I will not be providing live blogging for either of tonight’s by-elections, but here’s a space for you all to discuss the figures from Mayo as they come in.
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Mayo by-election count thread
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221 Comments
Saucey stuff. I am certain that unlike last time, this result will not be a real downer.
Very nice Dave, very nice.
Just back from the polling booth - judging by the preferences shown by who took what HTV card, I’d say it’s going to be very close, and the Greens or Di Bell the independant might snatch it on preferences. No wonder the Libs were worried.
I guess we’ll have more of an idea in an hour or so.
Wow, people really think the Greens have a shot? Amazing if the House of Representatives crossbenches double overnight.
Chinda63,
Do you think the mood out in the booths was anti liberal, or anti briggs to make it this close (if it turns out to be so)
I doubt it will be particularly close but am willing to be pleasantly surprised.
I am hoping for an upset, but the cynic in me still thinks Briggs will scrape home. But I would never underestimate Di Bell, I know she has impressed a lot of people in Mayo. And Briggs has certainly not impressed some areas of the electorate, particularly with those anti-Green pamphlets. The Libs losing Mayo…could it really happen?
Gosse and Parawa in, 10% against Libs, 9% to Greens, similar to Bell.
Vote #s:
Lib 54%
Green 18%
FF 10% Bell 9.33%
This is off 0.16% of the vote, so it’s hardly conclusive…of anything.
Diana, this old dear is down on her arthritic knees praying it might be so, hey and i’m not even overly religious!
If the swing were replicated across the electorate… (serious back of the envelope, from memory)
Libs on 43%, Greens on 20%…but even then I’d expect FF to pref the Libs back in.
And Di Bell’s just overtaken the Greens to go to 18.26%
i certainly would’nt want work choices Briggs representing me.
FF had an open ticket. Did not direct preferences.
Ummmm… or not. The AEC’s just removed the last booth’s figures, returning us to square one.
Sorry, I should know better. I mean FF voters.
2PP for Libs is higher than it was v. Labor thus far…
I’m hoping that Greens voters and Di Bell supporters will do enough to push Briggs to preferences, then it’s anyone’s game, surely.
I’m calling it for Briggs sadly.
Briggs falling slightly, he’s now on 45, whereas Greens + Bell is about 35%. If it gets a bit closer I could see something happening. Greens polling 21.87%. Pretty good, although we always do better when the Labor Party don’t run than when the Liberals are the absent party.
As expected, not much happening for Mary Brewerton, so more votes for Di and Lynton! I’m not calling it for Briggs yet!
Briggs is down to 43% now. Greens + Bell is at 37%. There is very few votes cast but if this pattern continues it could be very interesting.
I assume Day will preference the independent before either the Liberal or Green. If so Di Bell is a big chance of finishing ahead of the Greens candidate. She would win I would think.
Briggs’ primary vote is now only 42.44%. That is too low. He’s in trouble!
3.72% counted.
Briggs (LIB) 42.44%
Vontow (GRN) 22.35%
Bell (IND) 16.16%
Day (FF) 10.22%
Briggs at 58.57% 2PP vs. Greens.
Holy hell.
Greens at 23.43%
Liberal at 40.54%
Greens + Bell is now beating Briggs and Lib + FF won’t equal 50% by the end of the night.
A great night for minor parties is on
Bring it on!!!
As the vote goes on the Greens get stronger. This could be interesting.
Briggs’ primary vote is down to 41% with 17 booths in. The TPP looks like it might be maverick. It is possible that a candidate (Di Bell) wins a seat with less 20% of the primary vote.
If one of the minor parties wins I wonder how the MSM will spin this as a rebuff to Rudd. !
2PP down to 55.99 v Greens
If he’s at 56% 2PP vs. Greens he’s probably doing even worse against Bell. Greens are falling back and Bell is climbing.
Dumb question - is Day preferencing Di Bell ahead of the Liberals?
I am glad the ALP never ran a candidate. Would love Greens or Di Bell to win!
Bob Day is running an OPEN TICKET. NOT DIRECTING PREFERENCES….(As had been said several times…)
It’s only the small booths reporting so far — 2PP is still very sketchy — and could tighten. Could end up marginal…
Go Lynton!
Dyno - I’m not sure. But Day had nasty things to say about Briggs.
Libs must be thanking their lucky stars GRN & Bell votes are not reversed. Greens are the Libs best friend tonight. Cant see them winning but their holding out Bell. Bell votes will leak & FF will go solidly to Libs (or rather against Green). But if Bell can manage to overtake the greens, looks like she will win…
Yeah, if only they had each other’s spots on the ballot.
Would be useful to see some scrutineer figures here on:
(i) split of Day prefs between Liberal, Green and Bell
(ii) split of Green prefs between Lib and Green.
These would give a good idea of whether the scenario of Day beating the Libs from third place on the preferences of an ex-Lib FF candidate is realistic. If anyone can post anything of this sort here we can crunch some rough numbers.
Thing is, we aren’t going to know if Bell overtakes the Greens in the count tonight, cause of the way counting work.
We are going to be waiting a while
If Bell is only a couple of % behind the Greens I could see them overtaking the Greens with FF + Other preferences then winning on Greens preferences.
My understanding is that Day had an open ticket, ie no preferences recommended to anyone.
I’m starting to feel torn. I want the Greens to do as well as possible, because a good result here will be a boost for them everywhere. A good result for Bell is nice, but it has less significance elsewhere.
However, if Bell can get past the Greens on preferences it looks like she has a real shot, much better than Vonow has if he stays ahead. Who to barrak for?
Sorry, (ii) should be split of Green prefs between Lib and Bell, of course.
Any word on HTVs of micro candidates like Brewerton, Spragg, McCabe? If they decide the split between FFP and Bell, whoever is eliminated first will tell us how the night will play out.
Actually I think Bell would probably win on the votes as they stand. She’s near FF on the Ballot and will get a lot more FF prefs than the GRN. If she beats the GRN to second place she’ll win on these figures.
Bloody hell.
Lib v Grn: 52.75/47.75
Make that 52/48
Current TPP on AEC website has Libs 52 v Greens 48 (after 18 of 79) booths.
Could be an interesting count…
Bloody hell.
Lib v Grn: 52.75/47.75
Whoo hoo, it’s starting to get interesting.
http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HouseDivisionFirstPrefs-13826-188.htm
Down with the Tories, down, down, down!!! A swing against the Libs of 10% is nothing for them to gloat about, even if they win.
The other possibilty is that Day overtakes Bell, then Bell’s prefs push Day ahead of The Greens.
Then, amazingly, Greens prefs push Day over the line with about 15% primaries.
It’s not impossible. Who are the other independents preferencing?
A FF Lower House MP, dear GOD!
Diana
Reckon the press will also write this one up as a message to labor.
It doesn’t look all that likely to me that Di Bell will run second in this race. Its Liberal v Green in all reality.
glen
very witty
Briggs on 53.98 2PP WHOOOOOOO!
The TPP figures are for a lot less than the raw count.
8.8% vote for candidates other than Vontow, Briggs, Bell and Day.
Added to Day’s 12% i could easily imagine Bell overtaking the Greens.
But who knows. This is wide open.
You’d imagine the greens should stay 2nd after day and bell are preferenced out. Day would have most going to the libs, then a few more to bell than the greens you would think. That would not be enough for bell to overtake vonow
Briggs doing better now - primary up over 41% and TPP at 53.98%…
Rod @ 54
Undoubtedly!!
Sceptic - can’t see that happening. Day could overtake Bell, but I’m pretty sure Vonow will do well on Bell’s preferences against Day, so I can’t see him getting into position for Vonow’s preferences to matter.
It’s Briggs or Bell, with Vonow and outside chance at this stage I’d say.
BRIGGS ON 54.48!!!!!!! 2PP
The Liberals are winning on Bob Day’s preferences, oh the irony…
what would be really funny, if the greens win on the provisional count, that the media write it up as a media win, but we find that when the full count is done, that it’s actually Bell or Day that wins it.
That would be hilarious
Do we have any idea of the booths currently in and how they normally trend (more Green, more conservative)?
Diana,
maybe they wil point to the Democratic Labor Party’s poor vote as a message to rudd
If the Liberals end up with something like a 10% swing against them, Brendan Nelson may as well retire to the lovely Adelaide Hills and enjoy the sunshine and a glass of sauvignon blanc.
I wonder if William and Antony know what they’re missing - WA hasn’t even shut maybe someone should give them a wake-up call?
Briggs is doing better now - he’s up to 54% TPP without any of the Victor Habour booths having reported (primaries or otherwise)…
AKP ‘the media write it up as a media win’. Freudian or Gramscian slip?
Hmm. The booths left to come in are a motley collection of conservative booths (on an epic scale like one in Victor Harbor, the SH Teams, etc), and some big anti-Lib booths like Aldgate.
Utterly unilluminating.
Anyone know whether we’re hearing from Lib heartland yet? I’m looking at the booths, and in my limited knowledge am guessing that Brigg’s vote will increase when Goolwa starts reporting…
briggs 51.81
greens 48.19
Josh, you pre-empted my question!
51.81/48.19.
At the very least it’s a poor showing for the Liberal Party at this stage.
51.8 v 48.2
Exciting, innit?
And just to prove that progressives can also jump to conclusions on incomplete data sets:
Greens at 48.19 on 2pp!!1!
TPP - Libs 51.8%, Greens 48.2%.
The minor 9% of the vote will be crucial. The result depends on who is excluded first.
And yep it is exciting. Even if nothing comes of it in the end, this is great fun.
Have another check of the latest results: 21.35% counted:
Briggs down to 40% primary …. 2PP 51.8 to 48.2
Might I remind you that this is on less than 10% of the 2PP vote counted. Am I correct in assuming that these smaller booths are more rural and less fertile ground for the Greens?
Make that 48.4.
i meant a greens win, but i imainge the media would write it up as a win for them anyway
Libs down to 51.62% 2PP
I don’t realistically think Day would close the (currently) five-point gap to Bell off a little over nine points of shrapnel with a Green and Lib still in the race - indeed he’d be unlikely to get five points for himself out of that. So if things stay as they are then Day will be fourth.
2PP now 51.6/48.4 Lib/GRN.
Briggs will win .. but it’s fun pretending he might not
51.81 - 48.19
Too close to call.
A very nice entree
we are heading for boilover territory
Who is the DLP preferencing this time? And I’m assuming Mary Brewerton will be preferencing the Greens over FF and Di Bell this time…
Labor did well to sit this one out, it made it a much closer affair than it would have been. Now if only the Greens had decided to sit out as well, maybe that would have been the way to get an Indy in instead of a Lib.
I normally hate the Greens but tonight I find myself cheering them on!!
Primary Swings are based on booths IN so far, while 2PP have to use raw vote. At 2007 election, Downer got 51.1% Primary; if current swings hold up, Libs could be down to less than 40% primary. That could DEFINITELY be a boilover.
In all honesty, if Vonow is to win, I would have thought that the combined Di Bell + Lynton Vonow primaries would have to be at least around the same as Jamie Briggs -and they aren’t a million miles off that.
Democrats only polling 1.22% primary atm. Given that it’s only been less than 10 years since they almost tossed Downer out of this seat, it’s another sobering night for those Democrats out there…
Tomorrow’s headlines.
The Liberal Party finally win a State election! Greens claim Liberal heartland while another Nat bites the dust!
Vic H East is apparently in the 2PP count, which is surprising - from my memory of my cursory survey of last year’s results, it was the most conservative of the 3 booths there - I would have expected it to affect the result more.
If that is the case, and the other two booths are less conservative…
But no. Can’t let hope get best. Briggs will take it.
(but what if he doesn’t?? :D)
At least the Libs are polling a 2PP of over 50%, in the former Nats leaders seat of Lyne the best Drew can manage is 26% LOL!
Both Major parties have screw up over the years and come back. Yet why do people give up on the Democrats?
Im thinking the alp shouldnt run more often, better for the electorates, better for the spectators
51.46 to 48.54. How big a boilover would this be? (won’t happen, but it’s a lovely thought)
True, Matt - Vonow + Bell on 39, Briggs on 40.5…
Ironic then that Day, the disendorsed lib, may have something to say with his (voters’) preferences.
51.42% TPP now…
As for the Democrats, who would have thought in 2008, the DLP would be beating the Democrats in the Adelaide Hills…?
I know I’m being lazy but are there any really strong Liberal booths to come or are they very much the same across the board?
Now this is interesting. I personally hope Briggs will win… i think Matt Sykes is right, the combined Bell/Vonow primaries are too low. We won’t know for sure until we get some more preference counts of course, but there will be preference leakage from the minor parties/independents to Briggs. Briggs is probably safe over 40% of primaries, and certainly will be if he can stay above 42%…
Big jump to over 36% counted, Green swing still high, Bell a way back.
I think I’m starting to believe.
That included Vic H, balanced out by Aldgate I would imagine.
Strathalbyn, 1 more from Vic H still to come in the Capital C Conservative column…
Ben, the thing is there are a lot of small booths in the Adelaide hills that are pretty favourable for the Greens - areas that are naturally beautiful but close enough to Adelaide to commute. So the small booth/bad for Greens nexus doesn’t necessarily hold. On the other hand, I see some good Green booths that haven’t come in yet.
This result is Interesting for only a few months ago we had the Nats win Gippsland strongly yet a seat like Mayo normally a very safe Liberal seat has turned this result on! does this possibly damage Nelson’s leadership for even if the Liberals win they now have to fight to hold a seat that should never be in doubt.
Another big one; Libs below 51 on 2PP, Green swing above 11.
Briggs 50.94
Greens 49.06
theirs only 1% in it now!
I don’t think The Greens can win. The AEC’s TCP count is very accurate.
Di Bell could win though. She is most likely to beat Briggs and benefit from Day & the others.
htf are “conservatives for climate and environment”??
Aldgate TPP still to come in - the Greens still have a chance…
and that lasted 5 seconds!
Goolwa & Strathalbyn still not in…
Briggs to scrape in, as much as it pains me.
josh
dare to believe
Need to watch the % of the 2PP preferred count…
It’s only 15.87% so far…
Polling Places Returned: 39 of 79 Votes Counted: 15.87%
Also worth noting that no votes in from VH South, whilst no preferences have been counted in VH…
back to 51.13 - 48.87…
Why didn’t Bell run for the Greens.
VH South saw a very big swing to ALP at the last election, bigger than VH and I think (should have checked!) than VH East as well.
This means diddly-squat in a non-traditional 2CP count, but still!
51.03… what a tease of an election!
If VH stands for Victor Harbour I would expect a swing to the Greens for the health of the Murray River is becoming a big issue.
ouch … Briggs on 50.16% 2PP
50.16 to 49.48!!!!!!!!!!!!! OMG!!!
And booths shutting in WA, 3 big cons booths not yet in from Mayo but a remarkably uniform, steady result in thus far, and a popular independent romps it home against a failing national.
The headlines tomorrow are going to be worth cutting out & pasting on a wall…
What booth caused that moment!
Aldgate is in - that’s the big Labor booth.
There’s a couple of Labor-ish booths to come in, but not sure if it’s going to be enough for the Greens…
50.3 to 49.7 now. Go you good thing!
Goolwa and VH will favour Greens IMO because of the Murray.
Reading through the 2007 results, and the booths over 2000 voters had the following results…
Mount Barker (4363): Downer 52.44% 2PP
Aberfoyle Park (3096): Downer 51.26% 2PP
Strathalbyn (3084): Downer 61.19% 2PP
Aberfoyle Park North (2348): Downer 55.24% 2PP
Goolwa (2373): Downer 54.70% 2PP
Nairne (2163): Downer 51.69% 2PP
Stirling West (2125): Downer 53.88% 2PP
Given the overall 2PP was 57.06%, i am concluding the bigger booths aren’t as friendly to the libs. Given how close it is already, and none of these booths are yet factored into the current 2PP count (only 3 are in for primaries yet) - this could be very interesting in half an hour….!
2PP 50-2-49-8 - too close to call with 25% in!!
Briggs is the sort of candidate the ALP get (rightly) criticised for.
Based on 32 booths TPP in I had a look at the Libs’ 2PP from those booths from 2007 and it was 57.4 compared for their final for the seat in 2007 of 57.06 (including absent, prepoll, provisional and postal). So if their drop in 2PP compared with 2007 was uniform (which it often isn’t in a given seat, especially where a Green candidate is involved) then that suggests the final 2PP will be something like 51.1:48.9 Lib/Green - which is of course irrelevant if Bell beats the Green into second.
Surely if Bell beats the Green into second she wins - the question is can she do it? Green over Bell out to nearly 7% now, so I’d say it’s very hard for that to happen (in the absence of scrute figures showing otherwise).
This could go anywhere!
Goolwa in and swing still strong.
Back out to 50.92. (but the fact you can even write “back out to” is pretty remarkable)
thanks for those Interesting booth numbers! considering the closeness and I would image most ALP votes will go to the Greens or Di Bell I’m going to stick my neck out and can see the Greens in front by the close of counting but when all is counted the Liberals may well hang on!
ok, does this vindicate the ALP not running a candidate?
Very much so! I knew it was smart for the ALP not to run a candidate. There is a large amount of non-major party vote in Mayo IMO.
Does anyone know who Bill Spragg is? He’s an independent who’s got over 2% of the primaries - which could be vital in determining which candidate gets up…
That was VH South, Green swing holding at 11.5%
Will be interesting to see what %ge of FFP preferences are flowing to Greens. I’d warrant a fair chunk of that 7% increase in their vote is from socially conservative Laborites, not keen on the Greens but even less keen on the Liberals.
Well it depends on what you mean by ‘vindicate’. If what you mean as in, is it a politically smart move? Possibly. If what you mean is whether it’s the philosophically right move… no.
VH Sth also in 2CP
will this result have any impact on any decisions regarding the electorate of Higgins???
I think the interesting thing will be where the preferences of the excluded candiates go. I’m not sure about the other, but the DLP ran a sort of reverse donkey ticket which put Briggs at number 4 and Vonow at number 10 (and Di Bell at 11). I know Mary Brewerton preferenced directly to the Greens and then to Di Bell, but what about Bill Spragg, Malcolm King, Andrew Castrique, One Nation and Rachel Barons?
It will depend on where they put there preferences (or, to be precise, where their voters put their preferences) as to whether Di or Lynton finish second. If Di gets up there, it could be very, very interesting.
Philosophically????
2007 Lib overall 2PP was boosted by 0.6% by prepolls, provisionals, postals and absents. So looks like Greens need to get to something like 50.6 2PP on the night to win this. Currently the Libs are at 50.7. Day has dropped to just over 11 and Bell still has nearly seven points to catch the Greens off those votes plus 9.6 points of shrapnel. Again I doubt that’s all that realistic so *most likely* the Libs will scrape in but it’s not a good result for them.
“Between 1996 and 2007 there were nine by-election, three in Liberal held seats and six in Labor held seat. In its eleven years in office, the Howard government never once nominated a candidate for a by-election in a Labor held electorate.”
Antony Green
But of course the ALP are ‘gutless’…
Spragg is a scientist who’s pro-Murray. His HTV has Briggs and day last. His preferences go to Vonow via Bell.
SwingLowe @#143
Here is a link to Bill Spragg’s website.
http://www.billspragg.id.au/
I don’t think this will make any difference with regards to Higgins. Yes the margin in Higgins is lower (I think) but its the kind of seat that doesn’t swing as such and is less attractive for minor party candidates. I’m not saying Labor couldn’t win Higgins in a by-election but its highly unlikely.
Having said that, strange things often happen in by-elections.
Four booths still to come in on primaries. Two of them very small (not sure what’s taking them so long). One of the others is Stirling West, one of the Greenest booths in the state, although not so good for Labor so may not apply this time.
Now 51.48 TPP - Greens need to pull back a lot in Nairne and Goolwa without getting hit too bad in Strathalbyn…
Andrew Castrique preferenced Bell 2 and the Greens 5.
Waiting for La Gumeracha
Day must be kicking himself for not directing preferences!
Malcolm King said this about the Murray;
I think it’s safe to assume his preferences won’t end up with Briggs.
Does anyone know what the Briggs v Bell 2PP would be?
2PP now 52-48 to the Libs, looks like they scraaape in.
The AEC won’t count the Briggs V Bell 2CP until the full count is done on Monday, so the Libs can still lose it, keep the hope.
Actually it looks like the AEC are factoring in polling booth differences in their 2PPs so when it was 50.16 it really *looked* that close (for a moment).
Waiting for 2CPs from:
Callington
Cherry Gardens
Goolwa Central
Gumeracha (both)
Meadows
Nairne
Stirling West
Strathalbyn
Woodside
Anyone offer comments on these places?
It says “projected” TPP, so maybe there is some degree of guestimation happening as well…
AEC website only has 67.11% counted so far so hold your hats. 78 of 79 booths in though.
Gumeracha is Mary Brewerton’s home turf, so she might get her deposit back yet!
That was Callington, result still very steady.
Or not.
Callington back off the site, I think.
And it’s back.
Ufff. This is a silly count.
The OO spins/ calls it for Briggs. The crap just keeps piling up there.
Swing to Greens in Downer’s old seat
http://www.theaustralian.news.com.au/story/0,25197,24305578-12377,00.html
Final Primaries in:
VONOW, Lynton The Greens 14,188 22.57 +11.37
BARONS, Rachael Conservatives for Climate and Environment 579 0.92 -0.33
SPRAGG, Bill Independent 1,357 2.16 +2.16
KEIZER, Mathew One Nation 410 0.65 +0.65
BREWERTON, Mary Independent 1,507 2.40 +2.40
CASTRIQUE, Andrew Australian Democrats 773 1.23 -0.29
BRIGGS, Jamie Liberal 25,252 40.17 -10.22
KING, Malcolm Ronald Independent 164 0.26 +0.26
DAY, Bob Family First Party 7,024 11.17 +7.07
McCABE, David D.L.P. - Democratic Labor Party 1,117 1.78 +1.78
BELL, Di Independent 10,490 16.69 +16.69
Gumeracha in completely.
I don’t know how The Oz are projecting 55% TPP for Briggs - unless they’ve got different projection models to the AEC…
The only hope is Bell now, sigh
Lib on 25252
Vonow + Bell on 24678
First prefs now returned for all booths
Lib 40.17
Green 22.57
Bell 16.69
Day 11.17
rest 9.4
Bell has a bit over 20 points of Day+rest to bridge almost six points to the Greens to win the seat. Greens can’t really do it from here barring something bizarre on postals (51.9:48.1 2PP, six booths to go.)
I think the Oz are using the same predictor they use to explain the newspolls.
Oh, well, Libs down 10% on primaries is absolutely nothing for them to gloat about in a heartland seat.
Fingers crossed for Bell.
Re the Aus story they filed with only 16% counted hence the too-high 2PP for Briggs.
So we have to wait till Monday night to for final outcome?
Kevin
Well they made a bad mistake then!!
Back to 51.6:48.4
51.5:48.5
And back down to 51.6 with latest booth removed.
Strathalbyn still not in - looks like a win for the Libs (unless Bell sneaks in front of the Greens on the actual preference count)…
Given that Greens normally do very badly on postals this is going to be tough. We do well on absentees, but there will be trivial numbers of those (how many May voters are in Lyne today?) Prepolls can go either way.
Bell might still be a shot though - she closed the gap a bit on the last few booths. Needs a bit under net 30% of the smaller guys and Day. Day has no chance of overtaking her.
So if Day plus the minnows break 50% Bell, 30% Briggs, 20% Vonow then Bell’s in with a shot of overtaking Vonow. I don’t know how much better than him she’ll do, but you’d think 4% was not off the cards, and since Vonow’s likely to be above 46% even after postals you can’t rule her out.
Postals will favour the Libs this time.
Charming.
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,24304364-5006301,00.html
Must admit that the T-shirt the lib member handing out how to vote cards was wearing made them look like a green candidate.
Has counting stopped or what? Or are all the counters taking a break to watch the WA results.
Anyone know much about Strathalbyn? What sort of demographic is it?
The booth is a full 3.1% of the enrolment.
God The Advertiser is hopeless…
http://www.news.com.au/adelaidenow/story/0,22606,24303300-5006301,00.html
Saying the seat has been Won, by the Libs! Anything could happen with a 2PP count with Di Bell vs Libs…
Ah, ignore that!
Oz, counting has stopped for the night. The rest will be prepoll, absent, postal and provisional.
Final 2PP for tonight: 48.26 to 51.74.
Assuming final 2CP will indeed by Green vs Liberal, this means that the Libs have won it.
Liberals claim victory in Mayo
* Adelaide
* September 6, 2008 - 9:34PM
The Liberal Party has claimed victory in the by-election for the South Australian federal seat of Mayo.
Liberal candidate Jamie Briggs said while the result was close it was enough for the him to take the seat ahead of Greens candidate Lynton Vonow.
“We always knew it was going to be close but at the end of the day 50% plus one is enough,” Mr Briggs told AAP.
http://www.theage.com.au/national/liberals-claim-victory-in-mayo-20080906-4b3u.html
Result not over yet. Quite a few votes still to count. And also hard to know whether Bell still has a chance. I would expect that Bell would get more votes than Vonow from other independents and FF but whether enough to get ahead of Vonow needs analysis. But if Bell gets ahead she would pick up a pretty high % of Green prefs. Wait and see.
hmmm
Wow strong result by the Greens. The Democrats have confirmed in this election that they really are dead. They lost votes with no Labor candidate in a seat which they used to regularly attract over 10% (sometimes over 20%) of the vote.
Democrats = kaput. Even the party that campaigns via sock puppets onere beat them. *shakes head*
Is their one remaining MLC in SA doing much with herself, or just waiting for the inevitable?
You said it, BOP. She’s trying to remain relevant by being as controversial as possible, but at the end of the day she’s toast.
Quick pop in:
would like to see how Julie Bishop spins this one….
Yep, Bell is looking a distinct possiblity. Given the ballot order, I suspect a lot of FF voters will break to Bell.
What a turn up this would be!
FF Prefs for Mayo last time went: 52% Lib, 25% Green, 23% Labor. So much for FF voters being disciplined. It would be tricky but not impossible for Bell to overtake Greens.
This is only the first by-election for the democrats since they lost their last senators. There’s a school of thought that the party was blessed but also cursed by its senators. I’d like to believe that let loose from the senate, the democrats can rediscover their purpose. It’s a multi-year rebuilding process though, and I wonder if we have the time.
OTH - good information. AEC will no doubt get it right but I hope the Bell group has their scutineers on the job. Assuming that about 30% of all the rest of votes except Briggs Vonow and Bell go to Briggs (which allows about 50% of Day votes and is in line with current split where Briggs gets about 12/38 with the Lib/Green 2PP) then Bell would need to get a bit over 75% of the rest. Thats a long shot but possible. But worse is that Bell would then need to get about 92% of the split when Vonow is eliminated which would be remarkable. Live in hope that the outstanding votes - postals etc pull Briggs down lower to make it easier.
The 92% will be a bit tricky, but given that Labor consistently gets 80-85% of Greens prefs, could we expect the figure to nudge 90%?
Imagine if Mayo went from 11.3% to <1% which would be implied by a 80% Bell share of 2PP.
So a Bell win is quite unlikely, but shouldn’t be ruled out at the moment.
So, has the Messiah’s hiatus contribution to the Mayo fiasco been publicly acknowledged by the OO? It would have to be the significant factor. Shouldn’t the libs be excoriating him for maintaining and contributing to fed lib leadership instability? Isn’t it time that senior lib powerbrokers said something like:
‘Costello, you are helping destroy us: Piss or get off the pot.’
The OO is continuing its fascination with the Rudd’s government lack of narrative. They might want to suggest a narrative for the Opposition: ‘Serial moral cowardice.’
Jen:
Jen says:[i]would like to see how Julie Bishop spins this one….[i?]
I dont think she needs to say anything. They suffered a 10.54% swing
7.41 of the swing went to FF (Bob Day - Ex Liberal) and 1.81 went to the DLP (total 9.22%).
1.19% swing is not bad considering a backlash of 2 to 3 % is expected in Bi Elections
Ziggy
Australian Democrats have had their National Executive Ballot and the South Australian Division is just about to have their AGM. Mayo voting result is sobering and thank you everyone of the 700+ who did. If you want to more than vote your support you are very welcome to join and continue making a difference …
http://www.democrats.org.au
The Democrats brand name has proven to be the kiss of death to any candidate they run, no matter how good the candidate or how positive the media coverage in the local newspapers and radio.
I ran the Mayo campaign for the Democrats and was thrilled with the response we got from the local media. I worked hard, Andrew Castrique (the Democrats candidate) worked hard and in the end it amounted to almost nothing.
The positive thing from our campaign was organising a debate/public forum at Strathalbyn about the River Murray. 250 people showed up.
We were given the run around by the Liberal party and on the day of the debate Mr Briggs was trying to bully the facilitator and us into changing the format and start time. It was this bullying and Mr Briggs aggressive demeanour to those who asked questions that resulted in a massive 13.99% swing against him in that booth. Also contributing to that swing away from the Liberals was a large swing to local Di Bell who lives at Finniss which is nearby.
So where to for the Dems? Only time will tell. It is only a matter of time before a decision on their future is made by the party and its members. It really is a matter for the party to discuss and decide in the coming months.
On another point, turnout was way down (74.46%. Which is unusual for Mayo.) Many people who went through my polling booth just happened to be visiting the local library next to the polling booth and then came through saying they had no idea there was an election on.
I put this down to mismanagement of this by-election by the Australian Electoral Commission who only sent out one pamphlet to all householders and advertised once in the Adelaide Advertiser (somewhere in the middle) on the Thursday before. The Advertiser and Messenger papers also did not pay too much attention to the by-election in the lead up.
There will be lots of people receiving fines for not voting as a result.
The Dems have been clinically dead for several years and the corpse ought now to be given a decent burial. The name will however probably be maintained by a handful of cranks, like the Communist Party and the DLP. Serious people in the Dems should join either the Greens, the ALP or the Libs according to taste.
Labor have been morally dead for several years and the corpse ought now to be given a decent burial. The name is already maintained by a handful of cranks, like the like Liberal Party and the DLP. Serious people in Labor should join either the Greens, the Dems or vote independent according to taste.
It’s been fascinating listening to Jamie Briggs and others spin this result into something not so bad for the Libs. They claim that this result was to be expected and was due to losing a popular local member, plus the fact that there were 11 candidates standing.
Fact number 1 - this “popular local member” had a swing of 2.56% against him on primaries last November (6.5% TPP); one of the largest swings in the state.
Fact number 2 - the number of candidates standing is only an issue when those said candidates hate you and what you stand for and consequently preference against you.
Fact number 3 - following on from point 2, in any case it is the VOTERS who decide where to put their preferences, so if most of the people voting choose to put you low down on their list then you need to consider the possibility that the voters also hate you and what you stand for and they knew exactly what they were doing.
Fact number 4 - this always has been a rock solid Liberal seat and while the demographics are changing they aren’t changing fast enough for that to be a factor in this election. The problem in this case was clearly the CANDIDATE, what he stands for and the way he was parachuted into the seat. People resented it, and not just Bob Day and his mates. Jamie Briggs needs to have a long, hard look in the mirror (but I suspect it will only confirm how much he loves himself).
Next election will be very interesting. A lot will have to do with the way Briggs conducts himself both locally and in the parliament and the new housing developments both south and north in the electorate might start to play a part. Who knows? In a few elections time we might be talking about this as being a rock solid Green seat…
The Liberals main problem in Mayo was the lack of a Labor bogeyman. People knew that a vote for a Green or Independent wasn’t going to elect a Labor Member and voted accordingly.
It was a good result for the Liberals. They won the seat, that’s all that matters to the Liberals ultimately.
Mayo is still a safe Lib seat in ALP v Lib terms and always will be as long as they are the two majors.
But change to Lib v independent and most seats will favour the independent, eg Lyne. It’s just that there is usually a Labor candidate to spoil the independent. This time there wasn’t, and the Greens got close. In fact even the Greens may have been a spoiler here, with the Bell v Briggs count probably the smaller margin.
The trouble is that Labor normally contests every seat, rather than saying “Who’s the most Labor-like person who might win it” and letting, say, the Greens have a go at Mayo. They might both sit out of Barker and see if an indy wins it.
The Liberals might do likewise, sitting out for Adelaide, seeing if a FF or mate of Xenophon waltzes into an otherwise safe seat.
It wouldn’t happen, but it would be interesting - lots more seats would become marginals again.
Nor would it necessarily. The option is always there to vote Green-Lib-ALP… this isn’t the Senate with ticket voting. Looks to me like last time the ALP took it for granted as a loss, and this time a bunch of non-Libs didn’t - hence the big swing against the Libs.
Anyone with any further opinions on whether Bell can win?
I Voted DLP. No regrets. ANY independent would be better than a Liberal or Green yes-man. Democrats are dead and I’ve always disliked Family First and One Nation.
I agree the next election is going to be interesting because it is possible the Greens and Labor may be able to gradually win the seat.