8:41 – We now have the two-party-preferred from every election day booth and I’m led to believe that’s all we’ll get tonight. Labor’s 2PP is now sitting on 60.6%. This compares to 47.5% on the election day vote in 2022, a swing of 13.1%. Now it seems quite possible that swing will be moderated by the addition of pre-poll and postal votes, but it remains a huge swing towards a government. In general swings towards governments are rare in by-elections. I’m not sure I’ve seen many as definitive as this one.
That’s it for me tonight. I will be going back to my current project of finishing my federal election guide tomorrow, but in December I’ll be back with complete datasets of all the late 2024 elections. Thanks for joining me!
7:37 – The only reason to hesitate calling this race for Labor is that there is the potential that the gap between the election day 2PP and the pre-poll/postal 2PP could widen, as it has done in a number of other elections including the Dunstan by-election earlier this year. If that’s the case, the final Labor margin could narrow. But at this point it doesn’t seem possible for it to narrow enough. So this is a Labor win.
7:35 – Five election day booths have reported figures and Labor has a primary vote of 44.6%, plus a Greens primary vote of 16.8%, while the Liberal primary is just shy of 33%.
Those five booths are reporting two-party-preferred, with Labor on 59.4%. This looks very good for Labor.
7:04 – Just a reminder that the Liberal margin in Black is just 2.7% so they can’t afford much of a swing.
7:00 – Antony points out the turnout at the first booth was down quite a bit. We won’t get any pre-poll or postal votes counted tonight.
6:28 – And now Sheidow Park has Dighton on 50.1%. The ALP polled 39% there in 2022, so that’s another big swing to Labor.
6:57 – The first booth to report is Seacliff South. Labor’s Alex Dighton is on 40.6%, and Liberal Amanda Wilson is on 35.0%. The nearest booths in 2022 had the Liberal primary vote around 49-51%, and Labor’s primary was around 35%, so that looks like a big swing to Labor.
6:48 – Yes I’m still watching, but we have no data yet.
6:00 – Polls have just closed in the South Australian state seat of Black for the by-election triggered by the resignation of former Liberal leader David Speirs. I will be tracking the results here tonight, but while we wait for results you can check out my by-election guide.
I’m tipping a narrow Labor victory.
I mean I *was tipping a narrow one but the first two set of results are showing big swings.
I’d be cautious about projecting big swings in election day booths to pre-polls. In Dunstan the gap between pre-polls and election day results grew greatly as compared to the election.
But certainly a bad sign for the Liberals.
The gap in the 2024 by-election as compared to the 2022 election* I should clarify
@Adda, I agree. So far not good for the Liberals. Their primary vote has crashed. I don’t think there’ll be a swing to them on declaration votes, or let alone a big one that could save them.
This is catastrophic for the SA Liberals. Most booths have massive swings to Labor, even the usually Liberal ones. Postal and declaration votes will need to break 60-40 for the Liberals for them to have a chance of holding on. Antony Green’s called it already for Labor and he was predicting that we won’t get a result tonight like Dunstan.
Yeah, it suffices to say that even if there were to be no swing in the pre-polls, this would be a huge swing and clear win for Labor.
Seems like that 60-40 2PP poll a couple of months back was on the mark.
We could well be looking at a scenario where the full blue map of the 2022 election becomes a full red map in this by-election.
If these figures for Seacliff, Brighton and Marino are repeated federally Labor will comfortably retain Boothby next year. Nicolle Flint is more of a liability more than an asset and the Liberals will have a hard time winning that seat back.
The liberals have lost 2 seats in bi elections. Unheard of
By-elections where the government has won the seat of an outgoing opposition leader, since WW2 or thereabouts:
Gascoyne, WA – 1951
Earlwood, NSW – 1978
Burwood, Vic – 1999
Dunstan, SA – 2024
Black, SA – 2024
It’s rare enough for oppositions to lose by-elections, rarer still to lose them to the government, and even rarer than that to lose the seat of their former leader (literally once a generation). The SA Libs have now managed to do this twice in one year with successive leaders.
Even rarer is a double-digit swing to the government, assuming there won’t be a spectacular turnaround in postal or pre poll votes.
Given the circumstances in don’t see why people are surprised
That’s on top of a 6.5% swing at the 2022 election, too. Combined, that’s nearly a 20% swing to Labor compared to 2018.
Expect the libs to win both dunstan and black back in 2026
Once you take out his personal vote that’s enough to .one the seat.then you take in the people who are voting against the libs because of the circumstances of the by election did anyone actually expect them to hold on?