New South Wales By-Elections – Page 2

Save the date

Confusion surrounding the likely date of the New South Wales state by-elections, to add to that we already have about the federal election.

This coming Monday is the last date on which an election can be called for this year, specifically for the December 11 date spruiked recently by Anthony Albanese, which few if any still expect. The parlour game thus seems likely to move on now to the alternative scenarios of March and May. A complication in the former case is a South Australian state election set in the normal course of events for the third Saturday in March, i.e. March 19. If I understand the situation correctly, the South Australian government will have the discretion to delay the election by up to three weeks if a federal election is called before February 19 for a date in March.

Here’s what we do know:

• Max Maddison of The Australian reports grumbling within the New South Wales Liberal Party over its failure to have finalised candidates in the important seats of Dobell, Warringah and Gilmore. The report cites Liberal sources, no doubt with an interest in the matter, accusing Alex Hawke of using his clout on state executive to delay proceedings to the advantage of candidates of his centre right faction. “Other senior Liberal sources” contend the problem is “a lack of quality candidates and impending local government elections”. Prospective nominees for Dobell include former test cricketer Nathan Bracken, along with Michael Feneley, a cardiologist who has twice run unsuccessfully in Kingsford Smith, and Jemima Gleeson, owner of a chain of coffee shops.

• Further on Gilmore, the ever-readable Niki Savva reported in her Age/Herald column a fortnight ago that “speculation is rife” that Andrew Constance will not in fact proceed with his bid for preselection, just as he withdrew from contention Eden-Monaro ahead of last year’s by-election. If so, that would seemingly leave the path clear for Shoalhaven Heads lawyer Paul Ell, who is reckoned a formidable opponent to Constance in any case.

• Labor has not been breaking its back to get candidates in place in New South Wales either, with still no sign of progress in the crucial western Sydney fringe seat of Lindsay. However, candidates have recently been confirmed in two Liberal marginals: Zhi Soon, an education policy adviser and former diplomat, in Banks, and Sally Sitou, a University of Sydney doctoral candidate and one-time ministerial staffer, in Reid.

• In Victoria, Labor’s candidate in La Trobe will be Abhimanyu Kumar, owner of a local home building company.

• In an article by Jason Campbell of the Herald Sun, JWS Research says rising poll numbers for Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party are being driven by “skilled labourers and lower-end middle-management”, supplementing an existing support base that had largely been limited to people over 65. Maleness and low education remain common threads.

• An article on the voter identification laws by Graeme Orr of the University of Queensland in The Conversation makes a point I had not previously heard noted: that those who lodge a declaration vote in lieu of providing identification will have no way of knowing if their vote was ultimately admitted to the count. This stands in contrast to some American states, where those who cast the equivalent of postal or absent votes can track their progress online.

New South Wales by-election latest:

• It is now clear that the by-elections will not be held simultaneously with the December 4 local government elections as initially anticipated. The Guardian reports that the state’s electoral commissioner, John Schmidt, told a parliamentary committee hearing yesterday that “it wouldn’t be possible or sensible to try and aim earlier than the middle of February”, in part because the government’s “piecemeal funding” of his agency had left it with inadequate cybersecurity standards.

• Labor has announced it will field a candidate in Bega, making it the only one of the five looming by-elections in which the Coalition and Labor are both confirmed starters. James O’Doherty of the Daily Telegraph (who I hope got paid extra for pointing out that “Labor has chosen to contest the seat despite Leader Chris Minns last month criticising the looming by-election as expensive and unnecessary”) reports nominees for Liberal preselection will include Eurobodalla Shire mayor Liz Innes and, possibly, Bega Valley Shire councillor Mitchell Nadin.

• Anton Rose of Inner West Courier reports Liberal hopes in Jodi McKay’s seat of Strathfield are not high, particularly if Burwood mayor John Faker emerges as the Labor candidate, and that the party would “not be mounting a vigorous campaign”. One prospective Liberal nominee is said to be Natalie Baini, a sports administrator who was said earlier in the year to planning a preselection against Fiona Martin in the federal seat of Reid.

Poll news:

• A Redbridge Group poll conducted for Simon Holmes a Court’s Climate 200 non-profit group records Treasurer Josh Frydenberg’s primary vote as having slumped from 49.4% in his blue-ribbon Melbourne seat of Kooyong to 38%. With the Greens on 15%, well short of the heights achieved with Julian Burnside as candidate in 2019, such a result would put Frydenberg under pressure from Labor on 31%. Around half of the balance is attributed to the United Australia Party, which seems doubtful in an electorate such as Kooyong. The objective of the poll was to test the waters for a Zali Steggall-like independent challenge, and responses to some rather leading questions indicated that such a candidate would indeed be competitive or better. The survey was conducted from October 16 to 18 by automated phone polling from a sample of 1017.

• Liberal-aligned think tank the Blueprint Institute has results from a YouGov poll on attitudes towards carbon emissions policy, conducted in nine regional electorates from September 28 to October 12 with samples of around 415 each. In spite of everything, these show large majorities in favour of both halving emissions by 2030 and net zero by 2050 even in such electorates as Hunter and Capricornia. Even among coal workers (sub-sample size unclear), the results are 63% and 64% respectively.

• The Australia Institute has published its annual Climate of the Nation survey, based on a poll of 2626 respondents conducted by YouGov in August.

• It took me a while to update BludgerTrack with last week’s Resolve Strategic and Roy Morgan results, but now that it’s done, I can exclusively reveal that they made very little difference. Labor is currently credited with a two-party lead of 53.8-46.2.

Also:

• Antony Green has published his analysis of the finalised Victorian state redistribution.

Morgan poll, Essential Research voting intention and more

Two more weak sets of voting intention numbers for the government, plus the latest on voter identification and looming New South Wales state by-elections.

Two new bits of federal polling news:

• Roy Morgan’s fortnightly poll has Labor’s two-party lead out from 53-47 to 54-46, from primary votes of Coalition 36.5% (down one), Labor 35% (down one), Greens 13.5% (up two) and One Nation 3.5% (up half). The state breakdowns have Labor leading in New South Wales with 55.5% of the two-party vote (up two on the last poll for a swing of about 7.5% compared with the 2019 election), in Victoria with 56.5% (up half a point for a swing of about 3.5%), in Western Australia with 55% (steady, a swing of about 10.5%) and in Tasmania from a very small sample with 58% (up five, a swing of about 2%). The Coalition leads with 51.5% in both Queensland (down three-and-a-half points, a swing to Labor of about 7%) and, anomalously, South Australia (up six, a swing to the Coalition of about 2%). The poll was conducted over the past two weeks from a sample of 2778.

• Essential Research has at last come good with its occasional dump of voting intention data, providing results from its last nine fortnightly surveys. If the 6% undecided are removed from the equation, and the results are rounded to the nearest half a point, the primary votes convert to Coalition 39.5%, Labor 38.5%, Greens 10.5% and One Nation 3%. If preference flows from 2019 are used, this comes out at around 52-48 in favour of Labor. The pollster’s “2PP+” measure has Labor on 49% and 45%, without allocating the 6% undecided. These numbers are Labor’s strongest over the period covered by the release, which goes back to the start of July.

I’ll finally get around to adding all of this, together with this week’s Resolve Strategic poll, to the BludgerTrack aggregate later today. Also:

• The new voter identification bill was introduced to parliament yesterday and can be viewed here. The Guardian reports Centre Alliance Senator Stirling Griff is “generally supportive”, which could give the government the vote it needs to get it through the Senate together with those of the two One Nation Senators. The report also says Pauline Hanson is claiming credit for the measure, saying she had made it a condition for her party’s support for government legislation lowering the threshold for political campaigners to lodge financial statements conditional. Antony Green’s account of the issue is naturally definitive; Peter Brent also offers his thoughts at Inside Story.

• Julie Owens, who has held the seat of Parramatta for Labor since 2004, has announced she will retire at the election. Joanne Vella of the Parramatta Advertiser reports that Julia Finn, who holds the state seat of Granville, is not ruling out seeking the nomination, potentially setting up yet another state by-election. Durga Owen, criminal lawyer and Western Sydney University lecturer, has confirmed her intention to run.

• Vince Connelly, Liberal member for the soon-to-be-abolished seat of Stirling and unsuccessful preselection candidate for the safe seat of Moore, has confirmed his intention to run for the far less attractive prospect of Cowan, held for Labor by Anne Aly on a post-redistribution margin of 0.9%.

• The Victorian state redistribution has been finalised, and you can read all about it here. I haven’t had time to look at it in any depth, but you can join in a discussion about it on the Victorian Resolve Strategic poll thread that went up yesterday.

New South Wales by-election latest:

• Andrew Constance has announced he will not resign from his New South Wales state seat of Bega until November 26, which, as Antony Green notes, means the by-election for the seat is unlikely to be held this year, and certainly not on December 4, which has been mooted as the date for a “super Saturday” of by-elections coinciding with the state’s local government elections. Indeed, it does not seem that any of the members who have announced their imminent departures has actually formally resigned yet.

• A third contender has emerged for the Liberal preselection in Willoughby to succeed Gladys Berejiklian in Kellie Sloane, former host of the Today Show and Seven Sunrise. The other two contenders are Willoughby mayor Gail Giles-Gidney and Menzies Research Centre executive general manager Tim James, although a senior Liberal quoted by James O’Doherty of the Daily Telegraph describes the latter as “not a viable option” since he could potentially lose the seat.

The fortnight before Christmas

Another pre-Christmas election theory, a court ruling brings some clarity to Labor’s preselection process in Victoria, and the latest on New South Wales’ looming bonanza of state by-elections.

Seemingly nothing doing on the polling front this week, though I would have thought we were due the monthly Resolve Strategic poll from the Age/Herald. That may yet come – perhaps even very shortly – given the publisher’s unpredictable past treatment of it. I need a new post sooner than that though, so here are some relevant recent developments:

• Anthony Albanese has reportedly told his party to be prepared for the possibility that Scott Morrison will call an election for December 11 after he returns from the Glasgow climate summit early next month. Andrew Clennell of Sky News describes this as a “ploy”, and says the genuine view within Labor is that the election will most likely be held in March. Kevin Bonham notes that the proximity of this date to Christmas and New Year would complicate the protracted process of Senate counting, and that it would not allow time for new laws requiring registered parties to have at least 1500 members to take effect.

• The Victorian Supreme Court has thrown out a legal challenge against the Labor national executive’s takeover of the Victorian branch’s federal preselection process. This had been pursued by the factional bloc of the Right associated with Bill Shorten, which The Age reports is considering an appeal. Assuming the ruling holds, it confirms the preselection of former state party secretary Sam Rae in the new seat of Hawke, and allows the party to proceed with other federal preselections that have so far been in limbo.

• The Sydney Morning Herald reports that candidates for Liberal preselection in Hughes are likely to include Jenny Ware, moderate-backed director of legal services at Georges River Council, and that there is also likely to be a factional conservative in the field. This complicates matters for Melanie Gibbons, who will quit her state seat of Holsworthy to run, and has the backing of Scott Morrison.

New South Wales by-election latest:

• There is now a fifth state by-election on the way in New South Wales, and the first in a Labor-held seat, after Jodi McKay announced her intention to resign five months after losing the leadership to Chris Minns. This will create a vacancy in her seat of Strathfield, which she held at the 2019 election by a 5.0% margin. Anton Rose of Inner West Courier reports potential preselection candidates include Sravya Abbineni, multiculturalism adviser at NSW Government Health and former staffer to McKay; John Faker, mayor of Burwood; and Jennifer Light, the party’s national assistant secretary.

• The Nationals have preselected Nichole Overall, a local historian, communications consultant and freelance writer, to succeed John Barilaro as the party’s candidate in Monaro.

• In addition to the previously noted Gail Giles-Gidney, the mayor of Willoughby, the Sydney Morning Herald reports candidates for the preselection to succeed Gladys Berejiklian in Willoughby will include Tim James, factional conservative and executive general manager of the Menzies Research Centre.

Morgan: 53-47 to Labor

The latest fortnightly federal poll from Morgan, plus updates on looming state by-elections in New South Wales, which could potentially be forfeited by Labor.

The latest fortnightly federal voting intention poll from Roy Morgan finds the series continuing to bounce around within a range of 52.5-47.5 to 54.5-45.5 in favour of Labor, as it has through seven polls since July. The result this time is 53-47, in from 54-46 last fortnight, from primary votes of Coalition 37.5% (up one-and-a-half points), Labor 36% (steady), Greens 11.5% (down one) and One Nation 3% (down half).

The state two-party breakdowns, which range from respectable sub-samples in the case of the large states to a tiny one in the case of Tasmania, have Labor leading 53.5-46.5 in New South Wales (unchanged on the last poll, a swing of about 5.5%), 56-44 in Victoria (unchanged, a swing of about 3%), 55-45 in Western Australia (out from 54.5-45.5, a swing of about 10.5%), 54.5-45.5 in South Australia (in from 58.5-41.5, a swing of around 4%) and 53-47 in Tasmania (out from 52-48, a swing to the Liberals of about 3%). In Queensland, the Coalition is credited with a lead of 55-45 (out from 52.5-47.5, a swing to Labor of about 3.5%). The poll was conducted over the past two weekends from a sample of 2794.

Also of note, particularly in relation to state politics in New South Wales:

• There is now a fourth by-election on the way, following yesterday’s announcement by Holsworthy MP Melanie Gibbons that she will seek preselection for the federal seat of Hughes, where former Liberal incumbent Craig Kelly has defected to Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party. Holsworthy is far the most marginal of the four seats that will be vacated, having been retained by Gibbons in 2019 by 3.2%. However, the Sydney Morning Herald reports that Labor leader Chris Minns has said Labor “needs to consider whether to run in Holsworthy”, having “already suggested to his shadow cabinet that they should not run a candidate in Monaro or Bega”.

• The Sydney Morning Herald further reports that Willoughby mayor Gail Giles-Gidney is the front-runner for Liberal preselection in Gladys Berejiklian’s particularly safe seat of Willoughby. Based on the comments from Chris Minns noted above, it can presumably be taken as read that Labor will not run.

• As for Melanie Gibbons’ hopes for Hughes, both the Sydney Morning Herald and Daily Telegraph today report a view among senior Liberals that she would, in the words of the latter, “face difficulty securing preselection in a vote of party members”.

• If my thoughts on the federal election landscape are of interest to you, I have lately been providing material to CGM Communications’ state-by-state analyses, which have recently covered New South Wales and Victoria, and was interrogated for an election preview that aired on Nine News over the weekend.

Old, new, borrowed and blue

The AEC contentiously green-lights a party called the New Liberals, plus the resolution of the Tasmanian state election and Upper Hunter by-election.

Four entirely unrelated items of electoral news after a week without new poll results:

• The Australian Electoral Commission has approved the registration of a party called the New Liberals. In doing so it rejected a 55-page Liberal Party submission that included CT Group polling to support its argument that voters would confuse the new party with the old. The judgement cited the similarly unsuccessful bid to deny Liberals for Forests in 2001, in which it was determined that a ban on words as generic as “liberal” and “labour” demanded “clear language” from the Electoral Act – although it conceded the name New Liberals landed “much closer to the line”. The Howard government’s dissatisfaction with the 2001 ruling resulted in a new clause targeting names implying a “connection or relationship” with an existing party, but the AEC has ruled this doesn’t catch the New Liberals. The judgement also expressed reservations about the CT Group survey, in terms implying a dubious attitude to much of the modern practice of opinion polling. The Liberals can now apply for an internal review, followed by an appeal to the Administrative Appeals Tribunal.

• The count for the Upper Hunter by-election has been finalised, confirming a 5.8% winning margin for Nationals candidate David Layzell and a two-party swing to the Nationals of 3.3%. Antony Green crunches the ballot paper data (a welcome feature of NSW election counts) to determine how each candidate’s preferences divided between Nationals and Labor, which in aggregate was very similar to the 2019 election.

• Resolution also for the Tasmanian state election, which had a post-script after elected Adam Brooks was charged with firearms offences the day after his election was declared, prompting him to decline his seat. This was resolved through Tasmania’s recount procedure for lower house vacancies using the ballots that elected the outgoing member, which naturally went overwhelmingly to other Liberals. The result was a win for Felix Ellis, a member of the previous parliament who initially failed to win re-election, finishing the distribution with 5881 votes (53.4%) to Stacey Sheehan’s 5132 (46.6%). The party numbers remain Liberal 13, Labor nine and Greens two, with one independent.

• I had a paywalled piece in Crikey yesterday on the recently launched Australian Polling Council’s new code of conduct. Both council and code draw inspiration from the British Polling Council, though to my own disappointment it does not follow the British example in requiring members to publish full breakdowns and weighting bases for each poll. However, pollsters will be required to publish a range of other detail that is often absent from media outlets’ reporting of polls they commission, including margin of error calculations that account for demographic imbalances in the sample. The nine pollsters who are members of the council include most of the familiar names, but not Resolve Strategic and Roy Morgan.

Upper Hunter by-election live

Live coverage of the count for the NSW state by-election in Upper Hunter.

Click here for full display of latest results.

9.23pm. We’re still awaiting a pre-poll result from (I think) “Upper Hunter EM Office”, but that’s it for my commentary until the small hours. My live results page will continue ticking over tonight and over the coming days. A reminder that this is the only place you can find swings reported at booth level, that took me at least a week of fairly heavy-duty labour, and that donations are gratefully received through the “become a supporter” button at the top of this page.

8.43pm. Clarence Town now in on TCP, and it swung 22.5% to the Nationals.

8.38pm. Oddly, despite the Nationals doing quite badly on that Quirindi pre-poll, they got a 4.0% swing on two-party. I still have a big gap on my TCP swing projection and overall swing projection, which is presumably because two of the three booths where we only have primary vote results, Clarence Town and Singleton Heights, both had Labor down by about 17% on the primary vote. When their TCP numbers are in, presumably the TCP swing projection will shift in favour of the Nationals.

8.15pm. The Quirindi pre-poll booth is in on the primary vote, and it’s weaker for the Nationals than their overall election day result — down 6.8% as compared with 2.0%.

8.07pm. We’re at the stage of the count where the election day pattern is clear, and those booths yet to report results — 11 for the TCP count, but only one for the primary — are not going to change things much. The known unknowns are the pre-poll booths, of which we will get the Singleton and Quirindi results later this evening, and whether the dynamic there is different from election day; and how non-major party candidates go on preferences, which holds out at least the theoretical possibility of Labor not making the final two-party count, followed by who-knows-what.

7.49pm. As someone just pointed out to me on Twitter, the large-ish Clarence Town booth has the Nationals up 14.6% on the primary vote, so the conventional TCP-based projections should get a kick in their favour when its TCP result is in.

7.42pm. Projections based only on the TCP count — mine, Antony Green’s and Kevin Bonham’s — all show very little swing. However, my overall projection, which presumes to make use of primary vote results from booths where the TCP is yet to be reported, adds about 2% to the Nationals.

7.37pm. The largest booth to report so far, Muswellbrook Indoor Sport Centre, has recorded the biggest drop in the Nationals primary vote — 9.4%.

7.35pm. My preference projections are back to showing much the same splits as occurred in 2019, with no particular increase in the exhaustion rate. My projection of the Nationals swing/winning margin has accordingly come down a fair deal, without suggesting they’re in any danger (from Labor).

7.25pm. There’s quite a big gap between my two-candidate preferred swing of 2.1% to the Nationals, which booth-matches the TCP results in the 12 booths where they’ve reported, and my overall projected swing of 7.6%, which projects the changes in preferences on to the 14 booths that have so far only reported primary votes. Presumably the former figure will inflate as those 14 booths reports their TCP numbers.

7.15pm. Six booths now in on two-party. The exhaustion rate now looks higher than at the election, which sees off any hope Labor might have had that something would turn up on preferences. The gap in the primary vote swings in favour of the Nationals has also widened, the projected Nationals primary vote is now in the thirties, and my projection says 100% Nationals win probability — over Labor. But could one of the minor party candidates preference snowball their way ahead of Labor into second place?

7.12pm. I’ve just corrected a bug that was screwing up my projected two-party swing display. It’s predicting a swing to the Nationals of around 5%.

7.08pm. Observe my booth results map carefully and you will now see numbers indicating the two-party results in the two booths where they are available. Now I’m sure everything’s working, a plug for donations if you find this useful or interesting, which you can do through the “become a supporter” button at the top of the page — naturally there was a fair bit of work involved in all this.

7.06pm. Antony Green’s numbers basically align with my own, which is always reassuring.

7.03pm. Okay, now we’ve got two booths in on two-party preferred, and they are behaving very similarly to how they did at the 2019 election. That’s enough for my system to effectively call it for the Nationals, but I’d want to hold out for a few more booths. Note that this is entirely a two-party model, which is to say it rates the Nationals a near certainty of beating Labor — it’s a different story if another candidate makes the two-party cut. I may be being generous though in allowing that as a possibility, given the gap between second and third.

7.01pm. So going off primary vote projections based on the existing booth-matched swing, both Nationals and Labor are projected to be in the twenties (though only just in the case of the Nationals). I guess with that much non-major party vote out there you can’t rule out something surprising happening with minor candidates when preferences are distributed. Kirsty O’Connell, One Nation and Shooters are all just above 10%.

6.59pm. I observe that Kirsty O’Connell won the Wingen booth. You can see this by observing the booth results map at the bottom of my full live results page — the booth is colour-coded in grey, whereas other booths that have reported are green or red depending on who out of the Nationals and Labor has the highest primary vote.

6.56pm. A bit surprised there are still no two-party numbers — the NSWEC may be holding them back until they’re satisfied they have picked the right candidates for the notional count.

6.54pm. I believe we can be confident the final preference count will be Nationals versus Labor.

6.52pm. Primary vote results coming in at a fair clip, and there’s a fairly steady picture of the Nationals primary being down 3%-4% and Labor being down 5%-6%. If that holds, Labor needs to pull a rabbit out of its hat on preferences, on which we will continue to fly blind until two-party counts start to come in.

6.47pm. Eleven booths now on primary, and Labor’s drop is back to being a few points worse than the Nationals. Still nothing on two-party.

6.45pm. Ten booths now in on the primary vote and things looking a little better for Labor. But with the non-major party vote so high, this is very hard to read without information on preferences, which we won’t have until a two-party count comes through.

6.43pm. Given the booths in so far are from Nationals territory, they would have to be encouraged that their primary vote is almost holding up — Labor’s greater drop comes off a lower base. Other than that, the presence of a One Nation candidate is gouging support from Shooters.

6.40pm. Eight booths in on the primary vote now, and the Nationals still holding up somewhat better than Labor on the primary vote. Still nothing on two-party preferred though — maybe the preference dynamics will be different this time.

6.37pm. I think I’ve picked out most of the bugs, but disregard my projection until a TPP result gets reported. At the moment we’ve got five small booths in on the primary vote, and it does seem like Labor are down more than the Nationals.

6.30pm. That’s more like it. Two booths in. Only 201 votes, but so far, so interesting — both major parties down about the same amount on the primary vote.

6.28pm. Okay, the first booth is in and, frankly, disregard my results display for now — there’s a pretty big glitch in there.

6.15pm. Greens activist @seamus_polsci relates on Twitter that “the NSWEC has indicated that they will only be counting the election managers (Singleton early voting) and Quirindi early voting tonight (about 7,700 voters out of just about 19,000) rest will start counting from 9am tomorrow”.

5.45pm. Polls will close in 15 minutes. I’m in my usual state of semi-confidence about my live results facility working — it’s complicated on this occasion by the fairly high chance that the two leading candidates will not be those picked out by the NSWEC for the notional two-candidate preferred count, who, I think it’s safe to say, will be the Nationals and Labor candidates. Anyway, we’ll see how we go.

Some explanatory notes about the booth results map at the bottom of the page. Where no result is in for a booth (i.e. all of them at first), the location is indicated by a white dot. When a primary vote result is reported, the dot becomes colour-coded to indicate the party that won the primary vote. When a two-party result is reported, the dot turns into a number indicating the (colour-coded) winning party’s percentage two-party vote.

Upper Hunter by-election and Resolve Strategic state poll

One poll finds Gladys Berejikilian’s government with a commanding lead, while another suggests a tight race for tomorrow’s Upper Hunter by-election.

Two items to relate from New South Wales: tomorrow’s by-election in Upper Hunter and the first results from Resolve Strategic’s new state polling series, which the Sydney Morning Herald sneaked out on Wednesday without me noticing.

To start with the former, the by-election was initiated after the resignation of Nationals member Michael Johnsen, whose demise you can read all about in my by-election guide. Naturally, this site will be all over the count tomorrow night and beyond — my live results facility is ready to go and can be viewed here (if the format looks screwy at first, try a hard refresh). As you can see, this will feature neat displays of vote totals, booth results and swings, projections and, in an exciting new-ish feature, a map-based display of booth results at the bottom of the page.

The by-election event is fraught with significance for a number of reasons:

• The Nationals retained the seat at the March 2019 election by a margin of 2.6%, well within the range of a typical mid-term by-election swing. However, the clear pattern of strong electoral performances for incumbents since the onset of COVID-19 suggests the hurdle will be quite a bit harder to clear than the margin applies. This is awkward for Labor leader Jodi McKay, who is struggling with weak poll ratings and poor name recognition (more on that below).

• The parliamentary majority of the Berejiklian government is on the line — or at least it was until last Thursday, when Gareth Ward’s move to the cross bench ensured the government’s minority status come what may tomorrow, at least for the time being. The Coalition cleared the hurdle by two seats at the March 2019 election, winning 48 out of 93 seats, but one of these was lost when John Sidoti, the Liberal member for Drummoyne, moved to the cross bench in March pending an ICAC inquiry into his property dealings.

• As noted, the government is down another number owing to sexual violence allegations against Gareth Ward, who holds the seat of Kiama for the Liberals on a margin of 12.0%. The Sydney Morning Herald reports the Liberals are waiting on tomorrow’s result before “counselling” Ward about his future, the upshot of which may be another by-election.

• The Hunter region and its distinctive local economic and political concerns rose to the surface of national politics this week after the Morrison government announced it would bankroll a gas-fired power plant in Kurri Kurri as part of a $600 million play for the corresponding federal seat of Hunter, where Labor member Joel Fitzgibbon’s margin was sliced from 12.5% to 3.0% at the 2019 election, with One Nation securing 21.6% of the vote.

Monday’s Daily Telegraph had a YouGov poll of 400 respondents conducted last Tuesday to Thursday which, notwithstanding its small sample and wide error margin, pointed to a highly complicated contest arising from a field of 13 candidates. The primary vote numbers were Nationals 25% (34.0% at the 2019 election), Labor 23% (28.7%), Shooters Fishers and Farmers 16% (22.0%), One Nation 11% (did not contest), the Greens 6% (4.8%) and independent Kirsty O’Connell on 6%, despite the latter having received endorsement and $3000 in campaign funding from Malcolm Turnbull, who owns a farming property in the electorate. This panned out to a 51-49 lead for the Nationals over Labor on two-party preferred, although the primary vote numbers suggest it’s far from clear which two candidates will make the final count.

On to the Resolve Strategic poll in the Sydney Morning Herald, which had the Coalition on 44% of the primary vote (41.6% at the last election), Labor on 28% (33.3%), the Greens on 12% (9.6%), Shooters on 4% (3.5%), and independents and others 12% (12.0%). As with the federal polling from this series, no two-party preferred is provided, but it can be conservatively estimated that this would amount to a 4% swing to the Coalition, which won the election with a fairly handy break of 52.0-48.0. Gladys Berejiklian was credited with a commanding 57-17 lead over Jodi McKay as preferred premier.

The Sydney Morning Herald report says the poll was conducted from “1228 voters between mid-April and May”. I believe the deal here is that it combined responses from the surveys that have produced the pollster’s first two monthly results, which have been conducted mostly online, with a small cohort of phone polling add to the April survey.

Upper Hunter by-election minus twelve days

An important New South Wales state by-election attracts a large field of candidates, with Shooters Fishers and Farmers and at least one independent looking competitive in a marginal Nationals-held seat.

Less than two weeks to go until the Upper Hunter by-election, on which hinges the parliamentary majority (though not, by any stretch, the hold on power) of Gladys Berejiklian’s government. Conversely, a bad result for Labor may put pressure on the leadership of Jodi McKay, who would appear to be struggling with low name recognition: the last poll that gauged her personal ratings, from Ipsos was back in October, had her at 22% approval and 25% disapproval, leaving fully 53% uncommitted. My guide to the by-election can be found here – it needs an update, and will get one later today.

The by-election has attracted a bloated field of 13 candidates, including five independents alongside the nominees of the Nationals, Labor, One Nation, Shooters Fishers and Farmers, the Greens, the Liberal Democrats, Animal Justice and Sustainable Australia. The Nationals preselection was won by construction engineer David Layzell ahead of Singleton mayor Sue Moore – according to Max Maddison of The Australian, both Coalition and Labor strategists believe the local branch had “missed a trick” by overlooking Moore, who had been widely expected to win.

Labor’s candidate has been carefully chosen to assuage local concerns about its commitment to coal mining: Jeff Drayton, CFMEU mining division official and former Muswellbrook deputy mayor. As an approving Daily Telegraph reports, Drayton promises to be “just as loud just as often” as federal counterpart Joel Fitzgibbon, specifically regarding “inner-city greenies telling us what to do”, a designation that “most likely” applies to his own party’s climate spokesman, Adam Searle.

Absent from the field is the Liberal Party, the seat being reserved to the Nationals under the Coalition arrangement. This has given Malcolm Turnbull, who owns a farming property in the electorate, licence to stick his oar in by endorsing Kirsty O’Connell, Aberdeen farmer and independent candidate. Turnbull’s advocacy for the local area to transition from mining was one reason the Nationals were at the forefront of the successful charge to overturn his recent appointment to the state government’s Net Zero Emissions and Clean Economy Board. Turnbull suggests Gladys Berejiklian would “privately appreciate” O’Connell being elected ahead of Layzell.

Another independent is former Dungog mayor Tracy Norman, who has entered a preference swap with O’Connell, a move that was likewise applauded by Turnbull. Both O’Connell and Norman were critical of a recent Independent Planning Commission ruling to extend operations at a coal mine near Muswellbrook, which was applauded by the Nationals, Labor, One Nation and Shooters candidates along with independents Archie Lea and Steve Reynolds.

Two items of polling have emerged, though both are now showing their age: a uComms poll for the Australia Institute that looked encouraging for the Nationals, which was covered in this post; and a poll commissioned by Shooters Fishers and Farmers, and reported on in fairly vague terms by Linda Silmalis of the Daily Telegraph, had “the Nationals at 25, Labor 21 and Shooters 18 on primaries”. The latter result was quite a bit better for its commissioning party than the former, which had Shooters on single figures.