Petrie | AustralianPolitics.com

Seats That Swung To The Coalition In The 2016 Federal Election

July 14, 2016

As counting proceeds in the 2016 House of Representatives elections, it appears that only 16 seats resisted the nationwide swing to the ALP.

Fifteen seats held by the Liberal Party and 1 seat held by The Nationals recorded swings away from the ALP. Thirteen of these seats were already held by the Coalition.

The swings range from 0.09% in Cook to 3.04% in Deakin.

The Liberal Party won just one seat from the ALP, the Melbourne electorate of Chisholm, with a swing of 2.91%.

The national two-party-preferred swing against the Coalition currently stands at 3.16%. Every State and Territory swung to the ALP, ranging from 0.72% in the Australian Capital Territory to 8.90% in South Australia.

The Coalition won the State two-party-preferred contest in NSW (50.42%), Queensland (53.95%) and Western Australia (54.54%).

Update On Undecided Seats – Hung Parliament Looks Most Likely

July 5, 2016

11.39pm – Today I have removed 4 seats from the list of undecideds.

The 4 seats no longer considered undecided are: Robertson, Batman, La Trobe and Petrie.

Their removal means that the Coalition now has 68 seats, the ALP 66, and Others 5.

Of the 11 remaining seats in doubt, the Coalition is ahead in 5 and the ALP is ahead in 6. If these seats were to stay that way, the Coalition would finish with 73 seats, the ALP 72, and Others 5. The government would be three seats short of an absolute majority and we would have a hung Parliament.

Many media reports say there are only 8 or 9 doubtful seats. I have included Barker and Grey because the Australian Electoral Commission has not finished the reordering of two-party-preferred votes (Labor v. Liberal) to two-candidate-preferred (Liberal v. Xenophon). Both seats are likely to remain with the Liberals.

I have also included Melbourne Ports in the list of doubtful seats. There is a possibility that the full distribution of preferences could see the Greens overtake the ALP and move into second place. ALP preferences could then elect either the Green or Liberal candidate. The incumbent Labor MP, Michael Danby, issued a how-to-vote card that placed the Liberal candidate ahead of the Green. This adds an extra complication to predictions for this seat.

Ten seats in the table all have a margin of close-to or less than 1000 votes. Most have a margin of less than 1%. Experience shows that a margin of 1000 votes is unlikely to be reversed by postal, absent and declaration votes, although this varies widely between electorates.

There is a case to be made that Forde is the only doubtful seat left, but such a judgment is somewhat premature. The picture should be clearer by the end of Wednesday, July 6, after the counting of more postal votes.

House Of Representatives Undecided Seats: Latest Figures

July 3, 2016

These are the latest figures for seats that remain undecided in the House of Representatives.

The 15 seats in the table all have a margin of close-to or less than 1000 votes. Most have a margin of less than 1%. Experience shows that a margin of 1000 votes is unlikely to be reversed by postal, absent and declaration votes.

Of the 15 seats, the Coalition is ahead in 7, the ALP is ahead in 7 and the Nick Xenophon Team leads in 1.

On current counting, the Coalition and ALP each have a definite 65 seats, although estimates vary. If the Coalition were to maintain its lead in the 7 seats it is ahead in, it would have 72 seats, four short of an absolute majority of 76. If the ALP were to maintain its lead in the other 7 seats, it would have 72 seats, four short of an absolute majority. A government victory with 76 seats is possible, but the coalition will need to capture 11 seats from the list below. It cannot win Batman.

The seats of Batman, La Trobe and Melbourne Ports, in Victoria, and Robertson, in NSW, are not seriously in doubt. In Queensland, it is unlikely that Capricornia, Herbert and Petrie will change. In South Australia, it is not expected that NXT will win Barker, but very few votes have been posted as yet. Given the large number of pre-poll and postal votes, I have adopted an ultra-cautious approach to the list but I expect to be able to remove seats from this list in the next couple of days.

Significant new figures will not be available until Tuesday, July 5, when the counting of postal votes begins.

The table will be updated each day until all seats are decided.

Teresa Gambaro Announces Retirement At Next Election

March 9, 2016

Teresa Gambaro, the LNP member for Brisbane and the first woman of Italian origin to sit in the House of Representatives, has announced that she will retire at the election due this year.

Gambaro

Gambaro has held Brisbane since 2010, when she defeated the former Labor member, Arch Bevis. The ALP had held Brisbane for 30 years at that point.

Before representing Brisbane, Gambaro was the Liberal member for Petrie, winning the seat in 1996 and holding it until she was one of the casualties of the Howard government’s defeat in 2007.

Gambaro became a Parliamentary Secretary in 2004 and was Assistant Minister for Immigration and Citizenship in the final nine months of the Howard government in 2007.

She was Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for International Development Assistance and Shadow Parliamentary Secretary for Citizenship and Settlement from 2010 until the coalition’s victory in 2013. The former prime minister, Tony Abbott, did not include her in his ministry after the election.

Yvette D’Ath Wins Queensland Redcliffe By-Election For Labor With 16% Swing

February 22, 2014

Yvette D’Ath has reclaimed the Queensland Legislative Assembly district of Redcliffe for the Labor Party with a 16.1% swing in today’s by-election.

D'Ath She defeated the Liberal National candidate, Kerri-Anne Dooley, who stood in place of the former LNP member, Scott Driscoll.

D’Ath was the former Labor member for the federal electorate of Petrie for two terms from 2007 until her defeat last year.

The ALP’s primary vote rose 12.9% to 43.6% whilst the LNP’s fell 14.1% to 35.1%. The Greens vote fell 2.8% to 4.0%. An independent candidate polled 10.6%.

The ALP’s two-party-preferred vote is 56% to the LNP’s 44%.

Redcliffe is an electorate to the north and northeast of Brisbane. It includes the suburbs of Clontarf, Margate, Kippa-Ring, Redcliffe and Woody Point, as well as Moreton Island. Since its creation in 1960, it was held by the Liberal Party until the ALP won it in 1989 and retained it until 2005. The Liberals briefly held it again in 2005-06, before the ALP won it again.

The by-election was caused by the resignation of the former Liberal National member, Scott Driscoll. Elected in the LNP landslide of 2012, Driscoll was accused of misleading parliament over his business interests. He resigned last November.

With all polling booths reporting their results tonight, the two-party swing to the ALP is 16.1%. The ALP won 11 of the 14 polling booths. The swing to the ALP is roughly equivalent to the statewide swing against it in 2012.

D’Ath’s victory increases the ALP’s parliamentary representation to 8 members in Queensland’s 89-member Legislative Assembly. The party lost 44 seats in 2012 and its primary vote fell to 26.66%.

The ALP will portray the result as a vote against Premier Campbell Newman’s administration and its budget cuts. It will also say the result is a warning to the Abbott government ahead of its first Budget. Whilst a win is a win and the swing is substantial, in reality it is foolish to read too much into by-election results.

The next Queensland state election is due early next year, although Newman could opt to go towards the end of this year. The LNP won 78 seats in 2012 but defections and tonight’s loss means it now holds 74 seats. It can afford to lose up to 28 seats without losing government.

Posts tagged as “Petrie”

Seats That Swung To The Coalition In The 2016 Federal Election

Update On Undecided Seats – Hung Parliament Looks Most Likely

House Of Representatives Undecided Seats: Latest Figures

Teresa Gambaro Announces Retirement At Next Election

Yvette D’Ath Wins Queensland Redcliffe By-Election For Labor With 16% Swing