TAS 2014 – results wrap

Tasmanian voters elected a Liberal government tonight, but a number of seats are still up for grabs.

In four out of five electorates, the Liberal Party has gained a third seat. In two additional electorates, another seat is yet to be decided. In some other cases, it is clear which party will win a seat but it is not clear which particular candidate will end. In Denison, the party balance will remain steady at 2 Labor, 2 Liberal and 1 Greens.

At the moment, the number of seats per party is:

• LIB – 14-15
• ALP – 6-8
• GRN – 3-5
• PUP – 0-1

I’ll run through each electorate in turn to explain the situation.

Bass

In Bass, the ALP has lost their second seat to the Liberal Party, for a 3-1-1 split.

While the Greens are on only 0.75 quota, Greens MP Kim Booth should be able to hold on.

Liberal MPs Peter Gutwein and Michael Ferguson each won well over a quota of votes, and their surpluses will elect a third Liberal MP: either Sarah Courtney or Barry Jarvis.

The ALP’s Michelle O’Byrne has been re-elected. The ALP’s Brian Wightman is unlikely to gain many preferences from his Labor colleagues, as O’Byrne will soak up quite a lot of them to reach a quota.

Braddon

In Braddon, the Liberal Party has gained a third seat definitely, with the potential for a fourth.

The ALP has retained one of their seats, with the second Labor seat and the Greens seat both in play, which no possibility for both of those seats to be retained.

The final seat is a race between the Liberal Party, with 0.52 surplus, Labor with 0.40 surplus, the Palmer United Party 0.43 quota and the Greens with 0.4 quota. It is very hard to predict who will win this seat, but the ALP’s Brenton Best and the Greens’ Paul O’Halloran are unlikely to manage much of a productive preference swap.

Adam Brooks and Jeremy Rockliff have both been re-elected with a substantial surplus, which will flow on and elect either Roger Jaensch or Joan Rylah.

Jaensch or Rylah (whichever doesn’t win the third Liberal seat) will be in a four way contest with the ALP’s Brenton Best, the Greens’ Paul O’Halloran and the PUP’s Kevin Morgan.

Denison

Denison will see no change in the party balance, after a brief period earlier in the night where it appeared that the Greens could have won a second seat off the ALP. The swings against the ALP and the Greens were relatively modest, presumably due in part due to the absence of Andrew Wilkie, who polled strongly in Denison at the 2010 state election before winning the seat at the federal election.

Sitting MPs Scott Bacon, Matthew Groom, Cassy O’Connor and Elise Archer will be re-elected. The four remaining Labor candidates polled similar figures, with Madeleine Ogilvie the most likely to fill Labor’s second seat after the retirement of the ALP’s Graeme Sturges.

Franklin

The Liberal Party has gained a third seat at the expense of the ALP.

Sitting MPs Will Hodgman, Lara Giddings, Nick McKim and Jacquie Petrusma have all been re-elected, but prominent Labor minister David O’Byrne has lost his seat to Liberal candidate Paul Harriss, until recently an upper house MP.

Lyons

The Liberal Party has gained a third seat, either at the expense of Labor or the Greens.

The ALP and the Greens are in a fight for the final seat, which will either see Labor win two seats or the ALP and Greens each win one.

At the time of writing, the ALP has 1.66 quotas and the Greens have 0.67 quotas.

The race will be between the ALP’s David Llewellyn and the Greens’ Tim Morris, both on 0.47 quotas personally.

Sitting Liberal MPs Rene Hidding and Mark Shelton have both been re-elected, along with former Liberal Senator Guy Barnett. The ALP’s Rebecca White will also win re-election.

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