Queensland by-elections and Brisbane City Council election live

Live coverage of the counts for the Inala and Ipswich West by-elections and the Brisbane City Council election.

Full displays of results:

Inala by-election

Ipswich West by-election

Brisbane Lord Mayor election

Brisbane City Council wards election

11.42pm. My system has the Greens ahead in Paddington now, but slightly behind in Walter Taylor.

10.50pm. The ABC computer has different ideas from mine about a couple of things, notably Paddington, which it’s (again) calling for the Greens while mine has the LNP with its nose in front. This points to the difficulty of projection off an election that was held at the height of COVID, which dramatically changed how people voted. The Greens have a solid lead on the TCP count so far, but this is well behind the count for the primary vote.

10.08pm. One bright note for Labor is that they seem to have come to life in LNP-held Calamvale, which is now rated a likely Labor gain by both me and the ABC. That could see them break even after the loss of Wynnum-Manly, giving them the weak bragging right of not having done worse than last time. The ABC has retracted its call of Paddington as a Greens gain from the LNP — it and Walter Taylor both look very close.

9.54pm. I also note the ABC isn’t calling Ipswich West for the LNP — it’s projecting 52.6% TCP for the LNP whereas I have 53.2%. Mysteries abound — the TCP results on the ECQ site lag far behind the media feed, and actually have Labor ahead (from 6501 votes compared with 14,375 on the feed).

9.52pm. Actually, that’s not the reason my system is being more conservative about Walter Taylor than the ABC’s. I note that every ward result on the ABC says “0 of x centres reporting a preference count”, but preference counts have assuredly been reported. I’m not sure if this is purely a cosmetic issue or if the ABC is working entirely off preference estimates.

9.38pm. So Labor look like they are down from five BCC wards to four, having lost Wynnum-Manly to the LNP. The Greens are in the hunt in LNP-held Paddington and Walter Taylor, which both look very close, to add to their existing The Gabba. The ABC is calling Paddington for the Greens, so I suspect there is an issue here of my preference estimate selling them short — that will be corrected when a few more TCP results are through. However, their second tier hopes of Central, Coorparoo and Enoggera don’t look like coming through for them, so they will not emerge as the second strongest party.

9.35pm. I’ve devoted the last half hour to bug-hunting, at least partly because my read of a Labor disaster in the BCC ward of Wynnum-Manly didn’t seem to gel with the ABC — but now it does. That’s not to say there weren’t bugs though, one of which was stopping the two-candidate preferred tables from populating on the council wards results pages. That has now been fixed.

9.18pm. It’s been noted by preference estimates, which get used before two-candidate preferred numbers report, have been selling the Greens short in seats where they are challenging the LNP. I now have them ahead in Paddington, and a correction should soon come through in their favour in Walter Taylor.

8.41pm. A strong showing by the Greens in Labor-held Moorooka ward, where they look like taking second place from the LNP, but Labor still on track to retain it.

8.38pm. As well as Wynnum-Manly, I’m now projecting the LNP ahead in the Labor-held BCC ward of Morningside, suggesting they could be reduced to three seats. That at least raises the possibility of them being outperformed by the Greens, although it’s far from clear at this stage if they will add anything to their existing solitary seat of The Gabba (which is yet to record any figures) — there are four possibilities, but they’re not actually ahead in any of them.

8.34pm. Paddington still looks like a very close race between the LNP and the Greens with three booths in.

8.30pm. My system is now calling Ipswich West for the LNP. The projected swing in Inala is even bigger, but so is Labor’s buffer there.

8.21pm. My system is now calling six wards for the LNP, one of which is Enoggera.

8.19pm. Early figures suggest Labor are in big danger of losing Wynnum-Manly to the LNP, one of only five BCC wards they held going into the election.

8.18pm. The LNP looks like retaining Enoggera regardless of who comes second out of Labor and the Greens — my system is now favouring the latter. This was one of five LNP-held wards the Greens had identified as possible gains. Of their two presumed strongest chances, Paddington looks lineball and there is nothing in yet from Walter Taylor. Too early to say about their other second tier prospects of Coorparoo and Central.

8.13pm. While Adrian Schrinner is headed for re-election as Lord Mayor, he’s faded on my projection as the count has progressed, with a slight booth-matched swing away from him now recorded on the primary vote.

8.10pm. The good news for Labor is that my system is calling Inala for them. The bad news is that the swing is similar to the one that’s putting it on the cusp of calling Ipswich West for the LNP.

8.08pm. Early indications also point to a close LNP-Greens race in Paddington, where the Greens fancied their chances.

8.06pm. The first booth from the BCC Enoggera ward has the Greens second, but my projection has them behind Labor in a fairly close race for second. The LNP vote looks high enough for them to hold either way, but early days yet.

8.04pm. The Brisbane City booth gives the Greens an encouraging first result in the BCC’s Coorparoo ward — only 168 votes, but it points to a chance they will take it from the LNP, consistent with the party’s own expectations.

8.02pm. A booth in at last from Inala, and there too there is a huge swing to the LNP of over 20% according to my projection, with Labor’s primary vote collapsing 32.5% to 37.8%. No doubt Annastacia Palaszczuk had a big personal vote here, but still. Independent Linh Nyugen on double figures, presumably taking a bit from Labor. Bad as all this is for Labor, it doesn’t suggest they are in serious danger of losing.

8.00pm. It’s been noted that the informal vote in Ipswich West is out from 4.0% to 8.6%, which no doubt has a lot to do with an optional preferential voting council election being held on the same day as a compulsory preferential voting state by-election. Presumably this isn’t doing Labor any favours.

7.58pm. An eleventh booth in Ipswich West was obviously not good for Labor, pushing my projection of the LNP lead out from (from memory) 1.9% to 2.5% and increasing their win probability to 95%.

7.52pm. Substantial progress now in the mayoralty count, confirming what was noted before — Adrian Schrinner holding steady on his 2020 vote, and movement from Labor to the Greens but not enough to get the latter’s candidate, Jonathan Sriranganathan, to second.

7.50pm. The swing in Ipswich West continues to be big enough to make the LNP firm favourites when quite getting them to where my system would call it. The Brisbane council ward of Tennyson has been called for independent incumbent Nicole Johnston, who looks to be doing it easily.

7.43pm. Note that my mayoralty entry page does things like say certain wards have been “retained” by the LNP, which simply means Schrinner is projected to win there again. The system is geared to seat-style contests and I didn’t have time to finesse everything.

7.42pm. The lack of any action from Inala had me checking the ABC to make sure it wasn’t a fault in my system, but no, still no numbers there yet.

7.40pm. Some big lord mayoralty numbers in now, and the situation has settled quite considerably — it now looks like a status quo result with a bit of a swing from Labor to the Greens, rather than historic disaster Labor seemed to be suffering at first. Presumably this will start flowing through to the council ward results shortly.

7.37pm. Labor has perked up a little on my Ipswich West win probability with the reporting of a third two-candidate result, which presumably improved their projected preference flow.

7.33pm. On Brisbane Council, my system is now calling Bracken Ridge and LNP retain, which a huge swing blowing out what was hitherto a fairly tight margin.

7.31pm. My system has actually crossed the threshold where it’s not using my preference estimates in Ipswich West. So the 10% Labor win probability should probably be taken seriously at this point.

7.30pm. Eight booths in now on the primary vote — fast count there, slow one in Inala. Perhaps they’re prioritising by-election and council votes differently. In any case, the new Ipswich West results do not change what was written in the previous update.

7.28pm. Booth number five from Ipswich West is also less bad for Labor, being comparable to the last two. But I may have been wrong to say these booths were coming in below what the LNP needed to win the seat — I was just looking at the Labor primary vote (a lot on my plate at present). The LNP primary vote swing across the board is approaching 20%, which makes them look very dangerous. Legalise Cannabis are soaking up votes from the absent Greens and a lot depends on their preferences. My current projection assumes they will go 60-40 to Labor, but if they’re loaded with Greens voters they may get a stronger flow than that. Once there are enough two-candidate preferred votes in, my projection will go off the swing on preferences rather than my estimates.

7.20pm. From four wards, I’m recording LNP two-party swings of 4.2% to 15.0% for the lord mayoralty. It’s a similar story for the council, albeit that these are the same booths. So Labor would seem in big danger at this early stage of going backwards.

7.17pm. Two further booths from Ipswich West are better for Labor — seemingly a tad below what would cost them the seat. The two booths that came in first were well above that, so Labor will have to be hoping both were outliers. Still nothing from Inala.

7.16pm. My system is calling McDowall ward for the LNP and sees big LNP swings everywhere that a swing can be determined.

7.10pm. I’ve turned off some features that were misfiring on the mayoralty landing page. However, the primary vote numbers are suggesting a very good night for the LNP and not just in Ipswich West.

6.53pm. Remarkable first results from Ipswich West had me checking the ABC to see if there was something amiss in my system, but it concurs the LNP swing is blowing the hinges off. Still early days, but the fact that the ALP has been trounced in two booths will be giving them palpitations.

6.47pm. I’m hoping the screwiness on the lord mayoralty landing page at present will resolve when there are some numbers in that aren’t mobile booths.

6.37pm. To elaborate on that point, the swing results I have for the mobile booths are meaningless — in most cases there were zero mobile results last time, so I think I just gave them a fraction of a vote from the central pre-polling booth so the system would have something to work off. Everywhere else, the swing figures will be based on booth-to-booth comparison.

6.35pm. Two mobile booths in for the lord mayoralty, with the same issues noted in the previous update. The chart and dial on my lord mayoralty landing page won’t show anything until two-candidate preferred results are reported. Ordinarily I run projections based on the primary vote, but didn’t have time to do that in this case. A little perversely, I have projections for the mayoral results at ward level, but not overall. As always, another day to do all this would have been handy.

6.23pm. A mobile polling booth has reported 102 council ward votes in Bracken Ridge. Caution would be required here at the best of times, but especially on this occasion where mobile polling was just about non-existent last time because of COVID, making any swing figure meaningless.

6.20pm. One of the things I didn’t have time to do was code around a recurring issue where sometimes empty XML files get uploaded to my server, so I suspect there will be the odd occasion where you find the page hasn’t been filled out with data. If so, you should find it resolves after a minute or two.

6pm. Polls have closed for Queensland local government elections and Inala and Ipswich West state by-elections. The links above will take you to the Poll Bludger’s own live results pages, which I’m reasonably confident will work well in the case of the by-elections, but merely hopeful in the case of the Brisbane Lord Mayor and council elctions, which were a pretty huge undertaking and for which I was still squashing bugs up to the last, which is usually not a good sign. In any case, the first results should presumably be in in around half an hour or so.

Queensland: Newspoll, state by-elections and Brisbane City Council

Two polls suggest Queensland Labor faces a grim night tomorrow as it defends two seats at state by-elections and attempts to break the conservatives’ two-decade grip on city hall.

Queensland politics has something of a super Saturday on offer tomorrow with local government elections together with two state by-elections. The former encompasses elections for the lord mayoralty and the 26 wards that constitute Brisbane City Council, Australia’s largest, most powerful and biggest-budget municipality, and also the one whose elections are most sharply defined by conventional partisanship. For all these reasons, it is the only local government in which this site takes much of an interest. I am currently frantically at work getting my live results system in order for both the by-elections and the Brisbane City Council election, the latter of which in particular is a major undertaking comparable to a state election.

Two new items of opinion polling offer a pointer as to what might be expected, both providing very good news for the Liberal National Party:

Newspoll finds the state LNP with a lead of 54-46, pointing to a 7% swing off the 2020 result, which is a fair bit worse for Labor than any of the polling that helped usher Annastacia Palaszczuk out the door. The primary votes are Labor 30% (39.6% at the 2020 election), LNP 42% (35.9%), Greens 13% (9.5%) and One Nation 8% (7.1%). David Crisafulli achieves an uncommon feat for an Opposition Leader in leading the incumbent as preferred premier, by 43-37. Premier Steven Miles records 38% approval and 49% disapproval, while Crisafulli is respectively on 47% and 33%. The poll was conducted last Thursday through to Wednesday from a sample of 1037.

• DemosAU has a voting intention poll for tomorrow’s Brisbane City Council election which suggests the LNP will match its 2020 landslide, with the incumbent Lord Mayor Adrian Schrinner leading Labor challenger Tracey Price by 57.7-42.3 on two-candidate preferred (56.3-43.7 at the 2020 election) from primary votes of 46.7% for Schrinner (47.7% in 2020), 25.8% for Price (30.9% for Labor’s candidate in 2020) and 21.6% for Greens candidate Jonathan Sriranganathan (15.4% for the Greens candidate in 2020). Voting intention for the 26 council wards, all but four of which will have only LNP, Labor and Greens candidates (the four exceptions each have one independent) has the LNP on 43.7% (47.5% in 2020), Labor on 31.3% (33.8%) and the Greens on 25.0% (18.7%). The poll was conducted Friday to Thursday from a sample of 1034.

Sarah Elks of The Australian reported last week the “grassroots doorknocking data collection method pioneered by now-federal Greens MP Max Chandler-Mather”, which is claimed to have given the party an accurate insight into their looming three-seat haul in Queensland ahead of the federal election, is pointing to a swag of new ward seats, all from the LNP. Paddington and Walter Taylor are “tipped as gains”, and the party is thought “close to taking Coorparoo, Central and Enoggera”, in addition to its existing seat of The Gabba. Labor is reportedly hopeful of adding only Calamvale and Northgate to its existing five seats out of 26, raising the possibility of the Greens overtaking it as the party of opposition.

Also tomorrow are state by-elections for two Labor-held seats in the west of metropolitan Brisbane: Inala, which is being vacated by Annastacia Palaszczuk, and Ipswich West, which Jim Madden is vacating for a run at Ipswich City Council. While Labor’s 28.2% margin in the former seems unassailable, Labor appears at least nervous that little of the 14.3% margin in Ipswich West will remain after tomorrow, with Steven Miles telling journalists this week that his party faces a “double-digit swing”.

Essential Research 2PP+: Labor 50, Coalition 46 (open thread)

More static poll results in the wake of the tax cuts revamp, of which more than half say they know little or nothing.

The fortnightly Essential Research poll adds to an overall picture of static voting intention despite the government’s income tax overhaul, with Labor down a point on the primary vote to 31%, the Coalition recording 34% for the sixth poll in a row, the Greens up a point to 14% and One Nation steady on 7%, with undecided steady on 5%. Respondent-allocated preferences nonetheless cause Labor to perk up a little on the pollster’s 2PP+ measure, which has Labor up two to 50% and the Coalition steady on 46% (again with 5% undecided), Labor’s biggest lead on this measure since the start of October.

The poll also includes the monthly leaders’ favourability ratings, with differ from the separate approval ratings in inviting respondents to rate the leaders on a scale of zero to ten. This gives Peter Dutton his strongest result so far, with a four-point increase among those rating him seven or higher to 32% and a four-point fall in those rating him three or lower to 33%. Anthony Albanese improves slightly from December, when he recorded the weakest results of his prime ministership, with 33% rating him seven or higher (up one) and 35% three or lower (down two).

Questions on the tax cut changes confirm what was already established in finding 56% in favour and 16% opposed, while telling us something new with respect to awareness of them: only 10% consider they know a lot about the changes, with 37% for a bit, 40% for hardly anything and 13% for nothing at all. The poll also found 59% per cent for the “right to disconnect” laws working their way through parliament with only 15% opposed. Other questions cover fuel efficiency standards, party most trusted on tax, the importance of keeping election promises and the ubiquitous Taylor Swift, who scores a non-recognition rating of 3%.

The weekly Roy Morgan poll has Labor’s two-party lead in from 53-47 to 52-48, but this is due to changes in respondent-allocated preferences rather than primary votes, on which Labor gains one-and-a-half points to 34.5% – its strongest showing from Morgan since October – with the Coalition and the Greens steady on 37% and 12% and One Nation down half a point to 4.5%. The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of 1699.

In by-election news, of which there will be a fair bit to report over the next six weeks, the ballot paper draws were conducted yesterday for Queensland’s Inala and Ipswich West by-elections on March 16, which have respectively attracted eight and four candidates. Ipswich West is a rare no-show for the Greens, who are presumably more concerned with the same day’s Brisbane City Council elections. Further crowding the calendar is a looming state election in Tasmania, which is covered in the post above.

YouGov: 52-48 to Labor (open thread)

Another poll finds strong support for the government’s stage three tax cut changes have not shifted the needle on voting intention.

YouGov’s tri-weekly federal poll shows no sign of movement one way or the other in the wake of the stage three tax cuts rearrangement, with two-party preferred unchanged at 52-48 from primary votes of Labor 32% (steady), Coalition 36% (down one), Greens 14% (up one) and One Nation 8% (up one). The poll also has a question on the tax cuts which finds a 69-31 break in favour of the changes over the tax cuts as originally proposed. Anthony Albanese’s lead on preferred premier has narrowed from 45-35 to 45-38 and his net approval rating is out from minus 13 to minus 16, with Peter Dutton in slightly from minus nine to minus eight. The poll was conducted Friday to Wednesday from a sample of 1502.

Some notable electoral happenings at state level:

• There is the possibility of an early election in Tasmania as Premier Jeremy Rockliff pursues a demand that John Tucker and Lara Alexander, Liberal-turned-independent members who hold the balance of power in the lower house, agree not to vote for non-government amendments and motions. Further clarity may be provided after a meeting between the three at 1:30pm today.

• March 23 has been confirmed as the date for the South Australian state by-election in Dunstan, the highly marginal seat being vacated with the resignation on Tuesday of former Premier Steven Marshall.

• I also have by-election guides up for the Queensland state seats of Inala and Ipswich West, which will go to the polls concurrently with the local government elections on March 16.

Weekend miscellany: WA Liberal preselections, Queensland and SA by-elections (open thread)

A comeback lined up for a former WA Liberal Senator, plus candidates in place for state by-elections in Queensland and SA.

The biggest electoral news of the week was probably the annual release of electoral donations disclosures, which has been widely covered elsewhere. From the more narrow concerns of this site, there is the following:

• Ben Small, who served in the Senate from November 2020 to June 2022, has emerged as the only nominee for Liberal preselection in the regional Western Australian seat of Forrest. The seat will be vacated at the next election with the retirement of Nola Marino, who has held it safely for the Liberals since 2007. The West Australian also reports Mark Wales, an SAS veteran, Survivor winner and former McKinsey consultant, plans to nominate for Tangney, a normally comfortable Liberal seat that fell to Labor in 2022. Others known to be interested are Canning mayor Patrick Hall and IT consultant Harold Ong.

• The Liberal National Party has chosen its candidates for the looming Queensland state by-elections for the safe Labor seats of Inala and Ipswich West, respectively being vacated by Annastacia Palaszczuk and Jim Madden: Trang Yen, a 28-year-old public servant in the Department of State Development, and Darren Zanow, president of the Ipswich Show Society. The by-elections will be held concurrently with local government elections on March 16.

• With former South Australian Premier Steven Marshall saying he will formally resign from parliament “in the coming months”, the Liberals have preselected lawyer and former ministerial adviser Anna Finizio for the looming by-election for his seat of Dunstan, which once had the more instructive name of Norwood. Labor is again running with its candidate from March 2023, Cressida O’Hanlon, a family dispute resolution practitioner.

Miscellany: Essential Research on tax, Roy Morgan, by-election latest (new thread)

Half-cooked early indications on the tax cuts backflip produce mixed signals.

Projected ALP swing Projected TCP ALP win probability

The first two polls after the government’s tax cuts backflip are out, though neither was conducted entirely after the new policy was announced on Thursday. The Essential Research poll, which was conducted Wednesday to Monday with a sample of 1201, is as yet lacking voting intention numbers, which will hopefully be along later today. As reported in The Guardian, the poll presented respondents with a description of the stage three tax cuts as originally proposed and a choice of four responses, with only 22% favouring that the cuts proceed unchanged, up two from November. Of the remainder, 47% preferred they be “revised so they mostly benefit those on low and middle incomes”, in line with the government’s new policy, up six; 19% favoured an option of delaying cuts for those on more than $200,000 until “economic conditions improve”, down three; and 13% opposed the cuts altogether, down three.

UPDATE: Essential Research’s voting intention numbers are Labor 32% (up one from mid-December), Coalition 34% (steady), Greens 13% (steady) and One Nation 7% (steady) with 5% undecided. Its 2PP+ measure has Labor leading 48-46, in from 49-46.

The weekly voting intention poll from Roy Morgan had only half its field work after the announcement, being conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of 1688. The two-party headline of 50.5-49.5 in favour of Labor is in from 52.5-47.5 last week, though that result was something of an outlier: the previous four polls, conducted from late November to early January with a week’s break for Christmas, were all in the range from 51-49 to 49-51. On the primary vote, Labor is down one-and-a-half to 31% and the Coalition is up by the same amount to 37.5%, with both the Greens and One Nation up half a point to 13.5% and 5% respectively.

Essential Research also asked about respondents’ personal financial circumstances, which reportedly showed improvement “over summer”, though I can’t find the earlier poll being compared to. Eleven per cent rated their circumstances as comfortable, 38% as secure (up seven), 39% as struggling a bit (down four), and 12% as in serious difficulty (down two). Regarding the Israel-Palestine conflict, 67% felt Australia should stay out entirely, up six since November, with a five point drop in support for “active assistance to Palestine” to 16% and a one point drop for Israel to 17%. A presumably related question on the ABC found an even 39% for and against the proposition that it was independent and unbiased. Support for a republic was at 42% and opposition at 35%; on Australia Day, 40% supported the status quo, 18% a separate new date, and 31% a new date in addition to the existing one.

In other news, yet another by-election is on the horizon after Labor MP Jim Madden announced his resignation from the Queensland state seat of Ipswich West. Like the by-election for Annastacia Palaszczuk’s seat of Inala, this will be held simultaneously with the local government elections on March 16, at which Madden will run as a candidate for Ipswich City Council. Madden had previously announced he would retire at the next election after a series of unwelcome headlines last year, including claims of bullying and harassment of electorate office staff. Labor had already preselected Wendy Bourne, a Right-aligned former staffer to Annastacia Palaszczuk, who was unopposed after the withdrawal of Neisha Traill, an official with the Left faction Electrical Trades Union.

The road ahead: Dunkley, Inala and more

With dates set for a federal and a Queensland state by-election, a review of looming electoral events.

House of Representatives Speaker Milton Dick has announced the Dunkley by-election will be held on March 2, with nominations to close on February 8 and be decared the following day, and the Poll Bludger’s guide to the by-election is now up and running. It is the first of my guides to feature historical results charts for the primary vote as well as two-party preferred (among many other things), which I hope is of use to somebody because it involved a lot of work.

In a report on the by-election in The Age yesterday, David Crowe related that “this masthead reported last week that Labor officials privately believe the Coalition has the edge”. I am not clear if this refers to a report from Broede Carmody, saying only that the officials “expect a swing against them”, or one from Paul Sakkal saying “both parties are privately downplaying their chances”.

The other by-election on the way is in Queensland for Annastacia Palaszczuk’s safe Labor seat of Inala, which Premier Steven Miles has confirmed will be held simultaneously with the local government elections on March 16. Seemingly assured of Labor endorsement is Margie Nightingale, former teacher and policy adviser to Treasurer Cameron Dick, who has the support of the Right. Lydia Lynch of The Australian reports the Liberal National Party is “due to preselect its candidate within a fortnight” – I will hold off doing an election guide until then.

The council elections are of substantial interest in their own right, with Brisbane City Council in particular being both the most powerful and the most partisan local government jurisdiction in the country. The conservatives have been dominant since Campbell Newman became Lord Mayor in 2004. The current incumbent, Adrian Schrinner, won by 56.3-43.7 after preferences in 2020, a swing to Labor of 3.0% from 2016. His Labor opponent this time is Tracey Price, a lawyer and sewing shop owner.

The Liberal National Party’s dominance on council reached new heights with the elections of 2016 and 2020, both of which saw them win 19 out of 26 council wards, leaving five for Labor and one each for Greens and an independent. The Greens have high hopes of expanding their footprint after their federal breakthrough in 2022, to the extent of talking up the possibility of displacing Labor as the council opposition. Considerably more detail on the elections is available courtesy of Ben Raue at the Tally Room.

Also looming are Tasmania’s periodic Legislative Council elections, presumably to be held on May 4, which this year encompass two of the chamber’s fifteen seats: Prosser, covering rural territory immediately north of Hobart, and the self-explanatory seat of Hobart. These are of particular interest this year because former Greens leader Cassy O’Connor has abandoned her seat in the lower house to run for Hobart, which if successful will win the Greens its first ever seat in the chamber. The seat will be vacated with the retirement of Rob Valentine, who has held it as an independent since 2012. Prosser is held for the Liberals by Jane Howlett, one of the chamber’s four Liberal members, who won narrowly in 2018 and may struggle amid the government’s declining fortunes. Labor likewise holds four seats, the remaining seven being independents.

Friday miscellany: culture war edition (open thread)

Poll results on republicanism, Australia Day and boycotting Woolworths, plus Roy Morgan voting intention numbers and preselection latest.

Roy Morgan remains the only regularly reporting pollster to have returned for the year on voting intention, but Essential Research presumably isn’t far off. Past experience suggests it should be at least another week before Newspoll is back in the game. Which leaves us with:

UPDATE: There are now voting intention results for the YouGov poll mentioned below. Labor’s two-party lead is out to 52-48 from 51-49 in the final poll last year, from primary votes of Labor 32% (up three), Coalition 37% (steady), Greens 13% (down two), One Nation 7% (steady).

• This week’s Roy Morgan poll found Labor with a two-party lead of 51.5-48.5, after the Coalition led 51-49 upon the pollster’s return for the year a week ago. The primary votes were Labor 31.5% (up two-and-a-half), Coalition 37% (down two), Greens 12% (down one) and One Nation 4.5% (down half). The poll was conducted from a sample of 1727 last Monday to Sunday.

• Pollster DemosAU, which produced accurate polling on the Indigenous Voice referendum, has a poll showing strong support for a republic referendum in the next five years, but also that any given model for a republic will have a hard time ahead of it. On the former count, 47% said yes and 39% no, a notable contrast with Freshwater Strategy’s finding of 55% opposition to a referendum “now”. On the latter, “direct election with open nomination” trailed the status quo 38-41; “executive president/US model” trailed 35-43; “ARM ‘Australian choice’ model” trailed 32-45; the 1999 referendum proposal trailed 27-48; and the McGarvie model, for all its impeccable credentials, did worst of all at 27-49. The aforementioned are summaries of more detailed question wordings that can be found on the methodology statement. The poll was conducted January 8 to 12 from a sample of 1300.

• YouGov has an Australia Day themed poll finding 49% support for keeping the holiday as its present date, 21% for changing the date, and 30% favouring a “two-day public holiday that celebrates old and new”. Respondents were also which of three options was closest to their view concerning Peter Dutton’s call for a boycott of Woolworths and Big W: support for Dutton’s position, which scored 20%; support for Woolworths and Big W, which scored 14%; and “my main concern with supermarkets now is excessive price rises rather than this issue”, accounting for the remaining 66%. The poll was conducted Friday to Wednesday from a sample of 1532.

Other news:

Hayden Johnson of the Courier-Mail reports the by-election for Annastacia Palaszczuk’s seat of Inala simultaenously with Queensland’s local government elections on March 16, and that the Liberal National Party is expected to field a candidate for the safe Labor seat. Labor’s candidate is likely to be Margie Nightingale, former teacher and policy adviser to Treasurer Cameron Dick.

• Liberal preselection nominations have closed for Kooyong and Goldstein, where Josh Frydenberg and Tim Wilson were respectively defeated by teal independents in 2022. As previous reports indicated, Kooyong will be a four-way contest between Amelia Hamer, Susan Morris, Michael Flynn and Rochelle Pattison, with Hamer boasting the support of Frydenberg. In addition to Wilson and the previously reported Stephanie Hunt, the Goldstein preselection will also be contested by IPA research fellow Colleen Harkin. Rachel Baxendale of The Australian reports the preselections are likely to be held shortly after the Dunkley by-election.

Dan Jervis-Bardy of The West Australian reports Patrick Hill, Canning mayor and former police officer, and Howard Ong, a Singapore-born IT consultant, will seek Liberal preselection in Tangney, where the party suffered one of its worst defeats of the 2022 election at the hands of Labor’s Sam Lim. The report says the former member, Ben Morton, is understood to have ruled himself out. It also relates that Senator Michaelia Cash is marshalling support for Moore MP Ian Goodenough in the face of a preselection challenge from former Stirling MP Vince Connelly.