THE POLL BLUDGER
South Australian House of Assembly Election 2006

KAVEL
Liberal 2.9% vs Independent

Kavel includes the northern part of Mount Barker, which provides by far its largest booth, and stretches a further 25 kilometres northwards through the Adelaide Hills. Substantially over quota going into the redistribution, it has shed more than 4000 voters around Kersbrook to Schubert while gaining 1273 around Uraidla from Heysen, taking a negligible slice off what remains a safe Liberal margin. The seat has been held by three Liberal members since its creation in 1970, including the father and son team of Roger and Mark Goldsworthy (right). In between, the elder Goldsworthy agreed to surrender the seat to John Olsen in 1992 to facilitate his return to state politics after two years in the Senate, and thence to assume the leadership from Dale Baker. This prompted a counter-measure from factional moderates who prepared the way for Dean Brown's return by persuading Ted Chapman to retire in Alexandrina (the name of which changed to Finniss shortly afterwards). The two contenders won their respective seats at by-elections held on 9 May 1992 and promptly went head-to-head in a leadership vote, which was won by Brown.

Olsen served as Industry Minister in Brown's government before launching his coup in November 1996, which succeeded with help from defecting moderates and nervous members of normally Labor seats which the party looked unlikely to hold at the coming election. The latter group's hope that Olsen might save them was in vain, as the October 1997 election cost the Liberals all but a handful of their gains from 2002. Olsen was ultimately compelled to resign four years later over the Motorola affair, which had its genesis in his period as Industry Minister. As an incentive for establishing a software centre in Adelaide, Olsen had offered Motorola a contract for a government communications network which it duly received without a tendering process. A series of damaging leaks on the matter emerged after he became Premier, which were presumed to have originated from those aggrieved by Brown's downfall. Two inquiries were forced on the government by conservative independents, the second of which concluded that Olsen had provided dishonest evidence to the first. Olsen resigned in October 2001 and retired from politics at the March 2002 election.

The circumstances of Olsen's demise, combined with mutterings about Goldsworthy junior inheriting his old man's seat, led some punters to place their bets on independent candidate Tom Playford (above right), a Baptist pastor and son of the legendary former Liberal Premier of the same name. Playford indeed gave Mark Goldsworthy (above left) a run for his money, finishing ahead of the Labor candidate and coming within 2.9 per cent of victory after preferences. At the penultimate count, Playford led Labor 28.1 per cent to 24.5 per cent, with Mark Goldsworthy on 47.4 per cent. Enough preferences leaked to Goldsworthy after Labor’s exclusion to put him over the line, although Playford was reportedly in the lead at the close of counting on election night (he did notably poorly on declaration votes). Playford has announced he will run again, this time for Family First. He has kept his profile up lately by complaining that land tax is putting at risk the orchard his family has run since the days of his great-grandfather, a colonial-era Premier and later Senator. If Playford can again finish ahead of Labor, and if the Liberal vote slumps as much as some expect, who knows what might happen.

Labor candidate John Marshall (left) is a science lecturer at Flinders University.

Outside of this election guide entry and Flinders University academic Haydon Manning’s summary in the Sunday Mail, there has been surprisingly little talk of what could potentially be the most sensational single result to emerge from the election: a lower house seat for Family First. However, there are three reasons to advise caution over Tom Playford's prospects of going one better this time around. Firstly, Mark Goldsworthy was making his debut at the 2002 election, at which he replaced recently ousted Premier John Olsen. This time he will enjoy the benefits of incumbency, although it remains to be seen if this will cancel out what is likely to be a statewide drop in the Liberal vote. Secondly, the likelihood of an overall higher vote for Labor means he faces a bigger hurdle to win second place. Thirdly, as Antony Green notes, "the downside of Playford running as a Family First candidate is that both the Democrats and Greens have chosen to direct preferences to the major parties ahead of him".

ASSESSMENT: Liberal retain

Tom Playford failed to match his performance as an independent in 2002, his vote dropping from 18.7 per cent to 15.7 per cent. Labor was up from 18.0 per cent to 24.9 per cent, and Greens and Democrats preferences did not favour Playford as a Family First candidate as they did when he ran as an independent. Mark Goldsworthy was one of the few Liberals to record an increase on the primary vote, albeit a slight one – from 43.4 per cent to 43.9 per cent. The Greens also performed strongly, up 4.7 per cent to 10.0 per cent (one of four seats where they made double figures). With the two-party contest being Liberal-versus-Labor rather than Liberal-versus-independent, Goldsworthy in fact had a less nervous time of it than in 2002.

OUTCOME: Liberal retain (9.4%)