Possum has all the spiffy graphs.

As The Poll Bludger notes, there are two really interesting trends in the aggregate poll. First, the Rudd honeymoon is still very much alive for the 18-34 demographic (and it will be intriguing to see some good data on how Turnbull’s elevation shifts this – if at all – down the track.) Secondly, Labor is still doing poorly in the West, and has gone a fair way backward in South Australia. (Incidentally, the data supports the point Kim made here the other day about Labor trending upwards in Queensland federally while Anna Bligh’s state regime goes into a slump – albeit a slump which is still of election winning dimensions even if it’s not a Beattie style landslide. And federal Labor hasn’t been hurt in New South Wales by the implosion of the Iemma government.)

A lot of folks are attributing Labor’s performance in South Australia to the Murray-Darling basin issue. Again, it’s worth noting that Labor still has a primary lead of 3 points over the Coalition, but it is no doubt significant to see eight points knocked off its lead so quickly in the last quarter, after having been stable at 49% more or less since the election. I’d be interested to hear from South Australian LP-ers about what they think is going on.

If it is the Murray-Darling, this might say something interesting about the Rudd government’s ability to deal with relatively intractable problems through its preferred mode of governance. COAG is meeting today – in Perth, for the first time since the defeat of the Carpenter government. Writing in Crikey, Bernard Keane observes:

There’s something faintly pathetic about the Prime Minister sitting down with the mugs who make up our State premiers today to debate the minutiae of consumer credit laws, hazardous materials and registering business names. The contrast between that and the conflagration engulfing financial markets makes the whole COAG process look like an exercise in unreality.

Appearances are deceiving, however. The boring work of getting the Australian federation to work in as effective and business-friendly a manner as possible is a key reform, and the Prime Minister’s determination to cajole, beg and bribe the states into harmonising their regulatory frameworks across a range of areas is laudable.

Economic reform in Australia doesn’t tend to get noticed unless it comes with a capital R — the floating of the dollar, the end of protectionism, a new industrial relations regime, a GST. The smaller stuff, the 5% stuff, is mainly of interest to businesses.

It’s not glamorous, and it’s not easily spun into a “narrative”, but this sort of “5% stuff” is the nuts and bolts micro-economic reform Rudd, Tanner, Gillard and Swan promised would be a key feature of the Labor government. Most of it will probably survive the end of “Coast to Coast Labor”, and it’s probably more prone to defeat through bureaucratic and policy inertia than through some sort of crusade from Colin Barnett – which he would know well is not in his state’s interests. The days of Premiers’ conference fireworks are well and truly gone.

[It is worth observing, however, that the performance driven school bit of the Education Revolution is something Barnett wants nothing of. The politics of closing down schools - as LP observed at the time - is fraught, and if push ever came to shove, would make all the policy wonk rhetoric of metrics and incentives look completely irrelevant in electoral terms.]

Keane is right to say that much of the COAG agenda is necessary. But where it falls down may be in its intersection with issues which are both far more politicised and far more difficult to solve. In an interesting commentary in The Monthly, Judith Brett dubs such issues “Wicked Problems”:

The transition from Howard to Rudd is not about new national narratives, nor Big Ideas. It is about the hard work of solving complex policy problems which are linked by little else other than that they have been neglected for so long. Each is extraordinarily complex, and has a myriad of stakeholders and potential losers.

The Murray-Darling is one of those, as is student performance in schools, as Brett notes.

The Rudd government’s approach probably works best where policy issues are confined to one domain, with a finite number of stakeholders and a large degree of policy knowledge and smarts which can be tapped – often by doing an end run around the public service as a whole and/or by privileging Treasury’s role. Tax and welfare probably are amenable to some sort of policy fix, though the pensions issue shows how the politics of reviews and committee governance can come close to escaping attempts by the government to contain it. But issues like the Murray-Darling are just not fixeable in the same way, and climate change presents another dysfunction of the review governance model – delay costs, and stakeholder input (or rentseeking ranting from business) may well be the way that policy is watered down so much that it becomes meaningless or even counter-productive. Some old fashioned big picture instant decisions might be the better way to go.

We don’t have the constant distractions and bells and whistles of the Howard government to watch any more, but we nevertheless still do live in interesting times for Australian politics. I’m inclined to think that Rod Cameron still has the most elegant explanation of the Rudd government’s continued polling success – that public trust in government is being rebuilt through the rigid adherence on the part of Labor to keeping its election promises. But it’s still early days for the policy model and its politics, and it may be that there are some significant clues to its sustainability in the South Australian polling.

I’ve got a feeling the Nationals might go with Labor. It’s hard to explain why Brendon Grylls should give Alan Carpenter a big assist to stay in the leadership otherwise. But the contrary hypothesis would be it’s part of a game plan to keep us all guessing.

But, if the Fin Review is to be believed, the significance of a 4% plus swing to the Greens hasn’t escaped the attention of ALP wonks. “Labor hardheads” are quoted by the paper as concerned by the vote in Fremantle, and the implications for the seats of Federal Ministers such as Lindsay Tanner, Anthony Albanese and Tanya Plibersek. “Labor strategists” are cited as concerned about a drift away among “left-leaning voters”.

This is hardly rocket science. Any modern managerialist ALP government is bound to disappoint at least some left voters after the initial euphoria of a Tory defeat has worn off. And the Greens nationally are going to have a much bigger profile with a balance of power role in the Senate and new Senators who may develop a high profile. The article, however, leaves us none the wiser as to how “Labor strategists” think their party should respond.

The Labor Party’s response in the past seems to have often taken the form of “Extreme Green” propaganda. Kevin Rudd’s current disposition appears to be to ignore Bob Brown and the Greens altogether (perhaps because putting together a Senate majority comprising the Greens, Xenophon and Fielding is an inherently unwieldy act) and concentrate his rhetorical fire on the Liberals.

But at a deeper level, the fact that a party with almost 12% of the vote in WA goes unrepresented in the lower House (making something of a mockery about claims that it represents “one vote one value” because single member electoral systems don’t really do that) should cause progressives of all stripes to rethink things. There’s always going to be immense hostility from the major parties and all sorts of entrenched interests to any form of pr in any lower House (and Tasmania crippled its own governance by a Lib-Lab deal to shut the Greens more or less out of its version of Hare-Clark).

But Kevin Rudd should perhaps be thinking long term here (as he claims that he does). Tony Blair probably did want some sort of arrangement with the British Lib Dems – as demonstrated by his reaching out to then leader Paddy Ashdown and the inclusion of Lib Dem MPs and Peers in several Cabinet Committees. In the British context, even preferential voting would have been a significant innovation, however, and it was a bridge too far for Labour.

If, as has been reported, Rudd also has some sort of dream of a grand and enduring re-alignment which would consign the right of politics to a permanently embattled position, the best way to achieve this would be through electoral reform which would enable the ALP and the Greens to work together in a much less adversarial fashion. However, it’s hardly something that our Prime Minister, whose reputation for caution appears well deserved, would propose.

I think it’s time that we the citizens started pushing for this. MMP in New Zealand came about basically because of enormous distaste and alienation with business as usual “better of two evils” big party politics. This seems to me to be something an organisation such as GetUp! could well campaign on (and perhaps attractive to them because it would negate claims they’re an ALP front). It’s not as sexy as some of their issues, but it’s undeniably important. I suspect that it would actually be very much in the interests of trade unions to support such moves, because the disadvantages of putting all their eggs in the Labor basket should already be starkly apparent.

Whichever party the Nats decide to deal with, they likely won’t enter into coalition. They’d guarantee supply, but otherwise keep their options open. And given the Nats’ likely control of both houses, it would possible for one of those options to be to get legislation passed without the help of the government. Meaning ministers forced to implement legislation they voted against.

Unlikely, sure. But wouldn’t it be fun while it lasted? And what other wacky scenarios can people think up before boring reality kicks in again?

A possible Barnett premiership would shift the dynamics somewhat, but Barnett would still have considerable incentive to cooperate. Rudd’s template for COAG reform comes from the 90s when Liberal premiers such as Kennett, Greiner and Court worked with Labor premiers such as Goss and Paul Keating’s government.

It’s also worth remembering that Rudd’s “ending the blame game” promise was explicitly defined as a response to the “coast to coast Labor” scare. A Liberal state government or two would allow Rudd to sharpen the almighty Narrative some, as well as enabling him to adopt a somewhat tougher political persona, just as Labor will probably benefit politically from Liberal Senate obstructionism. It would be very far from the disaster some short sighted commentators with short memories seem to think it would be.

The Nationals in WA are more agrarian socialist than they are in the rest of the country, and there are some who say that Brendan Grylls personally leans more towards the Labor Party. Common ‘wisdom’ and Liberal MPs suggest that the Libs and Nats will come to an arrangement, but Gryll’s personal politics, and a desire (and need) to appear genuinely independent and influential mean that there’s a good chance he may prefer to make a deal with Carpenter.

Whether Carps will want to, when it will mean having to fork out a huge amount of money to rural seats, in addition to meeting all his election promises, and dealing with the instability of an angry party and CCC reports, is another question. Whether he’s capable of working with another party when he’s so terrible at working with his own is a third. To be successful would require an ability to reach a consensus, at least with the most important bills; that just isn’t his style.

But whichever man ends up Premier, both parties need to learn some serious lessons from yesterday’s result. On the booth I was on, there didn’t seem to be a lot of passion, either for or against anyone. This is reflected in the high minor/independent vote, and in what I’m betting is a high informal vote. While there were plenty of those heartbreaking votes with just a one that are clearly intended as formal votes, it appeared to me like there were a much bigger number of blank papers than usual. Unfortunately they are all lumped together in the final result – so anyone else who scrutineered a count last night, I’d be interested to hear your observations. For that many people to make the effort to get to the booth, wait in line, fold up the piece of paper and put it in the box, it says a lot that they found writing five or six digits too much of an ask. It also felt like there were much more donkey votes than usual, although with those it really is hard to tell whether it was intended as a donkey vote or an actual expression of preferences. Perhaps Mr Bludger can assess the results of candidates at the top of the paper as compared to their expected results?

One of the most effective ads of the campaign (as opposed to the one I enjoyed the most) was a silent piece that asked the viewer to name three things that the Labor Government had done with the boom. A Labor hack who pays attention to politics, I struggled for a while to answer the question. I have no doubt that most people struggled. Partly because it was a question that would have taken people by surprise, it’s also because, though arrogant about their mad skills as a government, they weren’t very good at The Narrative. Also, they weren’t all that flushed with mad skills. The Carpenter Government was uninspiring, lacked passion, and were pretty crap at understanding and communicating with the community. Their lack of political ability was made crystal clear in their lack of direct response to the ad. When I first saw it, I thought it was a good ad, too early. Turns out, I overestimated the Labor campaign team. It should have taken an hour’s writing and a day’s production to create a simple ad: “Only three things? Here’s 10!” Even they could have managed 10. I think.

They also need to learn how to work with others. It’s going to be an oft-repeated mantra that one of the reasons for the disaster was the imposition of parachuted candidates into seats. This is missing the point. Candidates like Bob Kucera were also parachuted candidates, but he knew how to work with local rank and file party members and supporters. What was a problem was campaign teams who thought they could run the show without them, and who didn’t care about including everyone. It was merely an extension of the last three years, in which the government grew even more distant from the party, and in which the rank and file grew increasingly disconnected. You can’t get a whole community excited about you if you can’t even bring your own party along. Not to mention another party…

Another problem with the “Dream Team” was the lack of diversity. While it was important for Carpenter to make a symbolic break from the problems of the last few years, his focus on actual “youth” alone was a mistake. In telling Kucera he was too old, for example, the Premier told a large group of his voting base that they, too, were too old.

Right now, the two parties are both trying to make deals with the Nationals and Independent MPs. But regardless of who wins, both parties will need to seriously examine the reasons for this result. It’s the job of the various party offices to examine the campaign flaws, however. Let’s hope that MPs choose to focus on the reasons they failed, as well.

But over in the West, Brendon Grylls’ strategy has worked a treat, with the Nats improving their vote and holding the balance of power in both houses. At state level, agrarian socialism and the politics of pork barrelling and extortionate negotiation seems to be a viable strategy for the party. So both Warren Truss and Barnaby Joyce have been contemplating an exit from the federal Coalition. As Andrew Bartlett points out, this is pretty weird for two Queenslanders who are supporting a merged entity at state level. The Nats, of course, don’t see the dissonance, because they’ve effectively swallowed up the Queensland Libs, and are happily preselecting their own members as LNP candidates in state seats which the Liberals had a better chance of winning in, and claiming that the “new face of Queensland” comprises a frontbench where the Borg has only one Brisbane member. Meanwhile, some former Liberals sit on the sidelines, hoping to resurrect their party if the LNP bombs at its first electoral outing when Anna Bligh goes to the polls.

In actual fact, the Nationals are a collection of disparate state parties rather than a national party. What works in WA and SA may not work in Victoria, NSW or Queensland. It leaves them in a huge dilemma, though, about how they position themselves federally, and any choice they make there – whether the previously mooted amalgamation or a Coalition split – will in turn effect their state strategies. The WA Nats are actually rather lucky they don’t have any federal representation.

Ever.

This was an election where all of the ALP’s problems over the last 6-8 years came home to roost.

There was no central theme. The campaign material was ugly, late out, badly written, and largely unrelated to anything voters actually cared about.

The central campaign was a shambles, courtesy of a complete disconnect between the Parliamentary Labor party, party office, and the lay ALP membership.

Local campaigns were worse – added to little or no leadership from Stirling St was the placement of inexperienced and incompetent teams in a large number of individual local campaigns. People who had either no campaigning experience, no recent campaigning experience, or who were completely subservient to the sitting members for whom they worked.

Add to this lazy and complacent sitting members, who assumed Buswell would take the Liberal party to the election, did no work as a consequence and are now looking about for someone else to blame.

Add to this a poll-based campaign which had its agenda set from data collected by a polling company that, it would now appear, knew fuck all about anything.

Add to this a lack of political operatives with a marginal seat campaigning background in ministerial offices – a key way of making sure that community concerns about sensitive issues are recognised and dealt with, and the best way of ensuring that ministers and the premier are aware what the actual issues are.

Add to this the complete inability of the Carpenter government to capitalise on its record of being a generally competent government – or even mention it during the campaign. Despite the usual media angst, there are no real problems in health and lauranorder in WA, and the looming infrastructure issues are largely in hand.

Add to this the fact that a two term government appears to have been outspent by a Liberal party that was broke and widely regarded as unelectable as recently as a month ago. How, a month before the election, was Stirling St not up to the armpits in cash?

Make no mistake, the ALP lost the campaign – Barnett didn’t win it. And they’ve lost, whether they’re able to form a minority government or not. While a Barnett government will be unstable, a returned Carpenter government will be worse – the presence of Michelle Roberts in the caucus room, at the very least, will ensure that.

They got beat because it was the worst run political campaign in recent history.

Sure, there was a generally hostile media environment (with Paul Armstrong at the West, in particular, intent on playing kingmaker at the state government level), a number of running (CCC, for example) issues, a Premier with little direct experience of formal campaigning and questionable political instincts, a botched preselection process which saw a number of sitting members dumped, and general voter fatigue with the government.

But those people in the WA ALP now looking for someone to blame – every MP who failed to get returned, every staffer newly out of a job, every political wannabe currently staring at the wreckage of their ambition – wants to pay close attention to the top part of that list, because the reasons they were weeping into their Crown lagers last night were the product of eight years of inattention and lack of political forethought, not one man’s decision to call an election six months early.

10.48pm. I’ll wrap it up here and carry on over at my place, so enormous thanks to Mark Bahnisch for allowing me to clog up his page. The Liberals have gained Ocean Reef, North West, Jandakot, Swan Hills, Mount Lawley, Bunbury, Darling Range, Kingsley, Wanneroo, Southern River and apparently Morley. Varying degrees of doubt remain about Riverton, Forrestfield, Collie-Preston and Morley. Labor might make a notional gain of Albany. Former Labor independent John Bowler has won Kalgoorlie from the Liberals. Labor may have lost Kwinana to independent Carol Adams. Independents Janet Woollard in Alfred Cove and Sue Walker in Nedlands may or may not lose their seats to the Liberals. The numbers are 27 to 29 for Labor plus Labor independents, with either one or two of the latter; 26 to 28 for the Liberals plus Liberal independents, also with one to three of the latter; and four for the Nationals.

10.33pm. ABC computer has Southern River back as Liberal win.

10.26pm. Primary votes in Southern River are Liberal 45.5 per cent, Labor 39.2 per cent, Greens 10.1 per cent, CDP plus Family First 5.5 per cent. The latter would make it very tough for Labor indeed.

10.24pm. ABC computer only has Southern River as “LIB ahead”, when the consensus seems to be that it’s gone.

10.17pm. Morley: Labor 36.0 per cent, Liberal 34.0 per cent, John D’Orazio 17.4 per cent. D’Orazio himself presumably knows something about it, and seems to think his preferences will give it to the Liberals. With the Greens vote on 7.6 per cent, I wouldn’t be so sure quite yet.

10.09pm. Alfred Cove still complicated: Liberal 43.4 per cent, Janet Woollard 25.5 per cent, Labor 20.1 per cent, Greens 9.4 per cent. Not sure what chance of Greens preferences putting Labor ahead of Woollard.

10.05pm. Carpenter not conceding.

10.02pm. So a left-right split of between 15-21 and 17-19. Greens one to five. Nationals one to four. Zero to three for the religious parties.

10.00pm. To clarify, this upper house stuff is based on very sketchy educated guesses following on from lower house trends.

10.00pm. Upper house part six: Mining and Pastoral. Upredictable, but very likely three left, three right. Greens and Nationals both in contention.

9.56pm. Upper house part five: Agricultural. Labor not certain of two seats: could be three Liberal, one Nationals and one Family First, or maybe two Nationals.

9.52pm. Upper house part four: South West. Looking like a close shave between four-two and three-all between right and left. A third left seat would certainly go to Greens. Family First and the Nationals in the mix for the three or four right seats.

9.45pm. Upper house part three: South Metropolitan. Liberals likely to have done well enough to have won a third seat, which if true is very bad news for Labor. Could be three Liberal, three Labor; or three Liberal, two Labor, one Greens.

9.42pm. Steven Smith says last Forrestfield booth good for Labor, returning it to lineball. But nobody doubts the Liberals have won Wanneroo, which decides the issue.

9.41pm. Upper house part two: North Metropolitan. Unlikely to be other than Liberal 3, Labor 2, Greens 1.

9.38pm. Upper house part one: East Metropolitan. The swing here might just be at that exact point it needed to be to give the CDP the final seat; it could otherwise go to the Greens. Other than that, Labor three and Liberals two.

9.33pm. Consensus seems to be Liberal Bill Marmion will defeat Sue Walker in Nedlands. The consensus probably knows something I don’t: figures are Liberal 43.6 per cent, Walker 23.5 per cent, Labor 16.4 per cent, Greens 14.1 per cent. Are Greens preferences putting Labor ahead of Walker?

9.31pm. The Greens still looking likely to fall short of overtaking the Liberals in Fremantle. McGinty on 38.9 per cent, Liberal 29.7 per cent and Greens 27.7 per cent, with the only preferences to come Family First and CDP.

9.27pm. In Kwinana, independent Carol Adams is well ahead of the Liberal, 24.4 per cent to 16.9 per cent, and very likely to ride over Labor on 39.6 per cent.

9.22pm. John Bowler also playing the leverage game.

9.15pm. Labor apparently think they’re gone in Forrestfield, yet with apparently all booths in they have a lead on the primary vote and likely to go further ahead on Greens preferences. Obviously I’m missing something here. Smith sounding modestly confident about Albany.

9.15pm. Brendon Grylls of the Nationals talking tough on who he’ll support, no doubt for leverage purposes.

9.12pm. Looks like all the booths are in from Wanneroo, and it’s the straw that’s broken the camel’s back. The Liberals lead 43.6 to 40.3 per cent, the Greens are on 8.6 per cent and apparently flowing weakly to Labor, and the CDP and Family first (5.3 per cent between them) would be going the other way. Most likely result looks like Labor with maybe 25 or 26 plus two Labor independents, with 30 required for a majority.

9.07pm. ABC computer gives Fremantle back to the Greens, but with 46.1 per cent counted and the computer’s unreliable record in calling contests involving the Greens.

9.05pm. Julie Bishop pretty much calling a Labor defeat.

9.04pm. Nationals seem to have won the four seats I expected: Central Wheatbelt, Wagin, Blackwood-Stirling and Moore.

9.03pm. Smith now sounding gloomy about Forrestfield as well as Wanneroo, and they need to hold both. Riverton and Collie-Preston very close; Labor 300 votes ahead in Albany.

9.02pm. Situation confused in Kwinana, but Antony Green and Stephen Smith seem to think the independent Carol Adams will win it.

9.01pm. Labor lead dwindling in Albany.

8.59pm. If anyone’s reading this at LP, I’m double-posting both here and at PB.

8.58pm. A reader says I’m too quick to write off the Greens in Fremantle, which may well be right.

8.57pm. ABC has Liberal 1.3 per cent ahead in Wanneroo, which would mean the end for Labor if so. But Antony Green warns that projections can be unreliable in this kind of growth corridor seat.

8.55pm. ABC computer giving North West to Labor, confirming what we’ve been hearing via scrutineers for a while.

8.54pm. ABC computer calling Collie-Preston for Labor.

8.51pm. Seats crucial to the outcome according to ABC commentators: Albany (51-49), Collie-Preston (51-49, big booth to come), Riverton (shaky), Wanneroo (49-51), Forrestfield (50-50), Joondalup (looking good for Labor). Labor would need to win all of them.

8.50pm. Labor clearly home in Joondalup, the 1.5 per cent swing very surprising under the circumstances.

8.48pm. Labor still ahead in Albany with 33.5 per cent now counted, after being stuck on 17 per cent for a long time. But the big booths in Albany proper as opposed to the rural hinterland could yet reverse this.

8.46pm. ABC computer calling Kalgoorlie for John Bowler, so there’s one piece of good news for Labor.

8.45pm. ABC now calling Wanneroo for the Liberals. Morley depends on John D’Orazio’s preferences, with reason to believe they will cost Labor the seat. Chamber graphic says Labor 29 seats, but that’s at the upper range of what seems likely. If it’s true there might yet be a minority government with support from John Bowler in Kalgoorlie.

8.43pm. Raw primary vote with 46.3 per cent counted: Labor down 6.2 per cent to 35.7 per cent, Liberal up 3.3 per cent to 39.0 per cent, Nationals up 1.2 per cent to 4.8 per cent, Greens up 3.9 per cent to 11.5 per cent. If that holds, the pollsters have done very well, but maybe calculated the 2PP wrong due to mistaken preference assumptions.

8.42pm. Jim McGinty’s scare over in Fremantle. As I was about to say, parts of Fremantle are migrant and low-income areas that don’t vote Greens, but other parts are very bohemian.

8.41pm. ABC computer still calling Joondalup for Labor, which I thought they would have dropped at a losing election.

8.40pm. Liberal Riverton candidate Mike Nahan complaining of expensive Labor campaign in Riverton, but says it has come at the expense of Labor defeats in Southern River and Jandakot.

8.38pm. Talk of Greens preferences overall behaving in peculiar ways. Labor can normally depend on at least 70 per cent of them and is reportedly not getting them.

8.35pm. 37.5 per cent counted in Fremantle, parts of which are greener than others, but Greens well ahead of Liberal 29.5 per cent to 27.3 per cent and Jim McGinty on a very weak 39.9 per cent. Parts of Fremantle are greener than others, but McGinty in big trouble from there.

8.34pm. Looks like I wreak havoc wherever I tread – LP now crashing. Am trying to do it both here and there.

8.30pm. Steven Smith calling Morley for the Liberals, but thinks John Bowler has won Kalgoorlie. Thinks Albany in play, but we’ve heard nothing about it from ages. Collie-Preston, Riverton, Joondalup, Forrestfield and Wanneroo all more or less 50-50. Outer limits of best case scenario for Labor means minority government plus John Bowler.

8.20pm. Thanks Mark. Labor can only afford to lose nine seats.

Labor losses: Darling Range, Ocean Reef, Bunbury, Jandakot, Mt Lawley, Southern River, Swan Hills, Kingsley

Labor in trouble: Forrestfield, Wanneroo, North West.

Close: Forrestfield, Collie-Preston, Joondalup, Riverton, Morley.

Miracles Labor can hope for: Albany, independent John Bowler in Kalgoorlie.

Shocks: Labor appears to have lost Kwinana to independent Carol Adams, and Jim McGinty might lost Fremantle to the Greens.