Category: Western Australian Politics

Secret Harbour by-election live

Live results and commentary from Western Australia’s Secret Harbour state by-election.
Projected 3CP Projected 2CP Win Probability

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Election night commentary

12:20am. The Secret Harbour Early Voting Centre has reported its two-candidate numbers, which closes proceedings for the night. One Nation have a 7.0% margin on both the two-candidate count and my projection, the latter of which I’ll shortly be turning off. The preference flow in favour of Labor has faded a little to 55.2-44.8, now that I’m including all vote types and not just booth votes.

10:20pm. Whatever doubt might have remained has been demolished by the 13,000 votes that have reported on the primary vote — which, contrary to earlier indications, can only be both its early voting and election day results — and it turns out to be One Nation’s best result, at 42.3% of the primary vote, and only an average one for Labor. I’m now projecting a One Nation winning margin of nearly 6%, and I believe that will increase when I have a more definitive preference flow calculation.

10:00pm. The WAEC advises says it “anticipates” that the Secret Harbour Early Voting Centre will report this evening, which it has until midnight to do.

8:49pm. Bit of a lull in the results. We are yet to hear from Coastal Lakes College, from which we can probably expect about 1000 formal votes, or from Secret Harbour Early Voting Centre. The latter, be warned, will report in two stages, starting with about 1000 votes actually cast there on election day. The early votes will come later — probably quite a lot later, and perhaps not tonight. The WAEC reports 12,869 early votes were cast, which “includes mobile polling and Interstate voting”. The former includes 217 votes that have reported their results, which may be the lot, and it also includes the 60 votes cast at the WAEC centre in Perth. Interstate votes I don’t know about, but I’m guessing it’s not many. So presumably there will be upwards of 10,000 Secret Harbour Early Voting Centre early votes in due course. If they break upwards of 53-47 to Labor, we’re looking at a different result.

8:39pm. If you’re enjoying the coverage, please consider rewarding all the hard work that goes into my results system (and everything else) with a donation through the “become a supporter” buttons at the top of the page and the bottom of the post.

8:29pm. Presumably because the ABC has switched off booth-matching and is now reporting the raw TCP as its projection. My own system tries to do something more elaborate with non-booth vote types.

8:22pm. The ABC’s estimate now aligns with my own in giving One Nation a margin of about 3%.

8:19pm. As ever, one remaining wild card: many thousands of early votes still to come. Though a lot of anecdotal evidence to suggest Labor won’t do particularly well out of them.

8:10pm. I note that my system’s projection is very close to the raw TCP result, whereas the ABC earlier projection of the One Nation margin has come down only modestly — 2.7% raw, 2.8% from me, 6.5% at the ABC. Despite what my projection says, Labor wouldn’t be conceding quite yet, but it’s undoubtedly not looking good for them.

8:09pm. There are now five booths in on TCP, and contrary to what I said two updates ago, that 60-40 split in favour of Labor is sticking.

8:03pm. Six booths in now on the primary vote, and the more recent ones have been even worse for Labor than the earlier ones. Nothing further on TCP though.

7:56pm. I suspect that 60% flow of preferences to Labor will fade as more results come in: a big component of it is Port Kennedy Primary School, which was a particularly strong result for the Greens relative to the Liberals.

7:56pm. My system is still calling a One Nation win, but the margin has been slashed, and prima facie the call looks too aggressive for my tastes.

7:52pm. The preference flow is a surprise: 60-40 in favour of Labor. With the next update my system should start using that flow instead of an estimate that was going nearly 55-45 the other way, and there’s a good chance my call of a One Nation win will be retracted.

7:48pm. The WAEC has released the hounds on the TCP count, which it is correctly conducting on a Labor-versus-One Nation basis.

7:47pm. A second batch of postals has been added, the total thereof being up from 1277 to 2597, and it does nothing to change the picture.

7:40pm. There is a consistent picture of a 20% drop in the Labor vote. The One Nation swings are more uneven — the mobile result is the big outlier, probably because it’s attending different places from last time.

7:37pm. It’s all happening now: my 90% ceiling is off and the call for a One Nation win is back on. That’s with a projected margin of 7.7%, which is a lot gentler for Labor than the ABC’s 10.5%. Both of us are applying speculative preference flow estimates, and there are lots of things we might be doing differently in terms of getting swings out of the postals.

7:36pm. I just slapped an arbitrary 90% ceiling on the One Nation probability, just in time for the first polling booth to report from Port Kennedy Primary School, which turns out to be consistent with the impression of One Nation leading on the primary vote and therefore very likely to win.

7:34pm. No, these are “mobile polling” results — I think the WAEC temporarily added them to the wrong row. My point still stands: I will want to see some polling booth results before I have confidence in my projections.

7:31pm. The Western Australian Electoral Commission booth is on. My system is calling it, but I wish it wasn’t — neither of the two results that are in are easy to match to the last election. Uniquely, this booth wasn’t in operation at all then, so I just allocated it 5% of the absent votes cast in 2025 for booth-matching purposes.

7:24pm. My preference flow estimates are more bullish for One Nation than the ABC’s — they’ve got the margin at 6.9%, I’ve got 8.7%.

7:16pm. We finally have results: a batch of 1277 postals, which are hard to booth-match with, so I’d add a note of caution to my projections. Early batches tend to be more conservative but my swing calculation doesn’t accommodate that — Labor had better hope that that’s what’s causing my projection of One Nation winning by an 8.7% margin.

6pm. Polls have closed for Western Australia’s Secret Harbour by-election. As always, the best place to follow the results as they come in is through this site’s second-to-none results facility (see link above), featuring swings, projections and probability estimates, a table recording results and swings at booth level, and – when you press the “activate” button at the bottom of the page – a map display that does likewise. I presume the Western Australian Electoral Commission will be conducting a notional two-candidate count between Labor and One Nation, despite what the relevant table on my results page shows. However, I believe that will be in the realms of mystery until they start publishing results from it, which the WAEC uniquely does not do until it’s convinced it has picked the right two candidates. With 16 candidates, first results could be a while coming.

Western Australia: DemosAU poll and Secret Harbour by-election

Days out from a by-election in which the party looks more than competitive, a statewide poll records a three-point gain in support for One Nation.

Three days out from the state’s highly anticipated Secret Harbour by-election, The West Australian reports on a DemosAU poll that has One Nation up three points since June to 21%, with Labor steady on 33%, the Liberals down two to 21% and the Nationals up one to 4%, and the Greens steady on on 12%. A two-party preferred measure based on previous election preference flows has Labor’s lead over the Coalition out from 53-47 to 54-46. Roger Cook’s positive rating is down one to 34%, with neutral up three to 39% and negative down two to 27%; Basil Zempilas is down one to 30%, up two to 37% and down one to 33%; and Cook’s lead as preferred premier is out from 44-33 to 46-32. The poll was published August 6 to 25 from a sample of 658. Extensive breakdowns are featured in the full release that will shortly be published on the pollster’s website.

Nothing in the way of a poll has emerged from Secret Harbour, the closest thing being a straw poll of 120 voters conducted on the first day of early voting by The West Australian, which found 50% voting for One Nation, 27.5% for Labor and 12% for Liberal (and The Australian reported that “more than half” of those it asked there said they had voted One Nation). A similar exercise by The West Australian during last year’s state campaign overstated Liberal support over multiple seats by not less than 10 points and in some cases by more than 20.

How-to-vote cards are available on the Electoral Commission site. Ten out of 16 candidates offer preference recommendations: Libertarians, Australian Christians and independent Paul Howard all have One Nation second and Liberal higher than Labor; the Liberals have One Nation third behind Australian Christians; and only the Greens, Animal Justice and independent Peter D. Dunne are favourable to Labor.

Secret Harbour by-election: August 29

The resurgent One Nation gets its first chance to flex its new muscles at a by-election for an historically safe Labor state seat in Western Australia.

I have a guide up for the Western Australian state by-election for Secret Harbour, where events have moved quickly since Paul Papalia announced his retirement on July 6. The by-election will be held on August 29, and candidates are already in place following the ballot paper draw on Tuesday. A remarkable field of 16 candidates has emerged, with six independents joining candidates from 10 of the state’s 13 registered parties. This is unlikely to dent perceptions of the by-election as a contest between Labor and One Nation, in an area whose low ethnic diversity and large trades workforce reflects that of the South Australian seats where One Nation emerged as a threat to Labor in March.

Labor’s candidate is Georgia Tree, a former staffer to local federal MP Madeleine King and government relations employee at Woodside. One Nation has endorsed Luke Herdegen, a gymnasium franchisee and former national weightlifting champion. Basil Zempilas’s contention that any defeat for Labor would a win for the Liberals said much about his party’s prospects, though it has a seemingly strong candidate in Ryan Robertson, a Rockingham councillor, real estate agent and former submariner, the latter a particular asset in a seat located near the HMAS Stirling naval base.

Friday miscellany: Morgan poll, by-election and redistribution news, Tasmanian state poll (open thread)

A second sharp drop for One Nation in a weekly poll series, an intriguing by-election on the way in Western Australia, and more.

The weekly Roy Morgan poll records One Nation tumbling another three-and-a-half points after their five-and-a-half point drop last week, reducing them to 22.5%. This still isn’t enough to cost them their lead over the Coalition, who are unchanged at 21.5%, while Labor is likewise steady at 28%. The difference is instead made up by a one-point gain for the Greens to 14% and a two-and-a-half point gain for independents and others to 14%. A Labor-versus-One Nation two-party measure based on respondent allocation has Labor’s lead out from 53-47 to 56-44. The lead over the Coalition is 55-45 based on respondent allocation, out from 53.5-46.5, and 54-46 based on 2025 election preference flows, out from 52.5-47.5. The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of 1584.

Other news:

• A Western Australian state by-election looms in the seat of Secret Harbour after Paul Papalia, who had been in parliament since 2007 and in cabinet since Labor came to power in 2017, announced his resignation on Monday citing a family illness. Labor confirmed yesterday its candidate will be Georgia Tree, a former staffer to local federal MP Madeleine King and government relations employee at Woodside. With its low ethnic diversity and abundance of trades workers, the outer southern suburbs seat appears to be promising terrain for One Nation. Tom Rabe of the Financial Review reports “multiple Labor sources” say recent internal polling from the seat has One Nation running neck-and-neck with Labor in the “mid-30s”, with the Liberal vote “hovering in the high teens”. Perhaps surprisingly, Liberal leader Basil Zempilas has vowed the party will field a candidate.

• The finalised boundaries were published this week for the federal redistribution of the Australian Capital Territory, with those for South Australia and Tasmania to follow over the coming weeks. This involves two seats that Labor won in 2025 by margins of around 20%, one over the Greens (Canberra, held by Alicia Payne) and one over the Liberals (Fenner, held by Andrew Leigh), and one the party came within 700 votes of losing to teal independent Jessie Price (Bean, held by David Smith). Bean both gains from and loses to Canberra: I calculate a 54.0-46.0 split in favour of Labor over Price out of the roughly 9500 formal votes being transferred from Bean to Canberra, and a near tie in the remainder. The extent to which the former helps Price, should she run again, depends on the unknown quantity of her latent support from the similarly sized area transferred from Canberra to Bean. What does favour her, albeit modestly, is the reversal of a plan from the originally proposed boundaries to transfer Norfolk Island from Bean to Canberra, whose votes I estimate as having broken 576-305 in Price’s favour in 2025.

• A DemosAU Tasmanian state poll for Pulse Tasmania has Liberal on 28%, One Nation on 21%, Labor on 21%, the Greens on 14% and independents on 12%. The last such poll in November did not feature One Nation as a response option, and had Liberal on 35%, Labor on 23%, the Greens on 15% and independents on 17%. The result at the election in July last year was Liberal 39.9%, Labor 25.9%, Greens 14.4% and independents 15.3%, producing a seat result of Liberal 14, Labor 10, Greens five, independents 5 and Shooters Fishers and Farmers one. The poll credits Premier Jeremy Rockliff with a 41-32 lead over Labor’s Josh Willie, in from 43-32. Rockliff is rated positively by 35%, neutrally by 27% and negatively by 38%; Willie positively by 23%, neutrally by 48% and negatively by 29%. The poll was conducted June 21 to July 6 from a sample of 999.

DemosAU: 53-47 to Labor in Western Australia

A rare state poll for WA finds Labor still ahead, but no longer overwhelmingly in command.

DemosAU offers the rare spectacle of a Western Australian state poll, which finds Labor down three points since the last such poll in February to 33%, with the Liberals up two to 23%, the Nationals down two to 2% and One Nation up one to 18%. Labor holds a 53-47 lead over the Liberals on two-party preferred, in from 57-43 at both the previous poll and the March 2025 election. Roger Cook leads Basil Zempilas 44-33 on preferred premier, in from 43-30. Roger Cook is up one on both approval, to 35%, and disapproval, to 29%, and Basil Zempilas is up three on both approval, to 31%, and disapproval, to 34%. The Cook government scores net negative ratings for its performance across eight issue areas, ranging from minus three on education and schools to minus 54 on housing.

The West Australian has a report on the poll, and the pollster should shortly be publishing a release with detailed voting breakdowns. The poll was conducted May 29 to June 11 from a sample of 1015.

UPDATE: Full report here.

DemosAU: Labor 36, Liberal-National 25, One Nation 17, Greens 13 in Western Australia

A new poll offers a now predictable finding that One Nation has transformed the situation in Western Australia, without scaling the heights seen elsewhere.

On top of a new federal poll and polls for Queensland (published yesterday) and South Australia (along shortly), DemosAU has a Western Australian state poll suggesting the One Nation revolution has been only slightly less transformative than on the eastern seaboard. After the last such poll in December neglected to include One Nation as a response option, this one has them at 17% (compared with 4.0% at the March 2025 election, when they contested 41 out of 59 seats), with most of the damage done to the Liberals (down nine to 21%, compared with 28.0% at the election) and Nationals (down two to 4%, compared with 5.2%). However, Labor has not escaped unscathed, being down five on December to 36%, compared with 41.1% at the election. The Greens are steady on 13%, up from 11.1% at the election. A conventional two-party preferred result has Labor leading the Liberals 57-43, essentially unchanged on the election result.

The poll finds Roger Cook viewed positively by 34% (down one on December), neutrally by 38% (steady) and negatively by 28% (up one). The respective results for Basil Zempilas are 28% (down two), 41% (up four) and 31% (down two). Results are also featured for Rita Saffioti, Treasurer and Deputy Premier (20%, 50% and 30%); former Liberal leader Libby Mettam (16%, 57% and 27%); Greens leader Brad Pettitt (15%, 56% and 29%); and One Nation leader Rod Caddies (14%, 55% and 31%). Cook leads Zempilas 43-30 on preferred premier, both down four points on December, with the balance going to “don’t know”.

Questions on the salience of issues and the best party to handle them point to health and hospitals as a vulnerability for the government, with 62% rating its performance negatively compared with only 8% for positive. Identical numbers were recorded for cost of living, which was rated the most important issue by 31%, slightly behind housing and homelessness on 34%. Health and hospitals was tied for third on 7% with immigration, followed by crime on 5%, with immigration and crime rated lower than is typical in other states. The poll was conducted February 12 to 23 from a sample of 969.

DemosAU: 56-44 to Labor in Western Australia

A new WA poll records only modest changes on the result that gave Labor a second sweeping win in March.

DemosAU has the first poll of state voting intention in Western Australia since the March election, showing Labor leading 56-44, compared with 57.1-42.9 at the election. The primary votes are Labor 41% (41.4% at the election), Liberal 30% (28.0%), Nationals 6% (5.2%) and Greens 13% (11.1%). Roger Cook is rated positively by 35%, neutrally by 38% and negatively by 27%; Basil Zempilas scores 30% positive, 37% neutral and 33% negative; and Cook leads 47-34 on preferred premier. Forty-three per cent regard the state as heading in the right direction, compared with 40% for wrong direction. The poll was conducted November 10 to 26 from a sample of 1012.

Western Australian upper house result

Labor bags 16 seats out of 37 in a reformed Western Australian Legislative Council, with the Greens holding the balance of power in their own right.

The button has finally been pressed on the Western Australian Legislative Council count (the Western Australian Electoral Commission pleads “a higher than anticipated number of voters preferencing above or below the line”), with the result related on X via Dylan Caporn of The West Australian: Labor 16, Liberal 10, Nationals two, Greens four, One Nation two, and one each for Australian Christians, Animal Justice and Legalise Cannabis.

We must await publication of the full count for details (which I’m attempting to get hold of via back channels), but other alternatives I had considered possible were an eleventh seat for the Liberals and a seat for Sophie Moermond, a former Legalise Cannabis member who ran at the head of a ticket of incumbents who had quit their existing parties. I had felt the latter a more likely outcome than a seat for Animal Justice, but I had perhaps underestimated how well they would do out of a substantial Greens surplus.

UPDATE: Full results and distribution of preferences here. At the final exclusion, Sophie Moermond fell out with 25,560, resulting in the election of One Nation’s second candidate on 33,997, Labor’s sixteenth on 28,640 and Animal Justice on 26,951. The eleventh Liberal in fact came nowhere near winning: Stop Pedophiles, Shooters Fishers and Farmers (who effectively disqualified themselves by identifying as SFFPWA on the ballot paper) and Sustainable Australia all survived to later stages of the count.

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