Odds and sods: week four

Labor firms in its favouritism on the question of party to form government, but the movement is mostly the other way in individual seat markets.

There has been a fair bit of movement in bookmakers’ odds for the election over the last week and a bit, first in favour of the Coalition and then against, with the leaders’ debate on Friday night appearing to provide the catalyst for the change. At the time of the last of these posts, the Coalition was near its peak at $3.30 with Labor at $1.32, but now Labor is in to $1.22 and the Coalition out to $4.30.

The most notable change on the seat markets is that there are now seven seats that are at evens, where there were none last week. As a result, the Liberals are no longer clear favourites in Capricornia and Bass, and Labor no longer are in Dawson, Leichhardt, Braddon, Deakin and Stirling. Most of these were rated very close to begin with, although there have been reasonably substantial movements in Braddon (Labor $1.40 and Liberal $2.75 last week, now $1.90 each), Leichhardt (Labor $1.70 and LNP $2.60 last week, now $1.87 each), Dawson (Labor $1.57 and LNP $2.25 last week, now both $1.87). The Coalition now have the edge in Indi, where they are in from $2.15 to $1.80 with the independent out from $1.77 to $2.00.

Other movements of note: a much tighter race is now anticipated in Liberal-held Robertson, where the Liberals are in from $3.90 to $2.05 and Labor are out from $1.21 to $1.70, and the Country Liberals’ odds have been cut from $6.00 to $3.75 in Lingiari, with Labor out from $1.12 to $1.22. Conversely, there has been movement back to Labor in Solomon, where they are in from $1.50 to $1.30, with the Country Liberals out from $2.45 to $3.25. There has been movement almost across the board to the Coalition in Queensland, leaving Labor still favoured in Bonner, Dickson and Flynn, but by narrower margins.

With seven seats now tied up, and one moving from independent Coalition, Ladbrokes now has Labor clear favourites in 79 seats (down five), the Coalition in 60 (down one), and others in five (down one). As always, you can find the odds listed at the bottom right of each electorate page in the Poll Bludger federal election guide. Another thing you can find is the latest daily instalment of Seat du jour, today dealing with Chisholm, in the post immediately below this one.

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.

1,345 comments on “Odds and sods: week four”

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  1. Sounds a lot like prosperity gospel.
    Larry Niven had an idea in some of his books of a fertility lottery to breed for luck.
    In Gatica didn’t the protagonist try to fake his genetics to get on the ship, and they let him on anyway because he showed he had something more important than genetics.

  2. guytaur @ #1198 Wednesday, May 8th, 2019 – 9:23 pm

    Andrew Earlwood

    Hate speech in the name of religion is hate speech.
    See Brunei where religion can go with hate against a whole class of people.

    The unease is the realisation that there was hate baked in.
    Just like we got used to no golliwog dolls we will get used to this.
    Its the same logical consistent argument that you can’t yell fire in a theatre.
    When speech causes harm we act.

    Unlike the US we go further with legislation like 18C

    Look at it like that and your unease should disappear as the logic is consistent and does not create an arbitrary constraint on free speech. It does not restrict religious speech unnecessarily

    AMEN!

  3. Even if IQ is related to genetics it doesn’t mean that high IQ parents will have high IQ children. The randomness of genetic apportionment at conception sees to that. Twins may demonstrate that IQ is related to genes, but siblings demonstrate that it’s more complex than that.

  4. Boerwar says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 8:34 pm

    Blue Report: 10 short days to bliss.

    Bluey notes that the Morrison stunt-a-thon has demonstrated that, when it comes to pouring beer on his head, driving a truck, sinking a pool ball, or hitting a ping pong ball, Morrison is good only for pouring beer on his head. Except that that was a waste of good beer.

    Gold…

    Nice work Boerwar as usual.

  5. LGH: “someone can ban me if they like”.

    Only William can do that.

    When he does, make use of your spare time to work on your manifesto. Just spare us the torture of having to read it here.

  6. DR
    says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 11:42 pm
    LGH: “someone can ban me if they like”.
    Only William can do that.
    When he does, make use of your spare time to work on your manifesto.
    _______________________________
    He should send it to Mensa, they’ll lap it up.

  7. Love the way that the fascists support genetic purity on the assumption that they pass the test. What’s the bet that LGH is a short sighted, knock kneed, pigeon chested weed with an IQ of 60? Bemused was chucked off this blog, but filthy fascists are okay it seems. Time to slither back under your rock LGH.

  8. Is there an expression in grammar for mixing tenses wrongly? As Morrison did.

    Peter van Onselen
    @vanOnselenP

    “We’ve brought (past tense) the budget back to surplus next year (future tense)”

    One reply was

    Alex Turnbull
    @alexbhturnbull

    Replying to @vanOnselenP
    Here’s how

    GIF of Marty’s DeLorean ‘transitioning’ through time. (Gifs don’t work here)

  9. Roger Miller

    Yes, the real tragedy of Gattaca was that the protagonist with ‘bad’ genes evetually did succeed, thus proving that the system could be overcome, but his one experience was never going to be enough to change the system. Particularly as his ‘wrongful’ success had to remain a secret.

    I didn’t realise until years later when one of our kids pointed it out that ‘Gattaca’ was a sort of take on the letters of the four amino acids in DNA – GTCA (without looking it up the only one I can remember for certain is Guanine!)

  10. Does the Daily Telegraph ever let up?

    One of the headlines on their website –

    Migrants could flood suburbs under Labor’s visa plans
    EXCLUSIVE Sydney’s west is to absorb the largest share of a flood of ageing immigrants under Labor’s plan to hand out unlimited visas to foreign parents, an analysis by The Daily Telegraph has revealed.

    Gotta love the ‘exclusive’ bit – who else would produce stuff like this?

  11. nath says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 11:47 pm
    There’s also something to be said for sweet dumb people. personally they are my favourite.
    —————————————-
    That may explain your problem with Shorten.

  12. Peter Stanton
    says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:05 am
    nath says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 11:47 pm
    There’s also something to be said for sweet dumb people. personally they are my favourite.
    —————————————-
    That may explain your problem with Shorten.
    _____________________________
    It’s probably more to do with Xavier than anything else. They only played football against other toff schools. No chance to hurt em. Can you imagine what Noble Park would have done to them?

  13. Taking lead out of petrol has probably improved IQ more than any breeding program ever would. Improved nutrition and early education would probably do the same in most of the world.

  14. nath says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:11 am
    Peter Stanton
    says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:05 am
    nath says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 11:47 pm
    There’s also something to be said for sweet dumb people. personally they are my favourite.
    —————————————-
    That may explain your problem with Shorten.
    _____________________________
    It’s probably more to do with Xavier than anything else. They only played football against other toff schools. No chance to hurt em. Can you imagine what Noble Park would have done to them?
    ————————–
    I can understand that. In my youth I had great joy in beating private school wankers in the pool. My only regret was that we did not play water polo against them

  15. Roger Miller

    I saw someone speak on this very issue of third world malnutrition and the long term effects on brain development and how they were trying to measure or quantify it on a community or country-wide scale. I think the gist of it was that more people survived to adulthood especially due to immunisations (where’s UAP when this happens?) but many would fail to reach their potential because of lack of various micronutrients in their childhood, and that this would have a massive adverse economic impact on the community/country.

  16. Peter Stanton
    says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:25 am
    nath says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:11 am
    Peter Stanton
    says:
    Thursday, May 9, 2019 at 12:05 am
    nath says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 11:47 pm
    There’s also something to be said for sweet dumb people. personally they are my favourite.
    —————————————-
    That may explain your problem with Shorten.
    _____________________________
    It’s probably more to do with Xavier than anything else. They only played football against other toff schools. No chance to hurt em. Can you imagine what Noble Park would have done to them?
    ————————–
    I can understand that. In my youth I had great joy in beating private school wankers in the pool. My only regret was that we did not play water polo against them
    ___________________________________________
    Nice one.

  17. LGH @ #1300 Wednesday, May 8th, 2019 – 11:29 pm

    Douglas and Milko

    For the research to be wrong this statement would be true:
    Genetics is unrelated to IQ. Or genetics is not related to ancestry.
    ……. etc.

    A child of a Khose is clearly likely to be shorter than a child of a Tutsi. That is a genetic inheritance. It is not just a matter of nutrition. That can be overcome by enough hormone enhanced chicken meat in the diet, but leading on from that it seems to me to be deliberately obtuse not to consider inherited bias in IQ.

    Now, I am not suggesting that any sub-racial group of Homo Sapiens Sapiens have any IQ profiles that reflect anything other than variations in nutrition and other environmental issues. But seriously folk can’t suggest that individuals all start off with the same intellectual capacity regardless of genetic history.

    NOTE: The contra argument is that every CLK dole bludger is a slacker who could have been a billionaire if they had just tried.

  18. Charles says:
    Wednesday, May 8, 2019 at 9:49 pm

    Can anyone confirm my recollection of this exchange:

    Morrison talking up govts/his achievements and says we’ve brought the budget back into surplus.

    Sabra Lane pulls him up and says no, you haven’t, it’s a projected surplus.

    Morrison fibs and says yes, that’s what I said.

    Audience laughs because they aren’t stupid and heard what he said.

    I’m claiming credit for this.

    I wrote to the ABC a week or so ago making this point and now twice in as many days we’ve seen Sales and now Lane pull him up on it. 😆

  19. There was another debate on Wednesday. A SA senators’ debats at the press club. There were four senators – Simon Birmingham for the Libs, Penny Wong for Labor, Sarah Hanson Young for the Greens and Cory Bernadi for the Australian Conservatives.

    Penny Wong got very upset about Simon Birmingham’s comments on China

    There is a snippet of that confrontation on the ABC, but more of the debate generally on skynews.

    https://www.skynews.com.au/details/_6034038791001

    The 13 minute plus footage airs comments by Wong, Birmingham and Bernadi, but whilst Hanson Young is also there I didn’t see any of her comments being included.

  20. Douglas and Milko:

    The article linked to by LGH is particularly bad science, and a case where an apparently statistically valid result is complete nonsense because of the underlying assumptions.

    Yes I thought that too.

    Everyone should have a pet theory to explain measured IQ decline. Mine is that it relates to there no longer being a need to perform mental arithmetic aa part of retail transactions, hence many people do not develop basic mathematical capability (and some are even “maths phobic”, apparently). IQ tests involve mathematical capability, and scores have fallen due to its absence. I.e. the IQ score fails to measure computer age intelligence.

  21. Byron,

    Actually, height is less correlated with genetics than intelligence is, BUT, the genes are not the important factor in intelligence that so many people over the years assumed they would be.

    This Scientific American article, nicely referenced, explains that while there is a hereditary component to IQ, you cannot predict exactly how the gene distribution will fall in any particular case. It also shows the importance of environment:

    https://blogs.scientificamerican.com/beautiful-minds/the-heritability-of-intelligence-not-what-you-think/

    For those who want the latest peer-reviewed research, this paper is quite accessible, if rather long:

    https://www.ncbi.nlm.nih.gov/pmc/articles/PMC4270739/

    Once again the conclusion is that will intelligence has a strong hereditary component, how that ability is expressed in the individual person is n where near as correlated to genetics as the actual genes themselves would suggest.

    LGH has probably left us, but in case you are around, unless you can read and understand my second link you have no right to be making such simple (and wrong) assertions about such a complex topic.

  22. Red Ted

    Everyone should have a pet theory to explain measured IQ decline. Mine is that it relates to there no longer being a need to perform mental arithmetic aa part of retail transactions, hence many people do not develop basic mathematical capability (and some are even “maths phobic”, apparently). IQ tests involve mathematical capability, and scores have fallen due to its absence. I.e. the IQ score fails to measure computer age intelligence.

    The research would actually support that. The correlation between genetics and IQ is low in child hood years, but grows as children with higher IQs seem to seek out activities that enhance their intelligence – or perhaps are forced into them by their enthusiastic parents! So, by age 20, the correlation between genes and IQ is significantly higher.

    My pet theory is that economic rationalism is depriving much of the population o good nutrition, and nutritions studies in British children a decade or so ago showed that giving children vitamin pills increased their IQ by about 10 points – highly significant.

    This Guardian article discusses the subject: https://www.theguardian.com/science/2011/feb/07/diet-children-iq

    And nowI had better get back to work, but I could not let LGH’s mistruths go unchallenged. This is about science for goodness sake, not about which type of food you prefer!

  23. As a follow up to my earlier post here is a longer (if still slightly abridged) version of Wednesday’s SA senator debate. You do get to see some comments from ALL the senators on the podium (including SHY). Interestingly, there is no Centre Alliance representative.

    https://2600.skynews.com.au/sa-senators-face-off-in-press-club-debate/

    “In a wide-ranging debate, moderated by Chief Political Reporter Kieran Gilbert, Senators Simon Birmingham, Penny Wong, Sarah Hanson-Young and Cory Bernardi have faced off at the South Australian Press Club.”

    The debate was generally civil and covered a range of topics – some focussed on SA issues, some that that are centered on SA but of national importance (e.g. drilling for oil in the Bight [a potential new Adani?]), and some national (e.g. disendorsed candidates). Cory Bernadi suggests that there should be non-compulsory preferential voting.

    Perhaps sadly, despite some good quality debating, all that 99.5% of the population will see is the last few seconds where Penny Wong refuses to shake hands with Simon Birmingham

  24. Anyone who is awake. You should tune into US Congress House Committee.

    The US is now in a full blown Constitutional Crisis

  25. Caught a bus this morning out to the Stormont building. Surely the most beautiful legislative building in the world. Amazing position on top of a hill looking across Belfast.. Too bad it’s absolutely useless

  26. Where do these women get that resilience?

    My mother, with two children, divorced a no-hoper husband and married my father, a widower with two children of his own, the year of the great stock market crash. She had left school at 15 to help support her working class family.

    Then through the years of the Depression and World War II brought another 10 children into the world (8 still living). In those years of the 1930’s she did this in a small house, without a fridge (just an ice-box), no washing machine, no dishwasher, limited hot water, no central heating, no car and no telephone. Fortunately in those days, bread, milk, ice and coal were home delivered. For four of those years her husband, a World War I veteran, enlisted again and was away with the AIF in the Middle East.

    She lived to the ripe old age of 92, still with her very sharp mental faculties, a widespread interest in all things political, artistic and sporting, and a stalwart Labor supporter. She could tell you, almost to the birthday the ages of her 28 grandchildren.

    On Mother’s Day I always remember one of her great sayings: “I didn’t come down in the last shower!” (AKA I wasn’t born yesterday!) I’m hoping that the Australian voter has been taking her attitude to the lies and misleading claims of the Coalition during this election campaign.

  27. A very good morning all,

    Received my postal vote documentation in the mail and completed in about 20 minutes. I’ve traditionally been a rusted on ALP voter all my life so it is generally a routine assignment for me however I do take note of the Senate. Occasionally I’ve voted for the Greens in the Senate. This year’s Senate voting paper is huge. About the length of three A3 sized pieces of paper lengthwise which would make it awkward in a flimsy voting booth.

    Anyway I was impressed with the technical arrangements of the envelope etc. Kudos to the wonks at the AEC. Meanwhile around the corner from my office there is a pre-poll voting booth and from a distance it takes on the appearance of a cheap real estate / sales office with lots of banners, A-frames and people milling around out the front in gaudy attire.

  28. Tuned in to CNN idly and watched a panel that included the former director of the Nixon Presidential Library, Tim Naftali. His physical resemblance to Nixon is creepy. Could be his brother or son. But what was even more surprising was he made some sense, even criticizing Trump for going over the top with a blanket claim of executive privilege. Mind you, compared to the present incumbent, Nixon was a choir-boy.

  29. Peter Stanton
    “… In my youth I had great joy in beating private school wankers in the pool. My only regret was that we did not play water polo against them”

    Nath
    “Nice one”

    Gecko
    Dickheads.

  30. AB11

    D&M – true, except for the cold mean rain in late spring

    You are not wrong! I am freezing, and I did not bring the right warm clothes. Yesterday I saw a couple of students carrying large radiator home between them, here in Bonn.

    Surely it has to get better?

  31. beguiledagain,

    Thanks so much for that story.

    I wonder how many women of the Catholic faith became nuns, because it was one of the few career paths open to women back then.

    I know about 3 of my great aunts became Mother Superior of the Australian and Oceania order of the Sisters of Mercy. Their home convent was based in Singleton, NSW. By 1966 they were coming to visit us in Blackheath in a late-model Holden, to “inspect” the local Catholic schools. The best thing was that they would inspect the school, and then take us great nieces and nephews out of school for the rest of the day.

    We used to call then Mother Alexia’s half-holidays.

    Actually, Kay Jay, when you are around, I remember that your Marie was a Sister of Mercy, and had a horrible experience. I really apologise if any of my relatives had any thing to do with that.

    I do know that after the great aunts left the school, the next day I was singled out for “special punishment”. I never made the connection. I just felt really stupid that I kept getting into trouble, no matter how hard I tried to be good.

  32. Hope Bolt, Murray and Credlin are replaced with Keating , Rudd and Gillard after they lose the election for the Lieberals! Sky spews after dark.

  33. FFS all that “IQ” measures is the ability to do IQ tests!. Like much of psychology it is pseudoscience. There are as many definitions of “intelligence” as there are people who try to define it!
    IMO intelligence is shown by being able to cope with one’s environment. Many Aborigines would have thought Burke and Wills stupid, because they couldn’t find Water! many people would find these same Aborigines stupid because they didn’t understand negative gearing.

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