Seat of the week: Griffith (plus ReachTEL polling)

Brisbane’s inner south again finds itself represented by a Prime Minister after another absorbing week in federal politics.

First the ReachTEL polling. Yesterday morning the Seven Network brought us a big sample automated phone poll of 3018 respondents which broadly corroborated the Morgan SMS poll in returning the Coalition lead to margin-of-error territory. The poll had Labor at 38.3% on the primary vote, the Coalition on 45.1% and the Greens on 8.7%, panning out to 52-48 in favour of the Coalition after preferences. Now Fairfax brings electorate-level ReachTEL polls of Maribyrnong (located in western Melbourne and held by Bill Shorten), Chisholm (eastern Melbourne, Anna Burke), Blaxland (western Sydney, Jason Clare) and McMahon (western Sydney, Chris Bowen), which have Labor’s two-party vote at 58.6%, 55.2% and 58.9% for the first three, with McMahon annoyingly not provided but Labor evidently in front. Earlier ReachTEL polling showed Labor losing all bar Maribyrnong. Now on to a Seat of the Week I’ve been holding back for a special occasion …

Kevin Rudd’s electorate of Griffith covers inner city Brisbane immediately south of the Brisbane River, from South Brisbane east to Bulimba and Queensport, south to Annerley and south-west to Carina Heights. The seat was called Oxley until 1934, the name later being revived for an unrelated new Ipswich-based seat in 1949. Highly marginal historically, Griffith changed hands between Liberal and Labor in 1949, 1954, 1958, 1961, 1966, 1977, 1996 and 1998. Don Cameron won the seat for the Liberals at the 1966 landslide and then had his position strengthened by redistribution, enabling to hold on to the seat through the Whitlam years. A redistribution at the 1977 election moved the seat heavily in Labor’s favour, resulting in Cameron switching to the new Gold Coast seat of Fadden and Griffith being won for Labor by Ben Humphreys.

When Humphreys retired at the 1996 election the Labor preselection was won by Kevin Rudd, the former diplomat who wielded great influence as chief-of-staff to Wayne Goss during his tenure as Queensland Premier from 1989 to 1996. In doing so he established a factional association with the locally dominant AWU sub-faction of the Right, which secured his preselection despite grumblings that the state branch was failing to meet affirmative action standards. However, the statewide rout that Labor suffered at the 1996 election saw Rudd fall it his first electoral hurdle, with Graeme McDougall gaining Griffith for the Liberals off a 6.2% swing. Rudd returned for a second attempt amid the far more favourable circumstances of 1998, picking up a 3.9% swing to unseat McDougall by a margin of 2.4%.

Rudd established a formidable electoral record in Griffith, picking up a 3.3% and 2.4% swings against the trend of the 2001 and 2004 elections. The electorate was substantially reshaped by redistribution at the 2004 election, absorbing inner city areas at East Brisbane, South Brisbane and Dutton Park while its eastern parts were hived off to the new seat of Bonner. In what may have been an early portent of Rudd’s electoral impact, the booths which were transferred out of the electorate contributed to a surprise defeat for Labor in Bonner by swinging heavily to the Liberals in his absence. As his party’s candidate for the prime ministership in 2007 Rudd enjoyed a further 3.8% swing in 2007, and as its recently spurned ex-leader in 2010 he suffered what by Queensland standards was a relatively mild swing of 3.9%.

The Liberal National Party candidate for the coming election is Bill Glasson, former president of the Australian Medical Association. Glasson’s father, Bill Glasson Sr, was a state National Party MP and minister in the Bjelke-Petersen, Cooper and Ahern governments.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,189 comments on “Seat of the week: Griffith (plus ReachTEL polling)”

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  1. BW at 733 – One of my daughters – a single mother shocked me a few months ago by saying that she would not vote ALP because of the effects of the single mother changes. She felt let down by PMJG. Now she’s back with the ALP because she knows that Abbott’s mob will screw ordinary people even worse!

  2. Rudd’s return to the leadership was ‘a catalyst’ for Combet’s decision.

    Is there a single poster on Bludger, ST excepted, who would prefer Rudd to Combet?

  4. ModLib @ 742
    The gender card was a fair one to play once but it did get trotted far too often without justification.

  6. [ Thx. Thought I half-remembered that. So it could just be that he needs to leave, rather than quitting because of the political circumstances. ]

    Possibly. But he did say the leadership change was the “catalyst”.

  9. I prefer most to Rudd in Labor and most to Abbott in Liberal.

    The real tragedy is that it is the Liberals who needed to renew.

  10. The opinion polling if they werent based on the media agenda .

    there is no reason at all for the coalition to be in the race

  11. ausdavo

    ‘BW at 733 – One of my daughters – a single mother shocked me a few months ago by saying that she would not vote ALP because of the effects of the single mother changes. She felt let down by PMJG. Now she’s back with the ALP because she knows that Abbott’s mob will screw ordinary people even worse!’

    I have no particular problem with your daughter’s original decision, nor with her decision to change her mind. Both are rational, if rather narrowly focused, decisions.

    Beyond that, I suggest you keep an eye on Rudd’s poppulism. Because, if he thinks there are a few more votes in sticking it to your daughter’s interests, he will flip and then flop.

    Apart from that, has anyone, but anyone, calculated what the charge to the Budget will be? No? The same people who have been, rightly, calling for properly costed policies from the Liberals are completely ignoring costings of Rudd’s decision.

  12. [ Turnbull imo , is no better than abbott ]

    Turnbull strikes me as an honest hypocrite. Abbott and Rudd are both dishonest hypocrites.

  16. The news ltd and pro coalition media propaganda polls , claim if labor did change labor would be romping it in.

    So those who defended the opinion polls , if labor doesnt lead comfortably

    then there is no defence that this opinion polls in the past and future will be nothing but rubbish

  18. jv

    http://www.aph.gov.au/About_Parliament/Parliamentary_Departments/Parliamentary_Library/pubs/rp/BudgetReview201213/ParentingPayment

    [The changes proposed in the Budget require all PP recipients who were on the payment prior to 1 July 2006 to be assessed under the same eligibility requirements as the new PP recipients (post 1 July 2006). In short, they will have the same participation requirements as those who claimed PP after 1 July 2006 and will no longer be ‘grandfathered’.]

    Obviously putting the previous unequal arrangements back in won’t work.

  19. I see that Abbott is playing the Rudd card, Rudd is playing the unity card, Bishop is playing the responsibility card and the rest of us might just as well be playing solitaire.

  20. [748
    Boerwar

    briefly

    ‘This will all end in tears.’

    Is already ending in tears.]

    I’m afraid you’re right Bw. We have to wait for the polls, but my guess is that in WA, at least, things will only go from bad to worse.

  21. 688
    Player One
    [Yes, I think that I will probably end up relegating the LNP to last place when I vote. The ALP will go second last.]

    That’s my plan: Preference ALP ahead of LNP, but only just.

    [But do you know something? If the LNP switched to Turnbull, I would probably reverse those.]

    You would not be Pat Malone there.

    (Though I would still vote Labor, primarily for the NBN, and to keep the hard right at bay — moderate conservatives I have no great problem with, but they are increasingly thin on the ground in the Coalition of late.)

  24. 741
    Boerwar
    [I can’t recall an election when the options were as bad as they are now.]

    No argument there, as far as leaders go.

  26. PO

    ‘Turnbull strikes me as an honest hypocrite. Abbott and Rudd are both dishonest hypocrites.’

    *laughs*

    You are getting close to the core of the Alice in Wonderland that passes for politics in Australia atm.

  30. If Rudd can do a reasonable Job from now to the election , if the opinion polling were reflection of reality

    Then Abbott coalition has lost the unlosable election, there is no reason for the coalition to be closer than 5% to labor

  31. Bar Bar

    ‘Greg Combet takes with him the last remaining vestige of visible integrity from the senior ranks of the caucus, imo.’

    As opposed to invisible integrity?

  33. So I’ve just discovered that my favoured Labor Party leader has quit.

    If people like Combet are calling it quits I really don’t see what the point is anymore.

  34. The real trouble with our two thoroughly ethically corrupt leaders is that there is not enough last places on the ballot to enable voters to do the right thing.

  36. Rosemour or Less@783

    So I’ve just discovered that my favoured Labor Party leader has quit.

    If people like Combet are calling it quits I really don’t see what the point is anymore.

    You were so happy the other day, too.

    *hug*

  37. Quiz: who is the silliest poster here:

    a) M Bob, with his absurd media/polls conspiracy theories?
    b) JV, with his endless thundering about non-existent “faction bosses”?
    c) Borewar, for being a crashing boer?
    d) Tom-the-best, for making Hanson-Young look like a realist?

  41. @Rosemour or Less/783

    I assuming it’s for health reasons as per pointed out by others.

    *me not tied to anyone to any party* thankfully.

  47. [Psephos
    Posted Saturday, June 29, 2013 at 4:32 pm | PERMALINK
    Quiz: who is the silliest poster here:]

    No room for moi in your list?

    Sad face

  49. ausdavo

    [One of my daughters – a single mother shocked me a few months ago by saying that she would not vote ALP because of the effects of the single mother changes. ]

    The problem I have with the attitude of sole parents to the change is that they knew it was coming anyway.

    I don’t think it was necessarily Gillard being harsh on women (even though the changes predominantly affected women), I think it was part of her ‘vision’ to lift women (and sole fathers) out of a poverty trap, and therefore the children.

    Most of it was about education. For the sole parents, and for their kids to learn by example. Another part of the scheme was about providing additional childcare.

    This raised another problem that was also tackled. Lifting the qualifications for early childhood carers/teachers – and its corollary, higher pay for those workers.

    Another was flexibility of hours in the workplace to cater for the obvious needs of all new parents, but particularly for sole parents.

    Having said that, all the ducks had to be lined up. One of the ducks out of kilter – and that duck was actually not just finding a flexible employer, but employment at all.

    The employment figures look good on paper, and especially compared to the rest of the developed world, but there are still not enough jobs to go round for people who want to work.

    It didn’t help that the MSM and the so-called Online Mummy Bloggers went for Gillard’s jugular over this issue.

    “Playing the Gender Card” I think it’s called.

  50. [Boat arrivals under Howard 2001 – 2006 5500+

    Not quite the one ST raves about]

    Take 2001 out(Pacific Solution was introduced LATE 2001 dumbass) and give us the number again.

    Go on… I dare you

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