OK, before you do anything else, go back and read what I wrote in May about how a hung parliament works. Constitutionally, Julia Gillard is in the same position now that Gordon Brown was then. Politically, her position is a lot stronger.

It’s a fortunate coincidence that we’ve already had two opportunities this year, in Tasmania and Britain, to think about the dynamics of minority government in a Westminster system. The basic message is always the same: the incumbent has the option to stay put until it becomes clear their opponents can command a majority — by an agreement reached beforehand, or by being tested on the floor of parliament.

David Bartlett and Gordon Brown both tendered their resignations before their hand was forced in either of those ways: Bartlett because he had promised to do so if he lost the popular vote, and Brown because he knew that his departure would improve Labour’s prospects of reaching agreement with other parties. Neither reason applies to Gillard.

Numbers of seats don’t matter in themselves, only as an ingredient in control of parliament. The fact that the ALP is easily the largest party in the new parliament doesn’t give it any special status. But if the Labor-Greens-Wilkie combination can edge its total up to 75 seats — a target that is now tantalisingly close — then it will be impossible for the opposition to put together a majority.

If Labor falls a seat or two short, then the independents have a free choice, and of course they will try to extract the maximum price before deciding — for themselves, their electorates and their ideas for better government.

I don’t know which way they might jump. But on the last three occasions when independents have been in that position in state politics — 2002 in South Australia, 1999 in Victoria and 1998 in Queensland — they went with Labor each time. Don’t rule out it happening in Canberra as well.