Sunday
While Terri Butler’s 2.3% buffer at the end of the night is enough to secure her victory, Bill Glasson can at least claim the uncommon feat of delivering a by-election swing to the party in government. The current margin represents a 0.7% two-party swing to the Liberal National Party compared with the September election result, which is likely to widen a little further on postals.
Commentators around the place have been scrambling to place the result into historical context, mostly with reference to the long record of federal by-elections. A general paucity of swings to governments is easy to spot, but closer examination shows how much swings can vary according to the circumstances of the by-election, and how unreliable a guide they can be to a government’s future electoral performance. The last pro-government swing federally was achieved when Carmen Lawrence moved from state to federal politics in Fremantle in 1994, and it was followed by a shellacking for the Keating government at the next general election two years later. The most recent state example I can think of is the Peel by-election in Western Australia in February 2007, when Alan Carpenter’s Labor government boosted its margin 18 months before being dumped from office.
Given the array of circumstances that can bring by-elections about, an effort should be made to compare like with like. Griffith is part of a long tradition of by-elections held when a member of a defeated government decides opposition isn’t for them. Unfortunately, those involved tend to be senior figures representing safe seats which the opposing party doesn’t bother to contest. During its first term, Rudd Labor only took the field when Peter McGauran departed in the seemingly winnable seat of Gippsland, only to cop a bloody nose for its trouble. Few were surprised Labor stayed out of the fray in Higgins (Peter Costello), Bradfield (Brendan Nelson), Mayo (Alexander Downer) and Lyne (Mark Vaile). Labor likewise went undisturbed during John Howard’s first term at by-elections to replace Paul Keating in Blaxland and John Langmore in Fraser.
The one by-election held during the parliament elected in December 1975 was occasioned by the death of Rex Connor, with the remainder of Labor’s diminished caucus staying put. It was a different story early in the life of the Hawke government, as Malcolm Fraser (Wannon), Doug Anthony (Richmond), Billy Snedden (Bruce), Jim Killen (Moreton) and Tony Street (Corangamite) headed for the exit at a time when forfeiting a by-election was still thought poor form. The last useable example in anything resembling modern history is the Parramatta by-election of 1973, which brought Philip Ruddock to parliament.
From this field of seven, the only result to match Griffith is Richmond in 1984, when Labor picked up a slight swing upon the retirement of Doug Anthony. No doubt this reflected an unlocking of the loyalty accumulating to brand Anthony, which between father Larry and son Doug had occupied the seat for an unbroken 46 years. Even so, the other Hawke government by-elections weren’t far behind, with the exception of Bruce where voters seemed to take a shine to Liberal candidate Kenneth Aldred for some reason. Coincidentally or otherwise, the two worst swings, in Gippsland (a 6.1% swing against Rudd Labor in 2008) and Parramatta (a 7.0% swing against Whitlam Labor in 1973) were suffered by the two shortest-lived governments of the modern era.
However, Griffith looks quite a bit less exceptional if the eight state results I can identify going back to the early 1990s are thrown into the mix. Four swings in particular dwarf those in Griffith, the two biggest being at by-elections held in country seats in New South Wales on May 25, 1996. Results in Clarence and Orange provided a fillip to Bob Carr’s year-old Labor government and a severe blow to the Nationals, perhaps reflecting the party’s recent acquiescence to the Howard government’s post-Port Arthur gun laws. On the very same day, Labor had an historically mediocre result against the Liberals in the Sydney seat of Strathfield, and finished third behind the Democrats in the Liberal stronghold of Pittwater.
The third and fourth placed results are from early in the life of the Bracks government in Victoria, when Labor pulled off rare victories in Jeff Kennett’s seat of Burwood in 1999 and Nationals leader Pat McNamara’s seat of Benalla in 2000. Also higher up the order than Griffith is the Elizabeth by-election of 1994, held four months after Dean Brown’s Liberal government came to power in South Australia. This may have indicated the popularity of outgoing member Martyn Evans, soon to be Labor’s federal member for Bonython, who had been designated as “independent Labor” for most of his ten years as a state member. Rob Borbidge’s Queensland government of 1996 to 1998 did less well, with the looming Liberal collapse in that state foreshadowed by swings to Labor in the Brisbane seats of Lytton and Kurwongbah.
All of this is laid out in the chart above, which ranks swings to the government (positive at the top, negative at the bottom) from the eight federal and eight state by-elections just discussed. Red and blue respectively indicate Labor and Coalition governments, the lighter shades representing state and the darker representing federal. Stats enthusiasts may care to know that the model y=10+44.3x explains 38% of the variability, where y is the government’s eventual longevity in office measured in years and x is the swing to the government across 15 observed by-elections. For what very little it may be worth, the positive 0.5% swing in Griffith associates with 10.3 years in government.
Saturday
| # | % | Swing | 2PP (proj.) | Swing | |
| Timothy Lawrence (SPP) | 570 | 0.8% | +0.7% | ||
| Geoff Ebbs (Greens) | 6,890 | 10.2% | +0.3% | ||
| Christopher Williams (FFP) | 651 | 1.0% | +0.3% | ||
| Karel Boele (IND) | 458 | 0.7% | |||
| Anthony Ackroyd (BTA) | 526 | 0.8% | |||
| Anne Reid (SPA) | 379 | 0.6% | +0.1% | ||
| Terri Butler (Labor) | 26,356 | 39.0% | -1.6% | 52.5% | -0.5% |
| Melanie Thomas (PPA) | 1,051 | 1.6% | |||
| Travis Windsor (Independent) | 585 | 0.9% | |||
| Ron Sawyer (KAP) | 694 | 1.0% | +0.4% | ||
| Bill Glasson (Liberal National) | 29,456 | 43.6% | +0.9% | 47.5% | +0.5% |
| FORMAL/TURNOUT | 67,616 | 71.2% | |||
| Informal | 2,093 | 3.0% | -1.8% | ||
| Booths reporting: | 42 out of 42 | ||||
Midnight. Finally got around to adding the Coorparoo pre-poll voting centre result.
9.22pm. Or perhaps not – Coorparoo pre-poll voting centre still to report, which is likely to amount for a lot – 5859 votes cast there at the federal election.
8.51pm. Morningside 2PP now in, and I’d say that’s us done for the night.
8.36pm. Camp Hill reports 2PP, leaving just Morningside. Glasson and LNP reportedly not conceding, but 2.4% leads (which accounts for the fact that the LNP is likely to do better on postals – Labor’s raw lead is 3.3%) don’t get overturned on late counting.
8.29pm. That’s all the fixed booths in on the primary vote; the outstanding ones referred to in the table are special hospital booths that may not actually exist (but did in 2013). Camp Hill and Morningside still to come in on two-party, and then I think we’re done for the night. It’s been a pretty quick count.
8.03pm. Two more booths a slight move to the LNP.
8.00pm. Four more booths in and a slight tick in Labor’s favour on the swing projection.
7.53pm. One more primary result and a number more on two-party preferred, it remains unclear who will end up with bragging rights to the negligible swing. What is clear though is that Terri Butler is over the line.
7.45pm. Thirty-two of 43 booths reporting, and the picture of a status quo result is unchanged.
7.36pm. A big rush of results that taxed my data entry chops to the limit has produced very little change to the projection, which essentially looks like no swing at all.
7.26pm. Coorparoo Central was a tricky one from a booth-matching perspective, as it’s a “merger” of two booths from the 2013 election.
7.25pm. Coorparoo Central, Greenslopes, Morningside South and West End in on the primary; Buranda West and Norman Park South on two-party. Upshot: a bit more breathing space for Terri Butler, who will be difficult to pull in from here.
7.19pm. The informal vote seems to be down pretty solidly.
7.18pm. I note that none of the booths from the electorate’s north-western latte belt have reported yet.
7.15pm. Bulimba, Carina Heights, Greenmeadows and Norman Park find Labor still with its nose in front, despite a slight swing against. Annerley has also reported a two-party result, so I’ve switched on preference projections based on the booths that have reported so far. This finds Labor’s share of preferences up 6% on 2013.
7.12pm. Annerley, Bulimba Heights and Norman Park South booth results provide better news for Labor, with Butler now pulling into a projected lead. However, I’m still going off 2013 preferences here, as only two very small booths have reported two-party results.
7.03pm. Holland Park and Buranda West are in, and also Murarrie on two-party, and the swing to the LNP is sticking, as is the extremely close projected result.
6.53pm. Another small booth on the fringe of the electorate – Mount Gravatt East in the south-east – and it’s another bad result for Labor, down almost double digits on the primary vote. I’ve switched off the preference swing calculation for now, so the two-party is going off 2013 preference flows.
6.50pm. The preference result is in from Holland Park West, and Labor has 7.2% more preferences than it got in 2013 – but we’re only going off 14 votes here. Nonetheless, my model is extrapolating off it to project the result for the other booth, causing Labor to go up about 1%. Bottom line: hold off reading anything into anything yet.l
6.42pm. Both booths are on the very fringes of the electorate: Holland Park West in the south and Murarrie in the east. The dynamic nearer the city may well be very different. I’ll stop getting a “#VALUE!” result on the Stable Population Party when I get a result from a booth where their vote in 2013 wasn’t zero.
6.38pm. Two very small booths on the primary vote provide a measure of encouragement for Bill Glasson, suggesting a very close result if 2013 preferences are any guide.
6.30pm. There have apparently been 2090 ballots cast at the Whites Hill booth, which compared with the 2083 cast at the election suggests a pretty healthy turnout.
6pm. Welcome to the Poll Bludger’s live coverage of the Griffith by-election. With polls closing round about now, first results should be in in maybe about an hour, although this can be a bit variable. Results in the table will show raw figures for the primary vote and booth-matched swings for both primary and two-party vote, together with a projected two-party total based on the booth-matching. Where available, the latter will be based on booth two-party results; at booths where only primary vote totals have been reported, two-party projections will be derived from 2013 preference flows taken together with the “swing” in preferences recorded across booths where two-party results have been reported. I’ll be copping my results off the ABC Elections page, as the AEC annoyingly does not publish booth results as they are reported (or at least, never has in the past). So those without a minute to lose should note that my table updates will lag about that far behind the ABC.
Seems the voters of Griffith haven’t been cheering for the Home Team. Abbott demands apology.Brandis calls for enquiry. Morrison furious etc
And Johnston will speak later when he is not so angry.
Waznaki
Glasson stands for the same thing as all the other rich white male Tories in parliament. Privilege.
[He has been campaigning for 2 years. He was coming off the back of a change of government and a big election victory for his party; and the resignation of a former prime minister.]
Yes, this explains why the LNP contested Griffith. I wonder if they’d have contested if Glasson hadn’t declared himself available.
Terri Butler had nothing but praise for Bill Shorten as leader. A man of vision who wants to build Australia
Bob Maguire …. meet Andrew Bolt:
“Now for another frightening thing for Labor to ponder. The Abbott Government actually got into its stride over the past month by becoming assertive, even aggressive, and tough – specifically saying no to an SPC bailout, stridently defending the navy from claims of mistreating boat people, warning of the need to slash entitlements and taking on the ABC.
The Coalition may well decide safety lies in asserting itself and its agenda, and the signs suggest it will be rewarded for it.
Excellent.”
[Lynchpin
….Suffer in yer jocks, losers!]
Well what a joyous occasion when we can all be thrilled with the result!
I don’t think anyone was seriously contemplating a LNP win tonight….I certainly didn’t see a single poster predict it, and the betting markets blew out for an ALP win.
It is currently a 2% thing with postals and other declaration votes to come. (Glasson did 5% better in postals than ordinaries last time…..lets see)
Grace Collier on twitter declares the “crims” win Griffith “by a smidge”
All class as usual.
[9.22pm. Or perhaps not – Coorparoo pre-poll voting centre still to report, which is likely to amount for a lot – 5859 votes cast there at the federal election.]
Which Glasson won 58% to 42% last time…….
Just saying……. :devil:
There were 5331 absent votes which went 58% to Labor, but there are no absent votes in this by-election. Absent voters will need to have pre-polled or postal voted. Postal votes were 8984 votes which went 52.09 to Glasson. There were 5708 votes cast at the Coorparoo PPVV last election and 57.92% went to Glasson
what can one say??
[
Go Bill Glasson!! @OckyGreen 31m
Let’s get first past to post voting in Australia please! #auspol #griffithvotes
]
[I don’t think anyone was seriously contemplating a LNP win tonight…]
I am sure Bill Glasson had other ideas.
Mad Lib still hopeful of a win. Hehehe.
[Lynchpin
Posted Saturday, February 8, 2014 at 10:43 pm | PERMALINK
I don’t think anyone was seriously contemplating a LNP win tonight…
I am sure Bill Glasson had other ideas.]
Not judging from his recent body language he wasn’t.
Well this marks the end of the Rudd era. The most divisive and destructive in recent memory. Kevin Russ will go down in history as a spoiler and one of Labors worst prime-ministers A leader who undermined his own party to claw back his job only to lose and then reign
he should have followed in Bailliue’s lead and removed himself from the daily throw and move to the back bench. We do not hear how Napthine or the Liberal Party axed their leader in Victoria.
Very pleased to see Kevin disappear. I trust he will not secure a posting in any future ALP government.
Not a win, an even better result than we already have tonight.
Isn’t it nice when we can all celebrate together? 🙂
I can tell you, Mod Lib, that all the Tories on my booth were very certainly contemplating a LNP win. Almost religiously so. Which of course made it so much better that we delivered a 3% primary swing to Terri over Kevin’s figures.
[Guy Houston @GuyHooter 1h
Griffith: Libs have a ‘star candidate’; a new Fed Govt; an LNP state govt; outgoing popular local MP – still couldn’t win. Where’s Abbott?]
Wasn’t Abbott banished from the campaign, save for the launch? From the grabs I saw on TV it was left to JBishop and others to campaign with Glasson.
@309 That would indicate that Labor could expect a higher then previous pre-poll vote.
Abbott was there
Bishop was there (although she thought she was somewhere else!)
Where was Kev?
Where was Gillard?
The Government Gazette spinning Griffith
https://twitter.com/NewsAustralia/status/432119432924520448/photo/1
Mod lib going through the ages.
[Everything
Posted Saturday, February 8, 2014 at 10:49 pm | PERMALINK
Abbott was there
Bishop was there (although she thought she was somewhere else!)
Where was Kev?
Where was Gillard?]
Mod, for someone who is often sensible, this is a stupid post.
Where was Kev?
Where was Gillard?
Where was Howard?
[ Everything
Posted Saturday, February 8, 2014 at 10:49 pm | Permalink
Abbott was there
Bishop was there (although she thought she was somewhere else!)
Where was Kev?
Where was Gillard?
]
Haven’t you worked it out yet mod, Kev and Gillard are the past, the presence is Abbott. You really have to work at extracting yourself from the alternate reality you seem to be stuck in.
Great win for labor.
This was a shoo in for Glasson three months ago.
Just shows how useless Abbott and co have been for three months.
Sloppy Joe will be sharpening the knife right about now…
Ha ha 🙂
Well enough mischief for tonight.
Congratulations on you win tonight Bludgeroonifyers!
Great result all around 🙂
Mod lib – Abbott visited for a day, Shorten for a week.
Give yourself another uppercut 😉
Where was Kev?
Where was Gillard?
Where was Howard?
Where was Fraser?
Where was Menzies?
Sorry sprocket, I haven’t read the Australian for 30 months or more and not about to start again. Not alone apparently.
[Henry
Posted Saturday, February 8, 2014 at 10:55 pm | PERMALINK
Mod lib – Abbott visited for a day, Shorten for a week.]
Perhaps Abbott should have put in more time and Shorten less, do you think? Hehe 😉
[Where was Kev?]
He was definitely there.
[Where was Gillard?]
Enjoying her retirement.
Abbott’s appearances OTOH were very much downplayed.
[
Everything
..
Great result all around 🙂
]
If this result is good enough for the Liberals; for them to stick with Abbott; it is a great result for Labor.
Brisbane Pre-Poll has both the LNP and the ALP on a -1% Swing.on Primaries but a swing of +2,4 TCP t9 the ALP.
If this trend is reflected on the remaining pre-polls and postals then LNP will go backwards.
Antony Green has some explanations to give on the ABC prediction model that’s for sure.
And may the Liberals have many more successful losses.
[The most divisive and destructive in recent memory. ]
Even today he was still trying to make the by-election all about him with his selfies and announcements of national bodies, clearly forgetting he is no longer in parliament anymore.
Very sad. The sooner Labor move on from this the better.
If this result is good enough for the Liberals; for them to stick with Abbott; it is a great result for Labor.
Give them enough rope frednk, let them go on their merry way.
Am I actually seeing the ALP commentariat gloating about a swing AGAINST them in a by-election when the voters are apparently turned off the LNP state and federal governments?
YIKES, what a strange place this is!
You guys realise that governments don’t win by-elections, aren’t you? A swing is a good result, a win would have been a mind blowing result.
The donkey and inverse donkey vote would have favoured the ALP but the LNP had the inverse donkey vote.
Go to bed mod, you have been spanked around a bit tonight.
Again,
😉
Mod Lib
And yet yourself you talking how this is a win for Libs 😛
You are no better than the ALP commentariat 😛
Just for anyone who thinks Glasson can still get there, the figures posted by kevjohnno @309 only close the gap by 1039 votes assuming the same results at Coorparoo and on postals and that everyone who absent-voted last time has either already voted or else evaporated. Obviously this can be padded by assuming larger turnouts for either of these and/or some swing to the LNP in them, but with a current 2PP gap of 4045 votes that only gets you so far.
Great to see such a strong, articulate candidate as Terri Butler get over the line, but this is hardly a ringing endorsement of Shorten, I wouldn’t have thought.
As Opposition by-election wins go, it’s pretty ordinary isn’t it? Holding steady to 2013 result at best? Given the complete hash Abbott and co have made of things thus far, surely a significantly better result could have been expected, even if Bill Glasson was a far stronger than average local candidate.
Stop spinning Mod Lib. Butler won against the odds of a known opponent. She will in all likelihood get a sophomore surge in 2016 and increase her margin.
Glasson is gone and will likely be replaced with the usual LNP numpty nobody time-serving loyal hack in 2016.
[Peter Brent @mumbletwits 9m
Fwiw, most reasonable comparison is probably Mal Fraser retiring from Wannon in ’83. 1.1 per cent swing to opposition.]
Can’t agree Alias. The Libs have royally stuffed this.
“A very status quo election result” according to Anthony Green.
After such a massive build up, the result just feels quite flat.
Correction: 1339 not 1039. Makes no difference.
How do you mean Lynchpin. I’m the first one to want to believe this by-election win will prove to be wind in the sails of the Shorten push for a one-term Abbott government but I’m struggling to see how holding steady at Rudd’s vote can be characterised that way.
Possibly interesting to note during Butler’s speech the cheers were louder for the mention of Plibersek than the first mention of Shorten and then louder again for mention of Albanese.
Moddy you should go and enjoy a bottle of Moet at least it tastes better than this government