YouGov: 50-50 in Queensland

Despite declining personal ratings for Annastacia Palasczuk, YouGov records no change from its finding in June that the two parties are neck and neck.

Results from a Queensland state poll by YouGov have been parcelled out over the afternoon by the Courier-Mail, whose reporting I will not dignify with a link (UPDATE: YouGov methodology statement here). The results show no change for the major parties since the last such poll in June, with Labor on 34% of the primary vote, the Liberal National Party on 38%, and level pegging on two-party preferred. The Greens are down a point to 13% and One Nation are up one to 11%. Annastacia Palaszcuk’s personal ratings continue to track downwards, her approval down five to 40% and disapproval up two to 41%, while David Crusafilli is respectively steady at 31% and up four to 27%, with Palaszczuk’s lead as preferred premier narrowing slightly from 41-28 to 39-28. The poll was conducted December 1 to 8 from a sample of 1000.

UPDATE: Now Nine Entertainment’s Brisbane Times website has a fortuitously timed Queensland poll from Resolve Strategic. The results are quite a bit stronger for Labor than YouGov’s, but the poll is a good deal less up to date as it combines results from the pollster’s national polling going back to August. The primary votes are Labor 37%, LNP 35%, Greens 11% and One Nation 6%, which compares with results at the 2020 election of 39.6%, 35.9%, 9.5% and 7.1%. No two-party preferred is provided as per the pollster’s usual practice, but the primary votes imply only a minor swing from Labor’s 53.2-46.8 result at the election. Annastacia Palaszczuk records a 42-30 lead over David Crusafilli as preferred premier. The poll has a sample of 924 and was conducted between August 21 and December 4.

Resolve Strategic poll and Australian Election Study (open thread)

Another poll finds the Albanese government ending the year in as strong a position as ever, plus the release of data from the Australian National University’s regular post-election survey.

The latest Resolve Strategic poll for the Age/Herald has Labor on 42% (up three since the poll conducted after the budget in late October), the Coalition on 30% (down two), the Greens on 11% (down two), One Nation on 4% (steady), the United Australia Party on 2% (up one) and independents on 8% (steady). No two-party preferred is provided, but based on preference flows in May this would have Labor’s lead approaching 60-40. The limited state breakdowns provided have it at about 57-43 in New South Wales, 62-38 in Victoria and 56-44 in Queensland.

Anthony Albanese records an approval rating of 60% (up three) with disapproval at 24% (down four), while Peter Dutton is respectively at 28% (down one) and 43% (up two). Albanese leads Peter Dutton as preferred prime minister 54-19, little changed from 53-19 last time. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1611. Further results on the poll concerning the parties’ capacity to handle various issues and other aspects of their performance are featured on the Age/Herald’s Resolve Political Monitor page.

Also out this week is the Australian National University’s Australian Election Study survey, both as a summary report and a full dataset for those with the wherewithal to use it. Among many other things, the survey found that Anthony Albanese scored better when rated on a scale from one to ten than any party leader since Kevin Rudd in 2007, whereas Scott Morrison was “the least popular major party leader in the history of the AES”, which goes back to 1987. A decline in partisan attachment going back to 2010 continued apace, with only 30% and 28% now rating themselves as Coalition and Labor partisans respectively. Supporters of the teal independents were largely “tactical Labor and Greens voters”, with only 18% of their voters having defected from the Liberals. The survey also provides further evidence for what already well understood about the Coalition’s problems with women and younger voters.

Note also the post below from Adrian Beaumont about today’s US Senate run-off election in the state of Georgia, and the ongoing coverage of the Victorian election count, where Labor seems set to match its 2018 performance in terms of lower house seats.

US Georgia Senate runoff election live

Live commentary from late Wednesday morning on the final contest of the US midterm elections. Also: polls turn against NZ Labour and Jacinda Ardern.

Live Commentary

3:44pm Thursday I’ve done a Conversation article which includes the Georgia Senate runoff result. The big advantage of Dems holding the Senate is that the Senate alone can confirm Biden’s judicial nominations for the next two years.

4:56pm Warnock’s lead out to 51.3-48.7 with 99% reporting. This result means Dems hold the Senate by a 51-49 margin, with Pennsylvania (a Dem gain) the only state to change hands this cycle. But the Senate races up in 2024 are bad for the Dems, as they will be defending 23 seats to just ten Rep defences.

2:59pm CNN and the AP have CALLED for Warnock, who currently leads by 50.7-49.3 with 98% in.

1:50pm The NY Times Needle is back. Warnock’s win probability is over 95% and his final winning margin is projected to be 3.2%. Warnock has just moved ahead in the live count again, but there’s still lots more votes to come in metro Atlanta.

1:37pm Cook Political Report analyst Dave Wasserman has seen enough.

1:23pm Warnock has retaken the lead in the live count, by 50.4-49.6 with 78% in.

1:16pm Back from lunch, and the Needle is still down. Walker is barely ahead now by 50.12-49.88 with 74% reporting. Metro Atlanta should get Warnock home from here.

12:54pm Walker now up by 51.0-49.0 in the live count with 65% in. It was about this time on Nov 8 that his lead maxxed.

12:44pm Live count has Walker hitting the lead by 50.6-49.4 with 59% in. But there’s still lots left to count in Atlanta, so Warnock should win.

12:40pm NY Times Needle has paused updates while they investigate a data issue. It had narrowed just before pausing.

12:26pm Needle now up to a 79% chance of Warnock winning, with a final projected margin of Warnock by 2.5%. That’s with an estimated 53% in.

12:18pm Needle now giving Warnock a 71% chance to win and a 1.8% lead in its final results projections. Still a range of Walker by five to Warnock by nine.

12:01pm Needle so far says result could be between a seven-point win for Walker and a nine-point win for Warnock. Best estimate is Warnock by 0.8%.

11:54am The NY Times needle so far has Warnock barely ahead by 0.8% when all votes are counted. That would line up well with his November 0.9% margin, but be worse than the polls.

11:35am With 34% reporting according to CNN, Warnock leads by 61-39. This would be early votes so far.

9:59am Wednesday Late polls are good news for Dem Warnock, with two giving him a five-point lead and one from the Rep-aligned Trafalgar group giving him a four-point lead. I have an appointment, but will be back at 11:30am.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

The United States November 8 midterm elections are not quite finished, as the Georgia Senate contest has gone to a runoff today, with polls closing at 11am Wednesday AEDT. At the November 8 election, Democrat Raphael Warnock won 49.4% and Republican Herschel Walker 48.5%. A Libertarian, with 2.1%, prevented a majority for either candidate, and so the runoff. Polls for the runoff suggest Warnock is narrowly ahead.

Democrats currently lead the Senate by 50-49. Even if Warnock loses, they will still control the Senate on Vice President Kamala Harris’ casting vote. But this election is important because Democrats face a very difficult Senate map in the 2024 elections.

Of the 33 Senate seats up for election in 2024, 23 are Democrat-held and just ten Republican-held. Democrat-held seats include three states – West Virginia, Montana and Ohio – that Donald Trump won easily in both 2016 and 2020. Democrats need to win Georgia next week to have a realistic chance of keeping the Senate after the 2024 elections.

At the November 8 election, Warnock took a big lead in early counting, but his lead fell back as the Election Day votes were counted. Walker led at various points, but late counting in Democratic areas gave Warnock a narrow win. If the result is close, I would not expect this contest to be called until Wednesday night AEDT.

NZ Labour has slid behind National in polls

The next New Zealand election will be held in late 2023. At the October 2020 election, Labour won a landslide, with 50.0% to 25.6% for the conservative National, 7.9% for the Greens and 7.6% for the right-wing ACT. At that election, PM Jacinda Ardern was assisted by her success at keeping COVID out of NZ.

NZ uses proportional representation with a 5% threshold, but parties under 5% can enter parliament by winning a single-member seat. The Maori party won two seats at the 2020 election on only 1.2% of votes.

National has now taken the lead, and the two most recent polls by media pollsters – Reid Research and Kantar Public – would give National and ACT combined a majority. Other polls suggest Labour could cling on with support from the Greens and the Maori party. Labour’s problems are probably due to the waning of the COVID boost and the rise of inflation.

Victorian election: late counting week two

Continuing coverage of late counting from the Victorian state election.

Click here for full Victorian election results updated live.

Friday, December 8

The last in doubt seat was determined in Labor’s favour today, with the preference distribution in Bass showing Labor incumbent Jordan Crugnale the winner with 20,803 votes (50.24%) over 20,601 (49.76%) for Liberal candidate Alan Brown. Labor thus emerges with 56 lower house seats, up one from their total in 2018; the Liberals on 19, down two, and the Nationals on nine, up three, with one or the other presumably to win Narracan when the supplementary election is held; the Greens four, up one; and independents from three to zero.

In the upper house count, the ABC’s projected margin for Transport Matters incumbent Rod Barton over Aiv Puglielli of the Greens at the final count for North-Eastern Metropolitan has narrowed to 16.95% to 16.38%, at which point the Greens could be confident that below-the-line votes would win them the seat. Barton is also a hair’s breadth away from exclusion behind Sustainable Australia at an earlier point in the count.

Thursday, December 8

Labor chalked up another win today when the button was pressed on Pakenham, revealing that their candidate Emma Vulin prevailed over David Farrelly of the Liberals at the last by 19,587 (50.39%) to 19,280 (49.61%). That gets Labor to 55 seats, which most likely will get to 56 when the button is pressed tomorrow on Bass, barring the emergence of some as yet undetected anomaly that up-ends the 211 vote margin on the two-candidate preferred count.

Wednesday, December 7

The preference distribution for Pakenham, earlier promised for today, will now be finalised tomorrow according to the VEC. That remains the only seat in doubt now that Northcote is decided for Labor, although I note that the ABC still rates Bass, where Labor leads by 211, as in doubt. There too the VEC is promising a preference distribution tomorrow. The preference distribution in Preston established that independent Gaetano Greco did not in fact make the final count, at which Labor retained the seat ahead of the Greens by a margin of 2.1%.

Tuesday, December 6

A preference distribution has been run for Northcote, which I believe was conducted electronically, with Labor incumbent Kat Theophanous making it over the line at the final count with 21,413 votes (50.22%) to Greens candidate Campbell Gome’s 21,229 (49.78%). The VEC site says “a recheck is taking place for this district”, but the ABC reports the figures as final.

In the other yet-to-be-called seat, Pakenham, Antony Green relates that the re-check of first preferences has shown up anomalies that will put Labor ahead when corrected, with the published results remaining those of the initial count. This involved an increase in the number of votes designated informal, which cut 274 from the Liberal primary vote tally compared with 111 from Labor’s. The difference is sufficient to cancel out the Liberals’ 90 vote lead on the two-candidate preferred count, though not so handily that you would rule out further anomalies tipping the result back the other way. The matter will seemingly be clarified when a full preference distribution is conducted tomorrow. Should the result go Labor’s way, they will have repeated their feat from 2018 of winning 55 seats, despite a statewide two-party swing that looks to be in excess of 3%.

Monday, December 5

My previous update dropped the ball with respect to Northcote, where a 1523-994 break on absent votes brought the Greens right back into contention. Labor now leads by 189 with the outstanding vote likely to consist of around 1500 postals, of which the latest batch broke an even 123-123, and a handful of provisionals.

The Liberals have opened a 90 vote lead in Pakenham, after the latest early votes broke 450-356 and postals broke 80-67, outweighing a 208-189 break to Labor on absents. There are still about 1500 postals to be accounted for, and since these have broken 51-49 in favour of the Liberals so far, this seems assured to remain close.

Mornington continues to edge out of reach of independent candidate Kate Lardner, with absents (349-338), early votes (268-203) and postals (110-102) all breaking slightly the way of Liberal candidate Chris Crewther, whose lead is out from 491 votes to 575. My results system is now calling it for Crewther, leaving only Northcote and Pakenham in doubt.

In the upper house count, second Liberal candidate Joe McCracken’s position in Western Victoria has strengthened appreciably, leaving him a likely winner over Stuart Grimley of Derryn Hinch’s Justice Party. The Greens and Legalise Cannabis remain in a race for a third left-wing seat, with Labor and now Liberal on course for two seats each.

Sunday, December 4

There are probably three lower house seats that are still in real doubt, not counting Narracan which will presumably be won by the Liberals or Nationals. This gets Labor to 54 seats with a best case scenario of 56; the Coalition to 26 with a best case scenario of 29; the Greens to four; and one outside possibility for an independent.

The most remarkable of the close races is Pakenham which was tied as of Friday, before Liberal candidate David Farrelly opened up a three-vote lead after a batch of absents were added over the weekend. Farrelly held a 220 vote lead mid-week before postals broke 964-781 to Labor and early votes did so by 457-420.

Labor holds a 285 lead in Bass, out from 53 after favourable results on early vote (1768-1643), absents (539-438) and recent batches of postals (826-820). Postals, of which the first batch broke strongly to the Liberals but more recent arrivals have been neutral, should account for most of the remainder, although there may also be significant numbers of outstanding absents.

Liberal candidate Chris Crewther’s lead over independent Kate Lardner in Mornington is now at 491 votes, out from 353, after postals favoured him 751-717 and early votes did so 413-329. The former were less strong for Crewther than earlier postals, of which at least 3000 yet to come. Together with the fact that further absents are likely outstanding, this means Crewther can’t be considered home and hosed quite yet, though he is clearly a short-priced favourite

Elsewhere, Paul Mercurio is probably home for Labor in Hastings, his lead out from 659 to 803 after the lastest postals broke 151-116 his way and absents broke 290-221. Labor’s lead over the Greens in Northcote is down from 874 to 781 after a batch of early votes favoured the Greens 1645-1454, outweighing an 832-734 break to Labor on the latest postals.

Now, finally, to the upper house, where the ABC is currently projecting a final result of Labor 15, Coalition 13, Legalise Cannabis three, Greens two and (deep breath) Derryn Hinch’s Justice Party, Liberal Democrats, Animal Justice, Shooters Fishers and Farmers, Transport Matters, the Democratic Labour Party and One Nation on one each. However, the ABC projections assume all votes are above-the-line and duly follow the group voting tickets, which likely means an over-estimation of the number of micro-party winners. To deal with the eight regions in turn, all links below being to the ABC projections:

Continue reading “Victorian election: late counting week two”

Newspoll: 55-45 to Labor (open thread)

Newspoll records a surge in approval for Anthony Albanese with Labor maintaining its commanding position on voting intention.

The Australian reports what sounds like it will be the last Newspoll for the year has come in with the two-party preferred unchanged at 55-45 in favour of Labor 39% (up one), Coalition 35% (steady), Greens 11% (steady), One Nation 6% and United Australia Party 1%. Anthony Albanese’s approval rating is up three to a new high of 62% and down four on disapproval to 29%, and his lead over Peter Dutton as preferred prime minister has blown out from 54-27 to 59-24. Peter Dutton is respectively down three to 36% and one to 45%. The poll was conducted Wednesday to Saturday from a sample of 1508.

In further federal polling news, I missed that Essential Research has snuck out its first set of voting intention numbers since the election, which it will hopefully now resume reporting regularly. Without excluding a 6% undecided component, this showed primary votes of Labor 33%, Coalition 31%, Greens 13% and others 6%, with the “2PP+” measure at Labor 51%, Coalition 43% and undecided 6%. The poll was conducted November 23 to 29 from a sample of 1042.

Note also the post immediately below from Adrian Beaumont on the US Senate run-off election for Georgia, which will unfold over the coming week.

US Georgia Senate runoff election minus four days

The last action of the midterms is important for Democrats’ chances of retaining the Senate after the 2024 elections. Also covered: the Malaysian election and UK developments.

Guest post by Adrian Beaumont, who joins us from time to time to provide commentary on elections internationally. Adrian is a paid election analyst for The Conversation. His work for The Conversation can be found here, and his own website is here.

The first section of this article has been copied from my article Thursday mainly about the Victorian upper house results for The Conversation.

The United States November 8 midterm elections are not quite finished, as the Georgia Senate contest has gone to a runoff Tuesday, with polls closing at 11am Wednesday AEDT. At the November 8 election, Democrat Raphael Warnock won 49.4% and Republican Herschel Walker 48.5%. A Libertarian, with 2.1%, prevented a majority for either candidate, and so the runoff. Polls for the runoff suggest Warnock is narrowly ahead.

Democrats currently lead the Senate by 50-49. Even if Warnock loses, they will still control the Senate on Vice President Kamala Harris’ casting vote. But this election is important because Democrats face a very difficult Senate map in the 2024 elections.

Of the 33 Senate seats up for election in 2024, 23 are Democrat-held and just ten Republican-held. Democrat-held seats include three states – West Virginia, Montana and Ohio – that Donald Trump won easily in both 2016 and 2020. Democrats need to win Georgia next week to have a realistic chance of keeping the Senate after the 2024 elections.

Republicans likely won the House of Representatives on November 8 by a margin of 222-213 over Democrats, the exact reverse of Democrats’ 222-213 majority after the 2020 elections. Republicans lead the overall House popular vote by 50.7-47.8 according to the Cook Political Report.

Update Sunday: The final undecided House seat, California’s 13th, has been called for the Republicans, confirming a 222-213 House win.

US polls understated the left, in contrast to polls at other recent major national elections

At the Australian national election, polls overstated Labor’s primary support and understated UAP, although polls were better after preferences as Labor performed better than expected on preference flows. Polls also understated the right at recent Brazilian and Israeli elections.

Polls for the US midterm elections understated the left (Democrats), particularly in some key Senate contests. In New Hampshire, Democrat Hassan defeated Republican Bolduc by 9.1%; polls gave Hassan only about a two-point lead. Democrat Fetterman defeated Republican Oz in Pennsylvania by 4.9%, but most polls gave Oz the lead, although Marist College (Fetterman up six) was an exception. Democrats also outperformed their polls in Arizona and Nevada.

We should not assume that polls will be biased against Warnock in Georgia, just because they were generally biased against Democrats at the midterms. Poll bias can change from one election to another, and the Georgia runoff is a different election.

Anwar Ibrahim finally becomes Malaysian PM

Anwar Ibrahim was finance minister in Mahathir Mohamad’s conservative UMNO government in 1998, but was removed from all posts that year, and jailed in 1999 after a trial for sodomy and corruption that was criticised by human rights groups. At the 2018 election, Mahathir led an anti-UMNO coalition to victory and became PM, but his coalition broke down, and UMNO returned.

Malaysia’s parliament has 222 members elected by first past the post. The November 19 election produced the first hung parliament in its history, with Anwar’s reformist PKR winning 82 seats on 37.5%, with the nationalist BERSATU on 73 seats and 30.4%, and UMNO on 30 seats and 22.4%. Most parties pledged to join a unity government led by Anwar, with a confidence vote scheduled for December 19.

UK Labour maintains huge poll lead, and receives big swing at by-election

It’s over a month since Rishi Sunak became Britain’s PM on October 25. Labour is maintaining a huge lead with its vote in the high 40s in UK national polls, with the Conservatives in the low to mid 20s in most polls. Some of the Conservatives’ losses recently are benefiting the far-right Reform, which was at 9% in a recent YouGov poll.

A parliamentary by-election occurred Thursday in the Labour-held City of Chester. Labour won by 60.8-22.2 over the Conservatives with 8.3% for the Liberal Democrats and 3.5% Greens. At the 2019 general election. Labour won this seat by 49.6-38.3 with 6.8% Lib Dems and 2.6% Greens. This seat was a safe Conservative seat until Labour won it in the 1997 landslide. The Conservatives regained it in 2010, but Labour won it by just 93 votes in 2015 and expanded that margin greatly in 2017.

Essential Research: PM favourability and China relationship (open thread)

Another poll finding little change in perceptions of the Prime Minister, despite a deteriorating view of the national direction.

The latest Essential Research survey has its monthly favourability trend ratings for Anthony Albanese which, as distinct from its straightforward approval/disapproval question, asks respondents to rate his performance on a scale of one to ten. This finds 46% giving him from seven to ten, up one on a month ago; 26% from four to six, down two; and 23% from zero to three, up three. On the question of national direction, 44% rate that Australia is on the right track, down two on a month ago and four on two months ago, compared with 36% for the wrong track, up two on a month ago and seven on two months ago.

Other questions relate to Australia’s relationship with China, which 46% expect to be better under the Labor government compared with only 9% for worse. Asked whether they wanted the government to look for opportunities to rebuild relations with China, take a more confrontational approach or maintain the current course, 54% opted for the first (up two from May), 13% the second (down six) and 12% the third (steady). Forty-four per cent think the AUKUS submarine partnership will make Australia more secure compared with 16% for less secure and 39% for about the same.

The poll was conducted Wednesday to Sunday from a sample of 1042. Note that progressively updated coverage of the Victorian election count continues on the post below.

Victorian election: late counting

Progressively progressively updated coverage of late counting from the Victorian state election.

Click here for full Victorian election results updated live.

Wednesday night

It is now acknowledged that John Pesutto has won Hawthorn for the Liberals, and Mornington continues to drift away from the only other teal independent in the hunt, Kate Lardner. In the latter case, today’s early votes broke 902-726 to Liberal candidate Chris Crewther, who now leads by 353. In Pakenham, the two-party votes were added for the early voting batch that appeared in the primary votes count only yesterday, and it broke to the Liberals less heavily than I had anticipated — 1135-907, turning a Labor leading of eight votes into a Liberal lead of 220. There’s evidently a complex mix in the race for the final seat in South-Eastern Metropolitan region, because the ABC’s projection now has it going to Legalise Cannabis, overtaking the Liberal Democrats who in turn overtook the second Liberal yesterday.

Tuesday night

I had a paywalled piece in Crikey today noting where the result for Labor in swing terms was particularly good (the same Chinese-heavy eastern suburbs that turned against the Liberals at the federal election) and particularly poor (the party’s northern and western Melbourne heartlands, which likewise were relatively soft for the party at the federal election). I also joined Ben Raue of The Tally Room to discuss the results on his podcast.

Turning to the count: it was a better day for the Liberals in Bass, where Aaron Brown went from 225 behind to 53 ahead after early votes broke 835-663 his way, and Mornington, where Chris Crewther’s lead went from 177 to 337 on a 747-588 break in early votes. The Liberals also got a strong batch of early votes in Pakenham, and while they are yet to be added to the two-party count, the primary vote results have boosted my Liberal two-party projection there from 50.0% to 50.8% and left my system not far off calling it for them. My system also no longer rates Benambra as in doubt.

Labor’s one good show was in Hastings, where the latest early votes batch broke 747-660 to Paul Mercurio, boosting his lead from 470 to 557. The fresh two-candidate preferred counts in Albert Park, Brighton, Melton, Point Cook, and Werribee yesterday caused by projections in those seats to go haywire yesterday, but this is fixed now.

While I still haven’t taken a serious look at the upper house count, I note that the ABC’s projection now has Adem Somyurek taking the last seat in Northern Metropolitan for the DLP ahead of Fiona Patten of Reason, though I have a notion that Somyurek may do less than brilliantly on below-the line votes. David Limbrick of the Liberal Democrats also has his nose in front of the second Liberal now in South-Eastern Metropolitan.

Monday night

There was no significant progress today, which was spent mostly on rechecking. That will continue today, but more interesting will be the addition of as-yet-uncounted early votes that were cast outside the home district. As noted below, new indicative two-candidate preferred counts are being conducted in five seats where the wrong two candidates were picked for the count on election nights, but in no case is the result in doubt. Happily, the Victorian Electoral Commission has a page on its website where such news is related in detail on a daily basis.

Sunday night

I spent yesterday fixing bugs in my results system, and now this is done to a reasonably satisfactory level, it should resume updating promptly, at least when I have an internet connection. Most of today’s activity will involve rechecking, but fresh two-candidate counts will be conducted in seats where the initial counts picked the wrong candidates – Albert Park, Brighton, Melton, Point Cook, and Werribee – although in no case is the result in doubt.

My system is giving away 45 seats to Labor and has them ahead in a further 11, which would result in the extraordinary achivement of an increased majority if it stuck. Seats my system is not yet calling but almost certainly soon will are Bayswater, Footscray, Pascoe Vale, Glen Waverley and Yan Yean, which get Labor to 50; Caulfield, Polwarth and Rowville, which get the Liberals to 12; and Mildura and Shepparton, which get the Nationals to not far behind the Liberals on nine. I still have nothing to offer on the upper house result, but that will hopefully change over the next day or two.

Bass. Labor’s Jordan Crugnale needed an 0.8% swing to retain her seat after the redistribution, and after looking gone on election night, a 5.0% swing in her favour on early votes puts it at 1.4%. However, the early vote count of 15427 formal votes is nearly 6000 shy of the number cast, which presumably means one of the three centres hasn’t reported yet. If the outstanding centre is more conservative than the other two, the swing on early votes — which is not broken down between individual voting centres, as would be the case at a federal election — will drop considerably when it reports, perhaps taking Crugnale’s lead with it.

Benambra. The ABC has Liberal member Bill Tilley marked down as holding off two-time independent challenger Jacqui Hawkins, but my more conservative system only gets his probability to 85.9%. He leads by 1.1% on the raw two-candidate preferred count, which is all you’ll get from the ABC — I’m still using a method that presumes to project a final result, which narrows it to 0.8%. Booth and early votes came in about where Hawkins needed to knock off his 2.6% margin, but he’s picked up a 5.3% swing on 2354 postals, about as many of which are still to come.

Croydon. Liberal member David Hodgett had a slight swing against him on ordinary and early votes in a seat where he was defending a 1.0% margin, but the first half of around 8000 postal votes have swung 4.4% his way and he will more than likely get home.

Hastings. Paul Mercurio looks likely to gain a seat for Labor that had no margin at all after the redistribution, and which was being vacated with the retirement of Liberal member Neale Burgess. Ordinary, postal and early votes have all swung slightly his way, leaving him 470 votes ahead with most of the outstanding vote consisting of around 3000 postals and 2000 absents.

Hawthorn. My projection has John Pesutto’s current lead of 0.7% (480 votes) narrowing to 0.3% at the last, mostly because the Liberals did poorly on absent votes in 2018 (36.5% by my post-redistribution reckoning, compared with 44.7% all told), of which I would expect about 2000. However, his primary vote is up 6.1% on the 3055 postal votes counted, compared with about 3% down on ordinary and early votes, and my projection method doesn’t presume that offers any guide to the 4000 or so outstanding. If it does, he will get home fairly comfortably.

Mornington. The teals could emerge empty-handed after a promising start in Mornington fell foul of a 2635-1553 break in favour of Liberal candidate Chris Crewther on postals, leaving him 177 votes ahead with about 3800 further postals still to come. On the other, the Liberals did poorly in 2022 on absent votes, of which there should be about 2000.

Northcote. The Greens’ lower house performance failed to match expectations set to at least some extent by a media determined to hype any anti-Labor narrative to hand, most notably in their likely failure to win Northcote. The first 1651 postals have broken 1027-624 to Labor, a swing in their favour of 5.7% with about 3500 still to come, but the Greens handily won absents in 2018, of which there should be about 3000.

Pakenham. Labor had a notional 2.2% margin in this essentially new seat, and their candidate Emma Vulin ended Sunday with a lead of eight votes over Liberal rival David Farrelly. Labor lost the first 2121 postals by only 1104-1017, a swing of 4.8% in their favour. The question is likely whether an advantage to Farrelly on 3500 or so remaining postals outweights absents, which on my post-redistribution calculation favoured Labor 1230-828 last time.

Preston. Labor’s 1306 vote lead on the two-candidate preferred count will assuredly be enough to see off the Greens. But at Inside Story, Tim Colebatch offers a “scoop”: the final count will in fact be between Labor and independent Gaetano Greco, and it’s not inconceivable he will win. Labor is on 38.1% of the primary vote to Greco’s 14.9%, raising the question of how many voters for sundry left-wing concerns (Greens, Victorian Socialists, Animal Justice and Reason Australia) moved promptly to Labor after their first preference over Greco, a “long-time Darebin councillor and Labor activist”.

Ripon. Liberal member Louise Staley needed a 2.8% swing here post-redistribution, currently has only 0.7%. Labor’s raw lead is 1358, but there are around 8000 early votes outstanding and Staley won the first batch of postals 1814-1272 with about 4500 still to come.