The Call of the Board wheel now turns to Western Australia, after previous instalments that probed into the federal election results for Sydney (here and here), regional New South Wales, Melbourne, regional Victoria, south-east Queensland and regional Queensland.
Western Australia has been disappointing federal Labor ever since Kim Beazley elevated the party’s vote in his home state in 1998 and 2001, and this time was no exception. After an unprecedented Labor landslide at the 2017 state election and expectations the state’s economic malaise would sour voters on the government, the May election in fact produced a statewide two-party swing of 0.9% to the Coalition, and no change on the existing configuration of 11 seats for the Liberals and five for Labor.
As illustrated by the maps below (click on the images to enlarge), which record the two-party swings at booth level, Perth typified the national trend in that Labor gained in inner urban areas, regardless of their political complexion, while copping a hit in the outer suburbs. This will be reflected in the seat-by-seat commentary below, which regularly invokes the shorthand of “inner urban” and “outer urban” effects. The map on the left is limited to seats that are clearly within the Perth metropolitan area, while the second adds the fringe seats of Pearce (north), Hasluck (east) and Canning (south).
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For further illustration, the table below compares each electorate’s two-party result (the numbers shown are Labor’s) with a corresponding two-party Senate measure, which was derived from the AEC’s files recording the preference order of each ballot paper (with votes that did not preference either Labor or Liberal excluded). This potentially offers a pointer as to how much candidate factors affected the lower house results.
Brand (Labor 6.7%; 4.8% swing to Liberal): Like so many other suburban seats distant from central business districts across the land, Brand recorded a solid swing to the Liberals after going strongly the other way in 2016. This dynamic drowned out whatever impact candidate factors may have had: Labor’s Madeleine King picked up a 7.7% swing on debut in 2016, but this time copped a 4.8% reversal despite theoretically being in line for a sophomore surge. The Senate result was little different from the House, further suggesting candidate factors were not much of a feature.
Burt (Labor 5.0%; 2.1% swing to Liberal): On its creation in 2016, Burt recorded a swing to Labor of 13.2%, the biggest of the election. This partly reflected the dramatic boomtime suburban growth that had caused the seat to be created in the first place, and which has since ground to a halt. The Liberals swing of 2.1% this time was typical for suburbia outside the inner urban zone, overwhelming any sophomore effect for the seat’s inaugural member, Matt Keogh. However, Keogh very substantially outperformed the two-party Senate metric.
Canning (Liberal 11.6%; 4.8% swing to Liberal): Covering Perth’s outer southern fringes, Canning was another seat that typified outer suburbia in swinging heavily to the Liberals, in this case to the advantage of Andrew Hastie. Hastie came to the seat at a by-election held a week after Malcolm Turnbull’s rise to the prime ministership in September 2015, at which he survived a 6.6% swing to Labor, most of which stuck at the federal election the following July. The swing in his favour this time has returned the Liberal margin to the peaks of 2013.
Cowan (Labor 0.9%; 0.2% swing to Labor): Anne Aly gained Cowan for Labor in 2016 by a margin of 0.7%, slightly less than she would have needed to hold out the 0.9% statewide swing had it been uniform. She was in fact able to boost her margin by 0.2%, in a seat slightly out of the range of the wealthier inner urban areas where Labor did best in swing terms. The disparity between the House result and the two-party Senate metric, which records a 1.5% advantage for the Liberals, suggests Aly can take much of the credit for her win, over and above the exercise of the sophomore surge effect.
Curtin (Liberal 14.3%; 6.4% swing to Labor): The most prestigious Liberal seat in the west had a complicated story to tell at this election: Julie Bishop retired after more than two decades as member; the party raised some eyebrows locally by endorsing a Christian conservative, Celia Hammond, despite the seat’s small-l liberal complexion; and Labor initially endorsed former Fremantle MP Melissa Parke, who shortly withdrew after copping static over contentious pronouncements about Israel. An independent, Louise Stewart, held out some promise of harnessing support from Malcolm Turnbull loyalists, but her campaign was torpedoed after polling she circulated showing her well placed to win proved to be fabricated. Stewart claimed to have been the victim of a trick, while the Liberal response to the episode betrayed a certain inconsistency in attitude towards the dissemination of fraudulent documents for political purposes. The loss of Bishop’s personal support and the broader inner urban effect were evident on the scoreboard, with the Liberals down 11.3% on the primary vote and 6.4% on two-party preferred. The Greens continue to fall just shy of edging Labor into second – this time they trailed 17.6% to 15.6% on the primary vote and 20.4% to 19.6% at the last preference exclusion. Louise Stewart finished a distant fourth with 7.8%.
Durack (Liberal 14.8%; 3.7% swing to Liberal): When she first came to the seat covering northern Western Australia in 2013, Melissa Price had to fight off the Nationals, over whom she prevailed by 4.0%. However, she has since gone undisturbed over two elections as the Nationals have fallen to earth. The applecart was upset slightly on this occasion by the entry of One Nation, who scored 9.5%, contributing to respective drops of 4.3% and 5.8% for Labor and the Nationals, while Price’s primary vote rose 2.6%.
Forrest (Liberal 14.6%; 2.0% swing to Liberal): Nola Marino was re-elected with a modest swing amid a generally uneventful result. One Nation and Shooters Fishers and Farmers were in the field this time whereas the Nationals were not, but this was rather academic as the primary votes for all concerned were inside 6%.
Fremantle (Labor 6.9%; 0.6% swing to Liberal): The scoreline in Fremantle was not particularly interesting, with little change on two-party preferred, and downward primary vote movements for the established parties that reflected only a larger field of candidates. However, the results map illustrates particularly noteworthy geographic variation, with the area around Fremantle proper swinging to Labor in line with the inner urban effect, while the less fashionable suburbia that constitutes the electorate’s southern half went the other way (a pattern maintained across the boundary with Brand, where there was a 4.6% swing in favour of the Liberals). Labor member Josh Wilson was in line for a sophomore surge effect, although this was not his first bid for re-election thanks to a Section 44 by-election in July 2018, which passed without incident in the absence of a Liberal candidate.
Hasluck (Liberal 5.2%; 3.2% swing to Liberal): The Liberals’ most marginal Western Australian seat going into the election, Hasluck delivered Labor a particularly dispiriting defeat, with Ken Wyatt securing the biggest margin of his four election career. The swing reflected the general outer urban effect, although Labor did manage to pick up a few swings around relatively affluent Kalamunda.
Moore (Liberal 11.7%; 0.6% swing to Liberal): This northern suburbs beachside electorate is affluent enough to be safe Liberal, but not fashionable enough to have partaken in the inner urban effect. Third term member Ian Goodenough picked up a very slight swing, as the primary vote told a familiar story of the three established parties all being slightly down amid a larger field of candidates.
O’Connor (Liberal 14.5%; 0.6% swing to Labor): Covering the southern part of regional Western Australia, O’Connor was held by the Nationals for a term after Tony Crook unseated Wilson Tuckey in 2010, but Rick Wilson narrowly recovered it for the Liberals when Crook bowed out after a term in 2013, and the Nationals have not troubled him since. One Nation entered the race this time, but managed only a modest 8.4%.
Pearce (Liberal 7.5%; 3.9% swing to Liberal): Among the many Liberal scalps that went unclaimed by Labor was that of Christian Porter, who emerged the beneficiary of the outer urban effect after being widely written off in the wake of the state election landslide and the coup against Malcolm Turnbull. One Nation landed a fairly solid 8.2%, contributing to a solid 5.2% primary vote slump for Labor.
Perth (Labor 4.9%; 1.6% swing to Labor): One of Labor’s few reliable seats in the west, Perth has undergone frequent personnel changes since Stephen Smith retired in 2013, with Alannah MacTiernan bowing out to return to state politics in 2016, and her successor Tim Hammond failing to make it through a full term. This complicates sophomore surge considerations for current member Patrick Gorman, who retained the seat without Liberal opposition at a by-election in July last year. The swing in his favour reflected the inner urban effect, but he also managed to outperform Labor’s two-part Senate metric for the seat.
Stirling (Liberal 5.6%; 0.5% swing to Labor): In a once marginal seat that looked increasingly secure for the Liberals after Michael Keenan gained it in 2004, this election loomed as a litmus test of how secure the party would look when stripped of his personal vote. The results were encouraging for the party, with new candidate Vince Connelly suffering only a slight swing. The results map suggests a pattern in which the beachside suburbs and areas near the city swung to Labor, while the unfashionable area around Balga at the centre of the electorate went the other way.
Swan (Liberal 2.7%; 0.9% swing to Labor): Together with Pearce and Hasluck, Swan was one of three seats in Labor’s firing line, but Steve Irons was able to secure a fifth successive win in what has traditionally been a knife-edge seat. This was despite the pedigree of Labor candidate Hannah Beazley, whose father Kim Beazley held the seat from 1980 to 1996, when he jumped ship for Brand. The results map tells a family story in that the affluent western end of the electorate swung to Labor, while the lower income suburbs in the east went the other way.
Tangney (Liberal 11.5%; 0.4% swing to Liberal): Liberal sophomore Ben Morton held his ground in this safe Liberal seat, despite the riverside suburbia of Applecross and Attadale partaking of the inner urban effect. He gained 4.8% on the primary vote in the absence of former member Dennis Jensen, who polled 11.9% as an independent in 2016 after being defeated by Morton for preselection.
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Pegasus @ #1333 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 11:36 am
Well done to the activists for pressuring this outcome to occur.
Word from the lower Hunter. They got a bit of rain, then the wind came & blew it all away.
“there is no
confidential section.”
Sure.
@TripleJay58 tweets
@Glenina57 “Finding 39: Voters most likely to be affected by Labor’s franking credit policy swung to Labor. Economically insecure, low-income voters who were not directly affected by Labor’s tax policies swung strongly against Labor.”
In other words LNP BS beat Labor not reality.
Simon Katich @ #1369 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 12:33 pm
Plantations are not forests, any more than limestone mines are The Great Barrier Reef. Pine plantations support almost no birdlife or wildlife. There are no tree hollows, no flowers, bugger all insects. Native plantations are similar, but at least their fallen leaves do no kill everything else. Every hectare of old growth forest that is clear-felled kills, by starvation, and/or fighting to death literally thousands of native animals and birds. Possums, gliders, wallabies, bandicoots, antechinus, parrots, honeyeaters, skinks, goannas, many other reptiles, on and on. They never come back, because all of them need hollows to hide in, or make nests in, and there are no fallen logs or dead branch hollows in plantations.
guytaur
says:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:19 pm
nath
He and Labor made a mistake. They went with Shorten when the members wanted the more left leaning Albanese.
Labor’s problem is taking the base for granted.
______________________________
I love Shortens response to the review. Saying that despite his failures he plans on retaining Maribyrnong for the next 20 years. The hide on this creep!
No no. Thank you. ‘Droughts always end’ is such an insightful offering I need a lie down to take it all in.
This tidbit from Labor’s review caught my attention.
“There was a swing away from Labor among voters aged 25-34 years living in the outer-urban and regional areas”
Unfortunately they did break down these figures by sex, for reporting purposes. Because I have encountered articles that Millennial men, especially working class, non-university educated ones, are starting to drive a backlash against feminism. Therefore; Scott Morrison’s image of a ‘typical Aussie bloke’ and his misogyny could be appealing to these voters.
“Care needs to be taken to avoid Labor becoming a grievance-based
organisation.”
Oh for FFS they are second only behind the Greens in their slavish attachment to PC Identity Politics.
Do they sleep during National and State Conferences?
nath @ #1008 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 1:15 pm
I read his statement and he blames Palmer and the Libs for tarnishing his reputation …but he takes full responsibility. Typical centrist logic having a bob each way which makes no sense.
What the review makes clear is that Labor has a critical shortage of political talent in its ranks of union hacks.
Yabba
I wouldnt (hope I didnt) suggest they replace forest.
Tristo
The two subsequent findings caught my eye…
Finding 30: Some groups of self-declared Christians swung against Labor.
Finding 31: Chinese Australian voters swung against Labor in strongly contested seats.
“respect the role of workers in fossil fuel industries”
Pull the other one. Outside of Fitzgibbon the ALP want to destroy them.
Yabba
Thank you. Thank you.
@Pegasus
Those weren’t surprising to me, given that a considerable percentage of Chinese Australians are Christian and often of the Evangelical type.
nath and RD
His statement was clear and concise, and crafted in a way to minimise internal backlash against him from his party detractors.
You inner city, cultured, hipster, whiskey snob.
Time for my second macchiato for the day. later peeps.
Bucephalus @ #1463 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 12:30 pm
As well they should. 🙂
“I love Shortens response to the review. Saying that despite his failures he plans on retaining Maribyrnong for the next 20 years. The hide on this creep!”
nath snarky comment about Shorten #9976. I’m starting to get the impression he just doesn’t like the guy..
“taking the pressure off electricity prices.” – has not happened anywhere in the world – there is direct causal correlation between the penetration of wind and solar and higher energy prices throughout the world and that is why South Australia is one of the most expensive in the world for power.
I don’t believe peeps should verbal Buce.
Because Buce is quite right.
All droughts end. By definition. They are periods of abnormally low rainfall.
What Buce intended to convey is that global warming is turning what used to be a drought into the new normal.
Buce is also obviously concerned that the Coalition’s drought policies, mired as they are in climate denialism, are farcical. $7 billion worth of decision making based on false premises when we desperately need a read budge surplus is a cause for deep concern.
Finally, Buce is also concerned that the Coalition has partly renationalized the Commonwealth Bank to give dirt cheap loans to farmers. The risk is carried by taxpayers. When farmers eventually go broke in the new normal, who carries the financial can?
You and me.
Kakuru
says:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:32 pm
“I love Shortens response to the review. Saying that despite his failures he plans on retaining Maribyrnong for the next 20 years. The hide on this creep!”
nath snarky comment about Shorten #9976. I’m starting to get the impression he just doesn’t like the guy..
_________________
And I was one of the 48.5% of people Shorten thanked who either voted Labor or gave them preference. Imagine what some of the people who voted against Labor think about him.
The ABC producers must be having a difficult day, trying to choose between supporting Morrison “keeping things ticking over” and quoting anything criticising Labor.
Tristo,
It wasn’t a surprise to me either but explains Bowen’s and O’Neill’s recent statements re freedom of religion.
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/labor-mp-fears-divide-between-religious-and-secular-australia-20190924-p52ug7.html
I witnessed firsthand pre-polling and on the day in Chisholm how many Asians spurned the advances of Labor and the Greens. It’s been going on for some time now.
I wonder if the writer of an article about Queenslanders reacting negatively to southern criticism and condascension recognises the irony of her opening paragraph:
“Glittering yachts dip in a shit-coloured river below a skyline….”
Does she open with this description just to emphasise and embody her point?
https://www.themonthly.com.au/issue/2019/november/1572526800/lech-blaine/how-good-queensland
Coalminers, Christians, Chinese communities and Cweenslanders are the ones who ran away from Labor, according to Greg Jennet.
lizzie
Morrison thinks the economy is a driverless car. We do rather lack a driver.
🙁
He has a very solid weapon against accusations of misogyny. Jenny Morrison is electoral gold for him.
Buce: ‘solar and higher energy prices throughout the world and that is why South Australia is one of the most expensive in the world for power.’
Are you suggesting that SA would have lower priced electricity by building a coal powered generator and importing the coal?
Probyn
“Shorten never had the popularity of Scott Morrison.”
Neither did Morrison, until he miraculously won!
How much more evidence do you need to remove control of the ALP from the union structure and allow some competent outside social democrats to take over.
Simon Katichsays:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:31 pm
So one moment I’m from Mt Gambier and the next I’m “inner city”.
Get your story straight boy! 🙂
“legislation for truth in political advertising.” …excluding anything about Medicare being sold and destroyed by the LNP because that is all true. Apparently.
Pegasus
Labor needs to get education about LGBTI people and equality generally into those Chinese communities. Thats the propaganda the LNP is using to win elections. State Labor can counter that with education.
In fact its the only thing that will change their perception of Labor.
Otherwise the LNP are just going to continue to demonise Labor and the Greens as those people wanting to change the sex of your child.
Its a reality Labor needs to tackle. I am pleased that Andrews has kept Safe Schools as that will help. However State Labor governments can do a lot to push some education into those communities to counter the propaganda.
Labor would do well to run more Family Law (The TV series) and yes there are gay people and highlight Taiwan Equal Marriage to the expat Taiwanese and Hong Kong cohorts in the Chinese community to counter it.
Mostly Labor needs to show those communities why religion should not influence their vote in a secular society and why we have that separation which lets them worship and not be dictated to by the government like China does.
Assuming that eventually all states will adhere to zero emissions plans, and assuming that research into eliminating methane emissions will fail, cattle will have to go.
At least some of prime cattle grazing country in Australia is highly suitable for timber plantations.
Since prime cattle country is usually already cleared and usually already has minimal biodiversity because it is based almost entirely on introduced grasses, suitably designed plantation regimes will improve both carbon sequestration and biodiversity.
Win win of the future?
No doubt the planet is warming and fossil fuels are contributing. Should we wind back our use of coal fired power stations or reduce mining and export of coal? We closed the hole in the ozone layer by stopping use of cfcs and we switched to unleaded fuel so we have the ability to implement change.
The L/NP are not brave enough to do anything positive. When insurance companies start refusing to insure the family home because of the risk of extreme weather events, perhaps they will. I wont hold my breath.
This lady could start a trend at the ballot box…
Recommendation 6: Without compromising existing support, Labor should broaden its support base by improving its standing with economically insecure, low-income working families, groups within the Christian community and Australians living in regional and rural Australia.
p.19 Why were the results in Queensland so bad? While Adani was a factor in Labor’s poor performance in regional Queensland, it does not explain the large swings against it in most of south-east Queensland. The groups of voters who swung most strongly against Labor were self-described Christians and economically insecure, low-income voters who do not like or follow politics. These voters are heavily represented in Queensland. Perhaps the perception of Federal Labor not being supportive of the mining industry, which is such
an important industry for all Queenslanders, played a role too. The cumulative effect of a number of issues made Queenslanders feel Federal Labor was not on their side.
———
I may have missed it skim reading but I didn’t see any recommendation to oppose everything the Greens Party propose.
@Pegasus
Anyway I don’t think these Conservative Christian voters are going to switch their voters, so long as Scott Morrison remains Liberal Leader. Especially given that especially the Evangelical Christians in Australia, often subscribe to Charismatic theology, such as what Hillsong preaches, which I am speaking from personal experiencing knowing a lot of Evangelical Christians in my life.
Anyway the finding that 25-34’s living in outer-urban and regional areas swung away from Labor, I found interesting. Since I have encountered reports that some Millennial men are driving a backlash against feminism in contemporary Australia.
Bucephalussays:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:30 pm
“respect the role of workers in fossil fuel industries”
Pull the other one. Outside of Fitzgibbon the ALP want to destroy them.
_________________________________________________________________________________________________________________________
Respect the role of workers in fossil fuel industries, yes, but do not kid them that life will continue as it has in the past.
Global warming, which like most Liberals Bucephalus seems to think is just a lie thought up by the world’s leading scientific institutions, means that such industries cannot and will not have a long-term future. But there is no reason why workers in such industries and their children could not have a future in renewable energies.
It is not respecting any worker to treat them like idiots and ballot fodder, as the Liberals do whenever they cynically campaign for their votes by playing on their fears or prejudices.
BOM is promising that it will become windy here tomorrow. That is not possible, IMO. It IS already windy here. Gusts to 63 kph. Some friends have just come from the airport and no coffee tea or me on the trip. The landing was something orrible.
#WeatheronPB
Its also wise to remember the results of the Marriage Equality Survey
Yes Labor is vulnerable to conservative christians in some seats. However its base is very much for Marriage Equality and no to religion in our state. That includes opposing the religious freedom bill.
The results were very clear. Those seats Labor occupies that voted against Marriage Equality are a minority even in Labor seats. Going back on advocating for equality is not in Labor’s interests.
So the broader outreach is the important part to take in about the review..
Inclusion means no moving away from Labor’s strong values and base just adding more to that base of support
PeeBeesays:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:42 pm
The deliberate lack of maintenance leading to closure and no new construction of new coal and gas fired plants in South East Australia (that’s SA, Victoria and NSW) and the massive over-reliance of SA on unreliable and intermittent wind and solar leading to massive inefficient extra expenditure on grid infrastructure has caused the high prices.
I note that SA is just now bringing on a new gas plant.
Show me one example globally where increased solar and wind has led to a fall in dometic power prices – just one would be nice.
Pegasus @ #1488 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 12:45 pm
Haven’t read it myself but I suspect it doesn’t mention the Greens at all – which is the most appropriate course to take in general.
guytaur
Social media platform WeChat has been used very effectively by the Coalition and religious groups to spread anti Labor and anti-Greens propaganda along the lines you are saying . In Chisholm this has been evident since before the 2016 federal election.
Issues such as SSM would have played its part in turning socially conservative people of faith away from more progressive parties, witness the swing against Labor in Western Sydney electorates.
Boerwar @ #1486 Thursday, November 7th, 2019 – 12:44 pm
Excessively negative. If we can stop adding CO2 to the atmosphere and then start pulling enough out of the atmosphere to counterbalance the methane that cattle produce, then we can have net zero emissions and cattle at the same time.
From that Monthly article:
This is probably right, and one thing to consider is that for a large cohort of voters the environment is rapidly moving from a top-of-the-pyramid cultural issue to a bottom-of-the-pyramid issue of Safety. I think Morrison sees this, which is why he tries (in vain, I think) to tell people to be reassured, everything is OK, things are being done.
I can spare an hour or 2…
Rex Douglassays:
Thursday, November 7, 2019 at 1:43 pm
Rex, I’m no supporter of the ALP except when it is ALP v Greens.
Exactly why would the Unions keep funding the ALP if they lost control of it? It is their party -they set it up and it is bought and paid for. That is the only reason it exists. Local Party members are deluding themselves if they think they have any influence on policy or preselections ( which are all agreed to by the Union affiliated Factions based on deals about who gets what and which Union Leaders or their partners get which Upper House seats etc).
ajm
Why do you comment before you have read the report? Try commenting after reading it when you are better informed but that’s not the intent of your post, is it?