Western Australian Election 2005
LEGISLATIVE COUNCIL
| Primary vote at 10 February 2001 election | Seats won | |||||||||||||
| ALP | GRN | DEM | OTH | ON | NAT | LIB | ALP | GRN | ON | NAT | LIB | |||
| Agricultural | 20.2 | 4.5 | 1.7 | 2.6 | 22.0 | 19.0 | 30.0 | 1 | 1 | 12 | 1 | 1 | ||
| East Metropolitan | 44.2 | 6.4 | 4.1 | 5.0 | 10.0 | - | 30.3 | 3 | 0 | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| Mining and Pastoral | 39.5 | 4.4 | 1.6 | 11.3 | 13.9 | 2.6 | 26.7 | 2 | 1 | 12 | 0 | 1 | ||
| North Metropolitan* | 37.0 | 9.7 | 4.3 | 4.5 | 6.1 | - | 38.4 | 3 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 33 | ||
| South Metropolitan | 43.0 | 9.0 | 4.9 | 2.2 | 7.1 | - | 33.8 | 2 | 1 | 0 | 0 | 2 | ||
| South West* | 30.7 | 8.5 | 1.7 | 3.3 | 14.2 | 6.2 | 35.4 | 2 | 1 | 11 | 0 | 3 | ||
| Total | 37.9 | 8.0 | 3.7 | 4.1 | 9.9 | 2.4 | 34.0 | 13 | 5 | 3 | 1 | 12 | ||
| * Region represented by seven members. Other regions have five members. 1. One Nation member Paddy Embry resigned to sit as an independent on 15 May 2003 2. One Nation members John Fischer and Frank Hough resigned to sit as independents on 1 June 2004 3. Liberal member Alan Cadby resigned to sit as an independent on 2 June 2004 | ||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
OVERVIEW The Legislative Council election will be the fifth under the current system of six multi-member regions, with four regions represented by five members and two represented by seven. The metropolitan and non-metropolitan zones have equal representation, despite the much larger population of the former. The electoral system is essentially the same as that for the Senate, with quotas of 16.7 per cent for the five-member regions and 12.5 per cent for the seven-member regions. As with the Senate, an above-the-line option is available and a lot depends on the parties' preference tickets which must be lodged three weeks before polling day. From the 16 separate elections held for five-member regions since 1989, the major parties have won all five seats on 10 occasions, one minor party member has been elected on four occasions, and two were elected on two occasions (in Agricultural and Mining and Pastoral regions at the 2001 election). In the eight separate elections for the two seven-member regions, no minor party or independent member was returned on three occasions, one was returned on three occasions and two were returned on two occasions. The current system was introduced by the Burke Labor government with the consent of the Nationals in the Coalition-controlled Legislative Council in 1987. The Coalition maintained its long-standing majority at the first two elections under the new system, winning 18 seats in 1989 (when the Dowding Labor government was narrowly returned) and 1993 (when the Court government came to power), although it was reduced to 17 seats from June 1991 until the 1993 election when Reg Davies quit the Liberal Party to sit as an independent. No minor party or independent members were elected in 1989, but their representation has been steadily increasing since. In 1993 Reg Davies retained his North Metropolitan seat as an independent and Jim Scott of the Greens was elected in South Metropolitan, each winning seats at Labor's expense. Despite comfortably retaining power in 1996, the Coalition's loss of an upper house seat cost it its majority, with the Greens winning three seats (Jim Scott in South Metropolitan, Christine Sharp in South West and Giz Watson in North Metropolitan) and the Democrats winning two (Helen Hodgson in North Metropolitan and Norm Kelly in East Metropolitan). Labor MLC Mark Nevill held the balance of power after he quit the party to sit as an independent in August 1999. The mould was broken at the 2001 election when both parties polled well below 40 per cent in both houses, which resulted in the Coalition losing four upper house seats including two of the three held by the National Party, while Labor gained only one. One Nation won seats at the expense of the Coalition in Agricultural (Frank Hough), Mining and Pastoral (John Fischer) and South West (Paddy Embry), although they were deprived of the balance of power by their own decision to put all major parties last on preferences, which delivered seats to the Greens in Mining and Pastoral (Robin Chapple) and Agricultural (former Senator Dee Margetts) to augment the three they retained in the metropolitan area. All three One Nation members have since quit what's left of the party; Hough and Embry will run as New Country candidates while Fischer will attempt to hold his seat as an independent. The tables below identify only candidates who have a strong prospect of being elected. Major party candidates who hold "unloseable" positions on their party ticket are marked in bold. An asterisk indicates that the candidate is a sitting member. Full candidate lists and grouped ticket preference allocations are available from the Western Australian Electoral Commission. Upper house election calculators Reader Graham Allen has kindly gone to the effort of amending the Java applet Senate election calculators he developed during the federal campaign to accommodate the Legislative Council election, which can be accessed below. You may need to download a Java plugin for these to work - you can do so here. The calculators allow you to enter voting figures for each of the grouped tickets in the relevant region, and then determine the flow of preferences based on the tickets lodged by each group and thus to project the final outcome. There are a small number of complications that are smoothed over here. Voters of course have the option of choosing their own preferences by numbering every square rather than accepting the party ticket through the above-the-line option, although less than 5 per cent of voters exercise it and they rarely if ever determine the result. Of even less significance is the fact that Allen's model ignores non-major party candidates other than those at the top of the ticket, rather than accommodate the meaninglessly complex tickets that some parties submit for whatever reason. The numbers you will find already entered are Allen's rough estimates, rather than the Poll Bludger's. AGRICULTURAL
Labor and Liberal incumbents Kim Chance and Bruce Donaldson are heading their parties' respective tickets and are thus certain of re-election, although Chance's internal position needed to be shored up by Premier Geoff Gallop when factional deals threatened to deliver it to Australian Workers Union state secretary Tim Daly who agreed to settle for second place. The election is all but certain to see the return of Chance and Donaldson along with Murray Criddle, the only remaining National Party member in the Legislative Council, all of whom entered parliament in 1993. Recent experience suggests that the minor party vote will settle after the aberration of 2001 and that Hough and Margetts will struggle accordingly. Should the voters revert to type, their places will be taken by Wendy Duncan, the National Party's first female state president, and Liberal candidate Margaret Rowe, a Greenough shire councillor. Hough is running for re-election with the New Country party, as is fellow ex-One Nationer Paddy Embry in South West, and he will be joined on their ticket by Western Australian Farmers Federation president Colin Nicholls. Assessment: The first four seats are very likely to go two Liberal, one Nationals and one Labor, but the final seat is an absolute lottery between Liberal, the Nationals, Labor, the Greens, Family First, Frank Hough and even the Christian Democratic Party. If the Coalition falls short the Nationals' surplus will be a handy dividend for the Greens, who will also get preferences from Liberals for Forests. If that puts them ahead of Labor, they will gather their surplus in turn and perhaps win the seat. If it doesn't, Labor could win with Greens preferences. Family First or the CDP could snowball into contention through preferences from One Nation, New Country, the Citizens Electoral Council and each other. As well as boosting their own chances, reports that Family First are tracking 4 to 5 per cent in some areas raise the prospect that their preferences might put Frank Hough back into contention. Hough had earlier appear doomed by One Nation's decision to put their former colleagues last, but without "Pauline Hanson" before its name the party might poll too poorly to make much difference. Outcome: 1. Bruce Donaldson (Liberal); 2. Kim Chance (Labor); 3. Murray Criddle (Nationals); 4. Anthony Fels (Liberal); 5. Margaret Rowe (Liberal). Barring the exception of 2001, Agricultural has returned four Coalition and one Labor members at each election under the current system. But this was the first time the region returned three Liberal and one Nationals member rather than two of each. The key to this outcome was a 9.4 per cent rebound in the Liberal vote to a historically typical 39.4 per cent, whereas the Nationals' 19.3 per cent was only 0.3 per cent higher than last time. Labor's vote was up from 20.2 per cent to 26.7 per cent, but their only serious source of preferences was the Greens (4.4 per cent) and they fell short of the 33.3 per cent required for a second seat. Lachlan Dunjey of the Christian Democratic Party narrowly missed out on the fifth seat from just 1.9 per cent of the vote, having been boosted by preferences from Liberals for Forests, One Nation, New Country and Family First. This left him a fraction behind the Liberals' third candidate (who had received preferences over the CDP from the Nationals and the Democrats) at the second last count. Another coat of paint and it would have been a case of Rowe's elimination delivering decisive preferences to Dunjey, and not the other way round. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for Agricultural Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results EAST METROPOLITAN
All Liberal candidates are new faces following the retirement of Peter Foss, a former Attorney-General who chose to go after failing to win the top position on the ticket, and Derrick Tomlinson, who like Foss entered parliament in 1989. Both places are being taken by women - Helen Morton, Kalamunda Community Care manager, and Donna Taylor, adviser to Senator Chris Ellison. Other preselection candidates included Monica Holmes, former member for the lower house seat of Southern River who also had her eyes on eyes on Serpentine-Jarrahdale. Assessment: The Greens' vote will probably need to increase to at least 8 per cent from their 6.4 per cent in 2001 if they are to win the fifth seat at the expense of Louise Pratt. Any improvement in the Labor vote of 44.2 per cent will probably put the seat beyond the their reach. Outcome: 1. Ljiljanna Ravlich (Labor); 2. Helen Morton (Liberal); 3. Nick Griffiths (Labor); 4. Louise Pratt (Labor); 5. Donna Taylor (Liberal). Labor cracked the 50 per cent mark, up from 44.2 per cent to 50.6 per cent, which meant three easy quotas on the primary vote. The Greens' only chance was to win a seat at the expense of the Liberals, but their stable 6.5 per cent vote was too low for this to be a serious prospect. The Liberal primary vote of 32.1 per cent was close enough to two quotas that preferences from the Christian Democratic Party and Family First put them well over the line. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for East Metropolitan Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results MINING AND PASTORAL
Liberal leader in the upper house Norman Moore heads his party's ticket, followed by Carnarvon pastoralist Ken Baston and Kalgoorlie South party branch president Brett Nazzari, who was defeated by Baston at preselection with a casting vote from the preselection committee chairman, prompting him to appeal to the party's state council. Labor veteran Tom Stephens, who entered parliament in 1982, was bumped aside on affirmative action grounds but has found a lower house refuge in Central Kimberley-Pilbara after failing to win Kalgoorlie at the federal election (which required him to quit his seat, former lower house member Kevin Leahy currently serving as his short-term replacement). In his place is Shelley Archer, electorate officer to North Metropolitan MLC Graham Giffard and wife of influential CFMEU boss Kevin Reynolds (see federal election entry on Canning for background on her role as campaign manager for dumped candidate Cimlie Bowden). Sitting member Jon Ford holds the comfortable second position, as he did when elected in place of Nevill and Helm in 2001. Vince Catania, son of former member for Balcatta and current Town of Vincent mayor Nick Catania, holds the potentially winnable third position. Assessment: By the Poll Bludger's estimation, a result of three Labor and two Liberal is all but certain. John Fischer and his high-profile running mate Graeme Campbell have done very badly on preferences, scoring last or near-last place from the Greens, the Democrats and their old friends One Nation. To win they would need to almost match One Nation's 2001 vote of 13.9 per cent. The Greens will not have Tom Helm feeding them preferences this time, and have not been put ahead of the major parties by One Nation as they were in 2001. This gives Robin Chapple approximately no chance whatsoever. The Liberals' already high hopes of recovering a second seat have been boosted by One Nation's decision to put them near the top of the pile, while the slow-learning Democrats have again chosen to alienate their left-leaning support base by putting the Liberals ahead of Labor. Outcome: 1. Shelley Archer (Labor); 2. Normal Moore (Liberal); 3. Jon Ford (Labor); 4. Ken Baston (Liberal); 5. Vince Catania (Labor). Mining and Pastoral returned to normal in returning three Labor and two Liberal members, which has been the outcome at each election under the current system except 2001. More than half of the 25.2 per cent vote for independents and One Nation in 2001 returned to the majors, with Labor up from 39.5 per cent to 44.0 per cent and the Liberals up from 26.7 per cent 35.7 per cent. This gave them both two clear quotas on the primary vote, but only Labor had enough of a surplus to remain in the hunt for the final place. They ended up winning it because their minor party opposition was split between the Fischer/Campbell ticket, which scored 6.0 per cent of the primary vote and received preferences from the CDP and the Liberals, and the Greens, who scored 7.6 per cent and received preferences from the Public Hospital Support Group, Liberals for Forests and the Democrats. The mutual hostility of these two groups meant the elimination of one was always going to send a decisive quantity of preferences to Labor at the other's expense. However, Labor's primary vote was still markedly below the pre-2001 norm whereas the Liberals equalled their 1996 result. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for Mining and Pastoral Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results NORTH METROPOLITAN*
Labor's ticket has not changed from 2001, Ed Dermer and Ken Travers topping the bill for the third time running with Graham Giffard in the potentially vulnerable third position. Giffard and the Old Right/Centre factional coalition had hoped he could move to the safe lower house seat of Perth at the expense of John Hyde, claiming to have the support of 48 out of 88 members on the party's electoral council, but like so many others the scheme was scotched by national executive intervention. The Liberal preselection was similarly eventful, with sitting member Alan Cadby dumped from second position to unwinnable fifth owing to the machinations of a "northern alliance" of party moderates dominating branches in the northern suburbs. Peter Collier, president of the Curtin division, was installed in his place. Cadby subsequently quit the Liberal Party and entered negotiations with Family First, but these fell through due to the party's disquiet over his support for abortion reform legislation in 1999. Assessment: By far the most likely result here is a status quo outcome of three each for Labor and Liberal and one for the Greens. Most of the plausible alternative scenarios involve a drop in the Greens vote of 9.7 per cent in 2001 to 8 per cent or below, which would have to be considered unlikely. If it does happen, their seat could fall to the Liberals or Family First. If the collective major party vote does not improve to the expected extent, there's a chance that Labor rather than the Greens could lose a seat to Family First, who have been targeting the region with suburban newspaper advertising. Outcome: 1. Ed Dermer (Labor); 2. George Cash (Liberal); 3. Ken Travers (Labor); 4. Peter Collier (Liberal); 5. Graham Giffard (Labor); 6. Ray Halligan (Liberal); 7. Giz Watson (Greens). A straightforward outcome with Labor (42.4 per cent) and Liberal (40.3 per cent) each scoring three quotas on the primary vote without enough of a surplus to freeze the Greens out of the final place. This was despite a slight easing in the Greens' vote from 9.7 per cent to 8.8 per cent, or 0.7 of a quota. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for North Metropolitan Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results SOUTH METROPOLITAN
Assessment: Unless the Greens lose ground from the 9.0 per cent they recorded in 2001, the result here is certain to be two Labor, two Liberal and one Greens. For Labor to win a third seat at their expense would also require an improvement on their 43.0 per cent vote from 2001 or an unforeseen resilience in support for One Nation, who have put the Greens last. Outcome: 1. Kate Doust (Labor); 2. Simon O'Brien (Liberal); 3. Sue Ellery (Labor); 4. Barbara Scott (Liberal); 5. Sheila Mills (Labor). The talk of the early count was the prospect that the final seat would go to Murray McKay of the Fremantle Hospital Support Group, who polled just 1.3 per cent. But in one of those strange twists characteristic of systems combining preferential voting with proportional representation, a resurgence by the Liberals later in the count ensured that the seat stayed with Labor. This was because the Liberals had the Christian Democratic Party ahead of FHSG on preferences, which ultimately allowed the CDP to get their nose ahead of FHSG at a crucial point in the count. Had this not happened, the distribution of preferences after the CDP's elimination would have put the FHSG ahead of the Greens, whose preferences would then have got them ahead of Labor. Instead, the elimination of the FHSG unlocked the preferences of left-leaning parties who had favoured the Greens over the CDP, whose subsequent elimination unlocked the preferences of right-leaning parties who had favoured Labor over the Greens. Lynn MacLaren's failure to retain the seat for the Greens was the most disappointing of their three upper house defeats, the result of a fall in the primary vote from 9.0 per cent to 7.8 per cent. This was still more than the Greens polled when Jim Scott was successful in 1993 and 1996, but since then the Democrats' share of the minor party vote has shifted largely to parties hostile to the left. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for South Metropolitan Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results SOUTH WEST*
Sharp is now retiring and the Greens ticket will be headed by Paul Llewellyn, despite earlier expectations the spot would go to former West Australian journalist Michael Southwell who in the event managed only half of Llewellyn's preselection vote. Also retiring are John Cowdell, who led the Labor ticket in 2001, and Bill Stretch, who was second on the Liberal ticket. Cowdell's departure led to speculation his place might be filled by Martin Whitely, left homeless with the abolition of his lower house seat of Roleystone, but he instead ended up with the prize seat of Bassendean. Incumbent Adele Farina has instead moved to the top of the ticket, and party assistant state secretary Sally Talbot is almost certain to be elected from the second place. The dumped Liberal member for Vasse, Bernie Masters, had hoped that Bill Stretch's retirement might offer him a lifeline but he was rebuffed here as well and will instead attempt to hold his existing seat as an independent. Barry House maintains his place at the top of the Liberal ticket and Robyn McSweeney replaces Stretch at number two. An extra seat for the Coalition would either go to Nationals ticket leader Steve Dilley, president of the WA Fruit Growers' Association, or third Liberal candidate Nigel Hallett, of whom the internet knows little except that he is rated a "loyal and trusted friend" by Senator David Johnston. Paddy Embry reportedly hoped to keep his parliamentary career alive by joining the Liberal Party but the plan failed to come to fruition and he has instead joined the New Country party along with colleague Frank Hough. Assessment: In the likely event of a subsidence of the large non-major party vote from 2001, the result here will be three Liberal, one Nationals, two Labor and one Greens. Most alternative scenarios involve the Nationals missing out. If Labor perform particularly strongly they might win a third seat; if voters do not return to the major parties to the expected extent, the outcome is anyone's guess. Family First have been heavily targeting the region with television and a strong performance could put their own candidate into contention, or deliver enough preferences to keep Paddy Embry in the hunt. Their vote could even allow micro-parties Public Hospital Support Group and Liberals for Forests to snowball, if they can manage at or near 2 per cent in their own right. Outcome: 1. Barry House (Liberal); 2. Adele Farina (Labor); 3. Roybn McSweeney (Liberal); 4. Sally Talbot (Labor); 5. Nigel Hallett (Liberal); 6. Matthew Benson-Lidholm (Labor); 7. Paul Llewellyn (Greens). Well might Wilson Tuckey be cranky with the National Party, whose decision to preference the Greens ahead of Family First decided the contest between the two for the final seat. Had Labor or the Greens won one seat elsewhere, the National Party would effectively have signed its own death warrant by facilitating an upper house amenable to one-vote one-value legislation. The Nationals might argue that their candidate could have got past the Greens if the Coalition vote had been just slightly higher, in which case the Greens preference deal would have delivered them the seat at the expense of Family First - to which the obvious response is that the deal itself, with a party held in very low regard by the Nationals' rural constituency, cost them the very votes that might have allowed this to happen. Instead the Greens were able to retain their seat despite fading from 8.5 per cent to 7.6 per cent on the primary vote. One Nation collapsed from 14.2 per cent to 2.2 per cent, from which a mere 0.7 per cent wound up with Paddy Embry. This made room for substantial improvements by both Liberal (from 35.4 per cent to 39.0 per cent) and Labor (from 30.7 per cent to 37.7 per cent), whereas the Nationals sank further from 6.2 per cent to 5.4 per cent. Click here for Graham Allen's upper house calculator for South West Click here for Western Australian Electoral Commission results |