Jun 28 2008
Kororoit by-election live
| Vote | Swing | 2PP | ||
| Marlene Kairouz (Labor) | 12,665 49.0% |
-13.9% | 56.3 | |
| Les Twentyman (Independent) | 5,108 19.8% |
- | 43.7 | |
| Jenny Matic (Liberal) | 5,345 20.7% |
5.2% | ||
| Marcus Power (Greens) | 1,297 5.0% |
-2.2% | ||
| Tania Walters (Independent) | 1,093 4.2% |
-8.1% | ||
| Andre Kozlowski (CEC) | 334 1.3% |
-0.8% |
Tuesday 6pm. I am reliably informed that the Victorian Electoral Commission has conducted an unpublished Labor-versus-Liberal preference count which puts Labor at 71.5 per cent. So the real swing against Labor was only 4.1 per cent, a good result for a third term government with a big majority. There was troubling news for the Brumby government on Saturday, but it came from Gippsland, not Kororoit.
Monday 1am. I have been too busy with Gippsland to comment on Kororoit. I rather feel that this shows a sense of proportion which is lacking at The Age, whose website puts Kororoit at centre stage with a headline reading “Big rebuff for Brumby”. This heads a story which claims Labor has suffered a 16.5 per cent per swing, a figure obtained by comparing the apple of 2006’s Labor-versus-Liberal result with the orange of Saturday’s Labor-versus-Twentyman result. A meaningful two-party swing cannot be readily obtained because we don’t know how Twentyman and the minor candidates’ preferences went, but an educated guess points to a Labor/Liberal split of around 70/30 and a no-big-deal swing of 5 or 6 per cent. There is no reason to be surprised that a candidate of Twentyman’s reputation and celebrity should be able to achieve 20 per cent of the vote, or that he should do so primarily at Labor’s expense given his ideological orientation.
8.09pm. Postal votes reel Labor in 0.4 per cent and boost Twentyman 0.3 per cent.
8.05pm. Deer Park Central boosts Labor 0.2 per cent, and cuts Matic’s lead over Twentyman from 1.3 per cent to 0.8 per cent.
8.03pm. Slow going with the remaining booths. It’s worth pointing out that Twentyman is not actually ahead of Jenny Matic on the primary vote, but will presumably get there on preferences.
7.51pm. Note that Tania Walters’ swing compares her performance with her result in 2006 as Family First candidate.
7.44pm. All booths bar Churchill Reserve and two in Deer Park have now been added. The error which omitted the Greens from the above results has been corrected.
7.28pm. St Albans North added, reining in Labor 0.5 per cent. 20 per cent counted, eight booths to come.
7.19pm. St Albans West booth in, confirming what I said in the previous entry.
7.14pm. Albanvale booth in. Primary vote swings suggest Labor will land a little below 50 per cent on the primary vote, but come close enough to retain the seat.
7.07pm. Creekside booth in. Table above shows primary vote swings comparing like with like from 2006, and a 2PP result based on raw primary vote with my own guess of the preferences.
6.00pm. Polls close. I am told that the VEC will be posting results on the half hour, so presumably we can expect to see the first serious results at 7pm.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:07 pm
3.5% reporting at 7pm.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:14 pm
Libs in front of twentyman means Labor on 70% tpp (atm).
June 28th, 2008 at 7:20 pm
Twentyman is getting close to over taking the Liberals. ALP primary is too high to see anything interesting to happen.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:25 pm
Is Walters a genuine independent or a dummy?
June 28th, 2008 at 7:35 pm
You’re missing a candidate in your list
June 28th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Yes, where is the Green?
June 28th, 2008 at 7:44 pm
Andy Landeryou has been quite vituperative with regards to Mr Twentyman recently.
Someone must have been nervous.
http://au.youtube.com/watch?v=qM8loeKEzzI
Cast out as an abomination, the Slanderyou returns to offer his assistance…
June 28th, 2008 at 7:49 pm
ESJ,
Walters is Family First, preferencing Kairouz because of anti abortion stance.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:51 pm
Omission of Greens candidate corrected.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:53 pm
So Family First got 12% in 2006 there?
June 28th, 2008 at 7:55 pm
12.4 per cent, to be precise.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:56 pm
13% Blair.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:57 pm
Sorry, I was going by Antony’s figures on the ABC site.
June 28th, 2008 at 7:58 pm
Almost a chance of overtaking the Liberals as the second party in a few more elections in the west.
June 28th, 2008 at 8:04 pm
Gee… just looked up the result, they were only 3% away from the Liberals in 2006.
Why did the party not endorse Tania Walters this time? Clearly many people were voting for the party name and not the candidate.
June 28th, 2008 at 9:14 pm
So is this a vote for pro-life, given the stance taken by Marlene Kairouz, and supported by Tania Walters? It is rare that a candidate declares themselves as prolife given the bias in the media against such a stance. Good to see marlene having the guts to take a stand, and to b rewarded in this way by the electorate
June 28th, 2008 at 9:15 pm
So they have a Labour MP with a name no one can pronounce like the last bloke. What ever happened to the Anglo Saxons in the ALP - must be all that ethnic branch stacking.
June 28th, 2008 at 9:30 pm
My sources tell me that the biggest issue at present is the proposal by the Victorian Legal Reform Commission proposal to decriminalise abortion!
At first I was cynical thinking it would be the 2am lockout or the Desalination plant but this result may prove my sources to be right!
June 28th, 2008 at 9:53 pm
Based on Antony’s latest figures, the formerly Family First endorsed Independent had her vote cut by about two thirds. The Labor candidate is down 12.7%. The pro-choice Liberal candidate is up by 4.8% and Les has 19.8% from scratch. How is this a pro-life vote?
The Libs have done well, on the back of a strong campaignbased on local issues such as transport and law and order. The relatively poor performance of Labor in the postals, perhaps shows how effective the smear campaign against Les has been, in the last few days.
June 28th, 2008 at 9:54 pm
Interesting to that the DLP did not field a candidate given it stance against abortion in the Upper House in Vic. Or were they satisfied that the ALP had a pro-life candidate?
June 28th, 2008 at 10:00 pm
Has the DLP have ever run a candidate in Kororoit?
June 28th, 2008 at 10:10 pm
No, it hasn’t.
June 28th, 2008 at 10:11 pm
Not in the 9 years I’ve lived here TW.
June 28th, 2008 at 10:17 pm
It was a rhetorical question, RB.
June 28th, 2008 at 10:22 pm
maybe the drop in the labour vote is a warning to Brumby not to proceed or to proceed with caution with his anti life program, re euthansia and abortion
June 28th, 2008 at 10:23 pm
I don’t think so Goanna. If it is, Brumby should ignore the warning.
June 28th, 2008 at 10:28 pm
So why didnt Family First run a candidate, and is Tania Walters no longer a FF member Does anybody know the story there ?
June 28th, 2008 at 10:42 pm
Does anybody know what the story is with Tania Watkins. Family First did not run a candidate. Why not.? She is no longer a member i believe. Was she running with the blessing of FF. Or was was she reallly independent.
June 28th, 2008 at 10:57 pm
Goanna,
It wouldn’t make sense for voters to vote against a pro-life Labor candidate if they wanted to tell John Brumby not to decriminalise abortion. In any case, he will be unable to get the legislation through the Upper house without the support of a large number of Liberals. I think that around 6 Labor MLCs will vote against it.
June 28th, 2008 at 11:00 pm
For every vote she got for her pro-life stance, there would have been a dozen more she got because of three simple words on the ballot: Australian Labor Party.
Abortion will only be a major issue if the Liberals were to take a totally different stance; and that it is a highly unlikely.
June 28th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
In the seat of Kororoit, most voters will not have the first clue about the nuanced debates there are to be had about abortion.
June 28th, 2008 at 11:33 pm
Tonight we are nazal gazing!
June 28th, 2008 at 11:34 pm
sure i know on most issues only a smalll fraction of the voters usually follow the issues closely
June 29th, 2008 at 12:20 am
The Green vote was low, was it as low as this last time in this seat?
June 29th, 2008 at 9:38 am
Goanna! it isn’t a strong area for the Greens also they would have lost votes to Les Twentyman
June 29th, 2008 at 10:11 am
So in the end: Not a great result for the ALP. It would have required an earthquake to upset the applecart in that area. Brumby is not going to losing sleep at this stage but it might be in the back of his mind as he eats his cornflakes in the morning.
Twentyman has possibly set himself up for a run at the upper house in 2010.
June 29th, 2008 at 2:15 pm
I hope this is the first time, and not the last, that Les runs in Kororoit. Perhaps at a later date, there might be equal scrutiny on potential influences on ALP drug policy.
June 29th, 2008 at 4:20 pm
Les won’t ever run out there again. He’ll probably have a crack at Footscray in 2010 where he’ll find far more receptive latte sippers than out in St Albans.
Labor’s incumbent is expected by many to retire so it’s a bit of an opening perhaps. And of course he has the advantage of living in the electorate.
He won’t have the resources to do the upper house thing, imo. Far too much ground to cover.
June 29th, 2008 at 6:54 pm
but Andrew, you only need 10% (in practice) to get elected in the Western upper house area, and Twentymen could get that in his sleep in this part of this world. It would be the smart option for him, and he could actually play a far bigger part in governing than he would in the lower house.
June 29th, 2008 at 7:47 pm
Andrew, that wasn’t latte I saw in Marlene’s cup, on ABC news tonight, was it?
tsk tsk
The upper house would be a dead end for Les. With some proper planning of a state election campaign, he would do better. We’ll see where the governments transport blueprint leaves the western suburbs, and how much disaffection he will have to tap in to.
June 30th, 2008 at 4:55 am
If anyone’s interested, I’ve added a new entry to the top of my post having a go at The Age.
June 30th, 2008 at 10:58 am
Lighten up Bill, it’s just a bit of blowback from the Labor nonsense about a vote for Les Twentyman being a vote for the Liberals.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:09 am
TW,
It would be a nice change if The Age published just the facts.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:26 am
What are you saying, GG? A vote for Les, wasn’t a vote for the Liberals? The Age story seems pretty rational is you view Les Twentyman as a ‘Liberal’ independant.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:36 am
The Greens can chip away at the middle-class left, independents can attract older Anglo voters (in Vic they are left independents in NSW they are on the right) but so long as Labor holds its NESB base it’s seats are secure. if Twentyman gave preferences to Labor than this would deflate artificially the 2PP swing (like Wills in 1996). I couldn’t see him getting ahead of the Greens in the race for the last LC seat in the west.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:51 am
TW,
Read William’s balanced summary on the Kororoit election and compare that with the inanity of The Age’s approach. You might also remember the bay dredging debacle. The Age campaign was a beat up from start to finsih. Unbalanced, unfair and unnoticed.
It seems the Age wants to be The Opposition when they grow up.
June 30th, 2008 at 11:55 am
Or possibly the Age is a business trying to sell papers and get people to read online articles with ads.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:16 pm
I Agree, GG. The lack of solidarity which The Age demonstrated for comrades in the transport and warehousing industries, over the dredging issue, was a low point and a disheartening glimpse of The Age under Ron Walker. I think the journalists at The Age were able to recognise the issue as well and have been struggling for their independance since.
William’s brilliance is not in dispute, but perhaps a little nuance was lacking at 1AM monday morning.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:22 pm
I’m surprised the Liberal vote was up given Twentyman’s candidacy. Perhaps Labor’s shock/horror campaign convinced Liberal voters that Twentyman wasn’t their sort of man.
June 30th, 2008 at 12:37 pm
Antony,
I believe a significant proportion of Liberal voters prefereced Kairouz before Twentyman which would confirm your thoughts.
June 30th, 2008 at 1:13 pm
Twentyman reckons the ALP’s dirty campaign tricks in the dying days of the campaign cost him 10% of the vote, and the seat. Sure, they bruised him, but they didn’t finish him off - not even close.
If you look at the early voting centre numbers, Twentyman did only 3.4% worse on primaries in the weeks leading up to polling day than he did on polling day itself. 3.4% strung into a 10% swing? Tell him he’s dreaming.
And that difference alone can be almost exactly reconciled with the 3.5% increase for Greens support on polling day, compared with Greens early voting results.
A couple of leaflets here and there only seemed to contribute to the indecision of the anti-Labor left, nothing else.
June 30th, 2008 at 1:30 pm
Hindsight is a wonderful thing, but with alot of aspirationals moving in to new subdivisions in the electorate, and many of those aspirationals not having a clue who Twentyman is or what he does for the community, it is perhaps not so suprising that the Libs got a swing to them. The Liberals also offered to fix alot of the problems that people have been asking the Labor party to tackle out here for 10+ years.
June 30th, 2008 at 1:36 pm
TW,
Depends how big the hind is.
The Libs promised $100 million of new spending in Kororoit. There are plenty of problems in every electorate. Governing is about priorities and balancing the budget.
June 30th, 2008 at 1:43 pm
So they say, GG. Although i’m pretty sure that voters in Toorak and Brighton never hear it from a Liberal government.
June 30th, 2008 at 2:07 pm
This result is a worrying result for Labor. The next election will be close in Victoria, because Brumby has not got the same aura as Bracks has about him.
Also Victorian Labor now counts the Greens and Leftie independents as the opposition instead of the Liberals. It is running somewhat fraudelent scare campaigns against these groups and is treating the electorate as mugs.
More worrying for the Victorian Party is that the so called movement groups the catholic right ( The SDA retail group) are getting more power within it. The preselection and admin committee are evidence of this. If their power continues problems could arise down the track regarding policy direction and being able to gain a diversity of members. More worrying may be splits within its ranks and the party in general. (1955 all over again? )
Finally the Party Secretary is running negative campaigns instead of postive ones and needs to change focus, personally i think he should be sacked.
June 30th, 2008 at 9:42 pm
The SDA getting control will be a serious problem. It is probably not going be the problem at 2010 election, but if the ALP does win a four term and the hard Right is fully in charge, then they might get sandwiched (Sort of the way the Canadian Progressive Conservatives were sandwiched by the left parties (LP, NDP) and a new rightwing parties (Reform)). The Liberals would probably do preference deals with anyone to win at that stage and most voters would probably be happy to see the end of the government by then.
I doubt the Greens alone can become the really opposition, but if the ETU or another Union is expelled and forms some form of leftish independent block that runs in conjuction with the Greens, there is a bit of a chance. There are a lot of leftish voters who are don’t really like the Greens that much but wouldn’t mind an alternative to the ALP. Also a union probably has enough members to form a party and man booths etc. Then the inner city would fall….
June 30th, 2008 at 9:46 pm
Andrew Landeryou has a different view.
http://andrewlanderyou.blogspot.com/2008/06/what-to-do-about-etu-should-rebel-left.html
June 30th, 2008 at 10:53 pm
Why is that not a shock?
June 30th, 2008 at 11:05 pm
BSF,
That’s your best comeback?
I’m disappointed.
July 1st, 2008 at 8:10 am
I wasn’t trying to make a comeback. I am just not suprised that his views do not align with mine.
July 1st, 2008 at 10:53 am
Paranoia about the SDA here, their wacky moral views are about as relevant as the nostaglia for the Soviet Union that used to affect the old guard of the Left.
July 1st, 2008 at 8:50 pm
It is not paranoia, the SDA are now the biggest union in Australia and more members mean more delegates at conference and more power within the Labor Party. They are a real concern.
Growler you and Landeryou know each other?
July 1st, 2008 at 9:04 pm
Double plus good.