More Senate entrails examined

The lower house count concludes with the Coalition on 51.53% of the national two-party preferred; the button is pressed on the Senate for Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia; only the Victorian Senate result remains.

The last two-party preferred count for the lower house is complete, leaving the Coalition with a national two-party preferred total of 51.53%, which is exactly the result that was projected by the opinion polls, albeit for the wrong party. The Australian Electoral Commission website continues to record that 288 declaration vote envelopes remain unprocessed, of which 234 are in the seat of Kingsford Smith, but I suspect that may just reflect tardiness in keeping these numbers updated.

We should also have the last Senate result finalised this morning, that being in Victoria, where a result of three Liberal, two Labor and one Greens is assured. Counts were finalised yesterday in Queensland, Western Australia and South Australia. To complement previous efforts for New South Wales and Tasmania, I offer the following displays showing how the preference distributions proceeded. In each case they record where the votes stood after the election of candidates with full quotas at the start of the count, and also in the final stages, where three seats were decided in Queensland, and two were decided in Western Australia and South Australia.

First up, Queensland, where the result was three for the Coalition (Paul Scarr, Susan McDonald and Gerard Rennick, all newcomers) and one apiece for Labor (Nita Green, also a newcomer), One Nation (Malcolm Roberts, returning after falling foul of Section 44 and having his seat pass to Fraser Anning, whose own party proved uncompetitive) and the Greens (Larissa Waters, another Section 44 casualty who had already returned to the Senate after her successor, Andrew Bartlett, agreed to make way for her ahead of the election). Queensland was the one state where the result was not clear long in advance, although in the final analysis it wasn’t really all that close. The Coalition won two seats straight off the bat and Labor one, leaving Green, Roberts, Waters and Labor’s second candidate, Chris Ketter, in the mix for the last three. There never seemed much doubt that the fourth seat would go to One Nation and the fifth to the Coalition, but Labor might have hoped the dual miracle of a strong performance in late counting and unexpectedly strong preference flows could have given Ketter the last seat at the expense of Waters. In fact though, Ketter trailed Waters by 52,767 votes (1.8%) at the start of proceedings, which widened to 78,681 (2.7%) by the end, with Waters doing predictably well out of preferences from Animal Justice and Help End Marijuana Prohibition – although she didn’t quite make it to a quota.

Now to Western Australia, which has returned three Liberals (incumbents Linda Reynolds and Slade Brockman, and newcomer Matt O’Sullivan), two Labor (incumbents Patrick Dodson and Louise Pratt) and one Greens (incumbent Jordon Steele-John). Reynolds, Brockman and Dodson were elected off the bat; O’Sullivan got most of the way there when the 1.4% Nationals vote was distributed; and Pratt and Steele-John were always going to get there late in the count ahead of One Nation incumbent Peter Georgiou.

South Australia produced the same result as Western Australia (and indeed New South Wales and Victoria, if the Coalition is considered collectively), the three Liberals being incumbents Anne Ruston and David Fawcett, and newcomer Alex Antic; Labor returning incumbent Alex Gallacher and newcomer Marielle Smith; and the Sarah Hanson-Young retaining her seat for the Greens. The top two on the Liberal and Labor tickets were elected off the bat; Hanson-Young made a quota after the third Labor candidate and the Help End Marijuana Prohibition candidate dropped out; and Antic stayed well clear of One Nation throughout to take the last seat.

The overall picture in the Senate was summarised here a few weeks ago – all that’s different now is that the “likely” qualification can be removed from Queensland.

Update: Victorian Senate result

The Victorian result was finalised this morning (Wednesday), producing the anticipated result of three seats for the Liberals (incumbents James Patterson and Jane Hume, and newcomer David Van), two for Labor (Raff Ciccone, who came to the Senate after filling a casual vacancy in March, and Jess Walsh, a newcomer) and one for the Greens (incumbent Janet Rice). The chart below follows the same format as those above, and shows that this was not a close run thing. The Coalition and Labor both had two quotas on ticket votes, leaving two seats to be determined through the preference distribution. Labor’s third candidate, incumbent Gavin Marshall, was never in contention, and his exclusion pushed the Greens to a quota with Van, Derryn Hinch and One Nation still in the count. One Nation then were excluded, leaving David Van well ahead of Hinch to take the final seat, without making it to a quota.

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.

1,392 comments on “More Senate entrails examined”

Comments Page 25 of 28
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  1. billie

    I was talking to a friend about this sort of thing the other day – she used to know someone who worked for the Salvos, and who would take her friends out on nights on the town (using her Salvos card), encouraging them to spend up big because ‘Jesus is paying’.

  3. billie

    A little off the subject, but my experience in voluntary orgs suggests that egotistical men are more likely to take advantage of loose accounting policy.

  4. Thanks, psyclaw. I remember having a long argument with a fellow Shire councillor who believed that because something was legal it was therefore ‘just’ and ‘right’.

  5. I thought “top end of town” was banned by Labor ten years ago.

    As a Greens, the pre-election appropriation by Shorten and Labor of the phrase the “top end of town” is rather ironic.

    Di Natale was routinely derided here long and hard by some Laborites for his use of the phrase.

  7. One thing that happened when effing Howard opened up work to charities was that they ‘needed’ to go ‘professional’ and as you then need to attract the ‘right’ sort of people the salaries of those running them absolutely sky rocketed. So in for the money not the cause would become common.

  8. Pegasus @ #1205 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 12:57 pm

    I thought “top end of town” was banned by Labor ten years ago.

    As a Greens, the pre-election appropriation by Shorten and Labor of the phrase the “top end of town” is rather ironic.

    Di Natale was routinely derided here long and hard by some Laborites for his use of the phrase.

    Well, it was wrong for Labor to bang on about it and it’s equally silly for The Greens to use it.

  9. Pauline Hanson would not like this allegory.

    This morning I ran into an old friend now 72 years old and recently retired from his career of 40 years as an interstate truckie in his own one-man one-truck business. It is easy to stereotype those in that business as having a set of values such that they might just find PHON attractive. I hadn’t seen him for about 10 years.

    He has had a few significant health probs in the last year and was telling me that all his doctors were Asian, and that they were extremely competent and extremely kind to him. I was quite surprised by this. Some tentative further views were advanced each way by both of us and as his confidence grew (that he would not offend me) he went on to say that the ocker, brash, she’ll be right, Australian culture has a long way to go to catch up with the sensitivities of some other cultures. And he was specifically referring to Australian doctors and their bedside manners, as well as Australians in general.

    I was quite surprised.

  10. The former Australian Conservatives leader is considering his future after deregistering the party and sources close to Senator Bernardi said they believed he would leave politics within 18 months to two years, ahead of the next election.

    The SA Liberals would then appoint a replacement, given Senator Bernardi was re-elected in 2016 as a Liberal, and sources from both the party’s Right and Moderate factions told The Advertiser Ms Downer would be a frontrunner.

    And a nice comment:

    Ronni Salt@MsVeruca
    12m12 minutes ago

    If you’ve ever been in a shearing shed at smoko time, there’s always that one dog that wanders from one person to the next, looking for a bit of food or a snack, constantly grifting around looking for the best place to settle.

    Shearer’s dog.

  11. The implied constitutional freedom of political communication that is necessary to the functioning of representative and responsible government might be found if the executive or the legislature has interfered with a pre-existing statutory or common law right in a manner that wasn’t serving a legitimate objective and / or that employed excessive or unreasonable means to achieve an objective.

    The Folau situation doesn’t involve an action by the executive or the legislature, so I doubt that the implied freedom of political communication jurisprudence is relevant. It can’t be just anyone trying to shut you up. It has to be the executive or the legislature.

  12. billie @ #1196 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 12:31 pm

    Lizzie I would like to see the operating & management costs of Hillsong health and care empire- but as they are a charity they don’t have to publish financial accounts. I bet their management costs are inflated.

    A friend worked for the Salvation Army. He got a stipend (a low wage that was tax free) and a credit card for expenses. When we went out to dinner we would give him cash and he would pay on his card.

    Another friend worked for a job network provider in the disability sector. It was a registered charity and my friend sourly noted that it appeared to have been established to provide work for the manager who was an incompetent law graduate from a ‘good’ family

    My son now works in Disability Care for the NDIS through a private provider of care services to the severely disabled that have to live in group homes.

    He told me the other day that the guy who started the business used to be a security guard before that. He now employs his wife and children as well as others in his extended family, plus the extra people he needs like my son, and as CEO he is on a $300000 per year salary.

    Nice work if you can get it. All taxpayer funded.

  15. Zoomster

    Your contrasting of “legal” with “right”, “just” and “fair” is also on the money.

    However, despite its failings (often due to complex rules about evidence”) the rule of law is so essential for a stable society.

    Because the alternative, as we hear about quite frequently in non rule-of-law countries, is a system where pollies and/or military and/or security types organise people to disappear from their homes overnight, never to be seen again. Or are just summarily killed.

    That’s what happens when arbitrary or extra-judicial “law” operates ……. a la Duterte’s “law” in the Phillipines.

  17. I’m not a fan of the way that we fill casual vacancies in the Senate. The process makes it too easy to gift seats to unsuitable people. I’d prefer a constitutional requirement for a special state-wide Senate election. Let the voters choose.

  18. BK

    I remember when she first started to appear on ABC panels, and I couldn’t work out why, as she had absolutely nothing to say. Then I recalled she was an IPA something or other.

  19. Psyclaw,
    Those truckie types are onto the generous and attentive nature of Asians. You should see how many of them have Asian wives.

  20. Nicholas

    Could you perhaps write your first paragraph in plain English. Sometimes something like “what that means is that…………” helps.

    Plain English always surpasses legalese as far as effective communication is concerned.

    Thanks

  21. lizzie @ #1218 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 1:17 pm

    BK

    I remember when she first started to appear on ABC panels, and I couldn’t work out why, as she had absolutely nothing to say. Then I recalled she was an IPA something or other.

    She has been groomed by the Liberal Party since University days. She was gifted a Chevening Scholarship though she never deserved it and a job in the Foreign Affairs Department though she never deserved that either. Then onto her next training ground in the IPA, spots on their ABC, and then the run to parliament. A political grifter, basically. Of no greater talent than blind faith to the Liberal Party and a family dynasty that enabled nepotism to flourish in her case.

  23. Peg

    ‘Di Natale was routinely derided here long and hard by some Laborites for his use of the phrase.’

    You Greens!

    Di Natale belongs is the Big End of Town. He has built himself a major new dwelling in an extremely expensive real estate area.

  25. C@tmomma
    says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 1:20 pm
    lizzie @ #1218 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 1:17 pm
    BK
    I remember when she first started to appear on ABC panels, and I couldn’t work out why, as she had absolutely nothing to say. Then I recalled she was an IPA something or other.
    She has been groomed by the Liberal Party since University days. She was gifted a Chevening Scholarship though she never deserved it and a job in the Foreign Affairs Department though she never deserved that either. Then onto her next training ground in the IPA, spots on their ABC, and then the run to parliament. A political grifter, basically. Of no greater talent than blind faith to the Liberal Party and a family dynasty that enabled nepotism to flourish in her case.
    _________________________________________
    On the other hand I assume Hannah Beazley is the soul of integrity and gained preselection because of an outstanding work ethic.

  26. Boerwar

    Here’s something scary for you. Both Iran and the US have reasons for wanting a bigly oil price surge. The US’s frackers are in dire need of higher oil prices and Iran’s economy could do with higher prices.

  28. At least Downer had a crack at a lower house seat. Twice. You won’t find Wong or Kitching ever doing that. Having to face and sell yourself to voters is beneath them.

  29. C@tmomma says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 1:20 pm
    lizzie @ #1218 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 1:17 pm

    BK

    I remember when she first started to appear on ABC panels, and I couldn’t work out why, as she had absolutely nothing to say. Then I recalled she was an IPA something or other.
    She has been groomed by the Liberal Party since University days. She was gifted a Chevening Scholarship though she never deserved it and a job in the Foreign Affairs Department though she never deserved that either. Then onto her next training ground in the IPA, spots on their ABC, and then the run to parliament. A political grifter, basically. Of no greater talent than blind faith to the Liberal Party and a family dynasty that enabled nepotism to flourish in her case.
    ________________________________________
    How would you know? Have your handlers at Menzies House been discussing internal matters with you?

  31. Why does no one ever mention the cost?

    Lenna Leprena@LennaLeprena
    45m45 minutes ago

    Sooo, Dutton thinks it’s just wonderful use of taxpayer’s hard earned to spend $1 million PER HEAD for every refugee on Manus..EVERY YEAR…yet..$15,000 per head for unemployed is a massive “burden” on society..well I say…eff you Bozo…

  32. Lars Von Trier @ #1229 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 2:28 pm

    C@tmomma says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 1:20 pm
    lizzie @ #1218 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 1:17 pm

    BK

    I remember when she first started to appear on ABC panels, and I couldn’t work out why, as she had absolutely nothing to say. Then I recalled she was an IPA something or other.
    She has been groomed by the Liberal Party since University days. She was gifted a Chevening Scholarship though she never deserved it and a job in the Foreign Affairs Department though she never deserved that either. Then onto her next training ground in the IPA, spots on their ABC, and then the run to parliament. A political grifter, basically. Of no greater talent than blind faith to the Liberal Party and a family dynasty that enabled nepotism to flourish in her case.
    ________________________________________
    How would you know? Have your handlers at Menzies House been discussing internal matters with you?

    No, it was in the papers, numpty. 😐

    I have a good memory, which hasn’t been destroyed by alcohol, as yours appears to have been.

    Now fap off and leave your pathetic attempts at snark at the door.

  33. zoomster
    says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 2:29 pm
    Oh, is Hannah Beazley being parachuted into the Senate? Must have missed that one.
    ______________________
    perhaps nepotism only relates to senate preselections.

  35. taylormade @ #1228 Saturday, June 22nd, 2019 – 2:16 pm

    At least Downer had a crack at a lower house seat. Twice. You won’t find Wong or Kitching ever doing that. Having to face and sell yourself to voters is beneath them.

    You mean like Cory Bernardi, Matthias Cormann, Michaelia Cash, and the Liberal list goes on and on and on…

  36. Ronni Salt@MsVeruca

    It could be hard for some to understand that after sitting as a director on a cumulative total of 17 companies over 2 decades, Angus Taylor would leave behind his multi-million dollar earning capacity in the corporate world for the life of a humble politician.

  38. Last January. Border Force (Dutton) still resisting medical transfers.

    A doctor on Nauru who blew the whistle on the deliberate medical neglect of refugees and asylum seekers on the island has been awarded a global award for free speech.

    Dr Nick Martin, the former senior medical officer for International Health and Medical Services on Nauru, spoke out publicly against what he described as Australia’s “inflexible, unswerving, and shameless” offshore immigration regime, that deliberately harmed asylum seekers and ignored doctors’ recommendations to treat dangerously ill people.

    In London on Wednesday night, he was awarded the 2019 Blueprint for Free Speech prize, an award previously won by Chelsea Manning, who revealed US military abuses and suspected war crimes in Iraq and Afghanistan, and John Kiriakou, the former CIA intelligence officer who revealed information about torture techniques including waterboarding.

    Martin’s medical attention and advocacy for the most critically ill of his patients resulted in their transfer to Australia for treatment, but ultimately cost him his job with International Health and Medical Services – at the insistence of the Australian government’s Border Force, which resisted the medical transfers of any refugees or asylum seekers held offshore.

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jan/17/nauru-doctor-wins-global-free-speech-award-for-speaking-out-on-offshore-immigration

  40. Kon Karapanagiotidis
    @Kon__K
    I’m appalled watching #Dutton call selfless doctors helping with #MedeVac “advocate doctors” as a way to smear them. These doctors are all volunteers, deeply ethical & always objective. They simply are doing their job as a doctor which is to save lives & ensure the sick get care

  41. Downer has all the power and comfort of the establishment behind her to fall back on.
    And all Hannah Beazley has is talent.
    __________________________
    She may have talent, but that’s not all she has. Her name has opened plenty of doors and jobs. Nice if you can use that.

  42. C@t

    Dutton thinks everyone has the same twisted moral attitudes as himself. He simply cannot understand charity, mercy or selfless service.

  43. lizzie says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 7:29 am

    Mexicanbeemer

    We have lost the shades of ‘wealth’ in discussing income. What happened to middle class? Except, of course, it seems it is no longer acceptable to talk of class.
    —————————————————–
    Class is a difficult thing to define in Australia has it seems to be different in different places, and the traditional concept is partly based on how European countries are structured which is why the ALP and unions were successful with gaining the support of European working class migrants whereas here class seems to be more about what your job is and where you live and how do you spend your free time.

    There is differently a top end of town that is defined by family name and by following the right education and career path and being a member of the right club and many local communities have a kind of local top end made up of people whose family has been in the area for multiple generations and their family members are involved everything from local businesses to sports clubs or the CFA or CWA.

  44. ‘poroti says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 1:55 pm

    Boerwar

    Here’s something scary for you. Both Iran and the US have reasons for wanting a bigly oil price surge. The US’s frackers are in dire need of higher oil prices and Iran’s economy could do with higher prices.

    A closed Strait would block not only Iran’s oil exports but most of its other exports and imports as well. OTOH the US oil interests would just love a 10% increase in their gross prices.

  47. zoomster
    says:
    Saturday, June 22, 2019 at 3:16 pm
    I don’t think the Beazleys come within a cooee of the Downers when it comes to entitlement.
    ________________________________
    Based upon what evidence?

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