As a bit of a postscript to my last post on the latest Queensland Newspoll, The Poll Bludger advises that Antony Green’s analysis of the redistributed state electoral boundaries has been published as a paper by the Queensland Parliamentary Library. It’s an invaluable resource for any Queensland politics watchers. According to Green’s calculations, Labor now nominally holds 62 out of 89 seats on the new boundaries (up from 59 won in the 2006 election). The LNP now needs to win 22 (up from 20) to form a majority government, and Labor would have to suffer a negative swing of 7.6% to lose its majority (up from -7.2%).
I’d be surprised if anyone sensible in the LNP could put together a target list of 22 or more seats where they have a realistic chance.
It really does make you wonder about this sort of commentary in The Australian:
LABOR has slowed the momentum of the Liberal National Party’s run to the next election in Queensland but Premier Anna Bligh is struggling to keep pace with her Opposition and satisfy community expectations.
Here’s an irony of poor analysis and sticking desperately to a “narrative” – to the extent that Anna Bligh can leverage this sort of coverage into a perception that she’s more of an underdog and the contest closer than it actually appears to be at the moment, she’s the effective winner from biased and/or uninformed stories.
So…what happens to the Lib Nats if they can’t win the next election? They’ll win seats, because it would be almost impossible NOT to, but if they can’t get close to government then the whole Goldbergian contraption will implode around Springborg’s ears, and probably strengthen the cause of anti-coalitionists in the Nationals.
It’s a really interesting question.
For a start, the Borg is toast if they lose.
Then the issue is whether they can put a brave face on it and hold together for another go with someone else (but who? they’re all problematic in one way or another, and how would the Nats react if there’s a Liberal LNP leader?) or if they splinter – and if so, into how many bits.
And already I think Barnaby is probably muddying the waters. People aren’t dumb. They can see his plays as being part of the same takeover or push aside the Libs mindset federally as we’ve got here with the Nats, and how does talk of a “new country party” remotely fit in with the supposedly unified LNP at state level? The schizoid nature of their presence across different levels of government is a real problem for them – I mean, is Campbell Newman the Liberal lord mayor? Or the LNP lord mayor? Note that they were trying to piggyback the back of the envelope public transport policy on his popularity, a lot of which I strongly suspect has evaporated since the BCC election anyway.
I think it’s safe to say that the LNP will not depart from the recent Queensland tradition of complete farce in an election year one way or another.
Mark,
It would have been fair to say the same thing about the ALP in WA prior to the last election.
Ok, I have to ask, just call it curiosity/unawareness.
Why do redistributions always seem to favor the Labor Party? Is it statistical anomolies, a correction from conservative friendly boundary drawing or intentional/unintentional effects of map makers when they are drawing the boundaries? It just seems a little odd that all of the most recent boundary changes that I can think of favor Labor and that this one ended in a 3 seat decifit for the LNP.
(I know WA was redistributed on one vote one value, so I guess you would have expected a slide back from the conservatives, but I don’t get that in QLD, because we disn’t change the underlying system by that much.)
PinkyOz
I think maybe that’s a question for Antony! I haven’t looked closely enough at all the changes to be able to venture an opinion. In the past, there’s been some suggestion that the quality of the work the ALP has put in has simply been much higher than that of the Nats and the Libs in the period when the Electoral Office invites submissions.
I’d say the redistribution doesn’t help either side in the end. The swing for change of government is hardly changed. On paper, the seats that notionally change party are:
Glass House switches from Labor to LNP, mainly because the bits it picks up from Nanango and Nicklin are conservative voting, while Labor booths in Caboolture are removed. The seat is definately weaker for Labor but estimating a margin is tough. Anyway, I think it is a seat Labor should never have won in the first place back in 2001.
Clayfield switches from Liberal to Labor. That’s true on paper because it couldn’t help but pick up Labor booths from neighbouring electorate, but I would be very surprised if Labor beat Tim Nicholls.
Mirani switches from National to Labor because it picks up a bunch of mining towns from the abolished Labor seat of Fitzroy. But without Jim Pearce, Labor may not do as well in those towns, so again, this seat is only notional Labor.
Burdekin also notionally switches from National to Labor because it gains Bowen, but that change also makes it much much harder for Labor to hold Whitsunday.
I don’t think the new boundaries make much change to the chances of Labor winning the election. What the redistribution did do was add another pressure for the Liberal and National Parties to sort out whether to merge. With so many vulnerable Labor seats on the Gold Coast up for grabs, and around the growing outer edges of greater Brisbane, the pressure to resolve who would run in each seat was another pressure for merger.
Thanks Antony, now I know.
While you’re chatting about things Brisbane – try not to hassle this guy over his carbon footprint.
The last federal and state redistributions in Victoria probably favoured the Libs all up. But I’d say that most redistributions will appear to favour Labor at the moment because the largest growth areas are in generally Labor-leaning areas. You have the growth regions on the edges of the big cities (predominantly Labor seats although certainly not all) and the inner urban apartment booms (even more likely to be Labor).
So when the redistribution happens they are generally taking votes out of over-populated Labor seats. This doesn’t always translate to boosting Labor but it probably will more than half the time.
“Clayfield switches from Liberal to Labor. That’s true on paper because it couldn’t help but pick up Labor booths from neighbouring electorate, but I would be very surprised if Labor beat Tim Nicholls.”
That was my initial reading of the situation too Antony, but looking closely at the suberbs moved into Clayfield it will be no walk in the park for Nicholls.
“Albion, Ascot, Chermside East, Clayfield East, Clayfield West, Doomben, Hamilton, Hendra, Hendra East, Kalinga, Kedron High, Lutwyche, Nundah, Nundah North, Nundah West, Pinkenba, Wavell Heights East, all feed voters into Clayfield post redistribution.
If Labor puts the heat and pressure on Nicholls that they put on Caltabiano last election, it will be interesting to say the least.
Steve,
You mean pick a high profile celebrity candidate and wait for the Liberals to implode?
PinkyOz
Another headache for the Liberal National Party is that they have a stack of very risky marginals of their own.
Liberal NationalSeats (23)
Warrego 22.7
Gympie 22.0
Callide 20.4
Southern Downs 20.4
Condamine 18.6
Surfers Paradise 12.1
Gregory 12.0
Toowoomba South 11.3
Buderim 9.3
Maroochydore 8.4
Moggill 8.0
Burnett 7.4
Noosa 7.4
Beaudesert 5.9
Dalrymple 7.7
Lockyer 3.4
Mermaid Beach 2.8
Kawana 2.6
Currumbin 2.2
Hinchinbrook 2.0
Caloundra 1.9
Bundaberg 1.0
Glass House 0.1
Bundaberg, Caloundra, Hinchinbrook, Kawana and Lockyer all have good reason to fall Labor’s way rather than the Liberal National Party’s way.
Bundaberg was just lost to labor last election due to poor internal party strategy. If they got their act together locally this time it could be different. The problem next year is that the Patel trial could make it difficult.
Caloundra has taken a lot of the area around Australia Zoo out of Glasshouse and the Deputy Leader of the Liberal National Party McArdle will be very much at the mercy of how the significant Green vote goes.
Hinchinbrook again has the Green vote as the difference between Labor and the Liberal National Party.
Kawana is interesting because the sitting member Steve Dickson has bolted to the new safe Liberal seat of Buderim, Leaving the Liberal National Party to fight this one out without a sitting member. The Greens 10.4% once again have enough supporters in this electorate to decide who wins.
Lockyer is an interesting electorate because the National Party vote has been seriously eroding in recent elections mainly under the influence of work related campaigns. It is the heart of Family First’s Queensland support and these voters might drag the degenerating Nationals over the line.
Add to the above list Mirani and Burdekin as troublesome for the Liberal National Party..
Mirani because it now includes the coalfields areas of the now abolished Fitzroy.The following areas have been transferred from Fitzroy to Mirani:
Alton Downs, Bajool, Baree, Bouldercombe, Dysart, Middlemount, Mt Morgan, Parkhurst, Ridgelands, Rockhampton High, Stanwell, The Caves, Westwood, Yeppoon,
Burdekin because the coalmining town of Bowen has been transferred from Whitsunday electorate.
Steve, the booths you listed as being moved into Clayfield were the booths that were in Clayfield at the 2006 election and voted Liberal. In total about 3,000 voters in Lutwyche and kedron have been transferred in. They were in Stafford last time, but I’d expect they would not be as strong for Labor once in a seat where the Liberal Party run a serious campiagn. That’s why I say the estimated Labor margin shouldn’t be taken that seriously. If the Labor were win Clayfield then there is no mystery about the election result, it would be another Labor landslide.
If you look at Brisbane seats, the trends are obvious. Moggill was the only Liberal seat at the 2001 and 2004 elections, joined by Clayfield in 2006. The other two regular Liberal seats in the 1990s were Indooroopilly and Aspley, so you can can count those seats as the four basic Liberal seats, and they correspond the traditional Liberal wards on Brisbane City Council.
The only other seats won by the Liberals since 1989 have been Mount Ommaney, Greenslopes and Mansfield for a single term in 1995. Sherwood which became Mount Ommaney was also won by the Liberals in 1989. There was also Chatsworth at the 2005 by-election.
Just outside Brisbane, Redlands was won by the Nationals in 1995 and 1998, Springwood was Liberal held for a single term in 1995 and Albert won by the Nationals in 1995 and 1998. Every one of those seats in the south-east corridor was affected by the proposed second tollway issue in 1995.
Oh come off it Steve, unless there is another landslide, I can name a dozen Labor MPs who will really struggle to hold their seats. I’d be amazed if Labor spent money chasing the seats you mention. They’ll be defending their own come the election unless its another landslide.
Obviously the single biggest contribution of the merger electorally will be to get around the “just vote one” habit everyone’s now got by only running one candidate – but I’m not sure how effective that will be for a number of reasons.
Antony, I think my point (and I should have argued it at greater length) is twofold – the first being that a uniform swing wasn’t much in evidence last time around – there were very regionally specific swings going in opposite directions – strongly against Labor on the Sunshine Coast, strongly to Labor in parts of the Darling Downs and Central and North Queensland, etc. I think it’s possible (just) that a very strong swing away from Labor could see a lot of dominoes fall, but I think it’s more likely that there’ll be movement in both directions and not much of it, in the absence of some big shift that the Borg might pull off during the campaign itself or some big snafu from Labor. If that’s the case, then I think (secondly) the number of seats does matter – particularly where incumbents are well dug in.
I think the possibility of Labor capturing LNP (particularly ex-Nat) marginals is less than last time because WorkChoices had a big impact in some regional seats which prefigured the federal swing (cf. the seats in the federal division of Blair and the later federal result). But I wouldn’t entirely discount it, and there’s always a risk from independents – particularly given the dynamics of the merger and some of the noise that will be coming from the federal arena – particularly from Barnaby.
Mark, I think the Independent conservatives will be the big unknown at the next election and can’t really be taken into account yet. There are huge numbers of former councilors roaming around left over from the amalgamation process that could cause the conservatives no end of trouble.
Antony, I don’t read the polls presently being very encouraging for the Liberal National Party at all. Even at 51/49 before the latest newspoll their support looked soft. Post the latest Newspoll they have a lot of work to do.
steve, yep, that’s what I was thinking about – the other unknown is disaffected Liberals who didn’t join the LNP potentially doing something in SEQ. At one point some of them appeared to be trying to go with the Mal Brough pseudo-plan of keeping the Libs alive as a legal entity. That obviously didn’t pan out. What do they do now? Wait for the LNP to fall over? Get out of politics altogether? And another factor may be the thin membership of the LNP in parts of Brisbane due to Liberals leaving/failing to renew – insofar as this plays a part in the resources available for a campaign in the city.
Antony what do you think the chance of the LNP getting these seats back that you mentioned? Surely they would be high on the LNP’s hitlist?
“Mount Ommaney, Greenslopes, Mansfield, Redlands, Springwood, Albert.”
Mumble seems to think there is some problem with the latest Newspoll numbers too in a week when we saw the Federal and state polling come out in the same week, but given that I would have thought the Liberal National Primary vote of 37% would be troubling for them.
http://www.mumble.com.au/
Yep, he may have a point. Additionally – there was something a bit odd about the SA numbers too, as you can see at The Poll Bludger.
Politically, Springborg has a major credibility problem with $64 Billion worth of promises made since the last election. $57 Billion by the National Party and $7 Billion by the Liberals with almost a year’s worth of their promises yet to come.
http://www.parliament.qld.gov.au/view/legislativeAssembly/tableOffice/documents/TabledPapers/2008/5208T4248.pdf
Its amazing. 1 bad poll and you waste no time in bagging the LNP. Labor has 5 bad polls in a row and we dont hear a word. The LNP will win seats at the next election. Whether it is enough to win government I dont think so. The seats the LNP will win are
Glasshouse
Whitsunday
Coomera
Redlands
Hervey Bay
Cleveland
Indoorapilly
Buderim
Keppel
Chatsworth
Jamie, I think the issue is that Labor haven’t had five bad polls in a row. Just because its better than the 2006 election doesn’t make it good for the LNP or bad for Labor. Until the most recent newspoll even a 51-49 result is only a 3.9% swing. If uniform, and as Mark points out that’s unlikely, that means only 11 seats would change hands. thats half the required number at best. BTW the LNP aleady notionally hold Glasshouse and Buderim, so even your estimate seems to be a pickup of 10.
I wouldn’t discount Aspley just yet. It depends what is happening across Brisbane. You also need to be careful with seats like Chatsworth and Cleveland where high profile candidates/MPs such as Andrew Trim and Michael Caltibiano contributed to a close result last time and are not running this time. You’d expect a win in those two seats, but you never know. Just because Vince Lester once held Keppell doesn’t make it LNP territory. It is a changed area and Yeppoon has more southerners. Redlands just elected a green anti development Mayor. Even Indooroopilly requires nearly 3% and the vote will be all over the place after Rhonan Lee’s defection and you can guarantee, despite the anti-rat rhetoric that the Greens and Labor will do a preference deal, so even in your list there is plenty of doubt. Don’t discount seats like Mudgeeraba and Gaven. I’d think it odd to get Coomera but not those. The key is SEQ – particularly Gold Coast and Brisbane. If the LNP cannot get traction they can’t win and every winnable seat in SEQ they concede (fail to win) they have to pick up a double digit seat from Labor.
I think 22 seats and an 8% swing to get an absolute majority is an extraordinarily difficult ask even though there is clearly dissatisfaction with the Government. Even then, I find it difficult to identify 15 seats that are likely to fall, nevermind 22.
Some dopey comments by some LNPers that suggested the recent polls were as as good as a win (one senior LNP person was claiming tat galaxy poll suggested LNP was eady for Government and a recent invite asked donors to come and meet the next government). This won’t help them claim the underdog status, while Bligh is sitting in a pretty good electoal position and yet seems to be being awarded underdog status without contest thanks to some poor commentary in the Australian and the Courier Mail.
Only in Queensland…
Jamie, congratulations for at least having a go but your list has a fatal flaw and that as Gobsmacked points out is that your list doesn’t take into account the Newspoll from last week. Your list appears to have been framed on the basis of the September Newspoll.
At this point all I would concede as lost to Labor from your list post Dec Newspoll are Indooroopilly and Glasshouse. Indooroopilly could be won by the Liberal National Party or the Greens depending on the extent of the traditional triennial implosion of the Liberal National Party which we all anticipate with glee.
The next Newspoll in March will be vital in determining how the election shapes up if it turns one more in Labor’s favour then the Liberal National Party would struggle throughout the election year I suspect. Forget Murdoch Press inspired plans for an election before the March Newspoll results are known, there is no way it will happen.
http://blogs.crikey.com.au/pollytics/files/2008/12/qldvotes.png
In the interests of fairness if the March Newspoll was to break for some inconceivable reason towards the Liberal National Party then from a technical chart analysis point of view it would herald massive problems for Labor.
It’s just very difficult to image why a Newspoll in the next little while would favour the Liberal National Party.