Glen Waverley – Victoria 2022

I bet Labor would campaign to the pro-vax moderates/centrist to gain this seat given the current MP (Neil Angus) is an anti-vaxxer and the current climate of the Matthew Guy’s Liberal Victoria is more leaning to the far right and could be Victoria’s (or perhaps even Australia’s) closest equivalent to the GOP. This can be evident in using populist campaigns against Andrews, opposes vaccine mandates (Crozier even said Vaccine Passport is segregation and opposes doses to be mandatory), and literally any covid restrictions. They even supported and attended the far-right rallies. There is also a large Chinese population in the seat notably in Glen Waverley (although also quite prevalent in the rest of the seats as well) and this could also be a disadvantage to the Libs as they seem to be heavily against China even though it is more of a federal issue meaning state level is often kept out of the issue?

Glen Waverley with its high Chinese population is very unlikely to support the anti vax movement and Neil Angus is really shooting himself in the foot.

The only thing i would add as a note of caution is that this is the strongest areas for the Lib in the Middle distance Eastern Suburbs after Manningham and includes some quite affluent areas such as Vermont, Wheelers Hill and eastern Glen Waverley. It is was a shock result that Labor won the Mount View and Jells Park booths (strongest Lib booths in this area) last election. Labor can increase their vote West of Springvale Road. Also part of this seat was in Mulgrave and some of the high Labor vote maybe a personal vote for Daniel Andrews.

Could the area north of High Street Road (still taking about East of Springvale Road) be due to Angus being an incumbent? Btw the Mount View booth was not in Mulgrave (it’s in Mount Waverley)
Angus was quite respectable by the people of Forest Hill probably until he announced his anti-vax stance (as I mentioned above) given the seat has amongst the highest vax rates and lowest percentage of covid cases in Victoria. Would not fit well with Small l Liberals/Moderates and Chinese voters, the big voting blocks in the seat.

Matthew, possibly to Angus being an incumbent. He got a sophomore surge in 2014 against the state trend. The swing in Forest Hill to Labor was considerable lower than the Melbourne average and considering that in 2002, Labor won it with a 5.8% margin with a similar state-wide TPP to 2018. Once theory, i personally have is that there is no railway line in Forest Hill (hence no level crossing removals or metro tunnel benefits to be realised). It seems the size of the swing was lower in areas where there was less commitments made such as Bulleen, Rowville, Forest Hill etc than in the seats such as Bentleigh, Carrum etc. Although it is also possible that Vermont is now stronger for the Libs similar to the trend seen in Knox LGA Agree Mount View Booth was in Mount Waverley but that particular booth is very strong for the Libs even in 2002 it was 58% for the libs and that part of Glen Waverley is more affluent and relatively less diverse being mostly outside that the Glen Waverley HS zone. Same as a federal level one of the strongest booths in Chisholm for the Libs. The part of the old Forest Hill electorate west of Springvale Road is very marginal and from a demographic point of view should be similar to the state-wide result.

I’d say this is gone for the Libs. Neil Angus being anti vax will really bite him. The state Libs for some reason keep spewing out the anti-China rhetoric seen from the federal Libs which won’t go down too well with the massive swings to Labor in the federal election in the area, particularly in the Glen Waverley suburb.

Don’t forget Vic Libs are more right-wing than the Federal Libs, rather more parallel with Canada’s Conservatives. They are most likely going to have Pierre Poilievre as a right-wing populist. Matthew Guy draws many similarities with Poilievre such as opposing lockdowns and vaccine mandates, spewing hardline irrational language against their centre-left opponents (Trudeau and Andrews), supporting far-right rallies, and denying its extremism, both have hatred with government departments with unfounded claims of their problems and so much more

Don’t know what glasses you’re wearing but the Vic Libs are totally controlled by the left faction.

If then why were their frontbenchere supporting the anti vax movements, the federal level prohibits frontbenchers to do so?

If then why were their frontbenchere supporting the anti vax movements, the federal level prohibits frontbenchers to do so?

Marh, stop, Neil Angus is not a far right politician, yes in terms of vaccination he leans to the right, but he is centrist in other areas of policy.
Plus this be election is about moving on from Covid-19’ lockdowns and restrictions and rebuilding Victoria from the vivid 19 crisis. The public do not care about Covid 19 mandates and care more about the management of the health system and improving the health system!

Are you sure that Neil Angus is not a far-right other policy? I have heard that he is also against abortion, just simply search it up and he attended an anti-abortion event with Bernie Finn. Yes, he was pretty respected before the vaccination controversy and Bennelong in the federal election was a textbook case of why candidates should not be sympathizing with the anti-vax movement (MP’s would be viewed as hard-right on social issues). GW has very parallel demographics with Bennelong although at a smaller size and population

This seat is an area that would be particularly supportive of Covid-zero, mask mandates and the lockdowns so Neil Angus being the only lower house MP to be anti-vax will be a huge liability. Add to that the incompetence of the state Libs and the state Libs’ hawkish stance on China which doesn’t make it hard to see why this seat would be anything but a Labor gain. Even though Dan Andrews may have some baggage, the state Libs have a much worse reputation.

@Marh been anti-vax doesn’t make you far-right and it’s not a prerequisite for the far-right. I don’t think anti-vax has ever been a far right or just right-wing thing, it’s always been a more hippy crystal healer type thing and probably still is. You’re more likely to find more anti-vaxers in Byron Bay or even Brunswick (read something awhile ago about a rift in the community as the vaccine uptake there was slow) than you are in the strongest Liberal or National booths. Also i don’t think been anti-abortion makes you far-right, he’s just a social conservative.
@Entrepenuer i don’t know how you can come to the conclusion that the Vic Libs are on the left side of the Lib party or are closer to the centre. Although i did see somewhere that Matthew Guy is in the moderate faction i think it’s probably a stretch to consider him such and shows you that factions are very muddied.

@North East, Sure Angus is probably not like the likes of George Christensen but Neil Angus interviewed Real Rukshan who is a well-known alt-right anti-vax commentator to express his view. I am not saying that every anti-vax is a far-right but in the past years, almost all new anti-vaxxers are part of the far-right and I never heard of a progressive politician undermining covid efforts. Wouldn’t having an anti-vaxxer just reduce the MP’s trust among the community?
Even worse, out of all the State Major Party factions in Australia, Vic Libs is the most sympathetic to the anti-vax movement evident from them joining the ‘freedom’ rallies back in November, possibly explaining one of the smaller factors on why the Libs lost votes in the Eastern Suburbs despite only being the federal election. I do agree that Guy is on paper from the moderate faction but bear in mind Guy and Vic Libs use hardline language (on the likes of Dutton) against Labor.

@North East Matthew Guy isn’t in the moderate faction though his predecessor Michael O’Brien is. I believe Matthew Guy is aligned with the Frydemberg-Sukkar faction which is why he recieved support from hard right state MPs like Tim Smith.

There seems to be virtually no correlation between the left-right axis and anti-vax sentiment.

The Hills in Sydney is one of the most right-wing areas in metropolitan Australia, in fact VoteCompass ranked Mitchell as the second-most right-wing electorate in the country after Maranoa. And yet, The Hills quickly became the most vaccinated LGA in the country.

@Nicholas, that’s just centre right-left political space which the anti-vax font does not belong in any of the centre space. I just mean the extreme right which is a small minority but spread out throughout the country. Many far-right anti vaxxer even live in safe Labor seats.

Vote Compass is self selected and not a scientific poll. I find it very doubtful that Mitchell would be right behind Maranoa and not some other rural Queensland electorate (that is, assuming the premise of Maranoa as the most conservative is correct).

@Dan M Thanks for the clarification, wasn’t sure myself. It certainly makes sense for Guy to be in the more hard right faction.

I think by “far-right”, a better term would just be “alt-right”.

The anti-vax movement isn’t necessarily tied to the far-right in any sense (ie. Fascism or the hard-right religious conservatives), but is very much tied to Trump’s “alt-right” which is more anti-truth, anti-establishment and anti-democracy than it is anything on a traditional left-right scale.

@Trent Makes sense. I guess another way to describe them is as reactionaries.

Anti Vax is just on the crazy axis

Traditionally, very few saw vaccine hesitancy as a left vs right issue. Many have their own reasons for avoiding vaccines. The Northern Rivers of NSW (Byron Bay) has been dubbed as the Anti-Vax Capital of Australia. Since Covid, the loudest anti-vax voices were from right-wing and far-right parties and people associate anti-vaxxers with the far-right. Think PHON, UAP, the right faction of the LNP, some US Republicans etc. I’m sure there are some Greens, Labor voters who are anti-vaxxers too.

Back to the original topic, the vote in Glen Waverley will depend on Albo’s approval, the view on the local Suburban Rail Link and whether there’s an “it’s time” mood (Dan’s been the Premier for nearly 8 years). I mentioned elsewhere that in an area with a large Chinese population, an anti-vax candidate won’t be well-received because they are more Covid-conscious. Anecdotally, just count the number of mask wearers in commercial areas like Glen Waverley.

I also add Vic Libs also are quite hawkish to China so expect this to be a factor in as well.
Also add in small-Liberals Anglos in the northern parts of the electrote who would not want an anti-vaxxer as their MP

Depending on the internal polling in the coming months, Albanese might show up hoping to turn Glen Waverley red in the same way he turned Chisholm red. If Dutton is seen as toxic, there may be attack ads showing him and Matthew Guy together. After all, I heard that according to polling in eastern Melbourne, locals felt abandoned by Frydenberg and Morrison. Dutton might be worse.

On another note, Gladys Liu, will seek nomination for the Libs’ upper house ticket. I wouldn’t be surprised if there are other ex-federal Libs who want to join the Vic Libs to “save” them.

Man, some of the comments here are delusional, especially from Marh.

The pandemic should be analysed along the authoritarian vs libertarian axis, not left vs right. It just so happens that right-leaning parties are far more sympathetic to libertarian ideals.

Too many left-wing partisans are spewing their bile over what would otherwise be an interesting site and comments section.

Agree with you Mark that social issues like vaccine mandates fall more on the auth vs libertarian axis and that is why some areas that seem conservative in nature still have high vax rates.

I think that is also the reason why many seats with high Asian (mostly Chinese) voters swung hard against the Liberals Federally, these voters whilst being fiscally conservative tend to lean more to the authoritarian side (Especially as China and CCP are pretty much full on authoritarian).

Yes, there is an increasing polarisation from vaccine mandates that define politics in Victoria in contrast states where both major party are pro mandate. Many of the LDP, UAP and ON federal votes would likely go to Vic Libs because they are more “libertarian” than any other LNP. Canada is another textbook case where their conservatives is heavily opposes vaccine mandates. Like my previous replies, Matthew Guy shares a lot of similarities of Pierre Poilievre

@Yoh An, I think lived experiences made Chinese and other East Asian voters more authoritarian on pandemic politics. For example, Covid struck East Asia hard in early 2020 and they also dealt with SARS in 2003 and MERS in 2015. Relatively libertarian Taiwan, South Korea and Japan have mask mandates, vaccine passports (in some way or another) or high mask-wearing rates and vaccine uptake. Before 2020, it wasn’t unusual for East Asians to wear masks.

Part of me thinks that pandemic politics will be in the rear-view mirror come November for middle and upper-class voters. The focus will be more on the transition to the post-Covid economy. Residents of low-income, outer suburban Melbourne and Sydney were most affected by Covid, literally and economically since early 2020, and won’t be so kind to the major parties, especially Labor in Victoria. We saw that recently with the Federal Election.

Votante, your comment is the reason why I probably see economic factors carrying greater weight in down ballot/state elections post Federal 2022 and that some commentators like Marh and Trent are probably wrong in suggesting Labor can still poll well in the affluent eastern suburbs.

Cost of living might not be as much of a factor for those living affluent, higher income suburbs but things like interest rate rises may well resonate just as much with those voters as they would in the more middle and low income suburbs.

Yoh An, I think most voters understand that issues like high interest rates are national rather than a state one. At state elections, people vote on infrastructure and local delivery more than the broader national/economic issues, which is why Labor typically perform a lot better than state level than federal level (in almost every state, NSW being an exception recently mostly just due to issues with NSW Labor).

I just can’t envision a highly educated, politically engaged, affluent inner city voter saying “Damn Victorian Labor! They are the reason my interest rate went up!”

Fair point Trent, that there is more separation between State and Federal issues for Australia vs US elections that makes down ballot losses for the party in power nationally not as significant.

I am also going by the experience of Victoria 2010, where Labor lost most Eastern suburbs seats despite polling well at the preceding Federal election (Although that case is probably different with Brumby being a less inspiring Labor leader compared to Andrews).

2010 was really a set of perfect circumstances for the Liberals:

– 11 year Labor government, which really had run out of steam and had really not delivered anywhere near what the Andrews government has, the state had felt a bit stagnant;

– Federal Labor had been in for 3 years and the Labor brand nationally was very tarnished by the Rudd/Gillard events, and the federal election was held only 3 months before the state election, with a minority government returned and controversy from the start (Victoria was strong for Labor at the 2010 federal election because Tony Abbott was so unelectable here)

– Bracks had been extremely popular but was only recently replaced with Brumby who was far less popular

– Ted Baillieau was seen as a very moderate Liberal leader and a viable alternative to Brumby

Even with all that going for them though, they only won with a 1 seat majority which I think highlights how hard it is for the Liberals to win in Victoria.

There’s a real possibility that the circumstances in 2026 are a lot more similar to the above: 12 year old Labor government, federal Labor may have been in for 4 years, the Liberals might have a more popular leader (especially if Pesutto gets elected this year), and if Andrews calls it a day the new leader may be the new Brumby replacing Bracks.

This time around though we have a state Labor government who are only 8 years old with their same popular (albeit divisive) leader and still steaming ahead with a big agenda, the state Liberals were gutted of talent in 2018 and returned a very unpopular leader and are perceived as directionless and weak, a brand new federal Labor government is still in a honeymoon period, and the Liberal brand is at an all time low point after 9 years of a deeply unpopular federal government and having just instilled possibly their most despised leader ever!

That’s why I think Labor will still at least match (if not better) their 2018 performance in some of the more affluent inner-south areas. In 2018 there was a backlash against the dumping of Turnbull but it seemed like a one-off mistake they got punished for; in 2022 the direction of the Liberal Party seems to be even more cemented now as a permanent and deliberate abandonment of that demographic, which senior figures have even said publically “we should forget about”.

@Yoh An, I think Vic compared to other states (especially QLD and Tas) mostly has their election results not too far away from the opinion polls federally. 2010 State Election was three months after the federal election but the Fed ALP by then became more unpopular. I think the only few flukes recently would be the Turnbull Honeymoon (late 2015) period where Turnbull was popular but Andrews was also popular as well.

@Trent You mentioned that there have been issues with NSW Labor. What issues are you referring to in this context ?

Nell Angus has been reendorsed so this will be one of the easiest target seats for Labor to target as Neil Angus’s anti-vax views especially when he said covid mandates is “apartheid” could have put many moderate votes off

@ Marh

With all do respect, I think you’re a little too biased towards one side to be making predictions

@Sam, nothing specific. Just that for most of the last decade, NSW Labor seem to have been similar to the Victorian Liberals in that they seemed to be in the political wilderness. I’m not from NSW so don’t really know why, but my understanding is that it may have been to do with some scandals etc that were occurring around the time they lost government in about 2011.

I don’t believe that’s still the case now, I think they regained a lot of ground at the last election and will be competitive (if not win) next year, but my comment was more just about how NSW over the last decade have been the notable exception to Labor dominating state politics.

I would like to transpose nsw federal to nsw state … and see the difference across seats.. suspect Riverstone Kiama Monaro and Tweed would have a different political lean.

Trent, you are right about NSW Labor having major scandals prior to their landslide loss in 2011. They also suffered a few prior to some elections (I think 2019 with Michael Daley making a gaffe about Asian voters).

However, I think Chris Minns as new leader is much stronger – he is probably like Keir Stamer as UK Labour leader (may be uninspiring but able to keep the pressure on an unpopular conservative government, given the Coalition’s issues with public sector workers etc)

Chris Minns is from the right faction and take more pragmatic stances so he is more like Scott Morrison of Labor. Stamer is more like Albo politically although You An is correct the the rhetoric is similar for Minns and Stamer

Matthew Guy is rather more Pierre Poilievre for Canadian Conservative (uses populist language in their campaigns against the centre-left government such as Covid mandates)

I would say that this seat along with Caulfield will be near certain Labor gains. Caulfield’s margin is knife-edge so any swing no matter how small would flip it whereas for here, Neil Angus’ anti-vax stance and antipathy towards the Libs among Chinese Australian voters will be more than enough to flip this seat especially since unlike the NSW Libs, the state Vic Libs have also parroted similarly hawkish language and views on China. Now it seems Matthew Guy is desperately trying to backtrack given how much campaigning he’s done within the Chinese community lately but the damage is likely already done.
Brighton and Sandringham are also looking like likely Labor gains though I can see the Libs possibly retaining the two if the Libs’ position improves and the state or federal Labor govt messes up big time but even then I’d say Caulfield and Glen Waverley would still flip.

Matthew Guy may have put the final nail in Glen Waverley’s coffin today. He can also say goodbye to winning back Ashwood and Box Hill.

According to The Age, he’s announcing this morning that if elected, his government will scrap the Suburban Rail Loop.

What is the rationale for opposing the SRL?

The only rationale i am thinking is if they want to prioritize Melbourne Metro 2 instead which is also a critical PT project

@Nicholas They want to redirect the funding to, ironically, free public transport for allied health workers. Not a very smart move since the SRL is popular in must win seats like here, Ashwood and Box Hill as well as Guy’s own seat of Bulleen. I guess the rationale is also that the Western suburbs won’t benefit from the Stage 1 of the SRL so this may he an attempt to win votes over there

@Nimalan, I’m pretty sure they don’t want to do that either since I’ve never heard Matthew Guy or the Libs mention anything about it.

The Age article says the rationale is to redirect the $34b saved to “fixing the healthcare crisis”.

Quote (something to this effect): “Voters have a clear choice between fixing the healthcare crisis now, or having a train line in 13 years”.

The problems with this are:
1. The healthcare crisis is national, most people recognise that
2. The healthcare crisis is not really about funding, but about staff shortages. Scrapping a rail line won’t magically create more healthcare workers.
3. Healthcare is Labor’s traditional strength. While people may acknowledge it’s in bad shape now, very few people – even most Lib voters – would actually believe that the Liberals will invest more than Labor into public health
4. Scrapping the SRL doesn’t even save $34b because most of that is private investment. It only saves $11b in state funds. Andrews can easily capitalise on that to demonstrate that Guy doesn’t even understand how the funding works.

Also Guy’s use of phrases like “… or a train line in 13 years” just reinforces the perception that his government is not forward thinking and don’t plan for the future, which is widely seen as the Andrews Government’s biggest strength.

It’s an astonishingly poor political decision from Guy & the Liberals!

@ Dan M, The Greens support Melbourne Metro 2 i am hoping other parties will also back this. It will allow for a Wollert and Doncaster rail and also increase capacity in the fast growing Wyndham area