Cooper – Australia 2019

As always, this will probably depend on Liberal preferences.

I think it’s inevitable that the Greens will win here eventually. The Green tide is creeping north of Bell Street into Preston, and it’s really only Reservoir that is holding out for Labor anymore.

Yes and no. I agree that demographic changes favour the Greens here, but there’s plenty of evidence in Sydney that a good left-wing Labor MP (Albo, Plibersek) can hold off the Greens so long as they’re the incumbent. I don’t have much confidence predicting one way or the other, but it wouldn’t surprise me if Kearney entrenched herself here.

I think the main reason Labor got a positive swing at the by-election was because they replaced David Feeney – he was parachuted into an assumed safe Labor seat that he wasn’t really suited to, whereas Ged Kearney is actually a good fit for this electorate. That said, Labor only won back about 1/3 of the swing against them in 2016 and the by-election result was still really a case of the Bell Street divide (the northern half voted Labor marginally more than the southern half voted Green).

I agree that the increased urbanisation around Bell Street will probably increase the Greens vote, although it definitely could end up like Sydney or Grayndler where a popular Labor MP manages to hold a seat that would likely otherwise be a Greens seat. Of course it could all change if a future redistribution changes the boundaries asymmetrically.

Given the unanticipated swing against the Green south of the divide (which was their stronghold), wouldn’t it be less likely that the Greens get caught off-guard in such a way again?

Is there any info indicating how well the Greens would have gone in the by-election had the south stayed true?

The Greens still have a chance as Kearney was elected to move Labor to the left on Adani and refugees, which hasn’t happened at all since she was elected – in fact the aforementioned Albanese has doubled down on LNP style refugee rhetoric.

However they will need to win it this election, with Kearney still on “probation”. If they don’t, Kearney will get promoted to the front bench in an endearing ministry, and be impossible to dislodge barring a significant scandal.

The Greens will need to repair their reputation and internal divisions – the Greens trade too much on people feeling good about voting for them. The state election campaign to re-elect Lidia Thorpe could go some way to doing that.

This seat may show how much the ALP/Green swing voters bases their choice on impressions rather than actions.

Kearney supposedly was going to #StopAdani and #BringThemHere but Labor don’t seem to be on track to change their policies on those. We shall see if that comes back to bite Labor.

My experience with my ALP/Green swinging mother is that it’s totally on style not substance.

The Greens have missed some favourable circumstances to win this seat lately:

2013 election: Labor govt on the nose. Long term incumbent retires. Labor Right hack parachuted from Senate.
2016 election: Said hack makes national dill of himself by somehow forgetting to declare $2+ million home.
2018 by-election: Said hack also forgot he’s a dual citizen. No Liberal candidate to capture preferences. (Plus did I mention it’s a by-election?)

This may well be a Greens gain eventually. But given (a) Labor’s improved standing in national polls; (b) a sitting member who’s a much better fit for the electorate; and (c) the Liberal party unlikely to change their preference strategy; Labor looks secure here in the short term.

Wreathy – I think someone would need to just go through booth by booth in a spreadsheet. Presumably more than a few people have. I don’t know if anyone’s posted their results. I might be able to do it myself on Sunday.

Raue has done that

https://www.tallyroom.com.au/33097

Bennee
I guess it was inevitable, but somehow it is still a surprise that leaves me feeling somewhat uneasy !!!!. I agree with you completely !!!

More your comments are not just accurate , but thoughtful, & insightful.

John
I could almost say the same to you. However i cannot see Kearny ever being that secure, due to the strong underlying Green vote.

The prospect , or possibility, of her being a minister i find quite chilling.

Ben
It is surprising that the redistribution seems to have had no effect on Labor’s margin. Is that correct ?

No, it did have an effect. It dropped from 1% to 0.6% (although I just realised that the margin at the top says 0.7% so thanks for helping me catch that).

WD, there’s only minor changes to Batman/Cooper and they kind of balance out. It lost a good Labor area in the north, a good Greens area in the south, and gained a 50-50 Labor/Green area around Coburg North.

Something that was overlooked during the aftermath of the by-election was that the Greens received a swing of 3%+. Although they lost on the two party preferred due to Labor’s deals with conservative minor parties, the Greens actually strengthened their position in Batman/Cooper. Since Ged has been just another useless do nothing Labor backbencher since being elected, Labor could be in trouble here. It’s clear that the Greens aren’t going away in this seat particularly anytime soon.

@Firefox
By your logic you also seem to be overlooking that Labor had a 7.8% swing on primary votes.
The fact is without a Liberal candidate their vote dispersed to Labor, Conservatives and the Greens.
On the primary results there was little or no chance of the Greens getting up regardless of preference arrangements.

As for the next election, Kearney should be safe enough, who knows if Bhatal runs for an 8th time, credit to her because that may well be a record for the amount times running without winning. IMO the Greens really need to run somebody new.

Now that Ged Kearney represents the seat, I really cannot see the Greens winning this anytime soon. Much like Graynder, there is always the talk around pre-poll but come election day the result will be evident. Bhathal still has a cloud of controversy and this may have helped Labor win it, but Ged Kearney “suits” the electorate and should easily hold.

Firefox, given thast about 20% of the vote was missing by the Libs not running, it’s very hard to argue the Greens picked up support. That’s why it is rightfully overlooked.

KrispyNachos the Green increased in raw number of primary votes, only 1,000 votes though.

Turnout was 81.4% which isn’t terrible for a by-election (turnout in Batman was 89.7% in 2016), but it is likely the lazy voters are Liberal voters (and therefore Labor preferencers)

This guide needs to be updated to reflect the fact that Alex Bhatal has announced she won’t be the Greens candidate at the next election. She’s retiring from politics due to continued personal attacks against her and her family. Even though she was cleared completely of doing anything wrong and the complaints about her were just from a tiny number of bitter people who were upset that their favourite candidate wasn’t preselected, it will be good for the Greens to have some clear air going into the next election with a new candidate. They’re a massive chance of winning Batman/Cooper.

The Labor primary vote increased largely due to Liberals who couldn’t bring themselves to go full fascist and vote for one of the far right minor parties. That and the negative press surrounding Alex Bhathal. Considering that, I think it’s rather impressive that the Greens managed a +3% swing. Bhathal has announced she won’t be recontesting the seat, so there won’t be any negative press related to that issue to effect the Greens campaign this time. Look for a larger swing to the Greens and an absolute cliffhanger which will probably take weeks to decide.

Bhathal not running anymore, announced today.

http://alexbhathal.com/2018/08/09/announcement-regarding-my-cooper-candidacy/

Alex Bhatal has pulled out.

Greens candidacy rolls back to a pre-selection. They greens have many local councillors, could be very competitive.

Presumably one of the four Darebin councillors will be preselected by the Greens to run here, also interesting to see if the Libs run here and in Wills where they indicated previously they wouldn’t.

Looking ahead the Greens have the state election to worry about where they should hold their seats, gain Brunswick, be close in Richmond, whilst aiming to come second in Williamstown, Footscray, Preston, Kew, Hawthorn, Malvern and Brighton. As well as other reasonable seats like Macedon and Monbulk.

Interestingly enough the Greens actually passed the Libs on 3PP in Preston but the VEC ran a Labor – Lib preference count.

All 4 of the Darebin councillors are signatories to the now discredited complaint that was strategically used to white ant Bhathal in the byelection.

If any of them are preselected (unlikely), they will not win. Even if people close to Alex Bhathal bite their tongues, Labor will bring it up.

L96 the VEC don’t do a full distribution of preferences, they just distribute until one candidate has a majority, and they also do an indicative ALP vs Lib count on election night.

There are a handful of state seats that the Greens could win if the Liberals tactically preference them over Labor; Preston, Footscray, Williamstown, Pascoe Vale. Federally, Labor would be toast in this seat and Wills, and Greens would be an outside chance for Gellibrand, Canberra and Grayndler. However the Liberals haven’t preferenced Greens since they actually got one elected.

You are also right about the Liberal held seats they can come second in. Hawthorn would be the closest to actually being winnable for Greens – the rest would be cosmetic and not amount to much, just like the Greens coming second in a handful of ultra safe NSW Liberal seats. There are a bunch of safe federal Liberal seats the Greens could edge into 2nd in (like Warringah 2016), but even ones held by unpopular prominent Liberals would not be at risk of falling over.

@John
I completely agree.
Whilst the Greens could finish in 2nd in many seats it is only cosmetic.
In Vic they should aim for Richmond and Brunswick before any other seats.
That being said Hawthorn and Preston aren’t unrealistic gains.

As for the Libs preferencing the Greens, I feel it would be smart for them, although they 100% won’t

The Liberals could prevent Labor from getting a majority, in the state election at least, by preferencing Greens over Labor. There’s enough seats like Preston to even make what would have been a convincing Labor victory into one where the Liberals win the most seats.

What they run the risk of is a party with up to 9 seats in each house; that’s no minor party. Furthermore Labor/Greens governments, for all the implied animosity around election time, are actually very productive in terms of legislation.

Either way I expect the Greens to do reasonably well in the state election as they will get similar coverage to One Nation in the Queensland election, and the Liberals will have a strong attack line about the “risk” of a Labor/Green government. More exposure and being talked about like an electoral contender is a good thing for the Greens.

How much of that will translate to the federal election? Not sure.

@John, exactly. I think Labor ought to be worried about being squeezed from both sides – this is an issue they’re going to have to face sooner or later. If the Greens do particularly well, it becomes very difficult for Labor to get to a majority. This will evoke all sorts of questions about legitimacy that an incoming government can ill-afford to have.

In my time with the Libs, I was a big proponent of this strategy. However, a significant number of people were motivated by a heavy disdain, even visceral hatred of the Greens. So much so, that they’d rather not have anything to do with them, even if that potentially meant a Labor government.

The smartest move the Libs could do would be preference the Greens, in seats like Cooper, Wills, Fremantle, etc. As this would likely deprive the ALP of a majority. Even though an ALP/GRN Gov would be possible, history has shown that those governments are chaotic thus setting up the Liberals for a win at the 2022 election. But I doubt the Libs would do this as they can’t look forward and have no view on the future.

@L96 “Looking ahead the Greens have the state election to worry about where they should hold their seats, gain Brunswick, be close in Richmond, whilst aiming to come second in Williamstown, Footscray, Preston, Kew, Hawthorn, Malvern and Brighton. As well as other reasonable seats like Macedon and Monbulk.”

You’ve somehow left out Albert Park which is in amongst Brunswick and Richmond as a red hot chance, should be a WAAAY bigger a target for them than the other seats you mentioned.

The Greens should be planning to win Albert Park, they would win it with 2016 federal Melbourne Ports votes in the relevant booths… Plus campaigning in Albert Park would help their federal campaign for Macnamara. A lot of the districts you named have no such overlap.

It seems strange to me that the Liberals can run a scare campaign about a Labor-Greens government even though the Liberals are guaranteed to form government with the Nationals. There are plenty of examples of dysfunctional Liberal-National Coalition governments (just look at the current federal government) and yet it’s rarely acknowledged. Labor is actually the only party that’s in a position to form government alone – I’m surprised they don’t mention that more often.

It’s also worth noting that the Greens don’t only compete with Labor – they picked up LNP seats at the last NSW, Victoria and Queensland state elections (Ballina, Prahran and Maiwar respectively). They’re also competing with the Liberals for federal seats like Higgins, Brisbane and Macnamara.

@Some Guy, that’s because the Libs-Nats are a formal Coalition. Yes, they’re technically different parties and they’ve disagreements, of course. However, IMO they should be viewed as intra-party disagreements, no differrent than internal party disputes within the Labor umbrella.The Coalition has been around for so long they mas as well be one party. That’s not the case with Labor and the Greens.

@Wreathy of Sydney, then why don’t they run as a single party? The Liberals and Nationals specifically choose to remain two distinct parties and Coalition governments face the same problems as any other coalition/minority government.

It’s purely a brand thing. Nationals attract completely different demographics to Liberals. If the Nationals disbanded there would be quite a few seats in regional NSW that would flip to Labor or an independent candidate.

The Greens could ultimately be in a similar position to the Nats, with the Greens cornering the inner city and tree/sea changer demographics that aren’t necessarily strong for Labor. However right now they’re still competing for the same votes, and have never stood aside for each other. Labor at this stage also stands to lose support in working class suburbs and regional centres from being closely associated with the Greens – why you see the Liberals trot out Green peril lines.

@John, you sum up everything perfectly.

I think you’re right John: if the Coalition actually became a single party it would struggle to appeal to all Coalition voters. I’d guess the average voter in Toorak doesn’t have very similar political views to the average voter in Traralgon. But that’s basically my point: a Liberal-National government is just as much of an awkward marriage of convenience as a potential Labor-Greens government, plus it’s far more likely to actually happen.

I read in the Age the Greens still haven’t finalised their canidate for Cooper as they are doing all the background checks before announcing it.

While the delay is no doubt been done to prevent a repeat of some of the skeltons coming out of the closet from their candidates like it did at the last state election in Victoria. It’s likely the Greens enthusiasm is waning in this seat.

Greens losing state seat of Nortcote at the last election which is based in Cooper and is their stronghold can only further dampen the party’s chances. Ged Kearney also having incumbency under her belt and likely has worked the seat hard will easily retain it and further increase her margin. When Labors vote rises soft Green voters comeback to the Labor fold as well which I predict will happen in this seat.

Richard Di Natalie has stated adding to the Greens tally in the House of Reps won’t be a priority and retaining all their Senate seats will be the Greens focus at the next election.

Good news is, The Greens will stay on 1 seat. I hope they never get the Balance of power, This will be a Labour Hold

To be honest I think the Greens will pick up this seat but not this election.

I think the Greens will self-implode. No chance of winning Cooper or any other lower house seat. Melbourne will change once Bandt leaves

Considering The Greens won a Plurality of votes in 2016, They have a fighting chance in 2022 when the Incumbent Labour government (Presumed) will get a swing against it like almost all 1st term governments do. For now, Labour hold. The Phelps bill will actually HELP Labour here because this electorate does not care about the boats, if anything this electorate supports asylum seekers

The Greens previous canidate Alex Bhathal has announced she has quit the party and was scathing about the way she has been treated.

Greens are fighting amongst each other which will hurt them at the next election. But I don’t see them imploding like the Australian Democrats their voting base is too loyal.

Agreed with Daniel the Phelps bill won’t hurt Labor attracting support in inner city Green strongholds in Northcote. Probably less support as you travel further out but even then you are dealing Labor strongholds the party has this seat sewn up.

The talk about the Coalition strategically preferencing the Greens in ALP-Held Seats is one that has been discussed in the past. Indeed, that is what happened when Adam Bandt was elected in Melbourne.

However, the follow-up to that is that the Coalition, if they were smart, would then be saying “We control who gets elected in this seat. You need to preference us somewhere in return.”

The benefit of this situation is that the ALP and Greens would then be spending resources fighting each other in a seat that the Coalition wouldn’t need to worry about.

The Liberals have already used this seat as a bargaining chip. It was reported last election Liberals agreed to prefernce Labor in inner city seats where the Greens are a threat providing Labor will prefernce the Liberals in three seats to fend off the Nationals in third party contests.

It also blunts Liberals attack of warning voters of Labor/Greens Alliance if they prefernce the Greens. Their rank and file also hates the idea of preferncing the Greens.

I actually think Ged Kearney can win this seat at this election without Liberal preferences. She is likely going to boast a bigger primary vote at the next election making preferences not necessarily a deciding factor in the outcome.

If the Libs were smart ….. they should play the disrupt game in seats such as Cooper, Melbourne, Wills, Grayndler and Sydney. Preference against the sitting member, would trap lots of Greens and Labor money and resources in these seats for election after election. It could be the gift that keeps on giving.

Labor win this year given Green disarray and Kearney’s profile but down the track a Labor govt will disappoint & provide many reasons to vote Green. So her position will never be secure

https://www.tallyroom.com.au/aus2019/cooper2019/comment-page-1#comment-730565

I agree Cooper will be a tougher for the ALP to win at the election after next with government incumbency. Wills will also get tougher for them, for the same reason.

The Greens have finally picked their candidate for Cooper, with Melbourne barrister, David Risstrom, a former Greens Melbourne City Councillor.

May have a broader appeal to moderate Greens than Bhathal.

Ged is off to a strong start and I think will likely retain the seat this election (especially given that Labor regained the seat of Northcote and easily retained Preston).

https://www.theage.com.au/national/victoria/greens-pick-barrister-to-fight-labor-in-seat-formerly-known-as-batman-20190222-p50zio.html

I would guess also that Greens ground campaign will be stuffed with Bhathal’s personal loyalists sitting things out?

I think the Liberal candidate is incorrectly listed on this page.

Helen Jackson is in fact the Liberal candidate for Cooper (not that it makes any difference).