Western Australian election live

A thread for discussion of the Western Australian election count.

And they’re off. Polls have closed, and the first results should be in in half an hour or so. I’ll be part of ABC Radio’s coverage, which you can hear on local radio in Western Australia and around the country on News Radio. Here’s a thread for you all to discuss the action as it occurs.

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.

487 comments on “Western Australian election live”

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  1. Well I certainly didn’t see the magnitude of that slaughter coming. No one did.

    That might be the nastiest election for a sitting government I’ve seen as a WAer since … well ever. And this time the Libs can’t really blame One Nation for their demise like they did in 2001…. well they can, but they played more than a part in it themselves this time.

    Also pretty happy that my state only has 4.5% nutcases prepared to vote ON. I was afraid that my fellow West Australians were madder than I hoped. Turns out they’re not. Though if a Flouride Free or DLS candidate gets up, then …. well Ricky Muir wasn’t that bad, we can hope for someone like him, rather than another nutcase.

  2. Jack A Randa – I said nothing of the sort. Read what I wrote again and tell me if it mentions “eco-regionalism”. Point is that there were other people around in the party who drove the issue much harder. FY anyway.

  3. Interesting fact: “Liberal Party” drew a position ahead of “Liberal Democrats” in five of the six seats, and behind them in one. Liberal Democrats polled 0.63%, 1.39%, 1.04%, 1.19% and 0.94% in the first five, and 4.36% in the sixth.
    Go figure. AGAIN.

  4. Ah, proof that Australia won’t be heading down the same dark path as the U.S. anytime soon. Thanks, compulsory voting. You mean that Trump’s brand of far-right insanity can never get off the ground here.

  5. The Fluoride Free lot will be conspiracy theory nutjobs and can probably be written off unfortunately. Daylight Savings might be useful, though I’ve been in Perth and it was still Daylight at 9 pm , what god damn use does WA have for Daylight Savings ?

  6. As far as Lord Muddles is concerned…his leadership is on life-support, as of tonight. He needed an against-the-odds win, or at least a close loss, to look secure as PM. As it is, the stench of death emanating from the Federal Liberal Party is now overwhelming. Even if there is ZERO swing in the other States (which I doubt), WA will seal their defeat at the next election, and now they know it.

    Thank you, thank you my fellow Sandgropers. You have restored my faith in humanity. <3 <3

  7. Elaugaufein
    Sunday, March 12, 2017 at 12:46 am

    The current WA LC is an adaption the ALP did with the Greens on a system the ALP set up with the Nationals. The ALP seemed pretty happy with it at the time. Both times.

  8. @Disasterboy
    Heh, I’m not any more impressed with it because it was a Labor thing.

    Queensland Labor has a long and inglorious history of trying to be clever with the electoral system and shooting themselves in the foot due to something they overlooked happening (In order: Completely Abolishing the Senate (though to be fair the idea of having a proportional chamber was not at all common at the time, the Senate of the time was more like the British House of Lords), trying to use malapportionment to setup a Rural Gerrymander that would keep Labor in power (and put Joh in power for 19 years instead), introducing Optional Preferential Voting in an attempt to hurt the Libs and Nats and then hurting themselves when the Greens came on the scene instead (since the Libs and Nats were in a formal Coalition they just didn’t run against each other), and then reintroducing Compulsory Preferential Voting to try and get more of the Green votes back on preferences right before PHON came on the scene . So Labor messing up an electoral system change isn’t exactly news to me.

  9. C@Tmomma
    Sunday, March 12, 2017 at 1:10 am
    19% swing to Labor for Sabine Winton! That’s Briefly the Super Campaigner!

    Sabine is going to make an excellent MP. I’ve spent most of the evening with her and the campaign team. We know we can do great things and we know how to do them. Further gains lie ahead.

    I should also like to acknowledge the efforts of Mark Folkard, the member-elect for Burns Beach. He is an excellent example of the power of self-belief, high ethical commitment and an incredible work ethic. He will also make an outstanding MP.

    These two – Sabine and Mark – defeated sitting Ministers. They are a great credit to WA Labor. I’m very proud to have helped them.

  10. Thank you, WA and all the footsloggers like Briefly and Grimace. You have restored my faith . What a boost to the morale…..I could feel the nation breathe a collective sigh of relief!!
    Now for Queensland and especially NSW where developers are devouring our green spaces, etc. Luke Foley initially impressed but his near invisibility and when he does comment, there is a touch of snide which is counterproductive . He needs to speak out on major concerns such as loss of amenity and not just protest issues such as greyhounds and well before the next election .
    Go the goodies!!

  11. I think Briefly deserves a gold star for his predictions; while the Liberals were doing deals and the press were running around like chooks with their heads cut of; Briefly predicted their fate.

  12. I think Labor will romp home in NSW. Apart from Gladys being just a Photios-copy (sic) and totally lame, there’ll be lots of shit bubbling up between now and the next election, including from her time as Transport Minister. Mikey left for a reason.

  13. Labor should now send in a flying squad to grab all the papers on Georgie Brandis’ dealings with the WA Govt.

  14. The Verminator vibbling and vobbling on ABC AM, it was time, federal government has nothing to do with it….blah, blah, blah etc. etc.

  15. Speaking of NSW, the three state byelections are less than four weeks away but the Liberals have not preselected anyone yet.

  16. ‘Well I certainly didn’t see the magnitude of that slaughter coming. No one did.’

    Not even our esteemed Fourth Estate, who have their fingers on the Australian pulse…

  17. BR – I understand that, with the Belgian Boxhead, they’ve found a way of injecting the talking points directly into his brain so they override all other thoughts.

  18. After the Victorian election, the ABC computer was predicting a couple of minor parties would get up in the Upper House – instead, the seats went to Labor.

    Rule of thumb is also that the fewer candidates you run in Lower House seats, the less likely it is that you win in the Upper House. It’s one of the reasons the majors always makes sure they run a candidate in every seat.

  19. I was utterly pleased with this result, and not just as a former Western Australian. It’s a complete and utter rebuttal to the bullshit argument that since Trump’s election the far right populist politicians have been unstoppable. There was never any proof of it locally, and now it’s been disproved in the most comprehensive way.

    If ONP can’t do better than 4.something % of the vote in a “frontier” mining state in a downturn, with every media outlet giving its leader free publicity, then how is it a serious threat? I was particularly pleased the Greens polled double ONP’s result, after being virtually ignored by media.

    Hopefully now the MSM can ditch the line that Brexit and Trump mean that we’re heading on the exact same trajectory as the US/UK. Turnbull should take the WA result as the chance to insert a bit of backbone and get something done on the issues (climatr change, housing affordability, equal marriage etc) that Australian federal politics has spent so much energy forestalling for years.

  20. No Sgt Thurs, you didn’t mention ecoregionalism. But in response to a post of mine in which I mentioned it, you jumped in and said “unless you were at the GM you don’t know what you’re talking about”. If you were trying to say “I was there and valiantly argued against the stupid idea, or the stupid implementation of it” you certainly didn’t say so. Chrissy and Giz sabotaged democracy. And for whoever above is blaming Labor, my recollection from 12 years ago is that Labor was proposing something closer to 1v1v in the LC but gave up on it only when they couldn’t get support from Giz. It really is all her fault!

  21. Yes Xoanon – in response to all the excitable children (aka reporters/journos) predicting an outbreak of Trumpism here, the response is “WE ARE NOT THE UK, NOR AMERICA!” Partly because of compulsory voting, partly because of our different history and demographics.

  22. And Sarge, if you are Giz, and you’re trying to say “Don’t blame me, the party made me do it”, there are times when principle should override party loyalty.

  23. A factor that deserves more recognition in the WA election is that the election of Trump in the US has already made voters in other parts of the world far more suspicious about those trumpeting the virtues of the looney right parties. People have seen what happens in the US when such groups gain power and they don’t like the dangers which it poses to all the world’s citizens. They accordingly are far less likely to use similar groups like Hanson’s One Nation, standing on much the same platform as Trump and with regular obeisance to his “victory”, to register a “protest vote”.

    The election of Trump, and the obvious chaos already ensuing, marks the beginning of the end of the success of the looney right in many parts of the world. Be interesting to see whether it has the same impact on various European elections in the near future. I suspect it inevitably will.

  24. And maybe to be more clear – if you’d said “The Greens made a mistake” I would probably wear that just fine. I actually DON’T like the outcome that was delivered and I don’t think I’m in the minority within the party proper. It’s more that you have pinned it directly on Giz which I don’t think is entirely fair. To your credit you did actually do something that very few people do which is make contact and ask questions. Many people do not, and present their own vague assumption of motive as fact. So, respectfully, apologies for the original challenge. But raspberries for other stuff.

  25. Rod Hagen – yes I think the Trump aftermath is helping Macron go ahead of Le Pen, and deflating Geert Wilders in the Netherlands and aFD in Germany. So Trump may yet help many democracies around the world, probably just not how envisioned doing so!

  26. Sarge, I pinned it on Giz because she was the one with the crucial vote in the LC and she made public statements “justifying” the silly unequal electorates (and, I think, afaIr, making her support for 1v,1v in the LA conditional on Labor agreeeing to the “eco” regions with equal reps in the LC). Ok she may have been a spokesperson for a “darker hand” (gawwd, do you play Dark Souls?) but she spoke as if she meant it. I’m not the only one who has had a poor impression of the WA Greens since then.
    But yes, alleluia for a second chance. If you still have any influence in the higher councils of the Greens, please remind them that (1) ecologies don’t vote, people do; (2) that sometimes people who live in an eco-sensitive area are the worst enemies of the ecology (like, in Mining and Pastoral they dig it up!); and (3) that therefore it is probably tactically beneficial to the Green cause as well as a matter of political morality to support 1v,1v. I have voted Green in Qld for the last few years because I respect the local Greens; it will be so nice to be able to say the same about the WA Greens. (Not that I’m likely to move there and have a vote there.)

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