Warrandyte by-election, 2023

Comparing Cranbourne to Penrith is highly misleading, You are basically comparing Holt (a very safe Labor seat that will NEVER fall to the Liberals in 100 years) to Lindsay in western sydney.

@Yoh An: I agree that Melissa McIntosh’s personal vote was indeed an important factor behind her increasing her margin at the 2022 federal election, but demographic changes also played a part. McIntosh is NOT aligned with the moderate faction, but she does have a good personality and is popular in the electorate. Judging from her social media, her passion and commitment for her electorate have been praised by her constituents, including non-Liberal voters. She also worked tirelessly for her constituents during the floods.

However, I do feel that Lindsay is becoming more conservative over time due to demographic changes. Have you wondered why some popular first-term Liberal MPs in Higgins, Wentworth, Reid, Curtin etc were defeated in 2022 while McIntosh increased her margin in Lindsay? The voters of Lindsay are certainly much more conservative than those in Higgins, Wentworth, Reid, Curtin etc, which was the reason why aversion of Morrison and the Morrison-Joyce Coalition Government was not able to overcome McIntosh’s personal vote and defeat her like in many other electorates. Considering McIntosh defied the statewide and nationwide trend to get a swing towards her in Lindsay, this is a sign that Lindsay is becoming more conservative over time, like what has happened in Banks and Hughes. Unless there are very favourable redistributions, it will be very difficult for Labor to win Lindsay back and McIntosh should continue to hold her seat without much difficulty until her retirement.

As for Cranbourne, I don’t see any sign that the overlapping state or federal seats are becoming more conservative or less progressive over time. In fact, the overall trend in the federal seat of Holt is that it is becoming safer for Labor over time.

Regarding Tim Smith, he should run in Kooyong in 2025. On the same token, Katherine Deves should run again in Warringah and Amanda Stoker should run in Ryan. Peter Dutton will remain as Opposition Leader until 2025.

If this all happens, I’d like to see the hard-right and their media allies who claim that the Liberals lost elections and their heartland because they were too left/woke/green, bet money on a massive Liberal upset victory in those seats and a nationwide blue wave.

@Votante no way we should get Josh to run in Kooyong because he can win it back. Similarly, if they get good candidates in Warringah and Ryan they can win them back too.

Obviously nobody with a brain likes wokeness (I’m no exception) but net-zero and the Voice aren’t woke. I think the Liberals and Nationals need to remain centre-right and go back to the good liberal conservative values of Sir Robert Menzies and John Howard. The NSW Coalition does this well. Even though they (somehow) lost the 2023 state election (after 12 successful years of great government, like come on people), they still managed to stop Labor from getting a majority (and of course if Gladys was still Premier she would have won with an increased vote/seat number, even Antony Green said this). If the Liberals move too much to the left then they aren’t gonna get as many votes but if they move further to the right they’ll also lose votes (just look at the Republicans in America; people like Abraham Lincoln and Ronald Reagan have lost control of the party so now it’s right-wing populist social conservatives like Trump, with the exception of a few good ones like Mitt Romney, but even then I wouldn’t vote for the Democrats).

Anyway, on a side note, when will that NZ election guide be published? I know it’s in October but still. It would be great if I could help create it. I can create some maps too.

There won’t be an NZ guide this year. I did it once and didn’t get much engagement. I just do Australian guides now. I am planning some coverage on the podcast.

The Liberals should have no trouble holding here however, with the recent poll from Roy Morgan with a 6.5% swing against them due to the civil war within the party. If Labor runs here they could potentially win it which would almost certainly see John Pesutto be replaced as leader.

@ Bob, i that is a good pick about polling suggesting that Labor has improved since the November election. it would be good to see if there is a geographical breakdown of the results. It maybe the case that part of that is due to Labor improving their standing in NW Melbourne as lock downs are in the rear view mirror now.

@Nether Portal, I think it will be tricky for the Liberals to win back Kooyong, Warringah and Ryan. Very rarely do independents/Greens lose seats to major parties. Josh may run for Kooyong again, and will have a better chance than most ex-Liberal MPs who lost seats to the Greens/teals. He’ll have a chance if Monique Ryan trips up. However, I can foresee her as well as Labor/Greens linking him with Peter Dutton. It would work for them if Dutton is still seen as toxic in Victoria, especially in inner-city Melbourne.

@Nimalan, good point about the geographical breakdown of swings. However, I’m skeptical of a sharp turnaround in NW Melbourne in 7 months. There were swings of over 15% in some seats like Greenvale so it was like going from a high water-mark to a low water-mark. 2026 may present something in between as these seats especially with urban sprawl and suburbanisation.

@Votante generally I would be very against comparing state and federal politics, but it’s Victoria so it barely matters. At the Victorian state election, the Liberals regained the seat of Hawthorn (John Pesutto defeated John Kennedy) and the Liberals fought off the teals in Kew (Jess Wilson). So it’s possible. Labor can try all they want, but really it’s not a Labor-voting area. In this part of Melbourne and the Northern Beaches of Sydney they have a lot of Liberal voters and teals get elected on preferences. These areas are economically liberal but environmentally progressive, which makes them perfect for teals.

Josh will have a good chance of regaining the seat, especially because people nationwide liked him probably more than they did Scomo (I mean here in regional NSW people liked Scomo, Josh and Perrottet but absolutely loved Gladys). If they field a good candidate in Warringah (overlying with Liberal-held state seats like Manly, as well as Wakehurst which is held by a non-teal independent) they can win it, as they can Goldstein and Wentworth from teals. Ryan due to it being a large electorate would be also winnable if they got a good candidate. Same as Indi, a regional seat. If they get Andrew Constance to run again in Gilmore (which he said he would like to do) then he will likely win it. Then if Josh wins Kooyong they’ll boot out Dutton in a week.

In short, the Liberals should be really targeting Bennelong, Blair, Boothby, Gilmore, Kooyong, Lingiari, Lyons, McEwen, Paterson and Robertson, amongst others. Labor is going poor in Tasmania, so even though Bass is a target seat for Labor I think Bridget Archer will hold on and I’m even more sure that Gavin Pearce will hold on to Braddon, where he had a huge swing to him.

Also the Nationals should target Hunter.

@ Neither Portal, i mentioned in the past threads that i predict Josh F would run in Higgins in 2025 instead of Kooyong as it is easier to defeat Labor than a crossbench member especially as many people in the affluent Core of Higgins around Malvern etc. had to hold the noses to vote for the least worse option in Ananda-Rajah whereas moderate Liberals are more willing to vote Teal than Labor. Higgins is also a more mixed seat that a Teal is unlikely to win, there is a also larger Jewish community in Higgins compared to Kooyong. Kooyong also has a large Chinese community around Balwyn which while is the least Teal friendly part of the seat is likely to remain hostile to the Libs. This makes Bennelong difficult to win back due to the ethnic demographics. I agree Libs would be targeting Blair, Lyons, Paterson etc . McEwen would depend a lot of what the redistribution brings if it goes into rural areas then absolute it becomes winnable for the Libs. I feel Gilmore and Lingari depend more on sitting members rather than the national mood.

@ Votante, Fair point the recovery in NW Melbourne may take sometime. In Greenvale in particular the swings were savage especially around Meadow Heights. I feel there was some recovery in the Labor vote between the May 2022 Federal election and the November 2022 state election especially in SE Melbourne and the growth areas such as Kalkallo where state Labor over performed the Feds although they did much worse in areas like St Albans, Meadow Heights etc. It is likely the time lapse helped Labor recover in the meantime especially since free kinder etc would played out well in Pakenham, Kalkallo etc

@Nimalan true. Bennelong is very Chinese but still, I think they could win it back. Constance was very popular in Gilmore, he lead on first preferences and only lost by about 300 votes (all due to Greens preferences, as he lead on every count but the one that Greens preferences were distributed). The NT is weird on politics, especially in remote Indigenous communities. Earlier this year there was a by-election in Arafura because the Labor member (Lawrence Costa, who was Aboriginal) died. If it was a resignation, the CLP could have actually gained the seat, but Aboriginal customs regarding the death likely made voters sympathetic to Labor because he was from that party. Manuel Brown (Labor) easily won the seat with a huge swing to him, the only other candidates being a CLP candidate and a Federation Party candidate. Originally, Indigenous people in remote parts of the NT often voted for Labor, whereas people in urban areas (Darwin, Palmerston, Alice Springs, Katherine and Tennant Creek) often voted for the CLP, keeping them in power from the time the NT got self-governance (I think it was in 1978, note that it wasn’t until the second NT election that Labor won seats, at the inaugural election the CLP and a few independents won every seat) until 2001. Ever since then they’ve lost most of Darwin. Then in 2012 when the CLP returned to power for one term they won mostly remote seats, seats in urban areas other than Darwin (Palmerston, Alice Springs, Katherine and Tennant Creek) and a couple of seats in Darwin, whereas Labor held on to the Darwin seats they won in 2001. The CLP were nearly wiped out in 2016 (only winning two seats: Spillett in Palmerston and the remote seat of Daly), but when they regained six seats in 2020, none of them were in Darwin. At by-elections Labor won Daly from the CLP and the CLP almost won Fannie Bay (after Michael Gunner resigned), even winning a higher primary vote (but not a higher TPP, so Labor held on). This is why it is so hard to predict NT elections, at least until polls are released. I do think the CLP could win this time because they only have a bare majority of 13 seats (if they lose just one then they are in a minority government). The CLP has eight and the rest of them are independents. As for federal seats, Lingiari is the remote seat so the CLP would be likely to win it if they campaigned hard.

P.S: it’s Nether Portal not Neither Portal. Named after the Nether Portal from Minecraft.

Pesutto is the right leader to get the Liberals back to government and the teals failure to break through in 2022 leaves the space open for state Liberals to be the party of choice for that voter coalition (even if federal liberals aren’t).

I don’t see federal Liberals coming close to winning 2PP for a very long time so the future of the state Liberals if they have one is split ticket voters – vote state Liberal and federal Labor or teal (or Green?)

Pesutto will get the blame if Liberals can’t hold Warrandyte and that will put the Liberals into a tailspin. So it’s in Labor’s interest to win here and it should be possible.

@John yes Pesutto is more likeable than Matthew Guy. Look, I don’t know about a lot of the stuff that Guy did to be disliked by most Victorians (somehow people preferred Dan Andrews over him and that’s saying something). But Pesutto is a Moderate and will be able to lead the Liberals to victory in Victoria at least at some point in the future.

As for federal politics, it won’t be “very long” supposing that by that you mean a decade. Albo will not be the next John Howard or Bob Hawke, he won’t last that many years whether it be due to a leadership spill, resignation or an election loss. Also nobody who votes Liberal on the state level will vote Greens on any level.

As long as there is infighting in Victoria liberal party they won’t stand a chance of picking or retaining seats.

@nether portal John Pesutto will never be premier as he doesnt stand for anything different to Dan Andrews and is basically just a soft version of labor.

@ Nether Portal,
Agree with you regarding Andrew Constance personal vote. Gilmore is interesting as in 2013 it had a swing to Labor against statewide/national trend when popular member Joanna Gash retired. Now that Fiona Phillips is a member of a government she will have an advantage, Labor can for example Pork Barrell the seat if it feels it needs to. She can also build a personal vote. Same in Lingairi now, Marion if she is a good member can reclaim the personal vote of Warren Snowdon that was lost in May 2022.

Surely this is well in truly in play given the latest Resolve Strategic and Roy Morgan polls.

@Adam
Especially if John Roskam wins preselection, his former IPA and non-local status will be used against him. Labor simply plastering that around will win them the seat. I hope for the Lib’s sake, that a local wins preselection.

Unfortunately none of the front runners are locals although there are a few locals in the race but they’re mostly pretty low profile and not that likely to win unless something miraculous happens.

I just wonder on Pesutto, and this idea that he is a ‘moderate’. Apart from anything, ‘moderate’ is in the eye of the beholder. One man’s moderate is another man’s radical so to speak.

This is the problem with trying to save seats from the Teals – do that and you risk alienating other voters, who may see the Teals as quite radical, you need to win elections.

Mostly Labor Voter

I’ve never understood this logic from people who believe the Liberal Party needs to be more conservative in order to win elections. Six of the last seven state elections have seen a party that describes itself as center-left elected. Say I was a Liberal voter who, as you propose, believes the teals are too radical and that the Liberals, by attempting to pander to these voters, are becoming too radical, or perhaps “woke”, in turn. I would then, logically, vote for a more conservative party such as One Nation, Family First or otherwise, but would my preference ever go to the teal candidate or Labor? No. It would return to the Liberals anyway. There is no point in the Liberals chasing my vote, because my preference is assured and my preferred candidate will never win (at least not in suburban/metropolitan Victoria). On the other hand, pretend I am a Liberal voter, who has witnessed a Liberal party that panders to conservatives who I think are too radical. I would then, logically, vote for a more “liberal” candidate such as a teal or, if things are dire enough, Labor or the Greens, who can win (or contribute to one another winning). The Liberal party cares (or should care) about these voters because their vote is far less likely to return to them in preferences. We know that this happens because Higgins, Kooyong, Wentworth and Warringah are not held by the Coalition.

Agree Douglas, in the same vein Labor should focus more on retaining their support among centrist voters which also include blue collar ‘industrial’ type workers as these groups of people are the ones who could easily switch to the Coalition. Whereas those who are more left leaning can easily vote for the Greens and then give Labor preferences in return.

The issue which Labor Voter highlights is only relevant if the voting system were OPV or first past the post, then it would be just as important to prevent extreme voters from fracturing and switching to alternative parties.

because that worked out for turnbull

Yoh An

There’s the pitfall of Labor’s movement towards the center in that parties to the left of Labor, most notably the Greens, can and have been elected. This is especially salient in Victoria, where 4 seats are within striking distance for the Greens at the next election. My guess is that Kat Theophanous will replace Maria Vamvakinou in Calwell in 2025, before the Green hordes retake Northcote for good. The other 3 seats, Preston, Footscray and Pascoe Vale, were part of the large anti-Labor swing in the inner-west and north, which was not entirely a pro-Green swing, as the Liberals and Family First improved their votes in those seats. Perhaps these seats will return to their normal safety next election, saving them from the Greens. The Victorian Greens are a branch at war with themselves, which will do them no favours.

Actually, Douglas and Yoh An, I think there are a lot of people who would vote for a more socially conservative, or at least what they consider less socially radical, Liberal party, but if they perceive the Liberals and Labor to be equally radical, will revert to Labor on economic grounds.

This is obviously all in the eye of the beholder, but in the general public there is a lot less ‘our lot are good, the other lot are the devil’ than there is amongst the more politically engage on here, and people can and do vote at times all over the place.

@ Mostly Labor Voter
I think there is some merit in that for example if the Climate debate was neutralized then the Hunter seats will no longer be competitive for the Coalition as they would vote with their economic interest. Conversely, seats like Higgins and to a lesser extent Boothby will likely be favorable to the Libs in such a case as the difference is now economic rather than cultural. However, it also depends on how Labor is travelling as well for example someone like Chris Minns, Peter Malinnakuas who are more socially conservative leaders would do better with more socially conservative working class voters like Kevin Rudd did in 2007. It is possible that Jim Chalmers may also appeal to such voters better than Albo did. Interestingly, parties like Family First and DLP while they preference the Libs on their HTV their voters often dont follow it especially in working class areas, so once they have expressed their social conservativeness by voting for FFP or DLP they preference Labor second. If you look at Scullin in the past when Family First ran we can see this. This is the great dilemma facing the Liberals especially in Victoria and it what is tearing themselves apart should they appeal to their traditional base in the affluent heartland, eastern suburbs and Sandbelt or try for Greenvale for example.

Nicole Werner has won preselection here. I’d say it’s a good win for diversity in an ethnically diverse seat

@Dan M
Bad decision, likely Labor gain; Di Cosmo should’ve won it, instead of some happy clapper who made no inroads into her electorate! Pick local candidates like Di Cosmo, Labor do it, Greens do it, Nationals do it, so why can’t the Liberals do that? They’re just repeating the mistakes of Aston.

Agree Dan M, Antonietta Di Cosma would also have been good and she came second. It is possible she can run in Bulleen next time if Matt Guy retires as she is still young and Bulleen also has a large Italian community. Nicole if elected would be the first female MP this relatively safe seat.

Granted, Nicole Werner is part of the religious right faction so though it could lead to a possible teal challenge or something Labor could campaign on, she’s no Tim Smith and it means the right faction are unlikely to revolt against one of their own just to bring down Pesutto.
On another note, Di Cosmo almost won the seat and probably would have won if Werner was eliminated before Roskam. Pretty impressive given she’s only 22 and is still studying in uni.

I dont feel that Nicole Werner religious conservatism would hurt here especially in the Doncaster East area as many of the ethnic communities are quite socially conservative. However, if she added Climate denialism to the mix then it would hurt as the area is quite environmentally conscious unlike Moira Deeming and Renee Heath her involvement in the church was not raised during the state election meaning she maybe a bit more pragmatic.

I read that the local Liberal branches are really worried about losing this, even though there’s still no Labor candidate. The Greens have just nominated theirs.

I thought it would be unusual for Labor not to have a candidate. I then realised it’s not really a ‘must win’ seat for Vic Labor. Federal Labor had more to gain from winning Aston as they only won a slim majority at the 2022 federal election and plus the margin was smaller. It was also during Albanese’s honeymoon period.

I also believe that they may want to maintain the status quo – keep the Liberals as unstable as possible for as long as possible. They want Pesutto it seems. Labor fielding a candidate would just give Pesutto an electoral test. If the Liberals score a swing against Labor, it might silence the hard-right and bring about party unity. If there’s a swing to Labor, Pesutto will be in trouble and possibly out the door the following Monday.

Do we know which candidates own investment properties?

@Douglas Greens are taking votes from Labor and that’s always going to happen but they currently hold 4 out of 88 seats. It’s not as if they’ve taken so many votes and seats to cause a hung parliament.
The seats of Footscray, Pascoe vale and Preston were close for the Greens because the Libs referenced them. They didn’t have drastic increases in their primary votes and there’s a big gap between them and Labor in primary votes.
In Footscray the Greens had a primary vote swing of 2.2% to them and there’s a primary vote gap of 20.7% between Labor.
In Preston the Greens had a 0.5% increase in primary vote and the primary vote gap between Labor is 22.5%.
In Pascoe Vale the Greens increased their rimary vote by 1.9% with a gap of 16.4%.
The Greens have been improving but last election wasn’t a drastic change in primary vote. Labors issue isn’t necessarily losing people who have voted from them to the Greens, their biggest issue is young people turning 18 who would vote have voted Labor in previous generations voting Greens.

@North East
Primary votes aren’t as relevant in showing the potential for the Greens to win Footscray, Pascoe Vale, and Preston as their 3CP votes are. They’re all roughly at 32% 3CP, and if you apply a Liberal preference flow (at the 3CP stage) of 35% instead of the much higher actual flow, they end up being about 60/40 in favour of Labor against the Greens.

We only really have numbers for Preston, but that’s still a 10% swing on a 2CP basis with this hypothetical. There is one aspect of primary vote that the Greens should be concerned about though, and that’s the potential of being beaten into the top two in Preston, which nearly happened while there were still 4 candidates in the running.

I can’t read the article, but in the Australian they pretty much called it that Labor won’t be running a candidate. The headline is ‘Labor to opt out of state by-election’, but the article from what I could read has suggested its ‘unlikely’ Labor to field a candidate. But it hasn’t completely ruled out Labor running a candidate.

The Age has been more cautious suggesting that Labor Mp’s and branches are pressuring Labor to enter a candidate in the race. From what I understand the party hierarchy doesn’t see the benefits. Because Labor already have a massive majority and the party would have to spend $400, 000 to run a serious campaign. It’s certainly taking the throat of John Pesutto leadership if they don’t field a candidate.

The Victorian Electoral Commission won’t set a date for the close of nominations until the writs are issued next Thursday, but Labor could have another month to decide.

The party has been cautious of spending up to $400,000 to run a serious campaign in a Liberal-held seat more than eight years into government. Labor already has a powerful majority in the lower house and has recently delivered a thin budget in an attempt to cut debt.

https://www.theage.com.au/politics/victoria/warrandyte-byelection-date-set-for-august-26-in-victoria-s-lower-house-20230707-p5dmgw.html

If Labor doesn’t contest, who will be the main opponent against the Libs? The Greens can do pretty well in the semi-rural green wedge. There’s also the perennial independent candidate Stephen Mayne and Angelo Von Moller, Simon Holmes a Court’s nephew who could contest as a teal independent.

Labor are daft not to contest. If the current state polls are right, the swing is enough to flip this. And if they win this Pessuto goes and Battin takes over which would mean the Liberals further alienate the public and Labor wins a massive majority at the next election.

Labors loss here by not running.

Labor didn’t need to run a candidate in Aston or Fadden did they? But they did, they give the seats a crack. That is what Victorian Labor should do as it’s part of democracy to give the people of Warrendyte a Labor candidate.

I actually predict the consequence of not contesting this will ripple federally and cost them gaining Menzies at the next election. Because a Labor MP here would help the federal Labor campaign and give the part momentum of gaining Menzies if they have this seat. Wolahan is appalling and wants the party to shift to the right under Dutton.

The big winner of Labor not contesting this seat is Keith Wolahan believe it or not.

If Labor doesn’t run it could be interesting considering the Greens candidate Tomas Lightbody already has some semblance of a public profile as Deputy Mayor of Manningham. Remains to be seen of course whether Labor would be silly enough not to run.

the reason labor wont run is they want pesutto at the helm if liberals lost the seat hed be finsihed

If Labor aren’t running, I wonder if the Greens will cause an upset and win the seat? I wouldn’t be surprised if they win given a vast majority of Melburnians despise the Liberals.

Nah, I doubt the Greens will win. This would be a big mountain to climb. Not all who voted Labor at the general election will vote Green. The Liberals will easily win, though it’s hard to say what their 2PP will be.

This would be a good opportunity for a serious independent who can bring together disaffected Liberal voters (from different camps) and Labor voters, who don’t want to vote Green. I alluded to previously that there are hard right Liberals who would not vote for Pesutto’s Liberal Party.

The Victorian Socialists running could also capture Labor voters (if there is no ALP candidate) strengthening the Greens through preferences. Still seems like a longshot.

I don’t think Victorian Socialists will contest a seat in Melbourne’s East. In fact they have only contested seats in Melbourne’s North and West at the 2022 state election. There’s a good chance that Legalise Cannabis will contest and capture Labor voters in the absence of a Labor candidate, strengthening the Greens through preferences.

@Joseph Victorian Socialists announced their candidate Colleen Bolger more than a week ago. You are right though they haven’t campaigned much in the East before.

Would the result in Fadden have turned Labor off running here? Clearly a safe federal LNP seat in QLD is different to a marginal state LIB seat in VIC, but I do feel a stronger result for Labor would’ve buoyed Labor to run here.

Wikipedia has a list of self-declared candidates and have links to their webpages. Vic Socialists, Freedom Party and Sustainable Australia will run at the by-election even though neither ran in Warrandyte last general election. Given it’s eastern Melbourne, I don’t expect VS nor Freedom to do that well.