Bruce – Australia 2025

@NP – agree with the sentiment on Macarthur (my seat). Liberals re-chose Binod Paudel (2022 candidate), likely to reuse resources as they have no chance of winning while Mike Freelander is MP. He’s mega-popular and definitely would vote for him when I can.

Mick.
What was the significance of all of those election years?
Vis a vis your other wish list …
The changes require a referendum so hard to justify.
The 4 year term is most desirable but the problem has always been that it results in an 8 year term which is very long – though they do have them in NSW. The senate is a fixed term – except when a DD resets the calendar so that constrains the timing of elections.

@redistributed all states Has have fixed 4 year terms the plus side is it provides certainty and the downside is it removes the flexibility for a leader to go when it is most advantageous and they are polling well.

@james moving this discussion to the Macarthur thread

I’m not sure but I think the Senate is there by the constitution as well. Abolishing that would also require a referendum and Tbh I would vote against that because like in NZ and QLD that effectively gives the government absolute power and could do whatever they wanted without any restraint or anything to keep them in check.

@Darth Vader, regarding “effectively gives the government absolute power and could do whatever they wanted without any restraint or anything to keep them in check”, that is the case in QLD but NZ is only if the party vote reaches 50%

From 1949 to 1998 there should have been an election every 3 years. Note the number of early elections. Part.of thr argument for fixed terms

@Mary yes but whatever government be it majority or a coalition has that power.

@NP: “A 5% swing is unlikely anywhere except WA and maybe the NT”: The recent quarterly Newspoll aggregate published in December 2024 recorded a 50% Labor 2PP in Victoria, which is equivalent to a 5% 2PP swing against Labor. Coalition polling 50% 2PP in Victoria is a very bad result for Labor and in my view pretty unrealistic.

50% 2PP in Victoria will put normally fairly safe seats like Bruce, Holt and Hawke at risk. Since 1983, Coalition only recorded 2PP above 49.5% in Victoria in four (1990, 1996, 2004 and 2013) federal elections, and in all but one (1990) of these elections the Coalition won a landslide victory. Even without wining back the then Liberal heartland seats that are now teal seats, the Coalition would have still won a solid majority in the 1996, 2004 and 2013 federal elections. It’s hard to imagine that the Coalition can poll a 2PP of 50% in Victoria but does not win a majority of seats nationwide. (A nationwide 50% Coalition 2PP as recorded in this aggregate won’t get the Coalition anywhere close to a majority).

Assuming Labor still does well with university educated, high income and Chinese Australian voters in the inner and middle suburbs, the swings against Labor in the outer suburbs snd regions need to be extraordinarily large to achieve a Coalition 2PP of 50%. At a Coalition 2PP of 50% in Victoria, we could be looking at some interesting and even astonishing results: Swings close to or greater than 10% against Labor in seats like Casey, McEwen, Indi, La Trobe, Flinders and Monash. Labor in serious trouble or even lose reasonably safe seats like Hawke, Holt and Corangamite. Gorton, Calwell and Lalor become marginal Labor seats.

The same Newspoll aggregare also recorded an LNP 2PP of 53% in Queensland, which is equivalent of 1.05% swing TOWARDS Labor. A swing towards Labor in Queensland makes you question the reliability of the state 2PP figures in this aggregate even more.

Labor still did very well in WA. Labor 2PP in WA in this aggregate was 54%, which was equivalent to only a 1% 2PP swing against Labor, making Labor the flavourite to retain Tangney and leaving only Bullwinkel in play.

As for Bruce, Labor is the flavourite to win, mostly due to Julian Hill’s personal vote, but the race could be close. Right wing minor party voters switching to the Liberal Party, many of whom would have preferenced Labor last election, and some Labor losing votes mainly to the Greens due to the Israel-Palestine conflict issue (not all Greens voters will preference Labor) and some others to the Liberals could make the race close. The good news is that Liberal results in the eastern part of new Bruce that were in La Trobe may have been inflated by MP Jason Wood’s strong personal vote. Liberal support in these areas may drop when Jason Wood is no longer on the ballot, helping Labor to retain the seat.

@ joseph those swings in qld and wa are within the margin of error a 5% swing is not and indicates serious problems for labor

I am now thinking that Bruce could be in play. The margin is reduced and the choice of a candidate from a South Asian CALD background might be a real plus. Having Brad Battin as the local member in Berwick might see more resources put into the seat as well. A seat that I will start to pay more attention to. An extra factor is that the fall in the Liberal PV almost exactly matches the Liberal Democrat vote last time – the latter had the Donkey position so possibility of confusion. If combined, it shows the Lib primary was pretty strong.

i think they may fall just short or win by a very slim margin here. if they are winning here they are likely in contention to forming some sort of government

Bruce with a 5.3% margin currently.

Interestingly, PollBludger’s poll tracker suggests that polls are indicating a 5.3% swing to the Coalition in Victoria, which is at least 3% more than any of the other states (NSW 2.2%, QLD 0.4%, WA 1.9%, SA 2.3%). Acknowledging that state level polls can be pretty unreliable, this still puts Bruce within range.

Bruce, Hawke, Holt and McEwen all swung to the Coalition in 2022. McEwen seems like the most likely gain, but winning Bruce as well would be a good result for Dutton in Victoria. Hawke and Holt are possibly in play as outside chances if things get really dire for Labor in the outer suburbs.

Seats like Chisholm, Corangamite and Dunkley are more likely to resist the swing to some degree, but may still be vulnerable.

@angas im saying McEwen and Astona are certain gains in VIC. Bruce Hawke Holt Chisholm Dunkley and Corangamite to all swing towards the coalition but by enough? Chisholm seems like its gonna be real close due to the chinese population Dunkley should be too. Bruce to be under 3% and a likely target in 2028 Hawke and Hold around 4% also a targate in 2028

Bruce is one of 8 seats in vic “under stress” 7 are in greater melbourne. others include Gippsland (safe national), Corio (relatively safe labor due to being richard marles seat), the others being Scullin (safe), Jagajaga (which could become marginal), Wills (under green threat), Melbourne (safe enough being Adam Bandt seat), La Trobe (safe liberal). Bruce will be close and may actually flip because of this issue.

Bruce is also very socially conservative relative to how they vote – similar to Werriwa, the ALP party machine is quite strong behind Julian Hill though

@maxim yes and the are held on the same margin however Julian Hil is probably more competent and visible then Anne Stanley in my opinion ive effectively given WErriwa to the libs barring some controversy but Bruce will be lineball but id say about 50/50 atm im not prepared to give that away t either side yet

There is some local issues going on in Dandenong that may cost ALP the seat or at minimum a lot of primary votes. The Labor dominated Council has named the Thomas St precinct as Afghan Bazaar despite 90+ of traders being there are Hazaras, majority of whom do not consider themselves as Afghans. For them the term Afghan refers to the Afghan enthic group and Hazaras thinks the term is exclusionary and wants to change it.

The Labor Councillors oppose and Rhonda Garad the Greens Councillors supports the name change petition introduced by the Hazara community who makes a significant percentage of Bruce’s population. Rhonda Garad is also the Greens candidate for Bruce in the federal election.

In the previous Elections, i reckon 95% of Hazaras voted for Julian Hill but I’m expecting a lot of them to shift to the Greens. And for the first ever there seems to be a very visible campaign by the Hazara activists to shift their vote away from Labor.

And those votes will most definitely not to Zahid Safi the Lib candidate.

@patreon the dandenong parts of ruce are the only thing that holds this seat for Labor once that is removed to population growth in Casey Bruce will be lost to Labor though that may happen anyway before that