11.30pm. The Legislative Council vote has Labor and Liberal a clear three quotas each with SA Best on two, with the remaining three seats likely to land with the Greens and the number four candidates of Liberal and Labor. Remarkably, this means likely defeat for Robert Brokenshire of Australian Conservatives, which has failed where Family First succeeded at four successive elections. The party is on 3.6% of the statewide vote, compared with 4.4% for Family First in 2014, which no doubt reflects the success of SA Best in scoring 19% of the vote. This amounts to 0.43 quotas, and compares with the 0.56 quotas that will be left to Labor after the election of its third candidate. To elevate past Labor from losing twelfth place to winning eleventh, Brokenshire has to close a gap of 1% in late counting and preferences – the most likely path to which is a weak showing for Labor in late counting. Preferences are unlikely to feature, as neither Liberal nor the Greens will be fully excluded at the point where either Brokenshire or Labor’s number four are excluded.
Kelly Vincent of Dignity scored a fairly modest 2.0%, and will not be re-elected. Taking the newly elected members together with those carrying over from 2014, the numbers in the new chamber look like eight each for Liberal and Labor, two each for the Greens and SA Best, one for Australian Conservatives, and former Xenophon member John Darley, whose Advance SA party managed only 0.4%.
10.13pm. A case can be made that Jay Weatherill shouldn’t have conceded. The ABC computer now has Adelaide down as a squeaker, converting their raw 1.4% lead into a 2.4% swing to Labor and a Liberal winning margin of just 0.6%. Given the number of outstanding pre-poll votes that won’t be counted on Monday, this one is certainly in doubt. Beyond that, Labor is certainly unlikely to win King or Newland, where they respectively trail by 1.6% and 1.5%, but neither is an actual impossibility. Nor is SA Best out of the hunt in Heysen. That makes for any 21 seats that the Liberals have bolted down, and only one sure vote on the cross bench. The Liberals are highly likely to make it to 24 if not 25, but the pre-election warnings about the perils of calling the result on election night with so many pre-polls outstanding don’t seem to have been taken to heart.
9.39pm. Michael Atkinson observes that there has actually been a two-party swing to Labor in the order of 1.5%, which still leaves the Liberals with a 51.5-48.5 majority.
9.34pm. Heysen has just tipped from SA Best ahead to Liberal ahead on the ABC computer, and the Liberals have moved further ahead in Newland, where they now have a bigger lead than in Adelaide.
9pm. Slow counts in Black and Dunstan are finally gathering pace, and they have yielded no surprises. The Liberals look like they’ve done enough in Elder and King and have their nose in front in Newland. This collectively gets them to 24 even if they don’t win Heysen, although they’re not home yet in Newland. Beyond that, Troy Bell, who’s looking good in Mount Gambier, would give them any remaining vote they needed.
8.42pm. Waite no longer in doubt, according to the ABC computer.
8.30pm. There are 24 seats where the ABC computer has the Liberals ahead. It’s lineball for them in Elder and close in Newland, but on the other hand they might win Heysen. I’ve also just noticed that they still haven’t shaken Labor in Waite. Other qualifications: only early numbers from Black, although those are looking good for the Liberals; nothing in yet from Dunstan.
8.23pm. Antony Green and ABC panellists suggests Heysen more in doubt that headline numbers suggest, and it’s now clear Nick Xenophon won’t win Hartley.
8.19pm. Lee now not looking so good for the Liberals, but a small booth on two-party preferred suggests they are a chance in Enfield.
8.15pm. I’m seeing 25 seats which the Liberals can feel pretty confident about, and at least one conservative cross-bencher. So it would appear we are looking at a change of government here.
8.08pm. More substantial two-party numbers now in from Heysen, and it looks extremely close. I’m not quite sure what to make of the numbers from Hartley, in that the two-party result looks better for the Liberals than I would have figured from their 41.2% primary vote. Either Xenophon is doing poorly on preferences, in which case he’s toast, or he will lift when a few booths with primary vote numbers also report their two-party preferred.
7.59pm. Despite the fact that Labor looks like winning Mawson, some good news is poking through for the Liberals: they’re ahead in King and Lee, have clearly won Colton, are in no danger in Morphett. A lot may depend on Newland, which is lineball.
Haven’t yet made mention of King, which is looking good for the Liberals — new seat in northern Adelaide with lineball margin and no sitting member. Liberals also looking good in Lee, but not home yet.
7.54pm. SA Best have lost ground on the primary vote in Heysen since last I looked, but are still clear of Labor 24.2% to 19.2%, which should be enough. Liberal candidate Josh Teague is on 38.1%, which presumably won’t be enough if SA Best indeed finish clear of Labor. So that one’s looking good for them. However, Nick Xenophon will need to pick up the pace in Hartley: there’s 15% of the vote in, and the Liberal candidate is on 42.4%, which would likely be enough.
7.51pm. Cross bench watch: Frances Bedford a clear winner in Florey; Geoff Brock looking good in Frome; Troy Bell looking good in Mount Gambier; no results yet from Morphett. So there’s a cross bench of at least three, perhaps four or five if things go right for SA Best, and a potential one extra in Morphett. Labor’s promising early results in Colton have now washed away.
7.40pm. We seem to be looking at a status quo sort of result with both major parties on around 20 to 21. But a big variable is whether the Liberals fight off SA Best in Hartley and Heysen. The two-party count has been stuck in Heysen for a while, but the primary votes look encouraging for SA Best. Still not enough for a read in Hartley.
7.37pm. Good early numbers for Labor in Colton, and they’re looking good in Badcoe as well. Less good in Mawson though, and it’s very tight in Newland. Early alarm for the Liberals in Waite has faded.
7.30pm. Starting to look promising for SA Best in Heysen, where the Liberal vote is a dangerous 37.0%, and SA Best are well clear of Labor. Labor don’t look to be making hoped for breakthrough in the seat of Adelaide. Big swing to Labor in Waite with 15% counted, which would have seemed an unlikely prospect for them.
7.21pm. Another excellent result for Tony Piccolo in Light, where 15% of the vote is counted and he is on track for a big swing. Not looking good anywhere for SA Best that I can see — except perhaps in Hartley, where the very first numbers are lineball. In Labor versus Liberal contests, Mawson looks close; encouraging early for Labor in Newland.
7.09pm. I sadly remain preoccupied with Batman. Still too early to say much with confidence, except that SA Best are not about to do anything remarkable. Antony going through encouraging early numbers for Labor in Light, and for Troy Bell in Mount Gambier.
6pm. Polls have closed for the South Australian election. Very early results from small rural booths should start coming in shortly. For what it’s worth, an exit poll apparently finds 50.5-49.5 to Liberal, but I’m a bit lost here without further detail: sometimes this just means an opinion poll conducted on election day rather than exit polling proper; when it is exit polling, it’s usually from specific marginal seats and thus hard to say what the result means without knowing which ones they are.
Weatherall leaves with dignity intact. He actually ddid well to get it this close.
What was the bizarre funky music on TV when Marshall came in to the Liberal HQ for his speech?? Did his teenage kids get hold of the sound system?
42% votes counted for LC, it looks like the numbers looks more or less the same.
Is it possible to concede and then change your mind if things come back to your favour? Just a follow up from William’s latest update.
One thing about taking over after 16 years in opposition is you have can blame your predecessor at will when things go awry.
I daresay Marshall will follow on from all the Tory leaders who have found themselves promoted several levels above their true station and do just that at every opportunity.
The Killers He’s the man Socrates.
According to William above Adelaide is now considered in doubt, although still strongly likely for the Liberals, it does put the majority in doubt in very slim doubt.
“Is it possible to concede and then change your mind if things come back to your favour? Just a follow up from William’s latest update.”
I’m not sure that the counting stops if a candidate concedes, it probably shouldn’t, but each of the candidates in live seats should surely be entitled to wait for the result even if the leader has conceded.
Xasrai
Concessions are formalities. They are not legally binding. The only thing that matters is the actual hard results. But, having said that, no candidate/leader concedes unless they’re pretty sure it’s over and, yeah, let’s face it: it’s over for Labor.
And that goes double for an individual candidate for a seat. Counting continues and ECSA declares the winner of the 2CP as the winner of the seat, regardless of concessions.
@Rational Leftist.
I’m sure you are right, I was just interested in finding out.
** A case can be made that Jay Weatherill shouldn’t have conceded. **
WB, I will take that to help me sleep.
“One thing about taking over after 16 years in opposition is you have can blame your predecessor at will when things go awry.
I daresay Marshall will follow on from all the Tory leaders who have found themselves promoted several levels above their true station and do just that at every opportunity.”
I’m not at all sure he’ll get away with that, when you’ve won a clear landslide you tend to be given a lot more leeway to do that, and if anything WA Labor have failed to truly capitalise on it, the story constructed in South Australia tonight is nothing like that and is very much tilted already against the incoming premier, even if he doesn’t find the electoral tide moving against his win through the next week.
So can Marshall get legislation like the tax cuts through?
The majority is in extremely slim doubt, but surely Bell is going to support the Liberals and Brock might do as well. So the Liberals forming government is not in doubt.
Didn’t Al Gore concede in 1990 and then ring George Bush back and say umm, actually, I withdraw that concession?
Al Gore certainly did not concede in 1990.
The withdrawal method doesnt come highly recommended.
Worth noting that John Darley’s party got 0.4% and he turns 81 this year. If he doesn’t serve a full term, presumably that seat reverts to SA Best.
The Leg Council result is fairly encouraging. Scutineering tonight – most voters at the booth I checked only put a 1 in a box above the line. Probably around 90% in this booth but that may not be average. And considering that now about 60% of electors don’t take a HTV card (because the party names on the ballot paper make it less useful than years ago) then that is no surprise.
Currently full quotas Lib 3 Labor 3 SA Best 2. Surplus left in race for last 3 seats are Libs 0.8, Greens 0.68 Labor 0.53 Conservatives 0.43 and SA Best 0.31. Apart from Dignity Party 0.23 which will pass on some significant votes to SA Best no other serious preference transfers look likely. Libs and Greens certain for spot 9 and 10 and pretty good odds that Labor will keep ahead of Conservatives for last spot.
Overall result 8 Lib, likely 8 Labor, 2 Greens, 2 SA Best, 1 Family First/Conservatives and 1 Advance SA (Darley). So when labor opposes Libs would need 4 from Greens, SA Best, FF/C and Darley to pass legislation. Without Greens, all the rest. Not easy.
Let’s do the numbers in the LC:
Lib + Con (let’s face it, they’re not voting against): 9
Darley – very likely: 10
SA Best (Either 2 or 3 elected): a party of former libs and small government activists who have a history of folding to Libs (especially if Nick commands): 12 or 13
Needed for majority in LC: 12
It passes. Maybe some concessions are made but it passes.
Observer
In my post I commented that from New England by-election LNP did not loose any elections that they contested. That doesn’t include QLD, WA, NT elections.
LP did not contest Batman by-election.
In Tasmanian & SA elections, ALP got between 32-33% vote. No party wins elections with that kind of primary vote.
One can give any number of excuses for losing but in the end ALP lost those elections.
No that was Harry Truman that conceded in 1990; only to promptly withdraw it an hour later.
I must ask: Would this be the first time an incumbent Government has gained 2PP vote and still lost Government?
So Chris Kenny’s sister failed to win her seat.
Bad luck to her but I look forward to the shitstorm he is going to cop on Twitter.
He has become a serial pest on there recently.
And Crabby on 24 just announced that Julie Bishop “a south Australian local” will be on insiders tomorrow.
I would love it if late counting gives Labor Adelaide. Not because it will change who is in Government but because it will get rid of Rachel Sanderson, the useless seat-warmer.
Stolen from Wikipedia,
Bishop was born in Lobethal, South Australia, and grew up on a cherry farm in the Adelaide Hills. She was educated at St Peter’s Collegiate Girls’ School and later studied law at the University of Adelaide, graduating in 1978. She practised as both a barrister and solicitor at the Adelaide law firm Mangan, Ey & Bishop, where she rose to become a partner.
Shiftaling, shouldnt boundaries lead to the party with most votes getting most seats? I thought gerrymandering was the opposite of that, more akin to what happened in 3 out of 4 previous elections.
Julie bishop has lived in Perth for nearly 40 years and follows the weagles. Hardly an SA local.
More fun from the LC, which is now nearing 60% counted: Dignity has not done at all well, falling behind both the Lib Dems and Animal Justice. Meanwhile the Danig Party has discovered the reason it’s a bad idea to give your fledgling party a name no one understands, and is struggling to reach triple figures (in raw votes!), although to be fair they were ungrouped.
I really can’t see much doubt in a 4-4-2-1 result in the upper house – I suppose there’s a vague possibility SA-Best gathers up a lot of preferences to challenge Labor for the last one but I doubt it (the Conservatives are closest on raw votes but I can’t see many possible sources of preferences for them – Stop Population Growth gave them a HTV #2 but I suspect most of their votes are donkeys, while the Lib Dems are probably mostly confused Libs as usual). That leaves, realistically, one seat in doubt out of two whole chambers. SA doesn’t muck about!
Sanderson’s lead is now 67 votes in Adelaide
Nobody in SA considers Julie Bishop a South Australian.
We’ve considered Hawke one, Gillard one but I’ve never heard anyone say that Bishop is one of us.
So, silver linings.
Chris Kenny’s sister appears to have missed out in Torrens.
Tom Kenyon’s loss lessens the SDA infestation.
Robert Brokenshire is struggling to retain his seat in the upper house.
Anything else?
That’s odd rational leftist, since hawke left sa as a child…
It’s not a landslide loss and the Libs are beatable at the next election (instead of having to whittle their seats down over two elections)?
Matthew @ #234 Saturday, March 17th, 2018 – 9:00 pm
I think WA has more of a claim on him than SA, and even that’s pretty tenuous.
I think the claim to Hawke is just based on him being the first (and, until Gillard, only) PM that had any real link to SA.
Matthew, it’s only gerrymandering if the boundaries are drawn with intent of creating a disparate outcome between the vote totals and the seat totals. Campaigning smartly to sandbag existing marginal seats isn’t even related, since (if nothing else) the Opposition can also campaign there to blunt your efforts. Failing to do this was Marshall’s mistake last election; fortunately for him, the SAEC was mandated to then redraw the boundaries so that he’d have won had they been in place in 2014. They did so, and even a modest swing back to Labor couldn’t save Weatherill.
As a counter case, consider Playford’s electoral maps – drawn to ensure a LCL win until the ALP won a landslide in the popular vote!
Matthew I guess I had assocated gerrymandering with unequal voting districts. I was under the impression that all districts should have an equal number of voters as far as is practicable, and I was shocked to hear of our “rotten” burroughs in tonight’s election coverage
Matt Yes I understand, it was not an intentional gerrymander, and the system has worked by (eventually) redrawing boundaries. But an earlier poster was suggesting that redrawing boundaries to bring votes and seats into closer alignment was itself gerrymandering ….
Ven, I have two problems with your statement.
First, your frame of reference is very narrow, drawn to exclude data unfavourable to your preferred conclusion. This is called “cherrypicking”, and its a bad debating tactic, especially onlinr where people have the time to analyse what you’ve said and not said.
Second, because you’re ignoring the provable existence of the “It’s Time” factor that builds over years of Government. Almost every long-running Government that secured reelection had a major external factor working in its favour – Menzies had the ALP split to thank for his longevity as PM, Bjelke-Petersen and Playford had malapportionment & gerrymandering (two different things), and so on.
The fact that a tired four-term ALP Government won a 2PP swing toward it should be highly concerning for Turnbull, along with the Kill Bill Brigade (aka Australia’s journalistic corps). Especially when paired with the fact that Ged Kearney got up in Batman despite being universally written off by the commentariat, despite the gushing over the Greens’ trendy, exciting young candidste, despite the Black Wiggle’s aping of the Libs’ latest hyperbolic lies about Labor.
It won’t, of course. But it should.
So with the fairness provision abolished, will the redistribution after this election be required to return to the practice of equally distributing voters between districts (presuming that the comment on ABC that they have done the contrary is accurate)?
It’s getting pretty interesting on the late count. In Adelaide, Labor is only behind by 67 votes. There’s still a lot of count left in Newland where Labor is only behind by 300 with a well-known incumbent likely to do ok on postals. Labor is probably slightly too far back in King. However, they are looking solid enough in Mawson. If all went right for Labor here, we would have 23 Liberal, 21, Labor, 3 others.
However, the Libs haven’t locked down Heysen or Finniss yet against SA Best – especially Finniss where there is more than half of the vote still to count. We have to see if prepoll behaves differently to on the day votes.
It was way too early a concession!
Shiftaling, you seem to be operating under some confusion. SALC boundaries, like all Australian lower-house boundaries, are drawn on a one-vote, one-value principle.
What happened in 2014 was that Marshall got greedy and tried to go for all the biccies, taking for granted that the marginal seats would fall. SA Labor saw him doing this and decided he couldnt do them much harm campaigning in Labor’s heartland, so they largely declined to engage directly with him and instead sandbagged the marginal seats. It paid off.
I don’t know, the numbers seem to bear out that story – Elizabeth has an 11% deviation from the average enrolment at 28399 and Flinders has -11% deviation at a mere 22756 enrolled voters acording to the ECSA website. Sorry to say if you live in a northern suburb your vote doesn’t countas much as if you live in Flinders, Frome, Mackillop, Stuart, Giles or Chaffey all of which have greater than 8% deviation from the average enrolment for all districts
BTW, on definitions:
Malapportionment is when electoral districts are drawn to have wildly disparate numbers of electors, to ensure that the minority continues to “win” elections. This is what produced the old “rotten boroughs” of pre -1832 England. While it can be done to ensure wins, it has the downside of being vulnerable to charges of injustice/unfairness that are easily explainable.
Gerrymandering is when electoral districts are drawn with the same (or similar) numbers of electors, but are drawn taking local conditions into account to ensure that the governing party wins most of the seats despite losing the overall vote. This is done by several methods, most prominently “cracking” (ensuring that an area with concentrated opposition voters is broken up between several seats otherwise weighted with your supporters to outvote them) and “packing” (writing a few seats off by packing opposition voters into them, thus ensuring that all the other seats have smaller majorities of your own supporters). Other methods exist – prison gerrymandering, highway-hopping, beachcombing, etc. – but are less often available for use.
Thanks Matt, mea culpa wrt to terminology – what we appear to have is malapportionment. I’m not too happy with that I have to say
PS: Hi, Briefly and anyone else who said hi earlier! I was moving from laptop to tablet and forgot to reply sooner. (I hate my life – my laptop’s power jack has died, and it’s 6-8 weeks for the replacement to be shipped out >.<)
Just out of curiosity, what would the seat numbers look like on old boundaries?
Shiftaling, in order to prevent the problem of splitting up city blocks/small towns/etc, most ECs haves a 10% allowance to either side of an averwge enrolment. Some also include large-electorate allowances, to minimize the number of people who have to travel hundreds of km to see their “local” MP. It’s complicated, I know – but these days, there’s usually a reasonable explanation for things that aren’t intuitive about seat boundaries.
TBH, Australian apportionment systems are among the best in the world these days. Both major parties respect the nonpartisan nature of the boundary-drawers and election-administrators. Contrast the USA, with rampant racial & partisan gerrymandering, ideologically motivated voter-suppression laws, dodgy vote-counting processes and several other serious flaws.