| # | % | SWING | 2PP | |
| Chew (CDP) | 1170 | 6.9% | ||
| Tinley (ALP) | 9123 | 53.8% | 1.7% | 60.0% |
| Harper (GRN) | 5177 | 30.5% | 13.8% | 40.0% |
| Georgatos (IND) | 1478 | 8.7% | ||
| TOTAL | 16948 | |||
| COUNTED: | 76.8% | |||
| BOOTHS (OF 12): | 12 |
Sunday. I’ve identified nine previous by-elections which were contested by Labor and the Greens but not the Liberals – four federal in which Labor was in opposition, and five state in which they were in government. The average result overall was a 0.11 per cent primary vote swing against Labor. In the state by-elections it was 0.9 per cent against Labor; in the federal by-elections it was 0.88 per cent to Labor. Six of the results were worse for Labor than Willagee, while only three were better.
However, I’d argue that one of these by-elections didn’t fit the mould. That was the Isaacs federal by-election in 2000, caused by the death of Greg Wilton. All the others were like Willagee in that they were caused by the voluntary mid-term departure of the sitting member, which demonstrably leads voters to be unhappy with the party concerned. Sure enough, Isaacs was Labor’s best result out of the 10, with their primary vote increasing 8.1 per cent. Take that out of the equation and Labor on average suffered a 1.14 per cent swing overall, or 1.53 per cent against when limited to the federal by-elections conducted while they were in opposition. Only two of eight results were better for Labor than Willagee, against six worse.
8.19pm. It’s in. With the notional two-party result with all booths counted plus (I presume) the evening’s supply of postals and pre-polls, the WAEC’s notional 2CP result is 60.53-39.47. My rough yardstick for the evening had been 50-30-10-10, so Labor can feel pleased, particularly with the psychologically important achievement of having improved their primary vote. My expectation of a Greens primary vote of 30 per cent factored in that it had been an unhappy campaign for them, but their 30.6 per cent is nonetheless a reasonable result that again demonstrates Liberal voters’ willingness to vote tactically. I’m told the Gerry Georgatos campaign had a fairly low profile at polling booths, which probably helps explain the surprising fact that the Greens got more preferences than Labor despite both minor candidates directing against them on HTV cards. Much of his support would have come from Liberals parking their vote with the only available independent and following their normal habit of putting Labor last, and he equally has a support base among natural Greens sympathisers.
8.04pm. I gather we’re still awaiting one booth’s notional 2CP count, and that will be it for the evening.
7.52pm. To clarify, the WAEC’s “2CP count” obviously refers to the full distribution of preferences, which will not be conducted until all the votes are in. They would do better to call it that.
7.45pm. Final two booths, Coolbellup Primary School and Southern Districts Senior Citizens Centre, have reported, respectively giving Labor a relatively poor and relatively good result.
7.43pm. Looks like the Greens are doing quite a bit better on preferences than either I or Antony Green had estimated. With real figures to play with, my 2PP figure for Labor has gone down from 63.0 per cent to 60.4 per cent.
7.37pm. The WAEC have outsmarted me. I had been hitting refresh on their “two-candidate preferred” page and coming up with nothing. It turns out they have a separate page called “notional distribution of preferences”. I will be interested to learn what the distinction between these two concepts is. No polling booth breakdown is offered.
7.33pm. The Greens might have spoken too soon in claiming victory there – 306 to 297 in favour of Tinley. Nonetheless, it’s given them their biggest primary vote swing of 23.0 per cent. Continuing the trend of Fremantle, evidently a lot of Liberals are happy to thumb their nose at Labor by parking their votes with the Greens.
7.32pm. Anglican Church of the Holy Cross Hall in Melville added.
7.25pm. Labor primary vote up slightly at Samson Primary School; just keeping their nose in front in the race to improve on their 2008 primary vote.
7.24pm. Samson Primary School added.
7.19pm. Greens Twitter feed reports they have won the Anglican Church of the Holy Cross Hall, which presumably means on the primary vote. This is Labor’s weakest and the Liberals’ strongest booth in the electorate. The other strong Liberal booth is the just reported Melville Senior High School – with a lot of slack to be taken up here there were solid primary vote swings for both Labor and Greens.
7.18pm. Melville Senior High School and Southwell Primary School added.
7.15pm. Labor vote down 5.1 per cent in Hilton, their weakest result yet.
7.13pm. Hilton Primary School and 933 pre-polls added.
7.08pm. East Hamilton Hill the first polling booth to give the Greens a single figure primary vote swing – however, this was a particularly poor booth for the Liberals, so there was less slack to be taken up. Labor down 2.3 per cent; touch and go whether they’ll break even.
7.07pm. East Hamilton Hill Primary School added. Still no real 2PP results.
7.02pm. Southern Districts Senior Citizens Centre (Drive-in) sees a lot more business this time around – 126 votes compared to 18.
6.59pm. Labor down slightly in both, Greens up 13.0 per cent and 17.9 per cent.
6.58pm. Caralee Community School and North Lake Senior Campus added.
6.52pm. Phoenix Primary School in – Labor down 3.6 per cent, Greens up 11.7 per cent.
6.48pm. All three sources have Labor up on the primary vote, though by wildly varying amounts. Same goes for the Greens – if their increase in Palmyra from 16.4 per cent 35.8 per cent is typical of the polling booth results, they will make up a lot of ground from the present scoreline.
6.47pm. 1658 postal votes added (this won’t be all of them).
6.46pm. Palmyra Primary School booth added.
6.35pm. A note of explanation. Vote numbers and the percentage figures to their right are raw votes. The swing and 2PP figures are derived through booth matching, so Tinley’s primary vote from special institutions and hospitals is 22.4 per cent higher than Carpenter’s was. The 2PP figure is based on a guesstimate that Liberal preferences would have gone 80-20 in favour of the Greens in 2008, and that this time CDP preferences will go 70-30 to Labor and Georgatos’s will split 50-50. On that basis, there has been a 25.2 per cent swing to Labor from special institutions and hospitals in Labor-versus-Greens terms. The CDP and Georgatos preference splits I’m using will be superseded by real preference splits when notional two-party figures start to come in.
6.31pm. Special institutions and hospitals are in. Good enough for me – I’m calling it for Tinley.
6.10pm. Welcome to the Poll Bludger’s live coverage of the Willagee by-election count. First figures should be through in about 15 minutes or so.
I wonder if the Feral look of Hsien turned off Liberal voters, as opposed to the conservative looking Adele Carles ?
Frank, I have the utmost respect for you and have always read your posts with interest, but you need to control yourself. You are only making yourself look bad.
PS fyi I am not a Green voter.
The result is pretty much meaningless with respect to Barnett. A good evening for Eric Ripper – a bad result would have damaged him, and he hasn’t had one.
You set a very low bar on “feral looking”, Frank.
[You set a very low bar on “feral looking”, Frank.]
You obviously didn’t watch the videos 🙂
Frank
Be gracious in victory.
nuff said
[Frank
Be gracious in victory.
nuff said]
But the Green supporters weren’t in Fremantle.
Well done Labor – a ripper result. 🙂
[But the Green supporters weren’t in Fremantle]
That’s their problem.
You’re way better than that.
Any federal implications in this result?
Glad that Peter Tinley got up, a quality candidate!
Coolbellup Boooth Tinley got 1,175 votes – his best booth.
Antony on Preferences :
[19:31 – Labor will be happy with this result because no inroads were made into its primary vote. The slight decline in after preference vote is meangless because at the 2008 election, Labor’s 2PP count included Green prefernces. In a 2CP contest against the Greens at a by-election, Labor is denied these preferences.]
William, the difference between the notional 2CP and the actual 2CP is that the notional 2CP is the count they do on election night between the two candidates that are favoured to finish 1st and 2nd by the electoral commission. The actual 2CP is the full distribution of preferences conducted once all the votes have been counted.
[Coolbellup Boooth Tinley got 1,175 votes – his best booth.]
In absolute terms, but in relative ones it was his worst – Labor vote down 6.7 per cent.
I’d agree – Hsien is many things, and I think we got a much better representative out of this election, but I would not call her “feral looking”.
How did Georgatas do at Coolbellup?
[The actual 2CP is the full distribution of preferences conducted once all the votes have been counted.]
No doubt that’s it. But surely the appopriate name for that count would be “full distribution of preferences”, or some such. Every other time I’ve seen an electoral commission refer to their 2CP count, they meant the notional one.
[How did Georgatas do at Coolbellup?]
Nothing special – 7.3 per cent.
Hsien Harper from an updated Perth Now article:
[Ms Harper conceded at 7pm that she was headed for defeat.
She said it was always going to be difficult to win the safe Labor seat.
But she was proud of the Greens efforts.
“A victory for us was to poll 35 to 40 per cent in primary votes and from what we can tell we did that,’’ she said.
“We appear to have doubled our primary vote in the electorate.
“Labor had to work its butt off to win this election and maybe they]
http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0,21598,26413737-2761,00.html
And they wonder why people attack the Greens:
[GreensWA
The Greens have gone close to doubling their vote on Willagee for the 3rd successive election, so… 62% primary next time? 😉 1 minute ago from TweetDeck ]
How dare they!
O but Frank today Bob1234 conceeded that the Greens only wanted the balance of power so if they think doubling their vote in a by-election without both major parties is a sign that they are going places then we know they have been spending a little too much time hanging around the likes of Minchin!
P.S if they have been hanging out with him then that could be considered a fair excuse.
[O but Frank today Bob1234 conceeded that the Greens only wanted the balance of power ]
Liar. I said all I want for the Greens is the balance of power.
Bob1234! you have jsut repeated that all you want is for the Greens to have the BoP! and i said Bob1234! said the Greens objective was the BoP
They sure do look similar!
No they don’t. Bob is not ‘The Greens’, therefore it’s not the same thing. If all The Greens wanted was the balance of power they wouldn’t bother wasting resources fighting by-elections.
Okay i withdraw the comment!
BTW thanks heaps to William once again for excellent coverage of this campaign 🙂
ABC Story on ALP’s win, inclding audio of Tinley & Harper.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/stories/2009/11/29/2756442.htm
The West’s story of the Win.
http://au.news.yahoo.com/thewest/a/-/newshome/6526811/tinley-wins-in-willagee/
ABC TV News footage.
http://www.abc.net.au/news/video/2009/11/28/2756407.htm
[If all The Greens wanted was the balance of power they wouldn’t bother wasting resources fighting by-elections.]
I have to disagree there. The BoP theory applies to both houses.
Peter Tinley’s Victory Speech 🙂
http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=p8HUbD_TJD4
Does it disappoint any WA Labor supporters that Labor has suffered a reduced margin? It seems Labor will only hold the seat with a 10% margin now, and it wasn’t even against the Liberals, it was against the Greens!!!
:kiss:
Bob – there is no doubt that it will turn back into a Labor/Lib contest at the next election. Ontop of that a Primary vote of 53.8% wont worry ALP members in the slightest.
[Bob – there is no doubt that it will turn back into a Labor/Lib contest at the next election.]
I agree.
[Ontop of that a Primary vote of 53.8% wont worry ALP members in the slightest.]
It’s a safe Labor seat. Labor won without prefs last election as they did in this by-election.
The Liberals, who got 31% of the primary vote last time, didn’t stand. As a result, all four candidates received a primary vote swing. Greens on 13%, ind Green on 9%, CDP on 7%, Labor on a measly 2%.
And the margin that Labor holds the seat on has been considerably cut, with the Greens on ~40% 2pp, something the Liberals couldn’t do.
Any Labor hack who thinks this result was good needs to take a good hard look at their contradictory Labor hackery lines.
BTW I hate the Liberals, and in a first past the post system i’d be voting Labor. Just incase you get the wrong idea.
Bob, is this really the best you can do? Pretty feeble if so.
Labor’s 2pp is typically bolstered by a strong flow of Greens preferences. They didn’t that strong flow of Greens preferences this time. In fact, they didn’t get any Greens preferences at all. Can you work out why?
Bob is upset his beloved Mother Hsien didn’t cause an upset – The Greens could pre-selet a serial killer and he’d stl support him.
Bob’s reminded me on an Alan Ramsey column from a few years back that took a look at the electoral history of a couple of rural Liberals.
The likes of Sharman Stone and Sussan Ley first won their seats from the Nationals, with margins of something like 51-49. At subsequent elections with no National candidate, they were reelected with margins like 75-25 against Labor.
Ramsey quite bizarrely took this as evidence of the tremendous personal appeal these MPs must have developed within their electorate.
[Labor’s 2pp is typically bolstered by a strong flow of Greens preferences. They didn’t that strong flow of Greens preferences this time. In fact, they didn’t get any Greens preferences at all.]
There was also no Liberal candidate/votes 😉
[Bob is upset his beloved Mother Hsien didn’t cause an upset – The Greens could pre-selet a serial killer and he’d stl support him.]
I don’t take much more than a fleeting interest in interstate state by-elections. Occasionally an aspect of them might interest me for a while. 🙂
I also note Frank that you said “… Greens candidate Hsien Harper having an indecipherable collection of letters parading as a name”. That’s pretty low for someone who claims to hold Labor values including tolerance of the diversity of people.
[The likes of Sharman Stone and Sussan Ley first won their seats from the Nationals, with margins of something like 51-49. At subsequent elections with no National candidate, they were reelected with margins like 75-25 against Labor.]
And funnily enough, 51-49 makes a seat more marginal than 75-25, regardless of what parties and candidates represent what numbers 😉
[I also note Frank that you said “… Greens candidate Hsien Harper having an indecipherable collection of letters parading as a name”. That’s pretty low for someone who claims to hold Labor values including tolerance of the diversity of people.]
You fool, That was Inside Covder’s descfription – not mine.
Learn how to read.
Correct – that was the Inside Cover journalist, not a quote from here.
And Hsien must be disappointed she only got 30% compared to her 34% in that bastion of the far left, Murdoch.
My apologies Frank.
[And Hsien must be disappointed she only got 30%]
I think she did pretty well considering she got a 13% swing, with an independent Green taking another 9% of the vote. Willagee was never going to fall to the Greens.
I think the greens should be pretty damn pleased with that. Sure its not winning it, but nobody really expected that outcome except perhaps the most optimistic. It would seem that on preference distribution, there really wasn’t much in the way of ‘vote splitting’ from the independents.
And frank, comments about the way Hsien speaks or looks is bloody appaling. You’d think a labor supporter would have worked out that sexist nonsense like that just isn’t appropriate to the modern age anymore. Grow up.
Either way congrats to all candidates. You too Gerry.
[And frank, comments about the way Hsien speaks or looks is bloody appaling. You’d think a labor supporter would have worked out that sexist nonsense like that just isn’t appropriate to the modern age anymore. Grow up.]
It is fair game, just as Greens Supporters criticised Peter Tinley for being a Military person and other vile accusatons about being a killing machine.
Glass Jaw anyone ?
The only numbers that matter for Labor here, going forward are the primary vote of 53.8% (boosted a bit further by postals? probably) and the turnout numbers (which indicates that they were pretty successful in their ‘get out the vote’ efforts).
The next election will indicate whether the Greens really made any inroads in Willagee on Labor votes and what percentage of Liberal votes boosted the Labor primary. By that stage Tinley will have had three years in the job and his performance will have an affect.
Does any one else see the blatant Greens lie in this article?
http://www.news.com.au/perthnow/story/0,21498,26413737-2761,00.html?from=public_rss
Another story I read had Hsien saying “30-40” was what they were hoping for. One of them has a typo.
Oz,
“A victory for us was to poll 35 to 40 per cent in primary votes and from what we can tell we did that,’’ she said.
That is a direct quote.