Prahran – Victoria 2022

Labor’s counter to such a scare campaign in that case writes itself – the Greens are only there because the Liberals put them there! (Of course that’s a somewhat disingenuous thing to say, but it would work.)

This is hard to pick
But despite the alp margin
On the new boundaries
I pick green retain but it
Is possible that Labor wins
Based on Lydia Thorpe’s problems

I’d estimate based on expected preference flows if the Libs do indeed preference the Greens, that in seats where the Liberal primary vote is around 20%, the Labor primary would have to drop below at least 43-44% for the Greens to win.

That represents about a -10% Labor swing in Footscray and Preston so I think they’d stay in Labor hands.

Pascoe Vale is harder to predict because if the high IND vote last time but could be in play.

Richmond & Northcote would definitely be Greens gains, and given Labor’s primary vote is only 43% already in Albert Park (with an expected swing against) that would fall too IF it becomes an ALP v GRN race.

I think Labor’s only chance in Prahran is an ALP v GRN count where the Liberals preference Labor. That’d be close to 50-50 I think.

I think we can rule out an ALP v LIB count because in 2018 the Greens underperformed and have surged since, Labor overperformed and are less popular since, and Labor don’t even seen to be trying here. So Greens won’t finish third.

Most likely outcome I think is still a GRN v LIB count (easy Greens win), and if the Liberals do fall to third but preference the Greens then that should be a closer but still comfortable Greens win over Labor.

I wouldn’t be surprised if the LNP preference the Greens ahead of Labor for tactical reasons. They did the same in South Brisbane at the last QLD state election. In Victoria, it’s their best chance to limit Labor’s net gains or maximise Labor’s net losses, and it doesn’t cost a cent and yet could influence the outcome. Them trying to turn the election into a referendum on Dan Andrews may keep this a Green seat.

The federal results showed that the Libs crashed in Higgins and Macnamara. I don’t think the Libs would be chasing votes in Prahran. Besides, the Libs struggle to get above 20% in inner Melbourne, north of the Yarra River, and Prahran may follow the same suit.

I believe that the Liberals are running a “Put Labor Last” campaign. I can’t remember where I saw this, but if they are, it would be to the benefit of the Greens in seats like this.

Greens hold, No contest, This is a SAFE Greens seat on 8%

@Daniel, the margin vs Lib is certainly safe but it’s misleading because the Greens were only 277 votes from being eliminated by Labor at the 3CP count last time, so the 2CP margin doesn’t reflect how close they actually were to elimination.

That said, I think there’s a general consensus that Labor won’t pass the Greens at the 3CP stage this time, as the Greens vote in the area has really surged in the 2 federal elections since.

But the risk for the Greens would have been the Libs falling to third, then if the Libs preferenced Labor the ALP v GRN count would be really close.

However, the Liberals running a “Put Labor last” campaign, if they back that up with their HTV cards, will lock in a safe Greens retain.

In Prahran in 2018, roughly 63% of AJP’s preferences went to the Greens. This helped push the Greens to overtake Labor in the distribution of preferences.

I’m surprised at how few candidates there are in this seat. So far, no Reason Party, no Victorian Socialists and no anti-Dan independents or “freedom” parties. The anti-Dan candidates are more concentrated in the western suburbs and northern suburbs and in Dandenong. From memory, UAP, ONP and LDP didn’t do too well at the federal election in Higgins and Macnamara.

It appears that AJP have the fourth largest number of Legislative Assembly candidates statewide (assuming LNP is one party). They are running in most seats.

I’m surprised there’s no Reason candidate here or in Albert Park yet because they generally had a bit of a base in St Kilda due to the prominence of sex work and its related support services in the area, dating back to when they were the Australian Sex Party.

I’ve noticed the Victorian Socialists rarely run south of the river though.

I agree and I think the Socialists are too busy concentrating funds and efforts in Western Metro and Northern Metro so it’ll be interesting to see!

I personally am surprised that Liberals and Greens are calling in big guns as mention by John Above. Greens have called majority of their federally recognisable names such as Senator Janet Rice, Macnamara candidate Steph Hodgins-May and even today Sonya Semmens for Higgins with Jason Ball for Higgins too. The Greens seem to be targeting this hard.

Similarly, the Liberals were seen at Prahran market this morning with Dr Katie Allen. It makes me question why the newly elected MP Michele isn’t out helping Vic Labor and why Liberals and Greens are targeting hard.

But if liberals do follow through with the Dan Last, it’ll depend where the Greens finish

Wrong type of election for the ALP to make a play here – there will be a statewide swing against the ALP compare to 2018 because that was such a blowout result. Plus the Greens have the benefit of incumbency.

I can’t imagine the Liberals actually believe they have any chance of winning, so maybe they’re canpaigning just to stay in second and keep Labor in third place because they’d prefer a Green retain than Labor gain, and without it having to be due to their preferences.

The Liberals’ overlapping federal result here was a further -11% drop after the 10% swing Katie Allen suffered in 2018.

A 21% difference between the Liberals’ 2014 primary vote and overlapping 2022 federal primary vote, from 44% to 23%! They have zero chance.

Also I don’t know if I’d call Katie Allen a big gun as she was a failed 2018 candidate who suffered a big swing, and one term federal MP who lost blue ribbon Higgins (albeit not her fault, she probably saved a few percent).

I understand why the Greens are putting in the effort though and as mentioned above I don’t think it would be because they’re worried about Labor beating them in primary votes or the 3CP race, I think most people expect the Greens to finish first. They’re just preparing for the possibility of the Liberals falling to third and directing preferences to Labor which would be a genuinely close ALP v GRN race (although looking more likely Libs will preference Greens now anyway).

Liberal MP David Davis and Prahran Candidate Matthew Lucas are again sharing “Put Labor Last” messages. Not long to go but it does look like Liberals will actually preference Greens ahead of Labor at least in the Inner City seats where they themselves have no chance of winning.

The Libs have officially confirmed preferencing Labor last in every seat. Nothing but a Greens retain here

What percentage of Liberal voters will follow the recommendation to preference the Greens above Labor?

@ Nicholas, i guess we need to look at the flow of preference in Melbourne (fed) 2010 or at the 2006 Vic state election for clues. Most Liberal voters in Prahran and other parts of the inner city will be more moderate ones.

I believe in Melbourne in 2010, the Lib preference flow was 80% to the Greens, 20% to Labor. Even if the preference flow is significantly lower this time, say 60%-40% the Greens would still win. Prahran has a lot of blue-green voters particularly in the South Yarra and Southbank end so I’d imagine the preference flows to the Greens would be pretty strong.

@Nicholas,

In any statistics I’ve seen, Liberal voters are usually more reliable in voting according to the HTV than Greens or Labor voters are.

That said – it’s still a minority who follow it exactly, maybe 25-30% at best.

I’d imagine most Lib voters here would preference the antivax parties below Labor which would not be what the Libs would have on the HTV card. Nevertheless, I’d say the vast majority would preference the Greens over Labor which is what really matters in this seat especially since the Libs put that on the HTV card.

There are no anti-vax or “freedom” parties running in Prahran, the only right-wing minor is Family First who oddly enough have said they’re preferencing Labor above the Liberals in all lower house seats where the Lib candidate isn’t “conservative enough”, to send them a message that apparently there’s no differe between “moderate” Liberals and Labor.

That will probably help Labor finish above the Libs who now have no real source of minor party preferences here.

Then with Libs preferencing Greens, even an ALP v GRN count should be an easy Greens retain. I don’t think Labor have any chance of finishing ahead of the Greens at the 3CP count, so Labor probably needed at least a 60-40 flow (likely more) of Liberal preferences to win. That won’t happen now.

I did a blog post on this topic recently. The LNP preferenced the Greens in South Brisbane in 2020 and 64% actually followed through and put the Greens ahead of Labor.

I tend to think Lib preferences would have gone around 65-35 to whoever they put higher on their HTV, which is pretty consistent with South Brisbane. Maybe a bit higher to the Greens in an area like Prahran.

So if they preferenced Labor, 65-35 would have resulted in roughly a 50/50 ALP v GRN race based on the primary votes I expect, but preferencing the Greens would be an easy Greens win.

Of course, I think the most likely outcome is probably still a GRN v LIB count anyway.

I think Hibbins will hold on as a result of the Liberal preferences announcement – if Liberals do fall third than than Hibbins just needs to ahead of the Libs in 3PP.

Labor still has a shot still.

Labor campaign is pretty non-existent here. I believe Labor has deployed resources to the outer suburbs to defend seats (or to Albert Park). Liberal campaign is very small. Greens are everywhere here in Prahran with loads of posters and corflutes and bilboards. Would be very surprised to not see a swing away from Labor and Liberal to the Greens here. I think Greens vote might hit closer to 35% to 40%.

Totally agree D M. I’ve noticed the same.

I live in St Kilda not far from the boundary of Albert Park & Prahran (in the Prahran section).

Immediately I notice that on my side of the highway, the only candidate there are billboards of everywhere is Sam Hibbins. No Labor, no Liberal.

But if I cross the highway, there’s no Greens material at all, just big Nina Taylor posters & billboards.

I’m predicting the Greens to match their overlapping federal result here which was about 38%, and already have a double digit lead in the 3CP count. I think Labor could be reduced to around 25% (worse than their overlapping federal result) and the Liberals reduced to around 27% (better than overlapping federal result), but still a significant swing against both going straight to Sam Hibbins.

Massive primary vote swing to the Greens here, +9.3% so far.

Funnily enough, re-reading my prediction above I said Labor 25% and Liberals 27%, that’s exactly what they currently are!

Anyway, Greens have cemented their hold on this seat now. 2CP might remain their safest in the state (currently similar to Brunswick so either could be) but no longer with a 3CP threat, and the Greens primary vote here is higher than in Melbourne, Richmond and Northcote, only Brunswick is 3% higher.

Looking at the booth results, the Greens weakest booth is still a 59% 2CP (South Yarra-Toorak Library), everywhere else in the 60s and 70s, with an 82% in St Kilda (funnily enough at St Michael’s, an elite private school).

Greens won the primary vote in every booth from what I can see.

Seems like it’s safe as houses now.

Sam Hibbins has resigned from the party given the Greens recent electoral luck recently and I am expecting in the Victoria election a anti-labor swing as the Green heavily rely on Labor preferences it will make it difficult to hold here.

Wow that’s big news!

I still expect a Greens hold but on a significantly reduced margin, for two reasons:

– A 13% swing to the Liberals is far too much for a single election, especially when the seat is not held by the party in government;

– At a 3CP level there is now a really large gap between ALP & GRN, it’s no longer close at all. So, if swings against Labor are expected (which I agree with), that’s not going to help close that gap.

Mathematically, the Greens are still in a very favourable position. Their primary vote could drop back to 30% and they’d likely still win because Labor are very unlikely surpass that, and the Liberals – in an area that has really swung hard against them – are very unlikely to record a 13% swing towards them.

Also, I haven’t seen very many Stonnington results yet, but some results from two council wards that do overlap with Prahran:

Alma Ward (Port Phillip) – A combined 50% between Greens & a Greens-adjacent independent, plus a combined 28% between the endorsed ALP candidate and the one who lost ALP pre-selection. This roughly matches their state & federal level results in the area.

Como Ward (Stonnington) – This covers northern South Yarra, the more affluent and less ALP/GRN part, and the ALP member is comfortably winning, with the Greens second, and a combined ALP + GRN + Socialists vote of over 62%, and this ward even includes some of Toorak! The Liberal member is only on 14%.

So, while the Greens & ALP seem to have crashed in a lot of council races, and a lot of council elections often lean a bit more conservative than state/federal, that hasn’t been the case in the area around Prahran.

He resigned over having an affair with a staffer because it was against the party room rules. I wonder how often this happens and it doesn’t result in a resignation – the Nats at least have a very public example. Seems like overly principled flagellation on the part of the Greens – but they are held to a higher standard than other parties

This has turned into a progressive leftist area from what I know unlike the Brisbane CBD so Greens hold.

I agree. Barnaby Joyce not only stayed in the National Party but even became their leader again after having an affair with a staffer, fathering a child with her, and leaving his family.

The Greens are always held to a higher standard.

Their chances of retaining Prahran (very likely anyway), or should I say, the extent of any swing against them losing some of the incumbency advantage, will be determined by the quality of who they preselect to run in Hibbins’ place. I doubt he’ll re-contest as an independent.

Any negative swing from the incumbent MP loss could also be cancelled out by swings against Labor benefitting them (especially among the public housing residents).

@NP, I agree.

The removal of Toorak from the boundaries and demographic changes in South Yarra alone would likely have wiped out the Liberals’ 2010 margin before even considering the rapid overall shift to the left in the last decade across all areas of the seat, at every level – state, federal, council.

Liberal 2CP here since 2010:
2010 – 54.8%
2014 – 49.6%
2018 – 42.5%
(Toorak removed)
2022 – 38.0%

They might get back to 2018 levels but not 2010-14.

The IBP – Inappropriate Behaviour Party – now has 3 seats – same as the Greens

@Trent
You make a fair point of Toorak being removed. I’m fairly certain the LNP directed its preferences towards the Greens so depending on what they do in 2026 will still have some sort of impact. I don’t think that the LNP can win on these boundaries but I do think that margin will go back to what it was in 2018.

Libs directed their preferences to Labor here but this will likely remain a Greens v Liberals seat anyway, at least for 2026.

@Trent I agree, as you said the Labor vote is now well behind the Greens vote in Prahran. This is a Greens vs Liberal seat since it’s progressive but also affluent.

SpaceFish, I’d argue that a big swing away from Labor isn’t a problem for the Greens unless it’s huge and almost all of it flows to the Liberals. It should keep Labor out of the 2CP, and the 2CP vote last time was 62-38, a pretty comfortable margin.

They’re taking it pretty seriously. Ellen Sandell: “The Member for Prahran has completely lost my trust, and the trust of his colleagues, and he will never be welcomed back to our party room”. Doesn’t seem like the way you’d react to someone falling on his sword for failings in their personal life. It’s clear the Greens see the affair as an abuse of power rather than just a tawdry scandal – which wouldn’t be a universally held view in the community (see Barnaby Joyce). Not hard to imagine constituents who’d rather he just did his job and the party kept Hibbins’ personal life to himself, as it’s basically an open secret that politicians have affairs.

Still I think most likely he’ll go away quietly as soon as Greens line up a compelling successor and there’s enough confidence Greens will do well in a byelection, or there’s a package deal of byelections going.

@Redistributed – 💀

Lib gain in 2026 i think

@Up the Dragons I wouldn’t entirely rule it out, but this area has moved to be quite progressive. They even lost it in 2014 when the Victorian Liberals were moderate (they only just started being moderate again).

However, as we saw in Brisbane, we could find out that these areas aren’t so left-wing after all.

@ Nether Portal/Up the Dragons

Prahran has had a redistribution that has removed the most Liberal part Toorak so not same seat as 2010. Also there has been densification so growth of renters. While many areas are quite posh it is still more progressive than Kew, Brighton etc. The Liberals will need to be very moderate to have a chance. This area is not really known for activism rather sometimes it known as place for Partying and nightlife. To give a Brisbane example Prahran would be like the eastern half of McConnel if you follow State Route 15 from the Storey Bridge to Breakfast creek to include Fortitude Valley, New Farm, Newstead and Teneriffe.

A Sydney example of this seat will be going east from Macquarie Street to include Kings Cross, Woollomaloo, Oxford Street, Centennial park and parts of Paddington

@Nimalan the Greens got 67.8% TCP at the BCC election in Fortitude Valley so I would class it as a left-wing area that is unwinnable for the LNP. New Farm is small-l-liberal and while the Greens got 52.6% TCP in New Farm the LNP got 56.1% TCP in New Farm South. Note that booth results always skew left because right-leaning voters are more likely to prepoll than left-leaning ones.

So based on the assumption that this area is like Fortitude Valley I would say it’s unwinnable for the Liberals, but if it’s more like Indooroopilly then it could be.

@Blue Not John What makes you say that Hibbins will simply move on? He’s not resigning as an MP and politicians have survived after comparable scandals to this. And he hasn’t shown any intent on leaving at the end of his term, based on this line from the Guardian ‘Hibbins said he would continue to fight for “the fantastic community I love and live in, Prahran”.’

Not that we can know where he’ll be at in 2 years but nothing indicates to me that he will quietly move on.

@ Nether portal it is a mix of both the South of the electorate is like Fortitude Valley while the North is like New farm, Tenerife etc

@Nimalan that sounds about right.

Up to and including 2014, this seat was really a battle between marginal but Liberal leaning South Yarra & strongly Liberal Toorak in the north, and strongly left-wing Windsor and St Kilda in the south, with Prahran and St Kilda Rd area being more moderately progressive.

Labor won it in 2002 and 2006, Liberals in 2010 and Greens in 2014, all marginal except in Labor’s 2022 landside.

A lot has changed since. Like Nimalan said, not only is Toorak removed although, but South Yarra now has a very tall skyline of entirely residential high rise that wasn’t there 10 years ago. Thousands of new residents whose demographic is more like what you get in Southbank and Docklands, not as left-wing as somewhere like Windsor but still solidly progressive. The Greens have comfortably won every South Yarra polling place since 2018 at both state & federal level.

Realistically, the Liberals can’t win this seat unless they not only win the South Yarra 2CP again but actually win it comfortably to cancel our the high Greens 2CPs in the southern end, which was even solidly left when the Liberals last win this seat.