Federal polls: Resolve Strategic, Essential Research, Roy Morgan (open thread)

Another three federal polls — one good, one bad and one ugly for Labor.

Three new federal voting intention polls have dropped in short order, including the monthly Resolve Strategic poll for Nine Newspapers, which seems to have lost most of the Labor lean that distinguished it from other pollsters before the start of the year. Both major parties are down two points on the primary vote from the February result, putting Labor at 32% and the Coalition at 35%, with the Greens up two to 13% and One Nation down one to 5%. Anthony Albanese’s combined very good and good rating is down three to 38%, with his combined poor and very poor up two to 49%, while Peter Dutton is respectively steady at 36% and down one to 44%. Albanese’s lead as preferred prime minister shifting out from 39-32 to 40-30. In the absence of a two-party preferred measure from Resolve Strategic, my own favoured method of calculating one from flows at the 2022 election (which lumps together independents and all parties other than the majors, the Greens, One Nation and the United Australia Party into a single category) gets a result of about 52.8-47.2 in Labor’s favour, compared with a bit over 52-48 last time. The poll was conducted Tuesday to Sunday from a sample of 1610.

The Guardian reports the fortnightly Essential Research has what is by some distance Labor’s worst result on voting intention this term, with the Coalition opening a lead of 50% to 44% on the pollster’s 2PP+ measure, the balance being undecided. This compares with a Labor lead of 48% to 47% last time and a reversed result the time before, the latter being the only previous occasion when the Coalition led this term. We will have to wait upon the release of the full report later today for the primary votes. Despite this, The Guardian report relates little change on a monthly leadership on which respondents rate the leaders on a scale of one to ten, with 32% (down one) giving Anthony Albanese a rating of seven to ten and 35% (steady) a rating of zero to three. Peter Dutton had 31% at the top of the range, down one, and 34% at the bottom, up one.

UPDATE: The primary votes are Labor 29% (down three), Coalition 36% (up one), Greens 11% (steady) and One Nation 7% (down one), with undecided up one to 6%.

Further questions relate to campaign finance reform and the state of Australian democracy, recording a drop from 46% to 32% in satisfaction with the latter since immediately after the 2022 election and dissatisfaction up from 18% to 31%. There was strong support for truth-in-advertising laws (73%), real-time reporting of donations (64%) and donations caps (61%), though the related proposal of greater public funding found only 29% support with 35% opposed.

The weekly Roy Morgan poll is also less than stellar for Labor, recording a tie on two-party preferred after they led 51.5-48.5 result last time. However, this is more to do with a weaker flow of respondent-allocated preferences than changes on the primary vote, on which Labor is steady at 31.5%, the Coalition up one to 38%, the Greens up one-and-a-half to 14% and One Nation down one to 4.5%. My own measure of a result based on 2022 election preferences has Labor leading 51.5-48.5, which is little different from last time.

We also have from The Australian further results from the latest Newspoll showing 51% support for fixed four-year parliamentary terms with 37% opposed.

Newspoll: 51-49 to Labor (open thread)

Slight movement away from Labor on voting intention amid an overall static result from Newspoll.

The Australian reports the latest Newspoll has Labor’s lead at 51-49, in from 52-48 three weeks ago, from primary votes of Labor 32% (down one), Coalition 37% (up one), Greens 13% (up one) and One Nation 7% (up one). Personal ratings are little changed, with Anthony Albanese up one on approval to 44% and steady on disapproval at 51%, Peter Dutton steady at 37% and up one to 52%, and Albanese’s lead as preferred prime minister out from 47-35 to 48-34. The poll was conducted Monday to Friday from a sample of 1223.

Tasmanian election and Dunstan by-election live

Live coverage of the count for the Tasmanian state election and the South Australian state by-election for Dunstan.

Click here for full display of Tasmanian results.
Click here for full display of Dunstan by-election results.

End of Saturday night

Labor leads by 6852 to 5875 in Dunstan, with upwards of 7500 votes to come — the Liberals will need about 56.5% of these to overhaul the Labor lead, the chance of which my system puts at 1%.

In Tasmania, contrary to the general assumption of a Liberal minority government, there are still live scenarios where Labor and the Greens get to sixteen with a natural ally in David O’Byrne making it seventeen, making the magic eighteen achievable through a deal with either independent Kristie Johnston or the Jacqui Lambie Network. But perhaps the most likely scenario is that the Liberals get to fifteen and the JLN gets to three, with the latter naturally gravitating to the option with the least moving parts in which the biggest party forms government. My read of the situation is that there is a bedrock thirteen seats for Liberal, ten for Labor, four for the Greens, two for the Jacqui Lambie Network and two independent, to which can be added a likely fourteenth Liberal and a third JLN. In greater doubt are two seats in Franklin, to go between Liberal, ex-Labor independent David O’Byrne and the Greens, and a seat in Clark that could go to Labor or the Greens.

Bass. Despite dropping 21.5% from a Peter Gutwein-fuelled 60.0% in 2021, the Liberals have clearly won three quotas with two for Labor and one for the Greens. Beyond that, the Jacqui Lambie Network has 0.63 quotas, though postals may reduce this, while I’m projecting a Labor surplus of 0.34 above their two quotas. That would seem promising with respect to Rebekah Pentland, the strongest performing JLN candidate. Michael Ferguson and newcomer Rob Fairs are clearly elected of the Liberals — the third incumbent, Simon Wood, holds only the slenderest of leads over controversial colleague Julie Sladden. The two Labor incumbents, Michelle O’Byrne and Janie Finlay, are both returned, and the Greens member will be Cecily Rosol.

Braddon. Other than the JLN gouging 11% out of the Liberals, this was a similar result to 2021. There is no doubt that the Liberals have won three seats, returning incumbents Jeremy Rockliff, Felix Ellis and Roger Jaensch; Labor has won two, returning incumbents Anita Dow and Shane Broad; and the Jacqui Lambie Network has won one, which could be either be Miriam Beswick or James Redgrave. To that the Liberals seem likely to win a fourth seat with a 0.69 quota surplus, barring some impressive preference-gathering from independent Craig Garland on 0.40 quotas or a late-count surprise for the Greens on 0.52.

Clark. The only division without the JLN running, the 4.4% drop in the Liberal vote is perhaps pointing to how the election might have looked in their absence. Also a bright spot for Labor in that their primary vote was up 9.7%, with the independent vote down despite a seemingly strong selection of contenders. The Liberals have a clear two quotas, ensuring re-election for Simon Behrakis and Madeleine Ogilvie, as does Labor, with Ella Haddad re-elected and Josh Willie moving successfully from the upper house, while Vica Bayley of the Greens has been re-elected. The contestants for the two final seats are independent incumbent Kristie Johnston, with 0.64 quotas; the Greens, with a surplus of 0.57 putting former Hobart Lord Mayor Helen Burnet in contention; and Labor, whose surplus of 0.54 gives newcomer Stuart Benson a chance. Johnston will presumably coast home as around 10% for various other independents are distributed, leaving the Greens and Labor vying for the last seat.

Franklin. Labor can also take something out of the result in the other Hobart electorate: the 6.2% drop in their vote doesn’t look so bad when David O’Byrne’s 9.0% is taken into account, and the 8.0% Liberal vote exceeded the JLN’s 4.9%. Eric Abetz and Jacquie Petrusma were closely matched on the Liberal ticket, and both will be elected; Dean Winter is returned for Labor and will likely be joined by Meg Brown; and Rosalie Woodruff was re-elected for the Greens with a quota in her own right. In the race for the last two seats, O’Byrne has 0.72 quotas, and I’m projecting the Liberals to have a 0.74 surplus over their second quota (keeping incumbent Nic Street in contention) and the Greens to have 0.57 over their first (Jade Darko being the leader out of the party’s minor candidates), with preferences likely to favour the Greens.

Lyons. The Liberal vote fell 13.5% here, in part because of John Tucker unproductively draining 3.3%. They nonetheless have a clear three quotas, re-electing Guy Barnett and Mark Shelton and facilitating Jane Howlett’s move from the upper house, while Rebecca White and Jen Butler are re-elected for Labor. For the remaining two seats, the Greens have 0.84 quotas, the Jacqui Lambie Network has 0.67, and Labor has 0.64 over the second quota. Preferences will presumably be unfavourable for Labor, so the situation is encouraging for Tabatha Badger of the Greens and one of two closely matched JLN candidates, Andrew Jenner and Troy Pfitzner.

Election night

9.22pm. I now have a bug-free Dunstan page — all two-candidate preferred numbers are in and it’s calling it for Labor.

9.13pm. Labor’s position in Tasmania, while not great, has looked less bad as the evening has progressed — I now have them holding steady on the primary vote, with the Liberals down by double-digits. The JLN hasn’t matched the polling, but it looks well placed in the three non-Hobart divisions.

9.01pm. Dunstan is looking a bit less dramatic with the latest update, which cuts my projection of the Labor swing from 7% to 3%. I believe my system isn’t making a probability determination because it isn’t sure the Greens won’t make the final count, but I suggest it should be. All the booths are in on the primary vote — the TCP booth results don’t seem to be firing in my results system, so my read is based on preference estimates, which are likely to be pretty accurate.

8.57pm. I’ve found the error that was causing my system to read a Liberal-Greens result in Dunstan. Now it’s pointing to an emphatic win for Labor, erasing the 0.5% Liberal margin with a 7% swing. The Greens are up 8.7% on my reckoning and having a good night in Tasmania, seemingly on track for two seats apiece in Clark and Franklin and one each in Bass and Lyons, while striking out in Braddon.

8.51pm. Franklin also looks three Liberal (Eric Abetz, Jacquie Petrusma and Nic Street, with incumbent Dan Young squeezed out), two Labor (Meg Brown likely joining Dean Winter), two Greens (Rosalie Woodruff plus a lottery for second) and one independent, the independent in this case being David O’Byrne.

8.47pm. Clark looks three apiece for Labor, Liberal and the Greens plus with incumbent Kristie Johnston returned, and none of the other independents in contention unless preferences behave in a manner I’m not anticipating.

8.43pm. Braddon looking like three Liberal, two Labor and one JLN, with the last going to either independent Craig Garland or a fourth Liberal. The three Liberal incumbents and two Labor incumbents are returned.

8.40pm. So then, some overdue commentary on what we’re seeing in Tasmania, starting with Bass. Three Liberal, two Labor, one Greens, one in doubt. Rob Fairs a clear second elected Liberal after Michael Ferguson, open race for the third. Labor’s two seats will stay with the incumbents. Cecily Rosol elected for the Greens. Presumably JLN to take the third, which candidate is unclear.

8.34pm. Continuing to bash away at technical issues, but it looks like a boilover in Dunstan. My projections are seemingly not to be relied upon in that they are pointing to a Liberal-Greens contest, but it seems what we’re actually looking at is a surge to the Greens, a drop in the Liberals and a win for Labor.

8.05pm. My Dunstan display at least seems to be going okay — looking like a big vote for the Greens. My projected TCP has the Liberals ahead, but it’s a bit speculative at this stage.

7.55pm. I’ve been trying and failing to fix an issue that is making the parties in the booth results table appear in the wrong order.

7.35pm The big swing against the Liberals in Bass looks to be extending to Launceston. Perhaps some of this reflects the loss of Peter Gutwein’s vote.

7.31pm. The booth results maps you can find on my Tasmanian election results pages are a good way of discerning regional patterns, and it doesn’t seem the booths around Burnie are doing anything special for the JLN. The main story in Braddon remains that Labor is down more than Liberal.

7.28pm. There are 11 booths and 3.7% of the enrolled vote in from Bass, and it suggests the Liberals have taken a big hit with the JLN in double figures. However, almost all of this is outside Launceston — there the JLN vote may be lower and less damaging to the Liberals as a result. Lara Alexander making little impression so far.

7.23pm. Early numbers are a bit unspectacular for the JLN in its presumed stronghold of Braddon, but it can’t be stressed enough that results will be heavily regionalised here and in Lyons — Burnie booths may bring them up. Similarly, it may be too early to read reach conclusions from John Tucker being outpolled by Shooters in Lyons.

7.18pm. Still a bit busy with bug-squashing, but both major parties looking well down in Lyons, Labor doing badly in Braddon, first numbers (very small in this case) in Franklin consistent with the trend except that the Jacqui Lambie Network is as expected weaker here.

7.08pm. So far, Tasmania looks consistent with the polls in that the Jacqui Lambie Network is on about 10% in the non-Hobart seats which has come at the expense of the Liberals — except in Lyons, where it’s come at the expense of Labor. A few more booths might establish if the latter is an early count anomaly.

7.01pm. I’ve ironed out my Lyons bug, and I believe the Dunstan feed is starting to work.

6.55pm. Not sure why the ABC has numbers for Lyons and I don’t. I do have numbers for Bass and Braddon though, which are obviously from very small rural booths.

6.45pm. For reasons I’m unlikely to be able to solve, my Tasmanian pages are sometimes loading properly but sometimes not, either failing to load the map or falling over altogether. So you will likely need to hit refresh a fair bit to follow them properly. So far I’m unable to upload the feed for Dunstan at all, but that may be because it isn’t live yet.

6.30pm. Polls have closed for South Australia’s Dunstan by-election, which on reflection I think would be best dealt with on the same post as this one.

6pm. Welcome to the Poll Bludger’s live coverage of the Tasmanian state election count. Polls are now closed and we should be getting the first results from small rural booths fairly shortly. Through the link above you will find live updated results throughout the night and beyond, inclusive of an effort to project party vote shares in each of the five divisions through booth-matched swings. Also note that coverage of South Australia’s Dunstan by-election will commence when polls close there in half an hour.

Tasmanian election minus one day

On the eve of the Tasmanian election, another poll suggesting the Liberals will emerge as comfortably the biggest party in a hung parliament.

On the eve of the Tasmanian state election, the print edition of The Mercury (no report online that I can see) reports polling conducted a fortnight ago for an undisclosed private client by Freshwater Strategy points to a seats result of Liberal 15, Labor nine, Greens four, Jacqui Lambie Network three and independents four. The poll reached 800 respondents in each of the five electorates, with the report relating results in Lyons of Liberal 38%, Labor 23%, Greens 13% and JLN and independents 11% each; in Bass of Liberal 40%, Labor 26%, Greens 10% and JLN 10%; in Braddon of Liberal 49%, Labor 15%, JLN 13% and independents 10%; in Clark of Liberal 26%, Labor 21%, Greens 20% and independents 28%; and in Franklin of Liberal 33%, Labor 27%, Greens 13% and independents 17%. The independent results would seem to bode well for John Tucker in Lyons and David O’Byrne in Franklin, and for two independents to be elected in Clark inclusive of incumbent Kristie Johnston.

For a good deal more on Tasmanian state election polling, see Kevin Bonham. I am presently in my usual election eve scramble to get my live results facility in place, which if all goes well will offer results by party down to booth level (which in 2021 at least were unique to this site) in both tabular and mapped form.

Roy Morgan: 51.5-48.5 to Labor (open thread)

Amid a drought of federal opinion polling, a sedate result from the often volatile Roy Morgan series.

The only federal poll for the week was the regular weekly Roy Morgan, which had Labor with an unchanged two-party lead of 51.5-48.5, from primary votes of Labor 31.5% (down half), Coalition 37% (down one), Greens 12.5% (down half) and One Nation 5.5% (up one-and-a-half). The poll was conducted Monday to Sunday from a sample of a 1710.

Aside from a dearth of published polling, the non-external factors that have contributed to this site being light on for posts lately have been the effort I’ve been putting in trying to get live results features up for the Tasmanian election (see above post) and tomorrow’s South Australian state by-election for Dunstan, which in the absence of any polling for the highly marginal seat should prove an interesting litmus test for Peter Malinauskas’s Labor government.

Monday miscellany: Coalition Senate preselections, campaign finance reforms (open thread)

An emerging conservative ascendancy in the South Australian Liberal Party finds expression in a Senate preselection boilover.

We’re entering the final week of the Tasmanian election campaign, with a hotly contested by-election for the South Australian state seat of Dunstan to be held the same day. On the federal polling front though, it’s likely to be a quiet week. There is the following federally relevant electoral news to relate:

• Arch-conservative South Australian Liberal Senator Alex Antic, who was elected in 2019 from third position on the party ticket, will be the lead candidate after a preselection vote on Saturday that will reduce fellow incumbents Anne Ruston from first to second and David Fawcett from second to third. Paul Starick of The Advertiser reports Antic won the ballot for top position ahead of Ruston by 108 votes to 98. This was despite Ruston’s greater seniority within the parliamentary party as Shadow Health Minister, and Peter Dutton reportedly “using his personal authority” to protect her. A conservative challenger, Leah Blyth, lost to Ruston by 118 votes to 82 in a vote for second position and to Fawcett by 106 to 103 in the vote for third.

• New South Wales Nationals Senator Perin Davey, who made headlines last month after a tired and emotional performance at Senate estimates, narrowly survived a preselection challenge at a party ballot held on March 8. Andrew Clennell of Sky News reports Davey scored 42 votes against 37 for Juliana McArthur, the party’s federal secretary.

• Liberal sources cited by Paul Starick of The Advertiser say Nicolle Flint has been declaring interest in returning to the Adelaide seat of Boothby, which Labor won when she vacated it in 2022. Flint “appears to have effectively ruled out” a run for the state seat of MacKillop, which it was long thought she was planning in pursuit of leadership ambitions.

• It was reported last week that Labor is developing legislation to place caps on political donations, to be balanced by greater public funding. This would be most consequential with respect to Clive Palmer, whose company Mineralogy gave $117 million to his United Australia Party before the last election, and businessman Mike Cannon-Brookes, who donated $1.2 million to Climate 200. The cap is “likely to be in the tens of thousands of dollars”, with the government concerned it be able to survive the kind of High Court challenge that Palmer says he is “absolutely considering”. It is also proposed that a cap be imposed on the amount that can be spent on campaigning in any given electorate, which teals and the Greens complain would disproportionately affect those who target small numbers of the seats. Any changes would not take effect until after the next election.

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”.