Last night’s election result was nothing like the wipe-out expected when the LNP was on 55-56% of the two-party-preferred vote back in September, but it’s still reasonably clear. Overall the scale of the defeat looks similar to Labor’s victory in 52 seats in 2020. Under Queensland’s unicameral system, that’s enough to govern comfortably.
I think there’s two interesting angles here – the regional nature of Labor’s losses, and how the minor parties (in particular the Greens) polled quite well but not where it was needed. There are also some interesting races where a 3CP count could come in handy.
In this post I’m going to run through a few statewide maps and explain the trends.
Labor suffered modest losses in urban South-East Queensland but were almost wiped out in the regions.
Of fourteen Labor seats outside the south-east, they’ve either lost, or are currently behind, in eleven of them. And they could still fall behind in Bundaberg. They have retained Gladstone and Cairns, but have otherwise lost everything – all three Townsville seats, two in Cairns, plus seats like Rockhampton and Mackay that they held on to in 2012.
About two thirds of Labor’s seats were in south-east Queensland, and the losses have been much more modest. They are currently trailing in seven seats in that area, but they are also in front in South Brisbane and have won back Ipswich West.
This map shows three different views of the partisan outcome – the two-party-preferred swing, which party is currently leading (with those confirmed in darker colours and those not confirmed in lighter), and a third map highlighting the seats that have changed hands, or at least have a different party in the lead.
Labor’s position across Brisbane still looks pretty solid, with a few losses around the outer edges of the urban area in the Redland and Moreton Bay council areas.
Generally the swings to the LNP are smaller in the Brisbane area, and there are pockets of big swings up the coast – Gladstone and Whitsunday stand out. Inala also stands out, but this is compared to 2020 when Annastacia Palaszczuk was the sitting MP.
Labor currently has a positive swing in two seats: Everton will likely reverse, and it’s fascinating to see that Labor has a 1.3% swing in Bundaberg, which was their most marginal seat in 2020. A good case demonstrating the value of sophomore surge.
The Greens had a rough night but amazingly didn’t actually go backwards overall. Their statewide vote at the moment is up 0.1% from 2020.
But if you look at this next map, which shows swings for the Greens and can be toggled to show the same for One Nation, you see that they were hit hard in the inner city.
The three biggest swings against the Greens were in three of their key seats, with South Brisbane ranked sixth. They have suffered their biggest swing in Maiwar, where Michael Berkman is in a tight race to hold on.
But their best seats were also in Brisbane. They got solid swings in the next ring of seats, in seats like Miller, Greenslopes and Bulimba. This isn’t necessarily bad news for the federal seat of Griffith, since these include the weaker parts of Max Chandler-Mather’s seat. They also gained a 4% swing in Ferny Grove while losing 4% in neighbouring Cooper.
I won’t try to answer the question of why this has happened, but it’s been clear that Miles comeback strategy has been quite effective at appealing to Greens inner-city voters.
This result has some parallels with Greens results in the NSW local government elections, where they lost seats in the inner city but gained seats in the outer suburbs, and the ACT election where some of their best swings were in the outer suburbs. Those results can be quite effective in PR systems but is a disaster if you’re the Greens trying to win in Queensland’s single-member system.
One Nation also had quite a big share of the vote but didn’t come that close to winning any seats. They cracked 20% in two seats, but generally spread their vote around in a very inefficient manner.
The story is different for Katter’s Australian Party. While there were rumours of KAP overtaking Labor and winning in urban Townsville seats that didn’t pan out, right now they are slightly ahead in a fourth seat and could come from behind to win in Mulgrave. Winning five seats off 2.4% of the vote would cement their position as a regionalist party who are able to win disproportionate numbers of seats with a concentrated vote. Indeed five seats would be about double their share of the vote.
Still despite KAP’s wins the number of crossbench seats looks about the same – the current seven could drop to four, or could be as high as nine. And the number of non-classic seats is not that high. There are currently seven races with a non-major candidate in the top two, and Mulgrave and Rockhampton could put that up to nine.
But if you look at the raw vote, the minor party vote is quite high, well over 20%. It’s not as high as the peak One Nation years of 1998 and 2017, but it’s otherwise the highest. Yet the crossbench is quite small, because of all of that inefficient Greens and One Nation vote.
Finally, I am not in this post going to go through all the seats still in play, but I wanted to mention three seats where a three-candidate-preferred count would be super useful.
In the federal election, the AEC conducted 3CP counts in Brisbane and Macnamara which helped call those seats sooner. In both seats, the 3CP was decisive in determining the winner, not the 2CP. I don’t know if the ECQ would consider doing something similar, but it would be very useful in three seats.
In South Brisbane, the reversal of LNP preferences to favour Labor, along with a swing from the Greens to Labor, means that Labor easily wins a Labor vs Greens 2CP count. But if the LNP can overtake Labor on the 3CP, it’s very likely the Greens would win on Labor preferences.
Right now, the gap between Labor and LNP on primary votes is 3%. There is also 3.2% of One Nation votes to distribute. That would not be enough to close a 3% gap, but if the LNP creep closer it could be done. Right now it looks very likely that Labor will win but that 3CP would clarify things.
In the Cairns-area seat of Mulgrave, the LNP is leading Labor on the 2PP with 52.7%, but the two parties have less than half the primary vote between them.
Katter’s Australian Party candidate Steven Lesina is 5.8% behind Labor on primary votes, with 32% of the vote sitting with other candidates. If KAP can overtake Labor they would have a good shot at winning.
In Rockhampton, the LNP’s Donna Kirkland has 51.7% of the 2PP. She is 10.3% ahead of independent Margaret Strelow but there’s almost 23% of the vote with others. Probably a too big gap to close but worth watching.
That’s it for now. I’ll be recording a podcast this morning, so depending on editing time it might be out around midday or late tonight.
Not the result I was expecting, but still the party I was expecting.
Firstly, I was indifferent to who won. I voted 1 Greens, 2 LNP, 3 Labor 4 ON. I did this not because I am a rusted on Greens voter, but I would put myself on the progressive side of the balance sheet. Nevertheless, most elections I generally vote 1 Greens (because I want to see more progressive policies) and 2 Labour. But this time, it was an “Its Time” election for me – Labor had run its course.
If I was within the Labor machine, I would think they would be quite chuff with the result (apart from losing). They kept the loss to a reasonable level (assuming 51 seats for the LNP) from which it keeps the LNP on their toes and Labor can easily return to power next time. Four years is enough time to bring about different externalities, different issues and more chance to see the LNP in action to make an proper assessment on what they actually did, which might make a few people reassess their vote next time. I don’t think the next 4 years is going to be kind to any incumbent government, so in one respect this may work in Labor’s favour come the next election.
Personally I am not a believer in one election has implications for other levels of governments or other states etc. Each election is different, fought at different times, fought on different issues and within an often completely different context. So I wouldn’t draw anything too much out of this election, other than the observation that (more so Labor) this is a continuation of the long slow decline of the two major parties.
The collapse of the The Greens vote was interesting. Again, I vote Greens, but I would hate to see them in power based on what I see and hear of them now (they need to continue maturing). But for me, the Greens being there as a semi-strong force is the only thing that is putting the brakes on Labor completely selling out and going all corporate.
Which electorates if you don’t mind sharing
@ Darth Vader
Toohey
https://www.abc.net.au/news/elections/qld/2024/guide/tooh
Definitely an interesting election night with a result I wasn’t expecting.
I think one of the interesting takeaways is the change over the night as election day votes were tallied which looked like a hung parliament or a very narrow majority vs prepoll and postal votes which swung the election much more to an LNP majority.
It’s definitely clear that the election swung back to Labor in the final week. Interesting on ABC last night the panellists were arguing for a move back to election day voting. In an earlier era, Labor just might have won the election based on more historic splits of election day vs postal and prepoll voting.
@macca yea because a lot of people can’t get to a polling booth on election day or whatever reason all they would do is cause long queues and make people very unhappy and stop people from voting especially the elderly and other disadvantaged groups
I wonder what will happen with Bundaberg.
Darth, how do you think the EC’s coped 20 years ago when 90%+ voted on the day?
@Ian I think Labor will lose it as more of the votes are counted. Very respectable result for Smith either way though, when you consider how bad the swing was in much of regional Queensland, the fact that the seat keeps ousting incumbent MPs after one term, and on top of that how Bundaberg has been voting to the right of the statewide result for some time now. Labor would be fools not to preselect him again in 2028.
Agreed, Laine.
Unless voters see the federal Coalition as too hard right I would expect Ryan to go back to the LNP and Brisbane to go to Labor.
As for whether Clayfield is a Labor target I don’t think it will be simply because of the upcoming redistribution. The only real solutions to the inner-city issue all involve making Clayfield safer for the LNP by moving it further east. This would make either Cooper, McConnel or Stafford better for Labor, however. I’ve moved the boundary to Clayfield itself and mucked around with Stafford to keep the Brisbane CBD itself in McConnel.
Hopefully the relatively narrow margin will stop the LNP from doing any particularly stupid Newman level political moves and will mean they are a (bit) more moderate.
The greens metro collapse was surprising (especially in my seat of Maiwar), especially as Berkman is a decent member, but I think support for some stupid policies (Israel/Palestine, CFMEU support, Lack of support for federal reforms), some encroachment from Miles, and a lack of focus on local issues, hurt them particularly with progressive professionals that live in these seats.
Ultimately I think this election shows that if Labor took a tougher approach to youth crime (even at least performatively) they could have won this election. It will be interesting if Crisafulli isn’t able to get the numbers down however, will the media turn on him or will it stopped being talked about?
@Mr Snrub I don’t think this election shows that Labor could’ve won if it took a tougher approach on youth crime. That’s what NT Labor did, and they lost votes on the left and the right. Because ultimately, the Liberals will always be the toughest on crime. You can’t “out-LNP” the LNP. I actually think Steven Miles being populist and differentiating himself helped prevent a total Labor wipeout. If Steven Miles focused on being “tough on crime” instead of having progressive cost-of-living policies, he would’ve lost votes to The Greens in the city, and lost more votes to the Libs in the outer suburbs and the regions. It probably would’ve been a total wipeout of Labor.
Maiwar is definitely a progressive professional seat, if the teals had got to it before the Greens they would do well here. The greens need to be careful not to lose the progressive professional vote while chasing the renter, youth, and more solid left vote in general.
@Nether Portal
Elizabeth Watson Brown hasn’t been seen anywhere in Ryan, and many voters are frustrated with her grandstanding and refusal to work with Labor. Given that the Scott Morrison factor is gone, I think Ryan should comfortably swing back to the LNP.
@Nether Portal
Elizabeth Watson Brown hasn’t been seen anywhere in Ryan, and many voters are frustrated with the federal Greens performative antics. Given that the Scott Morrison factor is gone, I think Ryan should comfortably swing back to the LNP.
I don’t think Miles populist policies and being tough on youth crime is an either/or, he could have done both (and I think it would be a popular combination).
But I do somewhat agree, given the amount of time Miles had to change things, he made pretty much the best choices he could. The negative perception of labor on youth crime had already stuck under Anna and I don’t think Miles could have unstuck it in time he had.
I think bundaberg and pumicestone will definitely swing LNP as counting continues
Probably Cairns, gaven and springwood too i would put my money on it
@Mr Snrub
I don’t watch much TV news, especially 7 or 9, but every time I saw the first 10 minutes of their 6pm news it was saturated with “youth crime” issues. Now I am sure that it is a very real issue for some, but like a lot of other matters – perceptions and cold hard facts often differ widely. I don’t blame people for getting caught up in the perceptions, we are hard wired for uncritically accepting that sort of thing, but I willing to gamble that those news items will quietly drop off the main news stories. It will be interesting if someone does the analysis of youth crime news stories on mainstream commercial news pre and post elections. Admittedly it works well for TV News broadcasters as well, so it might not disappear completely.
In a past life I worked at Logan City Council and one of those jobs was working on Safety Cameras that we installed in various places around the city. Youth crime was a problem then (late 1990s) and it will forever be an issue, unless the LNP are prepared to just lock kids up or spend big bucks on rehabilitation. As a town planner I also see no easy solution for the “housing issue” as this is a problem all around the world and if there was an easy solution we would have done something by now. We upzoned the hell out of Logan, but no one has taken up these opportunities, despite it being Code Assessable development, so IMHO supply and planning controls are not the core issue.
Ultimately, I think the LNP have gone down the fear path, but they will soon find out that governing is never easy. To effect change you have to make politically difficult and unpopular decisions and DC may not have the stomach to do so if he feels it may result in a one term government.
@dragons I already did.