Move it or lose it

As privately conducted seat polling continues to fly thick and fast, a series of disputes have developed over whether election candidates really live where they claim.

Three items of seat polling intelligence emerged over the weekend, none of which I’d stake my house on:

• Samantha Maiden of news.com.au reports a uComms poll of 831 respondents for GetUp! shows independent Zoe Daniel leading Liberal member Tim Wilson in Goldstein by 59-41 on two-candidate preferred and 35.3% to 34.0% on the primary vote, with Labor on 12.5%, the Greens on 8.9% and an undecided component accounting for 4.6%. It should be noted that the campaigns are clearly expecting a closer result, and that uComms is peculiarly persisting with a weighting frame based entirely on age and gender, which was common enough before 2019 but has generally been deemed insufficient since.

• Andrew Clennell of Sky News yesterday related polling conducted for the Industry Association of 800 respondents per seat showed Liberals incumbents trailing 58-42 in Robertson and 53-47 in Reid, and Labor leading by 56-44 in Parramatta and 54-46 in Gilmore, both of which the Liberals hope to win, and 57-43 in Shortland, which has never looked in prospect. The polling provided better news for the Coalition in showing the Liberals with a 57-43 lead in Lindsay and the Nationals trailing by just 51-49 in Labor-held Hunter. Clennell further related that “similar polling conducted earlier in the campaign also shows the government behind in Bennelong and Banks”. A fair degree of caution is due here as well: no indication is provided as to who conducted the polling, and its overall tenor seems rather too rosy for Labor.

• By contrast, local newspaper the North Sydney Sun has detailed results for North Sydney from Compass Polling, an outfit hitherto noted for polling conducted for conservative concerns that has then been used to push various lines in The Australian, which suggests independent Kylea Tink is running fourth and the threat Liberal member Trent Zimmerman faces is in fact from Labor’s Catherine Renshaw. The poll has Zimmerman on 34.9%, Renshaw on 25.0% and Tink on 12.4%, with Greens candidate Heather Armstrong on 15.0%. The online poll was conducted on May 6 from a sample of 507.

Speaking of staking houses, a fair bit of the electorate-level noise of the late campaign has related to where candidates claim to live for purposes of their electoral enrolment. The ball got ralling when The Australian reported that Vivian Lobo, the Liberal National Party candidate for the marginal Labor-held seat of Lilley in Brisbane, appeared not to live within the electorate at Everton Park as claimed on his enrolment. Labor’s demand that Lobo be disendorsed – always a challenging prospect after the close of nominations – was complicated on Saturday when Labor’s star candidate for Parramatta, Andrew Charlton, blamed an “oversight” for his enrolment at a Woollahra rental property owned by his wife a month after they moved to the electorate he hopes to represent.

The Liberals have naturally sought to maximise Labor’s embarrassment, with the Daily Mail quoting one over-excited party spokesperson calling on Labor to refer Charlton to the Australian Federal Police, as Lobo had been by the Australian Electoral Commission. But as the AEC’s media statement on the issue noted, Lobo has actively identified the Everton Park property as his residential address on his enrolment and nomination forms, potentially putting him in the frame for providing false or misleading information to a Commonwealth officer, punishable by a maximum 12 months’ imprisonment and $12,600 fine.

By contrast, Charlton’s is a sin of omission: failing to update his enrolment within the prescribed one month time frame after changing address, punishable only by a fine of $222 and in practice hardly ever enforced. There remains the question of why he was enrolled in Woollahra rather than at the Bellevue Hill property where he and his wife were living before their recent move to North Parramatta, but it’s difficult to see what ulterior motive might have been in play.

Now a new front has opened in the seat of McEwen on Melbourne’s northern fringe, where the Liberals are hopeful of unseating Labor member Rob Mitchell. Sumeyya Ilanbey of The Age reports today that Labor has asked the AEC to investigate Liberal candidate Richard Welch, who lives 50 kilometres from the electorate in the Melbourne suburb of Viewbank but listed an address in Wallan on his nomination form. Welch claims he had been living separately from his family in Wallan at the time of his nomination, but moved to his own property in Viewbank just days later after his landlord sold the house and terminated the lease.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

1,514 comments on “Move it or lose it”

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  1. In 2004 intelligent people voted for either directly or via preferences for a continuation of the Howard Government or for a new one headed by Mark Latham. Ultimately, those were the choices on offer. Their choice depended upon their take on what was best for themselves and their family and/or was was best for the country.

  2. Arky

    “ I can bear the Federal Liberal Party turning into Vic Liberal level unelectable whackjobs with enormous fortitude.”

    Or their QLD state counterparts for that matter, talk about a clusterf@#k.

  3. Late Riser –

    My predictions are:

    – PV (FINAL) – ALP 36.5, LNP 35, GRN 11.5, others 17
    – TPP (FINAL) – ALP 52.2/47.8
    – SEATS WON (OTN) – ALP 71; LNP 64; Others 6; undecided 10
    – SEATS WON (FINAL) – ALP 73; LNP 69; Others 9
    – Time that Winner is Declared OTN – Nope.
    – Time that Loser Concedes OTN – 1st of June.

    And the cask red of uncertainty will be much in evidence on the night (and in the days after….).

    BTW Mrs Geetroit has had to put up with my Eeyore ways for decades now and is rolling her eyes so far back she can see her brain.

  4. Patrick Bateman @ #891 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 3:40 pm

    Re housing, one of the biggest problems in this country is our allergy to high density housing. Every major city needs to shift to high density corridors with proper services and public transport supporting medium and high density residential developments.

    The conventional wisdom is that Aussies want a backyard and dislike apartments, but the evidence of ever increasing subdivision is that this is bullshit and that many people will take some house over no house. The backyard issue can also be addressed by actually investing in nice public spaces.

    To actually get cracking on this requires a weird alliance between wicked property developers, councils, state government, federal government, young people and environmentalists, facing off against the formidable forces of NIMBYs and other species of environmentalists (who think “big building = bad”).

    Yep, the footprints of our cities are huge.

    Until we address this, we will have little chance of coming to a solution.

    It doesn’t have to be highrise, terrace housing would be a huge improvement.

  5. Upnorth and Snappy Tom
    Monday, May 16, 2022 at 3:37 pm
    Snappy Tom says:
    Monday, May 16, 2022 at 3:35 pm
    and Cronus

    “Four decades ago I attended my high school’s muck up day. One girl wore a t-shirt with the slogan “No wucking furries” – hence establishing forever in my fantasies the correct spelling.
    中华人民共和国
    The correct spelling is indeed a conundrum”

    But the meaning is unambiguous and uniquely Australian.

  9. Even I would think a 2pp of 52.2 to ALP would be a majority Labor government.

    73/69/9 would be fascinating. A high chance of a snap rerun election with neither side actually conceding!

  10. Firefox @ #898 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 3:42 pm

    “But we need to transition NOW!”

    ***

    Yes, that is kind of the whole point. We have to actually start somewhere if we are to make the transition. We can’t just keep kicking the can down the road. It has to start now. That’s why we need parties and independents in the parliament who are willing to take the emergency seriously because Labor and the Coalition refuse to. The more Greens and indies in the parliament the better for Australia’s future.

    If you don’t have something to transition to now, it becomes much more difficult.

  11. Morrison has distroyed liberals chance in chizolm with china scare put loi in a imposable position when she had to say questioningthat her community being linkt to ccp is ofensive is corect but dutton did it with his disgraceful clame that if chinease people vote labor then there doing so because of that global times article morrisons gaslighting was on full display saying shes a real australian was bery disrespectful only defining her buy her race not what shes dun constantly referd to china plus the marles stuff would not be helping her the libs weaponizing this hassacrifised lois credability

  12. Good old AFR – it couldn’t be that there’s a federal parliamentary party full of men accused of either actually committing sexual assault and the like, or actively covering it up. It’s just that Morrison stands for a type of man who is “out of fashion”.

    Let’s hope rape and rape apology don’t come back into fashion any time soon…

    And of course no worries about the fact that the government is paying half a million bucks to a complainant and no-one apparently knows anything about it.

  13. ”
    GlenOsays:
    Monday, May 16, 2022 at 3:44 pm
    Ven @ #566 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 2:59 pm

    Electorate of McNamara could be in play because of this.

    Why?

    And please don’t answer “because Jews”. It’s basically a way to say that Jewish people are nothing other than Jewish, and all favour Israel.
    ”

    Because Sandman said Wentworth could be in play because Sharri Markson is trying to portray Albanese as anti-Semitic. I said McNamara could be in play.
    If Wentworth is not in play because of how Albanese is portrayed then McNamara will not be. 🙂

  15. poroti says:
    Monday, May 16, 2022 at 5:42 pm
    How about a sweep on what time Anthony Green goes
    ———————————————————–
    7:20pm

  19. JenAuthor @ #892 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 5:42 pm

    Sorry so late getting back on this … amongst other things Fran Kelly took Morrison’s line about someone leaking the AUKUS stuff and asked “did you leak it?” Penny reacted strongly and gave her a deadly stare. Throughout Kelly threw the govt’s opinion at Wong then tried to talk over Wong when she was answering to the contrary. Was very unedifying from Kelly. Wong drew her back on one set of assumptions that Kelly took as agreed (which weren’t).

    I really do hope this is just a short term contract for Fran Kelly which ends on Sunday.

  21. I got a letter from the restaurant owner of Delicado, based in North Sydney, busting my balls and telling me I should vote for Trent Zimmerman at the next election. Like… no…

  23. Jen Author,
    I’m sure Fran Kelly sincerely believes she is just being the devil’s advocate. Without realising that the devil is in the details that the Liberal Party supplies to her.

  25. I’m not going to make any prediction of seats/margins/2PP

    What I will say, the ‘feeling I get’ (and this is all about feelpinions, afterall) is that like 2007 there is a real mood for change (even without the Kevin07 vibe). So I am confident ALP win be the incoming govt.

    My other feelpinion is we are in a different time in terms of voter sentiment. Social media, silo barracking etc. means people generally seem to be more engaged and more definite in what they think — even if it is only that they’re fed up with Morrison and his cronies and their borderline corruption. Morrison has become viscerally hated esp by women. A change of leader in 2019 allowed LNP to skate home (- I reckon that if they’d stuck with Turnbull, Shorten would likely have won). Not the case now.

    The #LNP have missed the boat in that they are fighting ‘old-style’ elections — most especially they are trying to re-prosecute 2019 because it was a winning formula. (But only winning because there was a new leader.) But in 3 years the world has moved on in a major way … and they’ve been asleep at the wheel materially and figuratively.

  27. Mr Mysterious @ #919 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 5:59 pm

    I got a letter from the restaurant owner of Delicado, based in North Sydney, busting my balls and telling me I should vote for Trent Zimmerman at the next election. Like… no…

    You should kindly reply, dude, you’ve just lost a customer. 😀

  30. Patrick Bateman @ #876 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 5:36 pm

    Boerwar, climate defeatism is profoundly silly and just as bad as climate denialism.

    Sadly, I think you are right about the reef, with the exception of some of the interesting projects based around breeding coral that can survive warmer/different pH waters.

    However, as to our overall contribution, you seem like an intelligent fellow so you will understand that like every medium or large country, Australia’s participation is a necessary, but not sufficient, requirement.

    In addition to that, if we weren’t governed by morons we would already be massively accelerating projects so that what we export is not coal but clean energy. A good example is Sun Cable which will let us send power directly from Australia to Singapore and, indeed, the whole region. Put that sort of infrastructure in place, invest massively in solar, wind and battery storage, and we not only stop our own emissions but also take a huge bite out of the region’s emissions while also setting ourselves up with a way to make massive amounts of money and be a good friend to our developing neighbours.

    And if we stopped pussy footing around we could support India and other places to transition faster and make a motza in the process.

    On top of all of that, even if we fail I want to be able to look my kids in the eye and say that to the extent that it was within our power, we tried.

    So, in summary, stuff your defeatism!

    This is all true and we all know it.

    The defenders of the establishment however have decided to go the low road and employ the NRA style of avoiding responsibility for enabling the big emitters to burn our fossil fuel export$.

  35. No predictions from me either. I had mine thrown back in my face after 2019. And anyway, I’ve been doing pre polling. 😯

  39. JenAuthor @ #891 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 5:42 pm

    Sorry so late getting back on this … amongst other things Fran Kelly took Morrison’s line about someone leaking the AUKUS stuff and asked “did you leak it?” Penny reacted strongly and gave her a deadly stare. Throughout Kelly threw the govt’s opinion at Wong then tried to talk over Wong when she was answering to the contrary. Was very unedifying from Kelly. Wong drew her back on one set of assumptions that Kelly took as agreed (which weren’t).

    That reads like Kelly was simply giving Wong the opportunity to refute the charges from Morrison and give her side of the story.

  40. William Bowe @ #922 Monday, May 16th, 2022 – 6:00 pm

    If anyone wants to relive happy memories of election night 2019,……………..

    That post needs to include phone hotline numbers for grief counselling and PTSD

  42. Unleaded petrol up to $2.17 c in a Brissie folks. Whatever happened to Morrison’s promises about lower petrol prices?

  44. question….does my name appear in blue, rather than black…..does that mean I’m special…..It does, doesnt it?….I’m special, my mother WAS right

    Because you’re entering something in the “Website” field on the comments form (a free ad for Yahoo) when you post.

  45. Gee it’s getting closer now. I feel like the first two weeks of the campaign felt like ages, but the past week or so has been faster. The last couple of days will be slow again!

  46. “If anyone wants to relive happy memories of election night 2019, I’m doing a test run with the AEC’s archived data feed in sort-of-real-time here.”

    Cruel just cruel.

  48. Startling assessment from Uhlmann on Ch9 news. He said the Liberal party is about less government and SfM’s housing pledge is all about him trying to return to his Liberal roots.

    The Liberal party has not been about less government since probably before the Howard government. And certainly not since Howard became leader of the party.

    And Scott Morrison has never had a philosophy he believed in genuinely unless it came with a political advantage or benefit to him.

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