Call of the board: Sydney

Ahead of Newspoll’s apparently looming return, the first in a series that probes deep into the entrails of the May 19 election result.

In case you were wondering, The Australian reported on Monday that the first Newspoll since the election – indeed, the first poll on voting intention of any kind since the election, unless someone else quickly gets in first – will be published “very shortly”.

In the meantime, I offer what will be the first in a series of posts that probe deep into the results of the federal election region by region, starting with Sydney and some of its immediate surrounds. Below are two colour-coded maps showing the two-party preferred swing at polling booth level, with each booth allocated a geographic catchment area built out of the “mesh blocks” that form the Australian Bureau of Statistics’ smallest unit of geographic analysis (typically encompassing about 30 dwellings). The image on the right encompasses the core of the city, while the second zooms further out. To get a proper look at either, click for an enlarged image.

In a pattern that will recur throughout this series, there is a clear zone of red in the inner city and the affluent, established eastern suburbs and northern beaches regions, giving way to an ocean of blue in the middle and outer suburbs. The occasional patches of red that break this up are often associated with sophomore surge effects, which played out to the advantage of Mike Freelander, who had no trouble retaining Macarthur (more on that below); Susan Templeman, who held out against a 2.0% swing in Macquarie; and Emma McBride, who survived a 3.3% swing in Dobell (albeit there was little to distinguish this from a 3.1% swing in neighbouring, Liberal-held Robertson).

The second part of our analysis compares the actual two-party results from the election with the results predicted by a linear regression model similar to, but more elaborate than, that presented here shortly after the election. This is based on the correlations observed across the nation between booth-level two-party results and the demography of booths’ catchment areas. The gory details of the model can be found here (the dependent variable being Labor’s two-party preferred percentage). The r-squared values indicate that the model explains 76.5% of the variation in the results – and doesn’t explain another 23.5%. Among the myriad unexplained factors that constitute the latter figure, the personal appeal (or lack thereof) of the sitting member (if any) might be expected to have a considerable bearing.

Such a model can be used to produce estimates that hopefully give some idea as to where the two parties were punching above and below their weight, and where the results were as we might have expected in view of broader trends. The latter more-or-less encompasses Lindsay, which was the only seat in the Sydney region to change hands between Labor and the Coalition (the only other change being Zali Steggall’s win over Tony Abbott in Warringah). The table below shows, progressively, the model’s estimate of Labor’s two-party vote, the actual result, and the difference between the two.

The first thing that leaps out is that the current leaders of both parties did exceptionally well, with their margins evidently being padded out by their substantial personal votes. Beyond that though, patterns get a little harder to discern. The Liberal-versus-independent contests in Warringah and Wentworth appear to have had very different effects on the Coalition’s two-party margins over Labor, which reduced to a remarkably narrow 2.1% as voters turned on Tony Abbott in Warringah, but remained solid at 9.8% in Wentworth, suggesting Dave Sharma may have accumulated a few fans through two recent campaigns and a dignified showing in the wake of the by-election defeat. That there was nonetheless a 7.9% two-party swing to Labor illustrates that he still has a way to go before he matches Malcolm Turnbull on this score.

The modelled result further emphasises the particularly good result Labor had in Macarthur, a seat the Liberals held from 1996 until 2016, when Russell Matheson suffered first an 8.3% reduction in his margin at a redistribution, and then an 11.7% swing to Labor’s Michael Freelander, a local paediatrician. At the May 19 election, the seat defied the national pattern in which outer urban seats that responded had unfavourably to Malcolm Turnbull swept back to the Liberals, with Freelander in fact managing the tiniest of swings in his favour. In addition to Freelander’s apparent popularity, this probably reflected a lack of effort put into the Liberal campaign, as the party narrowly focused on its offensive moves in Lindsay and Macquarie and defensive ones in Gilmore and Reid.

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.

1,549 comments on “Call of the board: Sydney”

Comments Page 5 of 31
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  1. “That’s right. I’m simply trying to get you to see reason.”

    You’ll need to try a lot harder than you are right now. Implying that wartorn Afghanistan is safe because they play cricket is hardly the stuff of reason.

  2. a.r
    That read like someone that has never been a renter or been an owner occupier in a unit block.

    Investors in places like Docklands wouldn’t have that much difficulty in finding a new tenant and renters probably wouldn’t know about a special levy and as things currently are owner occupiers just cop up special levies when they happen with no way of writing that off.

    With any property there are areas that the unit owner is fully responsible for like interior or on the balcony.

  3. ar

    Or in the absence of an insurer the owning corporation should pay directly.

    And all their executives and managers during the construction………no matter where they are or work now. It might make them appreciate “red tape” and would make an excellent chicken to kill to frighten the monkeys .

  4. Frank Davies @Frank__Davies
    ·
    3m
    House passes resolution condemning ‘racist’ Trump tweets aimed at group of Democrat congresswomen

  5. Firefox @ #198 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 1:33 pm

    C@t, you are aware that the war in Afghanistan continues even as I type this, yes? Australia is still at war in Afghanistan in 2019, as is the US and others. It is an ongoing conflict.

    A cricket team? Seriously? There’s a fucking WAR going on but you think it’s a safe place because they have a cricket team?

    Oh dear, you are determined to misrepresent the situation in Afghanistan for your own narrow interests.

    Yes, a cricket team. Something emblematic of a stable society. Something I thought you would get. Apparently not.

    Then you just ignored the rest of the evidence of a society returning to stability and carried on about the war still being ongoing in 2019. A war that is essentially over as peace and reconciliation talks are underway.

    So I can only come to the conclusion that you wish to be unreasonable. Your call. I won’t be fooled by you again.

  6. Firefox says:
    Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 1:06 pm

    “We owe the existence of our population of political internees to the chicanery of the Greens, who voted with their alter-egos, the Liberals, to defeat Labor’s Malaysia Solution.”

    To even suggest that the Greens and Liberals are somehow on the same side in this is just… Look, I’m sorry, I’m not normally this blunt, but it’s just fucking stupid in the extreme.

    The interests – the political interests – of the Liberals and the Greens overlap on this issue. This matter – the matter of the indefinite incarceration of the desperate – is a campaign opportunity both parties. They aligned with each other from expedience, from opportunism, from cynicism to defeat Labor. Intransigent Opposition has its rewards. The reward for the Greens has been a gulag full of detainees, of political prisoners, of the condemned. The reward for the Liberals is a reputation for cruelty. It has served them very well. The hostages will never be freed. They are the property of the Greens and the Liberals, property that hovers in no-man’s land.

    The Greens and their alter-egos, the Liberals and One Nation, have a common shareholding here. They profit from this disgrace.

  7. Firefox @ #201 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 1:35 pm

    “That’s right. I’m simply trying to get you to see reason.”

    You’ll need to try a lot harder than you are right now. Implying that wartorn Afghanistan is safe because they play cricket is hardly the stuff of reason.

    You obviously haven’t been to Afghanistan recently, or even listened to the news it seems. You certainly aren’t interested in evidence which contradicts your narrow perspective.

  8. Crucially, the Refugee Convention offers no succour at all to those displaced by climate.

    It defines a refugee as “any person who owing to a well-founded fear of being persecuted for reasons of race, religion, nationality, membership of a particular social group or political opinion, is outside the country of his/her nationality and is unable, or owing to such fear, is unwilling to avail himself/herself of the protection of that country”.

    Climate refugees, in other words, don’t exist – at least, not from the perspective of the current legal apparatus.
    …
    Note that authorities classify the vast proportion of those detained in Australia’s offshore facilities as “refugees”. They’ve passed all the assessments; they’ve jumped through all the hoops – they’re legally entitled to protection.

    Yet, according to the Refugee Council of Australia, the government spends more than $573, 000 on each of them, not to provide them with a new home but to keep them incarcerated.
    …
    You can draw your own conclusions as to the likely treatment of those to whom Australia has no legal obligations at all.

    https://www.theguardian.com/commentisfree/2019/jul/16/australias-orwellian-anti-refugee-system-hints-at-whats-to-come-for-climate-refugees

  9. The hostages will never be freed while Lib-tyranny is intact. This tyranny is supported by the Greens. There is no doubting this. This is an object of Green political strategy. Suck it up.

  10. “a stable society”

    https://www.rferl.org/z/654

    16 July – Radio station shuts due to Taliban threats over female employees
    15 July – 11 Killed by roadside bomb
    15 July – Radio Journalist Killed
    13 July – 6 killed in Taliban attack on Hotel
    13 July – US Services member killed
    13 July – Rashid Khan named Cricket Capt despite poor world cup performance
    12 July – Suicide Bomber kills 9 at Afhan wedding
    09 July – Peace talks aim to end 18 years of Afghan war
    07 July – 12 Killed by Taliban car bomb in city of Ghazani
    06 July – 2 killed in Mosque bomb blast in Ghazani

  11. C@t, have you ever heard of Bernard Destremau or Yvon Petra? Perhaps you have, but probably not. They’re both former winners of the French Open (tennis). Their wins came in the years 1941-1945, during the time that France was under Nazi occupation. Does the fact that the French continued to play tennis in any way lessen the horrors of WWII that were taking place in their country? No, of course it doesn’t.

    Occupied France was not made a safe place because they played tennis or had forms of media and other entertainment, just as modern day Afghanistan isn’t made safe by their sports teams or other forms of entertainment either.

  12. Re Trumps claim that he doesn’t have a racist bone in his body:

    Literally, that is correct. Bones are neither racist nor non-racist.

    However, as for the bonehead himself…

  14. Mavis Davis says:
    Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 12:34 pm

    The Labor PV in QLD is in the 20s. This is the weakest in more than a century. QLD is where the tectonic plates of the fossil fuel industry and climate change collide. There will be no relief in QLD because, as Keating declared, coal is finished. It will take many years – decades – for coal to go under. Every single day until then will be a day for the Greens and the Liberals to make political hay at Labor’s expense.

    In the period since 1949, QLD has only rarely failed to provide a conservative majority in Federal elections. This cannot be changed while Labor’s PV is so weak. The majority vote for the LNP federally has not been volatile. It has been remarkably consistent. These days, where nature itself has been deployed by the Greens and the Liberals against Labor, the conservative plurality in QLD will consolidate. This is consistent with the results in May. Furthermore, the Liberals will run a repressive set of economic policies. QLD will not get off its knees. The Liberals will exploit this as they invariably do.

  15. Two can play that game, bakunin, Firefox and adrian:

    https://youtu.be/3I04c75-olg

    On the occasion of WAW’s EXPO 2019: #CelebrateCourage, The First Lady of Afghanistan, Her Excellency Rula Ghani celebrates courage with Women for Afghan Women (WAW) and, once again, extends her support, congratulations, and blessings to WAW’s life-saving and life-changing work in Afghanistan.

  18. Has the Taliban actually sat down and negotiated with the Afghan government or are the “ peace negotiations “ still being held outside the country between the Taliban and third party negotiators ?

    Serious question given I was under the impression any stability and peace in the country is still a long long way off.

    Cheers.

  19. Defence Minister Reynolds has essentially admitted that Australia has been defeated in Afghanistan when she confirmed that she was looking forward to a peace deal being agreed between the Afghanistan Government and the Taliban.

  20. briefly:

    [‘The majority vote for the LNP federally has not been volatile. It has been remarkably consistent.’]

    Save for 2007, you’re right. But it does not necessarily follow that the status quo is set in cement. Effective leadership and sound policies can change the tide. And, although it’s difficult to gauge the effect that Labor’s mixed messages on Adani had in regional Queensland, I’d hazard a guess, it was extensive, evidenced by the swing to, for instance, the Member for Manila. At the next election, Adani won’t be in contest. I also think Albanese will prove to be more palatable than was Shorten. I’m an optimist by nature.

  23. The Guardian will appoint a Pacific editor to expand its coverage of the region, commission investigations and lead new partnerships with journalists from other media organisations.

    The position, which will be advertised in coming weeks, has been made possible by a grant from the Judith Neilson Institute for Journalism and Ideas.

    The editor will work with independent news outlets and journalists based in the Pacific to develop a new reporting network to cover security and geopolitical issues, environmental challenges and social affairs.

    The role will expand Guardian Australia’s award-winning team of foreign correspondents and editors covering Asia and the Pacific, and is part of the organisation’s commitment to reporting on the region.

    https://www.theguardian.com/media/2019/jul/17/guardian-australia-wins-judith-neilson-institute-funding-for-pacific-editor?CMP=share_btn_tw

  24. My understanding is the Afghan government is playing no part in the “ peace negotiations “ currently underway and given the taliban consider the Afghan government to be nothing more than a “ sock puppet “ of America I would not hold my breath that any one on one would ever happen.

    Meanwhile bomb attacks are a daily occurrence throughout the country with a July 7 bombing killing 14 and injuring 180 including many children.

    Another failed western intervention with no resolution in sight and Americans, Australians etc throwing their hands up in the air admitting they have no fucking idea what to do.

  25. C@tmomma @ #196 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 1:26 pm

    Firefox @ #191 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 1:17 pm

    “Lol, says carper, whiner and scapegoater-in-chief about Labor here.”

    C@t, while you haven’t totally lost the plot like Mr. Lib-kin and a few others here, you’re definitely very quick to jump on the Greens at any opportunity, regardless of whether it’s warranted or not.

    That’s right. I’m simply trying to get you to see reason.

    The election result has clearly given Lib lite reason enough to further distance themselves away from socially progressive policy and even closer to LibNat conservative policy.

  26. Firefox:

    [‘They’re both former winners of the French Open (tennis). Their wins came in the years 1941-1945…’]

    In solidarity with the free-French, I refused to watch the men’s final in the period you cite.

  27. Richard Marles out of the hammock he’s been in for 6 yrs I see.

    As if he or Lib lite actually give a damn about asylum seekers.

    What a sick joke Lib lite and the LibNats are.

  28. My understanding is the Afghan government is playing no part in the “ peace negotiations “ currently underway and given the taliban consider the Afghan government to be nothing more than a “ sock puppet “ of America I would not hold my breath that any one on one would ever happen.

    The Afghan government is taking part. A nice bit of diplomatic theater means they are there ‘personally’ rather than ‘officially” . So everyone is pretending that they just happened to be in the area on holiday and thought they’d drop by. There are even some female MPs there “on holiday.

  30. doyley @ #218 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 2:07 pm

    Has the Taliban actually sat down and negotiated with the Afghan government or are the “ peace negotiations “ still being held outside of the country between the Taliban and third party negotiators ?

    Serious question given I was under the impression any stability and peace in the country is still a long long way off.

    Cheers.

    Their most recent meeting was face to face in Afghanistan. The Taliban finally conceded that the government of Ashraf Ghani is legitimate.

  31. nath says:
    Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 2:35 pm
    Rex Douglas
    says:
    Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 2:30 pm
    #EXCLUSIVE: NSW remaps old growth forests to open up reserves to logging https://t.co/8x3b4Cbp9B— Guardian Australia (@GuardianAus) July 17, 2019
    _____________________________________
    Insanity.

    In Green Valley, the forests will be torn out by their roots. This will not change unless and until the dysfunction in the centre-left can be defused.

  32. The Australian businessman Dick Smith has called for the franking credits system to be reformed after revealing he was once handed $500,000 in cash rebates in a single year.

    When Smith was told he would soon receive what he called “ridiculous money”, he complained to the tax office and requested that the agency close down his self-managed super fund.

    But he said he was told superannuation rules prevented it from shutting the fund – and therefore stopping him from getting the cash rebates.

    “They said to me we were going to get a $500,000 refund,” he told Guardian Australia. “I was so horrified.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jul/17/dick-smith-reveals-he-received-500000-in-franking-credits-in-a-single-year?CMP=share_btn_tw

  33. It’s very kind of Dick smith to say he doesn’t want the $500,000 franking credits rebate but the article says the ATO will give him the money anyway.

    So he does the virtue signalling thing but still receives the money. What he should do is have the ATO pay the money into the bank account of a reputable charity unconnected with himself and not claim that as a tax deduction next year.

    Will he do this? Did he speak up before the election?

  34. Rex Douglas says:
    Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 2:40 pm
    Richard Marles out of the hammock he’s been in for 6 yrs I see.

    As if he or Lib lite actually give a damn about asylum seekers.

    What a sick joke Lib lite and the LibNats are.
    ______________________________________
    Sir Charles Marles PC – Commander in Chief, Her Majesty’s Loyal Victorian Opposition.

  35. Anyone planning a holiday in Afghanistan?

    Afghanistan Travel Advisory:

    https://travel.state.gov/content/travel/en/traveladvisories/traveladvisories/afghanistan-advisory.html

    Do not travel to Afghanistan due to crime, terrorism, civil unrest, kidnapping, and armed conflict.

    Travel to all areas of Afghanistan is unsafe because of critical levels of kidnappings, hostage taking, suicide bombings, widespread military combat operations, landmines, and terrorist and insurgent attacks, including attacks using vehicle-borne, magnetic, or other improvised explosive devices (IEDs), suicide vests, and grenades.

    Terrorist and insurgent groups continue planning and executing attacks in Afghanistan. These attacks occur with little or no warning, and have targeted official Afghan and U.S. government convoys and facilities, local government buildings, foreign embassies, military installations, commercial entities, non-governmental organization (NGO) offices, hospitals, residential compounds, tourist locations, transportation hubs, public gatherings, markets and shopping areas, places of worship, restaurants, hotels, universities, airports, schools, gymnasiums, and other locations frequented by U.S. citizens and other foreign nationals.

  36. poroti,

    Thanks for your reply.

    It will be interesting to see how much clout any of the individual politicians at the talks have with the “ snout in the trough “ rabble of a Afghan government or if they are all there just pushing their own political power agendas.

    Whatever the case any “ peace’ is a long long way away.

    Cheers.

  37. cat,

    I am surprised that the taliban and the Afghan government have actually sat down and even more surprised the taliban has conceded the government is legitimate.

    Can you point me to your source reference please ?

    Cheers.

  40. From this source:

    For example, the Taliban do not accept the current constitution and see the Afghan government as “a US-imposed puppet regime”.

    So far President Ghani’s administration has not been involved in direct talks with the insurgents who refuse to talk to a government they don’t recognise.
    :::
    Therefore, given the internal rivalries and diverse agendas of various local actors, the intra-Afghan phase of the peace process might prove more difficult than the US-Taliban talks.
    :::
    Two rounds of intra-Afghan dialogue took place in Moscow earlier this year when Afghan politicians including ex-president Hamid Karzai, former commanders and civil society members, including women, met Taliban representatives to discuss ending the war.

    A third such meeting took place in Doha in July, in which several officials currently serving in the Afghan government also participated, albeit in a “personal capacity”. It is hoped that such meetings will eventually pave the way for formal peace talks between the Taliban and other Afghans, including the government.

  43. Mavis Davis says: Wednesday, July 17, 2019 at 3:34 pm

    Nah, there’s no evidence that the orange dolt’s a racist:

    https://www.news.com.au/world/north-america/shock-video-comes-back-to-haunt-donald-trump-as-he-insists-hes-not-racist/news-story/329e563eaeac934181b00ea8655d8e11

    **************************************************************

    For all of his erratic and unhinged narcissism, Donald Trump has a 2020 vision:

    Trump is framing the choice Americans will have to make in 2020. He has chosen his enemies and defined them: “These are people that hate our country. They hate our country. They hate it, I think, with a passion.”

    His message: My opponents don’t just disagree with me… they hate me. They hate you. They hate America. They hate everything you stand for and have built. The four minority women are not really Americans, they are aliens, socialists, communists… immigrants who have spit on the gift we have given them.

    In other words: I may be awful, but you people are dangerous.

  44. lizzie @ #232 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 2:54 pm

    The Australian businessman Dick Smith has called for the franking credits system to be reformed after revealing he was once handed $500,000 in cash rebates in a single year.

    When Smith was told he would soon receive what he called “ridiculous money”, he complained to the tax office and requested that the agency close down his self-managed super fund.

    But he said he was told superannuation rules prevented it from shutting the fund – and therefore stopping him from getting the cash rebates.

    “They said to me we were going to get a $500,000 refund,” he told Guardian Australia. “I was so horrified.”

    https://www.theguardian.com/australia-news/2019/jul/17/dick-smith-reveals-he-received-500000-in-franking-credits-in-a-single-year?CMP=share_btn_tw

    If Labor don’t jump all over this, they’re idiots.

  45. Andrew Elder
    @awelder

    Dick Smith wasn’t obliged to tell everyone about his franking tax windfall: not today, not two months ago, not ever. By contrast, journos had significant #resources to do more and better than merely simper about “controversy” or #balance

  48. doyley @ #237 Wednesday, July 17th, 2019 – 3:20 pm

    cat,

    I am surprised that the taliban and the Afghan government have actually sat down and even more surprised the taliban has conceded the government is legitimate.

    Can you point me to your source reference please ?

    Cheers.

    Sorry, I have been cooking dinner. Off the top of my head I heard it on the radio. Newsradio broadcast a lot of the BBC shows over the weekend and they have correspondents all over the world and I believe I was listening to their Afghanistan correspondent.

    My advice to you until I find it is, don’t necessarily believe the conclusion Pegasus and the other Greens may want you to come to.

    Cheers.

  50. Bruce Haigh
    @bruce_haigh

    #abc730 #ABCNews ABC – it’s not drought it’s climate change. We have a climate crisis. Get with it. You are becoming part of the problem. New thinking is urgently required, as well as leadership and different management strategies.

    ABC News has been part of the problem for a long time.

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