these last polls seriously.
Some of the electorate polls were on the money though, esp the Advertiser in Stuart & Boothby, Westpoll (which proved more reliable than the Newspoll WA breakdown) and the Bennelong polls come to mind. Newspoll’s Bass & Braddon + the local Tassie polling was a disgrace…these seats actually went to the wire.
FG, I certainly think the mystery of the late swing to the coalition and whether they can repeat it will be well worn themes in the next election.
My theory, well theory is overstating it a bit. My guess is that in the final week the coalition were tracking towards a 2PP of about 48. Most likely a narrow loss – but a nail biter and still in with a chance. The leaflet scandal derailed the last 72 hours and the swing back stalled leaving the final 2PP just above 47.
Any of the 8 seats the ALP won with less than a 1.5% margin (9 including McEwen) could have gone the other way if not for Kelly’s prank.
Pure speculation of course, but I do like the poetic justice that Howard was eventually cut down by poorly executed wedge.
Wet / Small l Liberal seat Kooyong swung toward it’s local MP, at my polling booth there were only pictures of Petro, it was all about him there was no Howard in sight, interesting side note the ALP had pictures of Rudd but nothing of the candidate.
Goldstein did what I expected all the booths East of Neapean Hwy went to the ALP but West of Neapean Hwy was an ALP no go zone.
Higgins also did as expected all the booths at the Western end went to the ALP with a few booths around the edge of the seat going towards the ALP but the Malvern/Toorak/Glen Iris area went Liberal.
I note with Wentworth that Turnbull appears to have won both Paddington booths.
Both Goldstern and North Sydney saw solid swings towards the ALP.
“I think the Greens should admit defeat in the Victorian Senate”
Well, call me weird, MelbC, but I think they should probably, you know, count the votes in this ‘ere democracy lark.
I know BTL is terribly inconvenient for hacks – since it means the lowly voter actually decides where their vote ends up; not some unelected apparatchik.
But since certain anonymous f*ckwit moron hacks in the VIC ALP managed to elect Mr 1.7% in ’04, well, can you blame the punters for going in under?
If you think Im harsh on the VIC ALP, i think you’ll find this view increasingly widespread in ALP ranks in, ohh, I dunno, about 7 months time when Rudd’s trying to get program past a happy clappy no one voted for.
Which gets us back to the VIC 07 vote – real shame the Green didnt knock off the Lib, innit, mate? Mightn’t have been a problem.
Enjoy yer champers.
Gotta agree WTR – justice indeed! I’m interested in the earlier post which suggested Crosby Textor had given up 2 weeks out and were simply playing to minimise the extent of the loss. If this is true and the narrowing was indeed happening, then they may have given up too soon.
Now I’m off to William’s new post.
For want of anything better to do, I have prepared a table comparing the enrolments of the 5 ‘outer ring’ Victorian seats – Wannon, Mallee, Murray, Indi & Gippsland – with the adjoining 5 ‘middle ring’ seats – Corangamite, Ballarat, Bendigo, McEwen & McMillan. The relevance of the comparison is that, as the pop’n of the ‘outer’ seats decline, thew will have adjoining portions of the ‘middle ring’ seats redistributed to them. E.G. Colac from Corangamite to Wannon. This, together with ‘tree change’ poulation movements from metro seats, should result in increased vote margins for the ALP middle ring seats (Corangamite, Ballarat, Bendigo & McEwen). If Traralgon moves from Gippsland to McMillan it may also assist in the ALP regaining this seat, which it won in ’98 but lost in ’01.
(Hopefully the data as I have entered it below will post as ‘wsywyg’, in which case it should read fairly clearly.)
The average enrolment across the 10 seats is 93,424. All ‘outer’ seats, other than Gippsland are below the average. All ‘middle ring’ seats are above the average – Ballarat barely. Seats vary from 88,890 (Murray) to 104,509 (McEwen).
The 5 outer seats are, on average 2,515 votes below the average for all 10 seats. The 5 middle seats are, on average, 2,515 votes above the average for the 10 seats.
Hope this makes sense / is of interest.
Clearly, Stone & Mirabella represent far fewer constituents than do their opposite numbers on the government benches from Bendigo & McEwen. (Did it ever feel g-o-o-d typing that!!!)
‘Outer’ Enrolled Diff to ‘Middle’ Enrolled Diff to Total Average
Seats Votes Reg. Ave. Seats Votes Reg. Ave. Votes Enrolment
Wannon 90,904 -2,515 Corang’m’te 96,155 +2,731 187,059 93,530
Mallee 90,112 -3,312 Ballarat 93,624 +200 183,736 91,868
Murray 88,890 -4,534 Bendigo 97,197 +3773 186,087 93,044
Indi 90,871 -2,553 McEwen 104,509 +11,085 195,380 97,690
Gippsland 94,882 +1,458 McMillan 87,092 -6,332 181,974 90,987
Total Total Total
‘Outer’ 455,659 -11,456 ‘Middle’ 478,577 +11,457 ‘Regional’ 93,4236
Outer Middle Regional
Average 91,131 -2,291 Average 95,715 +2,291 Average 93,424
Very interesting redistribution, I hope Victorian doesn’t lose a seat but when you consider that the inner city seats have not changed in over 10 years and with the changes in population in the outer suburb could be interesting.
BMWofVic @596 – Victoria is unlikely to lose a seat, as its population has been growing at the same rate as the national average. The slowpokes in the population stakes are NSW, SA and Tasmania; but Tasmania’s already at its constitutional minimum of five seats, so if there are seats to be lost they’d have to be in NSW or SA.
Possum,
When I heard about the Libs tax deduction for education expenses I thought that would be enough to get a lot of the “wet libs” back into the fold- just because these people already have a lot of money doesn’t mean they would take a bribe when it was handed out.
BMW,
Some time back you mentioned swings in Victoria and wrongly suggested that Casey was at or near the top. It was close to the Victorian average (Casey 5.3 cfd. Victoria 5.1). The big swings were Calwell 11.1, Holt 10.0, Aston (noted by you) 8.1, Indi 7.1. The seats which labor gained were next Deakin and McEwen 6.4 and Corangamite 6.1. Scullin and Isaacs were also both on 6.1
Correction.
In reviewing my spreadsheet I found a few more votes for the Greens. (I left out one of the gRoups ticket votes (The AEC had not listed then separately before)
The good news is that it does not change the overall result. (The green vote goes up but the number of undecided vote goes down.) The Greens still need over 100% of the undecided vote to secure a seat.
Revised summary
Group Vote plus Minor Party Ticket Vote
Party Liberal ALP Green Others (BTL) Total Quota
Votes 1294853 1287790 377868 37137 2,997,648 428236
43.196% 42.960% 12.605% 1.239% 14.286%
Quotas 3.0237 3.0072 0.8824 0.0867
* 0.0237 0.0237
* Note the the Liberal surplus of which 25% of the value is derived from 10% of the ballot papers transferred from minor parties will not be distributed as all positions are filled prior to their distribution. Should the UNLIKELY situation occur where the Liberal surplus is in fact distributed then a devalued percentage of the Liberal surplus (Thanks to a inbuilt distortion in the system adopted) will transfer to the Labor Party. It is also reasonable to assume that a proportion of the undecided BTL minor party vote will also favour the ALP which in turn places the result of the election further out of reach for the Greens.
The ALP position only improves.