The Willoughby count has been updated with 9673 postals on the primary vote, and while these have leaned less heavily to the Liberals than postals did in 2019, they suggest Tim James’ lead is likely to widen from here rather than narrow. James has added 4357 primary votes, or 45.0% compared with 43.4% of all either votes, while Penn has gained 2651, or 27.4% compared with 32.2%.
Counting has completed in Willoughby for what I expect will be all votes other than postals, leaving Tim James on 8365 (51.76%) to Larissa Penn’s 7797 (48.24%), with 2085 votes having exhausted. The total of 18,247 votes counted is put in the shade by the 25,071 postal votes that have now been received, which will be supplemented by a small number over the next week, counting of which will finally begin on Saturday.
I’m bumping this thread back to the top of the page because the NSWEC is conducting a new two-candidate preferred count in Willoughby between the actual leading candidates, Liberal Tim James and independent Larissa Penn, having conducted what proved to be a superfluous Liberal-versus-Greens count on the night. With results reported from 14 out of 24 booths, preferences are flowing heavily enough against the Liberals (10.2% to Liberal, 42.7% to independent and 47.1% exhausted) to perhaps make James nervous. The numbers are available at the NSWEC website – they are not being published to the media feed unfortunately, so my own results display doesn’t show them. James presently leads 51.4-48.6, which increases to 51.9-48.1 if the preference flow so far is projected across the yet-to-report booths.
That leaves, so far, 18,033 postal votes that have been received, which is more than the sum of the votes so far counted with many more still to arrive, none of which will be counted before the weekend. Ordinarily I would point to the fact that Gladys Berejiklian polled 66.5% of postals in 2019 compared with 57.6% of election day and pre-poll votes and deem the door still closed. But that was from a total of a mere 2269, in contrast to the present extraordinary circumstance where postal ballots were sent to every enrolled voter in the electorate. It may be that, as in the United States, that pool of postal voters, which is traditionally older and more conservative, is now dominated by those most concerned about COVID-19.
For more on the by-elections, below is a discussion between myself and Ben Raue which was recorded on Monday afternoon:
Counting closed last night with quite a bit of the pre-poll vote still unreported – I’m unclear as to whether that will be finished off today or tomorrow. In the very unusual circumstances of these by-elections, there will then be very little to report for a full week, since counting of the unprecedentedly large number of postal votes will not start for another week, as was explained here. There may be a few other types of vote added to the count (absents, provisionals and telephone voting), but these will be few in number.
Election night commentary
10.40pm. A second pre-poll booth from Strathfield, Strathfield EM Office (as distinct from Strathfield EVC), is much more favourable for Labor than the first — a 10.7% swing for compared with 4.8% against — but with less than a quarter as many votes.
10.31pm. Two more pre-polls, Bungendore and Jerrabomberra, are in from Monaro on both primary and two-party — Jerrambomerra was bang on the 7.9% election day swing, Bungendore was 13.3% but with fewer votes.
10.27pm. The Strathfield pre-poll is now in on two-party, and it was a 4.8% swing against Labor, such that there is now a 1.4% swing against them in the seat overall.
10.24pm. Primary votes from the Narooma pre-poll centre, the second in Bega out of six, are much the same in swing terms as the election day results, discouraging the notion of such disparity between them as might jeopardise Labor’s substantial lead.
10.01pm. The last of the Willoughby pre-polls is in on the primary vote, and contrary to what I suggested earlier, the Liberals have suffered identical 15% primary vote swings on election day votes and pre-polls.
9.43pm. The first pre-poll result from Strathfield, primary votes from the Strathfield booth, are quite bad for Labor: down 9.8% on the primary vote compared with 4.3% on election day.
9.32pm. Queanbeyan pre-poll in on two-party: 3.7% swing to Labor compared with 7.9% on election day.
9.24pm. A second pre-poll booth, Queanbeyan, is in on the primary vote in Monaro, recording a swing against the Nationals slightly below the election day results.
8.49pm. The first pre-poll booth from Bega, Bermagui, is in. My results page says it has swung no different from the election day booths, but this is the one pre-poll in the seat that was not in use in 2019 so I’d advise some caution. Nonetheless, Labor candidate Michael Holland is claiming victory as I speak. Regarding the previous entry below, it seems my perception of a weak result for the Liberals in pre-polls in Willoughby is to do with the way I’ve calculated the historic results, which was a necessarily imperfect process. The remaining pre-poll booth there, North Willoughby, will presumably tell a different story.
8.16pm. A second pre-poll booth is in from Willoughby, which makes two out of three, and I’m now more confident that both show a drop in the Liberal Party vote similar to the election day booths, and pre-polls are not in fact transforming the result here. So I remain curious as to where Zimmerman got his estimate of a 61-39 result.
8.07pm. The first pre-poll booth from Willoughby, and the second overall, is Willoughby EM Office – my swing figure says it’s not much different from the election day results, contrary to what we were hearing from Trent Zimmerman. However, my historic figures for pre-poll booths in the city seats are dubious because several new booths were added, and discretion was needed in dividing up the 2019 votes.
7.59pm. All election day votes are in from Strathfield now on both primary and two-party, and with the usual caveat added about election day votes only, the lack of any swing is at least a partial qualification to the picture of a night for triumph for Labor.
7.49pm. My commentary has slowed to a trickle because the picture on election day votes is now clear. We’re now in a period typical of modern election nights where there’s a lull between the election day votes coming in and the much larger pre-poll booths reporting later in the evening.
7.39pm. Trent Zimmerman goes so far as to suggest Tim James will end up on 61% two-party preferred, which suggests an extremely different dynamic on pre-polls than election day votes.
7.36pm. Antony Green in the same position as me in relation to Bega — his system is calling it for Labor, but the peculiarities of this election are such that he’s not willing to shut the door.
7.33pm. The Cooma pre-poll booth from Monaro is in, and there’s only a very slight swing to Labor compared with 7% on the election day booths — the first evidence those of us without scrutineering contacts have had that the Coalition may indeed be doing better on pre-polls.
7.26pm. I’ve spent a few minutes trying to fix my preference flow table, without success, so just disregard that. So far as the election day vote, the picture is now fairly settled. Firstly, the number of election votes we’re talking about here is unprecedentedly small, which has been reflected in the speed of the count. But for what they’re worth, the Liberals look like they’re in all sorts of trouble in Bega, but the ABC coverage indicates the feeling within the party is that this is misleading. There’s been a lot of progress in the Monaro count since I last commented, but no change in the overall picture — a big swing to Labor, but apparently not quite big enough. Very little swing in Strathfield; Liberal Tim James leading independent Larissa Penn in Willoughby by about 42.5% to 32.%, which would leave Penn in need of a very strong flow of preferences, so you wouldn’t rule her out unless you accepted the Liberals’ insistence that they’re doing better on pre-polls.
7.12pm. A slight swing to Labor in Strathfield; things have settled down in Willoughby, where my impression is of a tight result with maybe a slight edge for the Liberals over the independent, with the inevitable qualification that we’re flying blind without pre-polls and postals.
7.11pm. I’ve fixed my projections issue, although the swings in my “preference flows” table aren’t working, which was related to the problem with the projections. Consistent with what’s being said by Trent Zimmerman now, I’ve got the Nationals probably home in Monaro, but Bega still looks very bleak for the Liberals.
7.03pm. There’s an error in my projections which I’ll now work on fixing. Pay attention instead to the results in the tables.
7.01pm. Now looking even worse for the Liberals in Bega, where I think my numbers might be more up to date than the ones just noted by Antony Green, which had the swing at around 8% rather than my 12%.
6.58pm. Better news for the Liberals in Willoughby now. With 11 booths in out of 24, Tim James holds a fairly solid lead on the primary vote, which would probably be enough for him if there’s any rate of preference exhaustion, and certainly would be if it’s indeed the case that he’s doing better on pre-polls. Note that I’ve now arbitrarily set the probability gauge here at 50%. Also no swing now in Strathfield.
6.57pm. I’m now projecting a squeaker in Monaro off five two-party and nine primary results, which you can take as a Nationals win if the pre-poll and primary dynamic is any better for them.
6.56pm. That update is through now. We’ve now got six two-party booth results now from Bega, compared with I think only two before, but the situation hasn’t changed — still a big enough swing to Labor to carry the seat, but yet again, I observe that pre-polls and postals might change the picture.
6.54pm. There’s been an update that my system has failed to process, so the results are stuck for a short time. Should have new figures in a few minutes.
6.49pm. Now we have two booths from Willoughby where Larissa Penn has thrashed Tim James — along with a third which isn’t nearly as bad for James, but would still be worrying for him in his own right even if it were isolated. But like I say, Zimmerman says scrutineers are seeing something very different on pre-polls.
6.48pm. Some less bad primary vote numbers coming through from the Liberals in Bega, but it still looks like they will be relying on a more favourable dynamic from pre-polls and postals.
6.47pm. Trent Zimmerman on the ABC says scrutineers say pre-polls in Willoughby are encouraging for the Liberals.
6.44pm. Three booths in on the primary vote and one on two-party in Strathfield, a bit of a swing to Labor, but seemingly less than in Bega and Monaro.
6.42pm. We’ve now got two booths in from Bega on two-party, plus six on primary, which means I’m no longer going off preference estimates. The two booths have very different results, but when the primary vote booths are further factored in, it doesn’t look good for the Liberals. But — and here I may end up being a broken record — there may end up being a very different dynamic on postal votes.
6.41pm. So to be absolutely clear about this — my near 100% win probability for the Liberals in Willoughby assumes the Greens will come second, which they won’t. Disregard this figure, now and for the rest of the night.
6.39pm. I’ve managed to gloss over my problem with the Willoughby results page. A second booth, Chatswood Guide Hall, is less spectacular than the first, but still of concern for Tim James. The Liberal-Greens preference throw being conducted by the NSWEC will presumably be irrelevant, the contesting being between James and independent Larissa Penn.
6.36pm. Bermagui and Merimbula Public now in from Bega; Wamboin Hall in from Monaro. Liberal and Nationals still down heavily across the board.
6.35pm. Ben Raue on Twitter points out the number of votes reporting here is about 60% down the equivalent booths from 2019. So on top of all the other cautions, it’s possible the exodus from polling day to postal voting is dominated by conservatives.
6.34pm. Two booths from Monaro — Captains Flat Hall with 189 votes, 183 in Letchworth N’hood Cntr. Very solid swings to Labor in booth. So we’ve got five booths now altogether, all of them bad for the Coalition.
6.33pm. Second booth in Bega — Malua Bay Comm. Cntr — 195 votes, but very big swing to Labor. But I’d certainly ignore what my win probability estimate is saying for the time being.
6.29pm. Very interesting first result from Willoughby — Antony Green is noting this is likely to be her best part of the electorate, but independent Larissa Penn is outpolling the Liberal. I may yet regret the fact that this is the one seat where my results feature might not end up handling the strain.
6.26pm. My two-party preferred will be going off a crude estimate until a few more votes are in. I have a notion the estimate may be flattering to Labor, judging by the fact that I’ve got a bigger projected two-party swing than for the primary vote.
6.24pm. We’ve got a result – 78 votes from Towamba Public in Bega. Meaningless at this stage of course (a solid swing to Labor for what it’s worth), but the good news is that my results facility has dealt with it okay.
6.10pm. Links added above. The results map for Willoughby doesn’t seem to be working, but I’m hopeful it will resolve itself (and this seat is unlikely to be a focus of attention even if it doesn’t), and other than it looks okay so far. However, I won’t have cause for confidence until some actual numbers come through.
6pm. Welcome to the Poll Bludger’s live coverage of the count for the New South Wales state by-elections in Bega, Monaro, Strathfield and Willoughby. If and when I’m satisfied that it’s working properly, I will shortly provide links for my live results pages. First results should presumably be through from country booths in Bega and Monaro around 6.30pm.
Re B.S. Fairman at 11.21 pm
The Nats chose their candidate 2 months before the Libs chose theirs in Bega, as soon as Porky jumped.
Still there were some booths in Monaro with big swings, e.g. Bungendore, where the pre-poll swing at 13% is just above the Sat vote swing. There was a local factor in Bungendore, which was that Barilaro had supported a crazy decision to build a new high school on the only oval in the town. The new Council does not support that decision, so even though the Nats have retained Monaro, that oval might now be saved.
”
sprocket_says:
Saturday, February 12, 2022 at 9:15 pm
Domicron has fallen into The Liar’s porky pies
Labor did not go backwards in Strathfield
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Well! I don’t necessarily agree with you because IMO ALP needs to build up margins in Strathfield part of Reid electorate since other areas maybe Pro-Libs.
Evening all. Just back from an evening with friends and catching up on the good news. At first I though one seat changing hands was no big deal, but understanding the margins and history of the seats, Labor making a gain from among these four seats is a very big deal. As others have said, the independent vote is also significant for the Teals prospects. I wonder if the five Liberal defectors in Canberra this week have internal polling?
Pretty clearly the Libs distraction tactics have not worked. Voters suffering from covid, vaccine scarcity and now inflation aren’t going to forget their problems on polling day. No wonder Barnaby was ducking questions and there are no LNP MPs on Insiders tomorrow.
At the risk of inviting Lieberal trolls to pile on, I have previously posted about media coverage about a week ago of Jason Y L making a sexist comment online about 20 years ago. Maybe that was a factor in a disappointing, although probably successful retain.
The soft result in Strathfield may not contain any real seeds of hope for the Lieberals in Reid.
Looks like an outstanding result in Bega and couldn’t have happened to a more deserving Lieberal leader!
Re sprocket at 9.36 pm and pre-poll trends
Correct, no big surprises in pre-poll swings. E.g. Narooma pre-poll at 13.5% swing to Labor is 4% lower than election day swing of 17.7%, a usual difference. For comparison, Dr Holland got 62.6% of today’s vote in Narooma and 56.7% of the pre-poll, while Kristy McBain got 51.3% of the 4 July vote in Narooma in 2020 and 48.9% of the pre-poll. McBain did well against the breeze, Holland did great with the wind.
Granny Anny:
Saturday, February 12, 2022 at 11:44 pm
[‘Steely, I also have problems with revealing details of a MP’s private life, but Joyce is a special case.
In the past he has made a point of emphasing his catholic and conservative family values while secretly breaking every family values rule in the book. He is a drunk, not very bright, a rorter, and an insult to the parliament.’]
Pretty well sums up the double standards of this man. He reminds me of that shocker Patterson, who’s done more to ruin this country’s reputation than Greer:
https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=tzYi1TkIxaY
I’ve added an overall wrap to my coverage at https://kevinbonham.blogspot.com/2022/02/nsw-feb-12-by-elections-live-and.html
A mixed bag, good and bad spots for both sides, overall not much to see here in my view.
Ashleigh Raper. Well, Juanita, it was a mammoth task for Premier Perrottet to hold onto to Willoughby. It really is seen as prime Labor territory and the fact that Labor didn’t field a candidate made it all the more difficult for Premier Perrottet but, somehow, by the skin of his teeth he has pulled it off. What does this say about the fortunes and future of Labor in this state? I guess we wait but all signs are not looking good when a popular Premier is able to hold on to a seat like Willoughby in the absence of a Labor candidate. Back to you Juanita.
Thank you, Kevin.
I’ve added an overall wrap to my coverage at https://kevinbonham.blogspot.com/2022/02/nsw-feb-12-by-elections-live-and.html
Kevin Bonham:
Sunday, February 13, 2022 at 12:06 am
[‘A mixed bag, good and bad spots for both sides, overall not much to see here in my view.’]
You don’t think, then, that Bega’s not an omen federally?
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ajmsays:
Saturday, February 12, 2022 at 10:50 pm
Is the result in Bega a portent for other regional areas? Lack of services etc finally starting to bite?
Monaro is a bit different because of its proximity to Canberra but Bega strikes me of many regional electorates without good access to city based services. Perhaps the Nationals and rural Liberals should be getting worried
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Regional and Rural in NSW went through very very bad time in the last 26 months whether it Fires, Floods, Pandemic.
Gladys held it together till Delta broke in. Now that she and Barilaro are gone, R&R don’t know much about current LNP leaders especially who are idealogically and religiously fundamentalists.
It is like Minns Roti (Indian bread) fell into honey.
Re Ven at 12.44 pm
Most voters in Bega had seen more than enough of Perrottet even when he tried to keep away during the by-election, and the religious nuttery of ProMo in the past week reinforced that.
Barnaby in the Tourist Hotel, the HQ for that Nationals celebration after the retention of the National held seat is an episode of “Barnaby in the Wild”.
Barnaby , adorned in his working man’s khaki sheet , beer in hand, working the floor of the back slappin’, knock ’em down, Saturday evening after the races gathering to celebrate an expected victory.
The live cross, the Speers high shot, the noise, a marvellous backdrop for the retail politician as he “reluctantly” held onto his earpiece during the raucous celebrations.
Queanbeyan ever Labor, never mind in a oddly diverse electorate, as the “bucolic” smaller centres assure the Nationals victory despite another “caught with pants down” end to a political career.
David Attenborough would be proud.
“Overall” a good day out!
The golden NSW Lib/nats turn to the rusted NSW lib/nats
https://www.smh.com.au/politics/federal/the-hapless-politics-of-our-aged-care-catastrophe-20220211-p59vnb.html
I also think those sitting Liberal MPs with teal independents running against them will have watched the Willoughby results with particular interest.
Watching grabs of Perrottet’s comments last night it seems clear to me the Liberals are going to run with Sakr in Strathfield again next year.
ABC News:
Fiona Kotvojs says she will not concede defeat in the Bega by-election despite a double-digit swing against her and Premier Dominic Perrottet congratulating her Labor opponent.
I dont think Perrottet understands like Morrison , If Perrottet still the leader of the NSW liberal party this time next year, that he will be the problem for the liberal party candidates.
Confessions @ #214 Sunday, February 13th, 2022 – 7:06 am
I hope so. 😉
The NSW electoral commission are not going to count ANY postal votes, until the time for their receipt – 25 February – expires.
What a crock of Perrotet! It gives the Kotvojs of this world another fortnight of not conceding, like she did in the previous losses of this climate science denier.
There seems to be a massive crisis at the NSW EC. They have never been stellar when compared to their AEC colleagues and funding would no doubt be a significant factor but I am surprised that the state of the NSW EC is not getting more coverage given its importance to our democracy.
Cannot wait (spew) for the analysis piece by Alexandra Smith of the Nine Paper about these results. No doubt silver lining for the Liberals.
The delayed counting of postal votes and the like does seem at odds with computerized everything or the need for transparency and the “instant gratification” society.
Barnaby didn’t wait till the 25th February to “get on the grog” at the “Tourist Hotel” after declaring himself a winner last night.
The irony being that the pub is called the “Tourist” as it’s not known as one of Barnaby’s regular hangouts.
Wranslide at 8.17am
+1
Her setting up of the Upper Hunter by election last year as a referendum on Jodi McKay was particularly biased.
Then, when Jodi vacated the leadership, she was at fault for ‘plunging the party into crisis’!
Interested to see what folks think about the results in Bega and Monaro re implications for Constance federally.
Who’s have thought that voters don’t forget when govt failures directly impact their daily lives? The gallery has been assuring us the electorate will forget the govt’s problems when the election rolls around.
Not when the problems director affect their every day lives they won’t
Fiona Kotvojs in Bega doing a Trump and not conceding the election in Bega yesterday. 🙄
Could the seat of Aston be the canary in the coalmine on the night of the election with Alan Tudge determined to contest again? I hope Labor have a good candidate lined up there.
Scott Morrison can’t read people well. Who knew? 😀
Further to KB’s mixed bag take on these set of byelections.
1. Labor – meaning Minns and Nanva – did themselves no favours by not even agreeing to run a candidate in Monaro until after Xmas. Any chance to capitalise in a once in a decade opportunity to take this seat off the Nats was squandered: a point I made back to Adam Searle – and he and most the caucus agreed with my view – back in October last year: unfortunately because of the politics of revenge, Adam has no sway with the current leadership or head office and therefore the folly of running dead until 2023 remained the group thought in Team Minns until it was too late. Ultimately that might have cost them the seat, but the Overalls are Queanbeyan royalty, so maybe not.
2. Labor seems to have won 40% of the primary vote in Strathfield. Down 2-4% from 2019. However a high profile – somewhat Labor aligned independent syphoned off 9-10% of the total vote. The exhaust rate effectively killed off any meaningful 2PP swing. So I’m not sure at all there was any ‘mixed bag’ issues there. Especially for potential federal election implications. In the face of a pretty toxic and racist subterranean campaign Labor’s outsider candidate did well. It was a pleasing result for Labor.
A 17% swing to Labor in Bega – especially the swings in the northern part of the electorate that overlap with Gilmore – augurs well for Labor to hold on to that seat at the federal election and for that matter, Eden Monaro. Extrapolating further it seems very doubtful that the coalition will be able to offset any loses in urban seats in regional area like the south coast or the Hunter.
Re Gettysburg1863 at 8.52 am
Constance is now a no hoper in Gilmore. Labor will still claim to be an underdog but that will be unbelievable to the informed. The first sizeable booth that came in was Constance’s own turf of Malua Bay with swing to Labor of 22%. Scale of swing in northern part of elecorate (N of Bodalla is in Gilmore) showed strength of Dr Holland as local candidate. Gilmore was touted as most likely Lib gain in May. No chance now, so question for LNP back benchers is how could Dutton be worse than ProMo? Perrottet did ProMo no favour by having by-elections on 12 Feb not 19 Feb. Time for spill.
Important update from Ashleigh Raper of the ABC. Bega was never a particularly strong or safe Liberal seat and only held on personality of Constance. Is this a talking point regurgitated or her ABC analysis?
Re sprocket at 7.47 am and Cat at 9.02 am
Has Sportsbet paid out on a Kotvojs win yet? They could have run a book on when she would concede, but that might have required something other than their fake odds for who would win the seat.
There was a lot of polling, almost all of it internal, in Bega and Monaro at least. Many insiders may have known the consistency of that polling in Bega, though it was never reported in any detail in the media.
I am still waiting for the MSM opinionators and their Bludger fellow travelers to resile from their Albanese dissing and to admit that they were wRONg.
Albanese had been doing Morrison slowly. This week he speeded up the slow burn and put the blow torch to Morrison’s belly.
Bushfire should take a bow. He spotted Morrison’s employment pattern very early and predicted that Morrison would repeat as PM.
Not getting any swing in a Sydney seat at least part of which was in the LGA areas of concern is anticlimactic for the ALP.
But the bright side is that Minns now leads an increasingly talented team and, more broadly, people of ability want to be in NSW parliament – or at least the lower house.
@shellbell, yes both candidates are excellent additions to the caucus.
@andrew_earlwood I do not think anyone can blame Team Minns for not taking advice from Adam Searle or being extremely wary about it. As for the decision of Bingo Bob, well, I am not sure he made a decision really. There is also the cost. Labor HQ is not exactly flushed with funds statewide and the current leadership are not particularly effective fundraisers. The win for Labor in a few seats will give some hope of being competitive which should assist going forward.
Re Wranslide at 12.14 am, 7.59 am and 10.18 am
Some genuine questions, notwithstanding your midnight humour:
What’s your problem with the NSW EC? They counted the votes cast yesterday without evident errors. They gave all electors a postal vote option (at least if the letters arrived), which was very sensible. The reason for the delay in counting postals is to preserve the integrity of the voting, which is paramount. The Electoral Commissioner pointed to funding inadequacy. This has not compromised the results. We have enough genuine crises around, without attempts at solutions. No need to invent fake ones.
Do you agree with William’s description (10.37 pm last night) of the NSW optional preferential voting system as a “bastard”? There are some very serious issues here. Who fathered this bastard, and why?
In terms of increasing seriousness there are at least three problems. First, it is inconvenient at best for selfless psephologists like William and Antony Green, making their judgments a little more tricky.
Second, for Labor it has become a self-perpetuating own goal state-wide, apart from the idiocy of a candidate like Farrelly recommending to voters choosing her that they should not give a rats about who wins the seat (same applies to some other candidates, including Mr Haggar for Greens in Bega).
Third, do proponents of optional preferential believe that voters whose votes exhaust understand the system? This could be checked, e.g. through an exercise in participatory democracy. It is most likely that the main reason for exhausted votes is that the voters do not understand rather than that they do not care who wins the seat. Those are the mutually exclusive options for this point. There is only one, pathetic and very sobering argument for optional preferential, which is that it reduces the informal vote. But this is unpersuasive empirically (e.g. informal rate in Bega at 2.8% is not much less than for Bass in 2021 Tasmanian election at 3.5%) and misguided socially because there are possible solutions such as basic education in the Australian preferential voting system (compared to UK) at school etc.
Finally, Ashleigh Raper is wrong about Bega. Constance was not a strong member. He got only one big swing in five previous elections, during the 2011 landslide. One can forgive Ms Raper for tending a bit to believe Liberal nonsense more than Labor nonsense, given what a former Labor leader did to her.
The reason why Labor won Bega well is that they ran a very good local campaign, after a slow start (Dr Holland was announced as their candidate just before Xmas, 2 months after Mrs Overall in Monaro.) Albo made a point of appearing in Moruya at a press conference with Dr Holland, Fiona Phillips and Kristy McBain. ProMo, Australia’s worst PM, did not bother, knowing he could only lose more votes.
William
A suggestion for future seat background summaries eg upcoming national election.
It would be very helpful if the how to vote cards/preference listing for candidates could be shown on your individual electorate guides. Hard to chase up in many cases but PB contributors could probably be enlisted to do it for you. Similar for upper house (I think Antony Green usually tries to provides these)
You have results for previous election for each seat and 2PP preferred for a few elections. Also perhaps a link to the penultimate result to give some history.
It’s out! We waited with baited breath. But Alexandra Smith from the Nine Paper has released her analysis. And it’s a doozy. Labor just held on in Strathfield. Andrew Constance was vastly more popular than McKay. And it continues. These analysis pieces, must have been part of an annual performance review and development goal, are rather special
I’m in favour of OPV except when I’m writing code around it.
I don’t think anyone in Labor State or Federal will see anything too problematic in Strathfield. You really have to be deliberately obtuse to miss Farrelly’s contribution which at this point looks like it’s knocked about three points off both Labor and Greens primaries and is likely to have exhausted a significant number of these votes.
That dynamic simply can’t play out in the Federal Election. Even if Farrelly ran in Reid and again picked up 9% or so two thirds of which came right off the Labor and Greens PV it would largely end up right back in Labor’s 2PV. Under compulsory preferencing it looks pretty certain that at least on the votes we have counted so far that Labor would have picked up a percent or so swing. Nothing to write home about, but also nothing to sneeze at. It’s also worth noting that 54.4% is also the same margin McKay held at the end of election day counting in 2019 so it’s not unreasonable to assume there’s a good chance Li won’t also get back up to around 55% once all the rest are counted.
That’s obviously not saying that Strathfield would be indicating Labor can have a huge amount of confidence in picking up Reid as opposed to how Bega and Monaro will give them a lot more comfort about retaining Gilmore and E-M. (All the Bega booths in Gilmore bar 1? showing solid Labor 2pp leads atm). But equally nothing here to indicate that if the tide really is going out on Morrison that Reid won’t go out with it. Either way Reid is likely to be close and hard fought.
@ratsak don’t tell Alexandra Smith that. The state of the political commentariat in NSW is in a dire state. They whine about the NSW Obeid era. It might be time they all looked at themselves. They look worse than the ALP state government in its death throes under Rees and Kristina.
To be fair, Andrew Clennel was probably the last journo that had any clout or nouse in the NSW gallery even if he did write for the terrograph.
And to be fair perhaps Alex Mitchell.
Two candidate preferred calculation for Willoughby removed from the NSW Electoral Commission site. They chose to do it for Lib vs Green, which is pretty meaningless.
https://results.elections.nsw.gov.au/SB2201/Willoughby/Parliamentary/TwoCandidatesPreferredReport.html
https://citynews.com.au/2022/overall-pulls-further-ahead-as-by-election-count-continues/?utm_source=mailpoet&utm_medium=email&utm_campaign=canberra-daily-today-s-news-today_7801
As of Monday evening, further counting in Strathfield has improved the ALP’s position. There is now a 0.5% swing on 2PP to the ALP, rather than a small swing against. Still a lackluster result for the ALP though.
For what its worth, there has been no change in the betting markets odds for Reid-ALP are still favourites. But there has been a modest shift in the odds for Gilmore in the ALP’s favour.
https://www.tallyroom.com.au/45417
Ben Raue and William Bowe
Some sense of likely postal vote trends in Bega can be guessed at by comparing Eden-Monaro in 2019, when Labor did not run a strong postal campaign, and the 2020 by-election, when it did.
In 2019 Kotvojs got 57.1% of postals, whereas in 2020 she got 53.2%. In 2019 Kotvojs got 56% of the Merimbula pre-poll, whereas in 2020 she got 49.6%. She got 52.4% of the Sat vote in Merimbula this time, and 56% of the larger pre-poll.
With all pre-polls now counted, the swing against Kotvojs is 12.3%. After all postals are counted it is highly unlikely that the swing will be less than 10%. By not conceding she is merely faking a Trump.
The key issue in the by-election was said by the former member, Mr Constance, to be the need for improved health care. Reading the tea-leaves from this by-election, that issue helps Labor federally.
Thanks Dr Doolittle. Those are interesting comparisons to give us some guidance.
Might the fact that there are so many more postal votes than previously – apologies, I’m not sure of the estimated % but thought it could be as much as 30-40% of the total votes so possibly at least 50% more votes than the current totals so far – be the reason that Kotvojs is not conceding?
Morning all. After further counting Willoughby is back in doubt. So much for the late counting helping the Libs.
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2022-02-16/willoughby-seat-remains-in-doubt/100833364
“ The ABC’s chief election analyst Antony Green said Mr James is currently ahead with 51.9 per cent of the vote with Larissa Penn on 48.1 per cent.
Counting so far shows a swing of more than 19 per cent against the government.
“The result has implications federally because a little independent with not much money has run the Liberal Party a tight race in a safe seat,” Mr Green said.”
I’ll be amused to see how RW media explains this one away. On these numbers every inner city Liberal MP facing a Teal is in big trouble.
I am curious.
Did the Greens put out a HTV ticket which gave the Indie No 2 on the ticket?
Would that have made the difference?