Prahran – Victoria 2018

Crucial test case for the Greens as a party.

I’m assuming that with incumbency Sam Hibbins’s incumbency advantage the Greens will consolidate the left wing primary vote and easily come 2nd. But then what happens to traditional lib/lab swing voters? Are they more likely to vote Liberal when that might be perceived as the only way to not elect a Green? Or will some consider the Greens for the first time and sure Hibbins up?

If Green incumbents do as well in these kind of marginal/Liberal leaning seats (see also: Ballina and Maiwar) as they do in traditional Labor seats they could one day threaten many more hung parliaments across Australia’s lower houses.

If they get swept out here they probably are incentivised to give up running hard in Liberal seats entirely, which would be a shame, all they could work towards is turning narrow Labor majorities into hung parliaments.

Libs will probably run a campaign of “boo minority government, boo loony Greens who are anti-progress, vote for us for a solid majority government that is serious, the economy blah blah.”

this as Bennee points out an unusual 3 way marginal…… which is very evenly split…..50/50 alp lib and 50/50 lib/gn…….. also there are many permutations….. what if libs poll third for example?

The Libs (shock horror) have actually preselected a candidate with the credentials that would appeal to the more liberal-leaning/sympathetic Greens voter, which I suspect would be prominent in a seat such as this.

They are definitely gunning for this seat and they have come to the conclusion that a significant number of Greens voters will vote based on personality rather than the politics of the party, and their choice of candidate reflects this.

The Liberals can’t possibly finish 3rd. If they somehow were to (their candidate gets done for malpractice or something?) Labor would win in a canter.

Matt is right about the “Greening” of other party candidates in seats like this and it seems a very sensible thing for them to do, but they are still tied to the rest of their party’s campaign which might involve fearmongering about safe-schools, African gangs, etc. which could be distasteful here.

I don’t see it as candidates “greening”, as the nature of many of Melbourne’s inner suburbs have always been home to Deakin Liberalism which has from time to time influenced the Liberal Party, the ALP, the Democrats and nowadays the Greens. People often overlook why Menzies didn’t want the Liberal Party to be a “Conservative” party because he knew that the mindset of places in the inner east and south including his own seat were more Liberal minded than Conservative minded.

As a Greens supporter I’m confident about retaining this seat. Sam Hibbins to win with a primary vote above 30%

Greens will retain with an increased margin.

I think the Greens’ incumbency at state level may have even factored into the 2016 federal results in this area.

Most of these areas had a swing of roughly 10% towards the Greens between Prahran 2014 & Higgins 2016 and that was with a) Liberal incumbency at federal level; b) Honeymoon period for Turnbull as a small “l” party leader. Most of that wasn’t from Labor either, a lot was from the Liberals.

With a Greens incumbent and a state Liberal party running a very conservative ‘culture-war’ campaign, a focus on law & order issues (which even the local candidate is pushing on her flyers) that really has no resonance in this area, not to mention how on the nose the federal Liberals are, this should be a win for Hibbins.

Have a look how much South Yarra, Prahran & Windsor moved towards the Greens in just 2 years between the 2014 state election to the 2016 federal election (acknowledging state & federal results aren’t always comparable, but this is significant):

South Yarra booths:
LIB primary – 49% in 2014 -> 44% in 2016
GRN Primary – 23% in 2014 -> 34% in 2016

Prahran booths:
LIB primary – 41% in 2014 -> 37% in 2016
GRN primary – 27% in 2014 -> 36% in 2016

Windsor booth:
LIB primary – 36% in 2014 -> 27% in 2016
GRN primary – 31% in 2014 -> 47% in 2016

Across the 3 suburbs combined, the Liberals’ primary vote dropped from 45% to 40% while the Greens’ primary vote jumped from 25% to 35%.

Also interesting to note is that in 2014, the 2CP vote (not listed by booth here) was very much divided by Commercial Road with the Liberals winning Toorak & South Yarra to the north and the Greens winning the suburbs to the south. In 2016 however, the Greens won the combined South Yarra booths 51-49, leaving just the small section of Toorak as the only suburb the Liberals won in 2CP terms. If those numbers are replicated this year, the seat would be unwinnable for the Liberals.

So factoring in Greens incumbency and the prospect of conservative culture warrior Matthew Guy as premier, I don’t really see the movement towards the Greens being reversed this year.

While all eyes are on Prahran as the most interesting and super-marginal contest that could go 3 different ways, I’m predicting a solid 54-46 Greens win here.

I think Albert Park is more likely to be 2018’s version of the 2014 Prahran contest than Prahran is.

That South Yarra booth is the booth we previously discussed, the booth is divided at federal level whereas at state level it is one booth. It is better for the Liberals when that booth is one whole booth compared to when its divided like it is federally.

Those South Yarra results I put in the post above are a total of all 5 South Yarra booths combined – Fawkner Park (Ports), Fawkner Park (Higgins), South Yarra, Hawksburn and Hawksburn Central, so they cover the entire suburb across both Higgins & Ports.

As you mention the Ports results for Fawkner Park were the best one for the Liberals, but they were included and it was still a 51-49 2CP for the Greens. It would have been even more if I only looked at the Higgins booths, a couple of which the Greens won 55-45 & 56-44.

Noting too that obviously the Ports results for Fawkner Park were a 2CP vs Labor, not the Greens. In my suburb-wide 2CP calculation I simply allocated 53.98% of the 1868 total votes to the Liberals and the other 46.02% to the Greens, acknowledging that’s not perfect because the 2PP may have been different if it was Labor preferences distributed.

Here are the 2CP results I got by suburb:

Toorak: Liberals 67-33
South Yarra: Greens 51-49 (as mentioned, that included the LIB 54-46 in Ports)
Prahran: Greens 57-43
Windsor: Greens 65-35

St Kilda & St Kilda East booths within Prahran combined for 67-33 ALP v LIB, but the Greens came first with a 37% primary vote.

Considering how small the section of Toorak is within the Prahran electorate, the Greens dominated the ordinary vote within the boundaries of Prahran in 2016.

If the Libs can only manage around 50-50 in South Yarra again they are in trouble because dominating one-third of Toorak isn’t enough to compete with the Greens owning everywhere south of Commercial Road.

Trent

That is why if Macnamara was redrawn using either Williams Rd or Orrong Rd as a boundary then the Greens would be a strong chance of winning the seat.

Neil Pharoah was at Prahran Station again this morning. He’s been very visible campaigning early on, at Prahran Station once a week for about a month already and I assume probably the same at South Yarra & Windsor on days he’s not at Prahran. Whereas I am yet to see either Katie Allen or Sam Hibbins campaigning at all yet, apart from a pretty ineffective brochure in the mail from Allen.

Labor could be a dark horse here. Even though the inner south is moving pretty steadily away from Labor, they only lost by a few votes last election and Daniel Andrews wasn’t very well known at the time.

Andrews’ popularity and Labor’s overall strong performance in office might negate a lot of the ALP-to-Green movement that’s been going on in the inner south this time and keep it very close again.

I don’t see the Libs improving on 2014 here so the 3PP stage will decide it.

2016 Higgins results should be treated with a bucket of salt as the ALP candidate was Carl Katter (even more “interesting” than his half brother) and the GRN candidate, Jason Ball, had a high profile and great story as a LGBTIQ+ footy player.

Animal Justice Party preferences decided this last time – LAB getting the fewest of the remaining 3 parties by some margin, which was weird given the very popular and now legislated puppy farm ban that they took to the election. 50 AJP preferences the other way and this is a LAB seat.

Very close result again

Liberals would have won a Lib vs ALP runoff in 2014.

Labor candidates putting in effort isn’t the same as a well resourced campaign. You will see candidates from all parties in unwinnable seats putting in major effort out of passion (or CV building).

However it’s very interesting if Liberals aren’t trying very hard as this should be one of their main target seats. Greens you could attribute to a lack of resources and 3 MLCs in an even more tenuous position than Hibbins.

Incumbency is a big deal. I wouldn’t write Labor off (also with the possibility of Liberals finishing 3rd), but it would be very surprising if Hibbins gets under 30% primary which would be the main ingredient necessary for an ALP win.

Important statistic that everyone is ignoring: enrollment in 2014 44075, enrollment in 2018 50207. 6132 new voters and we can only make assumptions about how they’ll vote.

The appalling service on the Frankston line plus the reluctance of the Andrews gvmt to connect South Yarra station to Metro tunnel has cost the ALP badly here, it may very well come to how many ALP voter peel off to the Lbs. Betting makrkets also point to no clear winner with sportbet giving the Greens $2.25 and $2.40 for the Libs. ALP on $4.00.

At the moment (28/9) the betting market is pointing to a ALP return with anyone’s guess in Prahran. No lib losses, Bentleigh, Carrum and Frankston all very very close but the libs very narrowly ahead in Bentleigh and the ALP very narrowly ahead in Carrum and Frankston. We’ll see how this changes

In general new enrollments in an area like this implies children turning 18 and gentrification. Also isn’t it a very LGBT+ area? I imagine marriage equality survey could have driven many lazy not-yet-enrolled people to sign up.

John: Yep if 2014 was ALP v LIB, the Liberals would have won by 25 votes. However, I really do think this time around that the Liberals will do worse in both primary vote and 2PP than they did in 2014, so whoever comes second out of Labor & Greens should win the seat.

Comparing 2014 with 2018, consider these factors:

– Incumbency: In 2014 the Liberals had the advantage of a first term incumbent, in 2018 they don’t.
– Andrews: In 2014 he was relatively unknown, now he has a huge (and mostly positive) profile.
– Federal stigma: In 2014 the Libs did have an unpopular leader in Abbott, but they were a relatively new government and the Rudd/Gillard drama was still fresh. In 2018 Rudd/Gillard is a distant memory while the 5 years of Liberal turmoil and the recent outing of Turnbull has hurt the Liberal brand badly.

This is a very socially progressive seat where Turnbull’s ousting, the Liberals’ lurch to the right (at both state & federal level), and the issues Guy is focusing his campaign on will all do brand damage here, regardless of who the local candidate is.

I still don’t think the ALP will win the seat, the Greens have to be the favourite and I think should win it pretty comfortably, but I do think Labor will do a bit better than people expect and could make it close in the 3PP stage.

And I think considering the Liberals lost the seat with almost a 45% primary vote last time, I just can’t see any way they will be improving on that. I’m predicting more in the 40-42% range which will make it hard for them to crack 47% of the 2PP vote.

Bennee – Yep it’s a huge LGBT+ area. Also in the last 4 years both Windsor & Prahran have become considerably more ‘hipster’ too. Windsor especially has pretty much become the southside’s Fitzroy, and it’s pushing more into Prahran now which feels like its getting its boho back as the Windsor-vibe keeps spreading north of High St.

Another significant change – and one that may account for a significant portion of those 6000+ new electors – is the massive amount of high rise development in South Yarra. It’s still the upmarket end of the street, but it feels less exclusive than it used to and those high rises would have moved more young affluent professionals, mostly singles or couples without kids, many probably LGBT+ and most likely renting, into the suburb. This is a major Greens demographic.

This was the main reason I wanted to point out the 2016 federal numbers within the boundaries. I know you can’t compare state to federal, but as a local what’s interesting was that the difference between 2014 and 2016’s results actually reflects the demographic changes I’ve noticed over the last 5 years.

Windsor becomes a hipster enclave, and the Greens vote skyrockets to 47%.

South Yarra has massive high rise development that feels like its bringing more Greens demographic in, and what was previously a Liberal stronghold suddenly has a 2PP of around 50/50 Liberals & Greens.

The Greens’ strong federal result within the boundaries in 2016 can be attributed to many things that may not impact a state election – candidates, federal issues, SSM, etc – but I don’t think you can overlook the demographic changes either, and they do impact it.

Trent

Well spotted, I had forgotten about the surge in apartment based residences around South Yarra, although I know the area very well, I just hadn’t thought about it in terms of election results.

I suspect you may be right although it may split with the Greens benefiting at state level and the Liberals at federal level particularly as O’Dwyer is fairly normal for a Liberal MP.

I am not sure the Greens can rely on issues like SSM as it has been passed and isn’t a state issue, although I agree that Toorak Rd South Yarra doesn’t have the same sense of being an exclusive village that it once did although it still feels wealthy.

I think ultimately all future elections in that area will be Green vs Liberal.

I agree, I think this year’s state election is the last election that the ALP will have a reasonable chance in the area for the foreseeable future.

After that, both Higgins and Prahran will be Liberal v Green for a long time, pending some sort of major shift in party dynamics in Australia.

There will always be a strong Liberal vote due to the wealth in the area but unless the party starts moving with the times (and away from the right) on social issues, Prahran will look increasingly bleak for the Liberals over time. Higgins obviously less so because of the rusted on Toorak-Armadale-Malvern belt.

I live in this electorate.

Ordinarily I’d say Sam Hibbins is in trouble. He hasn’t made that much of a name for himself, and the Libs’ candidate is appealing to undecided Liberal vs. Greens voters (a group that definitely exists).

But Sandbelter has said all that needs to be said re the increasing size of the roll. There’s growth in all sections of the electorate, but on balance the demographics are still changing. Labor is finished and Greens will easily grow their 2CP.

So should be a retain for Hibbins – unless things really change in the next few weeks 🙂

Agree demographic change favours Greens, but maybe it’s also a problem it’s aspect of the high population turnover in this seat which makes establishing a personal vote difficult – problem for Hibbins? On Andrews’ popularity in 1999 Labor ran Joseph O’Reilly from Victorian Aids Council but Libs held easily & maybe Kennett’s social liberal image helped them? Could it be same for Andrews?

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/labor-on-track-to-ride-to-victory-in-prahran-after-bike-lane-pledge-20181023-p50bgj.html

ReachTel poll from October 18 of 603 voters in Prahran is a bad result for the Greens but an even worse result for the Liberals, with primary votes of:

Liberal – 33.3% (-11.5%)
Labor – 30.3% (+4.4%)
Greens – 24.5% (-0.3%)

2PP 57-43 to Labor.

I don’t think results that extreme will play out like that in 4 weeks time, but I think it shows that Labor are definitely in with a shot, and supports my prediction that whoever comes second will beat the Liberals (although by a closer margin than this poll).

To get an ALP-GRN 2pp in that ReachTel Poll is virtually impossible off those primary vote numbers. The margin between Liberal and Green is 8.8% and between Liberal and Labor it is 3.0% (sums to 11.8%). If the Other vote is 11.9%, then in the distribution at the 3pp level, then the Liberal Party would have to receive virtually no preferences from the ‘Other’ vote to finish outside the final 2pp. It’s an unheard of preference flow and a stuff up by ReachTel.

Surely that’s a typo by The Age

“The result puts it well clear on a two-party preferred basis, with 57 per cent of the vote to the Greens’ 43 per cent.”

Makes no sense.

Is there any publication of the actual polling? I’d also be interested what order they asked the questions and how the 11.9% breaks down into “other” or “undecided”. “Other” could imply Reason party, Animal Justice, and Victorian Socialists which would of course be much better for Sam Hibbins than if it was “undecided.”

I noticed the same but I wasn’t sure if it was the poll itself that asked for the wrong 2PP option or if The Age article just put the wrong parties in the 2PP results.

I would have thought that not yet knowing ALP would come second in their result, the 2PP question asked in the survey would have been GRN-LIB considering the Greens hold the seat. But maybe since it was commissioned by a cycling group on the back of an ALP announcement, they requested a two party question that was irrelevant to the election 2PP, more to measure whether the policy announcement would make people more likely to vote Labor or Greens. Who knows.

In any case, the 2PP is likely to be even worse than 43-57 for the Liberals with those PVs. In 2014 their 2PP was only boosted by 5% after preference allocation. Given the high “Other” result it may be a little more than that, but I imagine that set of PVs would have an ALP-LIB 2PP closer to 59-41, so if the election results are anywhere close to this poll the Liberals are on track for an embarrassing wipeout here.

That’s a great point about the “Other” Bennee. Greens won off the back of AJP preferences in 2014. “Other” could also just be disillusioned Liberal voters who can’t stand Matthew Guy and/or the tarnished Liberal brand in general, but don’t want to vote ALP or Greens so indicated “Other” in lieu of seeing what other independents/minors are on the ballot.

I figured at first that 2PP had to be a typo by The Age too but then I realised, why would they ask for an ALP 2PP at all when the seat was GRN-LIB last time? So maybe it was just a weird question the cycling group commissioned, or maybe The Age have done their own bizarrely irrelevant 2PP calculation from the data, so I’m also very curious to see what questions were asked and in what order too.

I would treat that poll with some caution as I would be surprised if the seat was won by such a margin, I think the last time Prahran was on a margin of 7% was back in 1992 in a landslide election, however it is possible this could be the first indications of a backlash against the federal government, and I am not expecting the ALP to reach the final two and if the Greens do increase their primary, I would have thought they would have taken votes from both the other two.

(It’s definitely not a push poll)

Yesterday I received a pamphlet in the mail from the Liberal candidate Katie Allen sent in an envelope marked “IMPORTANT – Victorian Electoral Commission” along with a postal vote application form. Surely that has to be breaking some sort of rule to send campaign advertising in a fake VEC envelope?

Trent – both major parties have been doing this for decades. Its an application for a postal ballot not the ballot.

Yes I know, that’s exactly what I said – “a postal vote application form” was my precise wording.

I never said it was a ballot, I said that what was deceiving was sending out campaign advertising in a fake VEC envelope that was not from the VEC.

Trent.

Not sure about the VEC but my federal member has done that at the last few elections, I have wondered without checking if that is within the rules but I am guessing it might be okay if it includes postal vote infor, and people are more likely to open such mail if it came from the AEC/VEC than if it clearly came from a politician even if it could be misleading.

Another ReachTel poll reported in The Guardian was conducted last week commissioned by an environmental group of about 500 voters in Prahran with similar results to the cycling poll a couple of weeks earlier – big collapse in the Liberal vote, significant boost for Labor and the Greens now in distant third place, with PVs that would put Labor well in front in 2PP terms:

Liberal – 31.9%
Labor – 34.2%
Greens – 21.9%

If I combine this poll of 500 with the previous poll of around 600, it comes out with roughly the following results among 1100 responses:

Liberal – 32.7%
Labor – 32.1%
Greens – 23.3%

I was actually called for this one and was a respondent, so I can confirm that it was definitely not a push poll (at least with regard to voting intention). The voting intention questions – first the primary vote and secondly a Labor vs Liberal 2PP question – were the first two questions asked before I even knew what the rest of the poll would be about, so they were not contextualised by any of the environment questions which followed.

Trent, what was the “other” or “not sure” options?

From memory the PV question was framed something like the following:

“If an election were to be held today, who would you give your first preference vote to? Pretty 1 for the Australian Labor Party, 2 for the Liberal Party, 3 for the Greens, 4 for the National Party, 5 for another party or 6 if you are undecided”. Something along those lines. I do remember it asked about the Nationals which is kind of strange if only 3 inner city electorates were polled.

From reading the report (there’s a link on Poll Bludger) it looks like an ‘undecided’ response also prompted a follow up question asking which one you are leaning towards. I didn’t hear that question because I didn’t choose undecided.

The PVs for ALP, LIB & GRN only add up to 88% and the report said that 8.8% of voters were undecided, so I assume it breaks down to 34.2% ALP, 31.9% LIB, 21.9% GRN, 3.2% Other and 8.8% undecided.

It did mention that 50% of undecided female respondents said they are leaning towards the Liberals. The Liberal vote is usually higher among males so I assume around 5% of that 8.8% undecided will probably lean Liberal.

Unfortunately I can only find a summary of “highlights” published rather than the full results, but the above basically summarises all the information I could glean from it.

It’s interesting that it pretty much mirrored the previous poll’s result with both ALP & LIB in the 30-35% range and the Greens in the 20-25% range, which seemed a bit unrealistic at the time but is perhaps more accurate than I thought.

As a Prahran resident I can verify that Neil Pharaoh has definitely been campaigning the longest and has been the most visible, although the Greens have the most ads around. The Liberal candidate has pretty much been invisible apart from sending letters out, at least around the 3181/3182 end of the seat where I live. Perhaps she’s been more visible up in South Yarra.

Just got one of the “Get a postal vote dressed up as fake VEC” letters from the local Lib member. First time that’s happened in my seat (Carrum) that I remember. Personally, I find it pretty deceitful, and makes my chances of voting for them drop even further.

Expat – both the Libs and Labs have been sending out postal vote application forms for at least 2 decades from my knowledge. I got minefor Albert Park today too. My letter also stated were I could early vote and the start date for early voting and the address. I see nothing wrong with that as its a costly service to voters by a party as we all know that about 30% vote before the 24 Nov 18

I know it’s happened for a long time, and I’m not implying it’s against the rules or anything. Just stating that this is the first time I remember seeing it in my electorate… and personally I just find it tacky that they dress it up in a VEC envelope.

I agree with Expat. The problem isn’t sending out the postal application form, it’s using a fake VEC envelope and putting a party pamphlet in it.

The VEC logo on the envelope shows that it contains VEC material and should not be thrown out as junk mail. A storm in a tea cup. There was a candidate letter as well but this was about voting methods as well as five one line party policies. Remember the candidate is paying postage which also saves the VEC postage if a voter rang and asked for a application and this application has been sent out in plenty of time too. The application has to be filled in and sent to the VEC who then send the voter the ballot paper and then the voter mails it back.

Just had another polling call but this one was internal Liberal Party polling (number verified as belonging to Liberal Party). The poll was specific to Prahran as it named the 3 main candidates, and I think the questions were actually read by Katie Allen herself.

First question was first preference offered in this order – 1 for the Liberal Party’s Katie Allen, 2 for Labor’s Neil Pharaoh, 3 for The Greens’ Sam Hibbins, 4 for somebody else.

Second question was a 2PP choice – 1 for the Liberal Party, 2 for the Labor Party.

Next was the alternate 2PP choice which the previous poll didn’t ask – 1 for The Greens or 2 for the Liberal Party (in that order).

After that a couple of push-polling questions – do you believe Daniel Andrews & Labor have done enough for the Prahran area, and do you believe Daniel Andrews has done enough for Victoria.

What about Alan Menadue the Independent Have herd him speak and he seems to undersatand a lot of the problems in this area ?

My prediction: A key contest – Hibbins has incumbency and will support a minority Andrews government, so should hold as the incumbent left candidate, as Labor are currently on course to win again. A seat the Liberals NEED to win in order to reclaim Spring Street.

Greens seat most at risk, if there is a swing to Labor there are lots of Liberal votes to convert (unlike inner city) & it would take only a very few of these to shift to put Labor in second place and hence win. View seat polls with doubt but that is story that they suggest.

I agree completely. In 2014 only 16 votes needed to change from Greens to Labor for Labor to have finished in second place. It’s hard not to see that happening if there is a significant swing to Labor.

I feel like the swing away from the Liberals will be strongest in the inner city too, and particularly seats like Prahran. The Liberals’ campaign has not only just targeted their more conservative suburban base at the expense of inner city Liberal voters, but aggressively attacked a lot of policy positions the swinging “small l” voters in the inner city would support (safe schools, safe injecting rooms, etc), and there are a hell of a lot of them in suburbs like South Yarra & Prahran.

Voted this morning at the Prahran East polling place (Prahran RSL right on the border of Prahran & Windsor).

Observations:

– No Liberal posters or advertising had Matthew Guy’s face on it whatsoever. Obviously trying to sell Katie Allen as a “small l” progressive candidate from the medical profession, in a seat where Guy’s policies are poison.

– Also no attack posters by Labor featuring Matthew Guy, which I think is a missed opportunity to make sure voters are reminded that a vote for Katie Allen, regardless of her personal credentials, is a vote for Guy government (shutting down injecting rooms, abolishing safe schools, mandatory sentencing, etc)

– Matthew Guy pulled up in his “Get Back in Control” bus but was gone within 15 minutes. Seems very quick. Perhaps the local Liberals don’t want his face to be seen in the vicinity?

– I took particular notice of what pamphlets people were holding, and people’s reactions to the HTV volunteers. A lot of people holding red & green pamphlets but no blue. A lot of people holding only a green pamphlet. A smaller number had only red pamphlets. I pretty much only saw blue pamphletsin the hands of people with all 3, and only saw 1 person holding only a blue pamphlet.

This seat always leans red/green well above the seat average, but in 2014 it was only 55-45 vs the Liberals (in the ALP v LIB count published). However, in Higgins 2016 it was 61-39 vs the Liberals. From my observations today it looks like it will break a lot closer to Higgins 2016 than Prahran 2014.

Typo… Meant to say this polling place always leans red/green well above the seat result.

This one won’t be officially decided for a while because the 3PP count will be so close between all 3 parties.

However, it will be an ALP gain. They lead the Greens by 78 primary votes now. Reason preferences (which outnumber Animal Justice) will favour Labor over Green and postals will favour Labor over Green. They should finish about 200-300 votes ahead of the Greens.

Libs currently in third place by 211 votes but postals will put them in the top 2 where they will be thumped.

Prediction – ALP 61, LIB 39.