Mundingburra – QLD 2020

The big news here is in the past week with Coralee confirming the worst kept secret in Townsville, that she would be retiring because of her current health. I do wish her a speedy recovery 🙂 I was reading an article that waxed lyrical how the Premier only dedicated 40 odd words to her in passing as opposed to when the Rockhampton Labor MP at the 2017 resigned and spent 200+ words. I already had this as a TOSS-UP with a chance Labor could hold on but that’s definitely gone now.

KAP have been campaigning quite hard across the Townsville seats as have One Nation and to a lesser extend the LNP. There have been signs up in some areas, trailers of the candidates being driven around and already some candidates and local MPs across the region appearing on local podcasts (such as High Humidity – which has already interviewed Robbie Katter [KAP-Traeger] & Stephen Andrew [ONP-Mirani]).

Prediction (August 2020): TOSS-UP (no lean, it’s too open)

Of course the above has happened since I originally had this prediction. The ALP vote will drop and it’s a 3-way contest really between LNP, ONP and KAP. Crime is the key talking point up here and all 3 of those parties have hit that hard.

I don’t consider this a toss up at all. Like all Townsville and Thuringowa, I see Mundingburra falling fairly easily.
Mundingburra will swing more strongly to the LNP in the absence of the sitting MP and a strong local candidate in Glenn Doyle.

It’ll be interesting to see who One Nation and Katter Party direct preferences to after each other.

Most elections KAP have not directed preferences using a double sided HTV or two column HTV.
Most Katter Party voters are Dissatisfied National Party voters. The Liberals successfully took over the much larger National Party.

I was talking to one previous Katter candidate today not from Townsville who said he would go back to NationLs if they walked from Liberal Party.

However the two others in this didcussion both previously political active would have gone to Conservative Labor if Labor splits again.

I am surprised that we do not have more parties and have no doubt by 2004 including
National
Liberal
Brothel Zone Labor
Industrial Labor
Greens
Katter
Palmer
DLP
Protestant Christian’s ( AC / CD/ FF)
Libertarians ( Bernardi’s lot)

Plus a mensgerir of Hansonites and conspiracy theorists who are more prone to splitting than Cadbury’s Flake

last time alp got 3/3 townsville seats……. all very marginal. but this time I suspect at worst 2/3 alp

Andrew Jackson –

You possibly mean “Leyonhjelm’s lot” rather than “Bernardi’s lot” but I certainly agree with you that the Australian context can and should support a wide range of reasonably popular political perspectives.

On the economic left there are three obvious groupings corresponding to the Greens, left wing Labor and right wing Labor (most with some micros attached).
On the economic right there are another four obvious groupings corresponding to Leyonhjelm’s LDP and wetter Liberals, the “moderate” Liberals, the conservative-Christians with their prosperity gospel (some in the Liberals, some in AC/CD/FF), and the contemporary Nationals. I also put the populist Palmer and Hanson on the right economically. High Toryism isn’t really a thing here.
In the economic centre there’s a bunch of independents, and more debatably, Katter and where SFF is rapidly going – basically Nats, but not tied to the Liberal right-wing.

September prediction: Easy LNP gain, even if Labor somehow holds the other 2 TSV seats (which I’m not at all confident of) they won’t hold this.

Labor have already lost this one. It was an uphill battle before they lost O’Rourke, and now they’re doomed. They should spend the local resources they would have spent here on sandbagging the most survivable Townsville seat and financial resources on gaining winnable LNP held seats in SEQ.

Labor tanking could help KAP beat LNP/PHON and that may be the best possible outcome for them on the cards here in terms of forming government. However you will likely need Greens to put KAP over ALP to do that and I’m not sure they’d be up for that.

Cr Les Walker was endorsed tonight as Labor’s candidate.

Stand by my original prediction – LNP gain.

Alexj
i enjoyed your political perspective response to AJ on sept 16.
I pretty much agree entirely. I guess the question i’d like to ask is predictive. Who do you see ascending, & diminishing ? Also for what reasons ? No pressure !!
cheers wd

KAP are in for a good chance here.

Its been reported in the Courier Mail today Labor’s internal polling has them holding this seat.

@ Politicial Nightwatchman……I still can’t see Labor holding this.

KAP and PHON announced pref swap today (greens last in every seat). Could change the game? Clearly Bob sees chance for his son to play kingmaker in QLD and no doubt has one eye on next fed election?

PHON and KAP putting the Greens last? Completely unsurprising!

In this seat, I think it’s instructive to look at the 4CP from last time: ALP 37%, LNP 28%, PHON 19%, KAP 16%.

When KAP excluded, about 60% of their votes went to PHON, 20% LNP, 20% ALP. I don’t know what their HTV said. So that left things at ALP 41, LNP 31, PHON 28.

For KAP (or PHON) to win here, they need to pick at least another 3% off the majors (all else being equal). Shifts in the PHON/KAP split only change who comes third. But if they can overtake the LNP to come second on 3CP, they can win.

Labor’s in a tricky position here. Their best result is a repeat of last time, leading the 4PP and KAP/PHON prefs scattering enough. If the LNP finish first then ALP won’t catch up, and if LNP finish third they play kingmaker.

The next best result for Labor has something like 1 in 3 Labor+Greens voters strategically voting KAP, which isn’t really feasible.

Good analysis Alex. I am was liking an LNP win here but Katter is right in it.

If Townsville people like the COVID response and the Premier’s appearances this week then maybe the Labor holds. I just see it as unlikely.

Decided to have a look at the betting pools (via Ladbrokes), to see which seats are currently looking like changing according to the punters. This is one of the ones with a party other than the incumbent ahead in betting pools (the below show just the most notable parties for the seat)…

LNP – 1.73
Labor – 1.95

I’m calling this a Labor hold now after the controversy that has come out from the LNP candidate from his Facebook posts. I notice Labor has now moved into favorites on Sportsbets for this seat at $1.65 compared to LNP $2.10. I also don’t see any of the minor parties having a hope in this seat. KAP hardly has alot faith with the punters listed at $12.00 in this seat.

Last Week Prediction – ALP retain, just. KAP will finish ahead of One Nation, but LNP will get a stronger flow of preferences than in 2017. Mundingburra will be the ALP’s only Townsville-area seat.

So, a couple of weeks ago I noted that Ladbrokes had this one leaning LNP. Ladbrokes doesn’t seem to be updating much of their odds (most of the “changing hands” predictions that Ladbrokes had at the time still have the exact same odds now, which I find unlikely), so I figured I’d look at Sportsbet instead. They have Labor ahead.

Labor – 1.65
LNP – 2.10

Prediction: Too Close to Call – Lean LNP Gain

LNP gain but not by the margin you would expect after a campaign that focused on Townsville while neglecting Brisbane.

Too close to call, but slight lean to a Katter gain. In electorates such as this i think you can almost assume the PHON voters will swing Katter.

Final prediction: LNP gain, Labor are too on the nose in TSV to win this surely?