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Super Saturday elections: Rebekha Sharkie wins Mayo and Labor on track to retain Braddon – politics live
Super Saturday elections: Labor's Susan Lamb pulls ahead in Longman – politics live
(35 minutes later)
Christopher Pyne just said on the Sky panel that he has heard that the Bribie Island pre-poll booth (one of the biggest in Longman) saw about 70% of votes go to One Nation.
And in Braddon
If true, that is a surprise. Bribie, also known as God’s waiting room, is a very big boomer community which has mostly gone to the Liberals in the past. That would suggest that those One Nation votes would go back to the Liberal party (one of the reasons I am not confident in calling Longman just yet) but you never know with One Nation voters.
Empty seats galore at the @brettwhiteley60 by-election party in #braddon just as many media as Liberal Party faithful @SBSNews pic.twitter.com/J0fTyWyOM5
For what it is worth, the Malcolm Turnbull vs Boomer event occurred:
Meanwhile, in Mayo
Well I don’t think that quite went to plan for @TurnbullMalcolm at Bribie Island Hotel #SuperSaturday pic.twitter.com/qAyy2JZhkg
Rebekha Sharkie supporters serenade the successful candidate in Mount Barker #ausvotes #mayovotes pic.twitter.com/OKNTlMT984
Poll refresher
For anyone with a hankering to know - polls have just closed in WA.
What have the polls said?
Now, back to that commentary.
We’ve had a rush of local seat polls in these byelections – by my count there’s at least 15 seat polls. Most have been commissioned by media outlets, with a handful published by groups like the Australia Institute and the Australian Forest Products Association.
We have heard a lot (A LOT) about what these results would mean for Bill Shorten. Malcolm Turnbull a few weeks ago made it clear that Longman and Braddon was a contest between himself and the opposition leader.
The polls suggest that Braddon and Longman are both very close, while Rebekha Sharkie has a sizeable lead in Mayo.
Turnbull hosed down that in the last couple of weeks - which was notable.
Four polls in Braddon have ranged from 52% two-party-preferred for Labor to 54% for the Liberal party. Six polls in Longman have ranged from a 50-50 tie to 53-47 to the LNP.
But now that Shorten and Labor’s strategy has paid off - with dividends - attention is going to turn to Turnbull and what it means for his leadership future.
Sharkie’s lead in the four Mayo polls has ranged from 58% two-candidate-preferred up to 62%.
Tony Abbott must be the happiest man in Australia right now.
We’ve also had one Galaxy poll of Fremantle putting Labor on 66% to the Greens’ 34% after preferences.
There is no other way to look at Longman - where Mal Brough once won 51% of the primary vote - and to where the LNP is sitting now - at around 25% without repercussions. And I say that, pointing you to what happened in 2016, with Wyatt Roy and the billboard.
We should be careful to not put too much weight in these polls – even repeated polls predicting a close outcome can be off. We saw four polls each in Bass and Macarthur at the 2016 election which predicted extremely close results, and Labor then won each seat by 6% to 8%.
Particularly, if you are Peter Dutton. His seat is right next door, has a similar constituency and is very much on the radar.
How might One Nation preferences flow?
Given how powerful Dutton is in this governemnt and the party room - there are some very, very uncomfortable conversations in Turnbull’s future.
We’re expecting One Nation to be a big factor in Longman. The party polled 9.4% in Longman in 2016, and some polls have predicted a vote of over 20%. That won’t be enough to win, but would make their preferences crucial to the outcome.
Back at the Caboolture RSL and Ben Smee says:
One Nation preferences in 2016 didn’t tend to flow strongly to either major party. Over most of Queensland, their preferences slightly favoured the Liberal National party, but in Longman 56.5% of One Nation preferences ended up with the Labor candidate.
“We’er hearing here that Labor thinks it has won the remaining booths - Ningi, Kallangur, Caboolture East.”
Of course, there’s a difference between what a party recommends and what their voters do. One Nation recommended a preference to Labor in Longman in 2016, but it seems unlikely that many voters would have seen a One Nation how-to-vote. It will be much easier to cover the booths in a byelection, and One Nation has decided to recommend preferences to the LNP. This could lead to a stronger preference flow to the LNP, but One Nation voters are not known for strong preference discipline.
Which would just about call it.
There’s also a suspicion that many One Nation voters may simply preference the party that they would have otherwise considered voting for, regardless of their party’s recommendations. One Nation’s vote in 2016 was highest in the most Labor-friendly part of Longman. It may be that a surge in One Nation primary votes doesn’t do much to shift the two-party-preferred count.
Look, it is looking like Susan Lamb has won Longman, which means commentary at the parties is turning to what went wrong for the government - and Labor just keeps pointing to Malcolm Turnbull.
So back to Longman (I am sorry WA, I sort of forgot all about Fremantle and Perth, but really – it is a one-horse race there)
“There has been a big swing against the LNP here, and he can’t disown that,” a lead campaigner is telling me.
Susan Lamb – 40.54%
It is not enough that they are claiming victory, as yet.
Trevor Ruthernberg – 27.9%
But they are feeling good. Really, really good.
One Nation – 15.38
He is basing that on his magic formula, and I can’t argue with that.
That is with 16 of the 40 booths counted.
We’ve been heading down that path - but I just want to see a few more booths before I can say for sure.
The big story here is the swing to Labor on the primary vote (so far). And before anyone starts yelling at me, I have maintained this whole time that polling of single seats is very difficult (which is why, as Katharine Murphy mentioned in her piece today) neither of the major political parties put too many resources into research polling.
So, on the Bribie booths we have been looking at, we have some figures from the Woorim booth (one of the bigger ones)
Rebekha Sharkie has picked up some Liberal votes – but the big swing has come from Labor.
Of the 580 votes there, Susan Lamb has won 238 - 305 with preferences and Trevor Ruthernberg has 192 - 244 with preferences.
Labor sources told me at the time they were only running in Mayo to help Sharkie win, so I don’t think they are going to be too sad at that result.
That’s good news for Labor.
The Downer dynasty, as predicted, has not been enough to win Mayo.
And so far - with just over 30% of the vote counted in Longman - that campaign is paying off.
Rebekha Sharkie, who could give the whole parliament a lesson on how to be an excellent local member, has won it – with about a 9% swing.
The LNP is looking at a 9.3% drop.
Ben Smee has just told me that Ali France, who is Labor’s candidate in Dickson, Peter Dutton’s seat has rocked up to the Caboolture party.
That gives Susan Lamb a path to victory. It would take a pretty big upset at this time for Labor to lose this.
You may remember from the feature I did not so long ago that Labor was looking at Longman as a test for the general election - win Longman on these campaign tactics, which, as several campaign heads told me was all based on class warfare - and then you have a pretty good shot in Dickson and Petrie.
We need to wait for the remaining booths to fill in the details, but the big picture is very clear - all three of the MPs who faced serious challenges have been re-elected, seemingly with increased majorities.
Queensland is shaping as one of the most important states in the coming election. It has about 10 seats up for grabs on current predictions. Labor only needs two more for a win. It’s why WA is so important as well - there are quite a few Liberal MPs in trouble in the west.
Labor’s Justine Keay is up 0.3% off 48/71 in Braddon, whole her colleague Susan Lamb is up 3.2% off 15/40 booths in Longman.Sharkie is up 3% after 26/76 booths in Mayo.
We are all being a little more cautious with Longman - the One Nation candidate, Matthew Stephen is polling at around 15% at the moment.
There will be time later to discuss the polls in these three seats. The repeated polls in Mayo did a decent job of predicting a strong vote for Sharkie, but overestimated the LNP vote in Longman.
That is not quite enough to give Trevor Ruthernberg the bump he needs to win, but it makes it close.
More from Labor sources in Longman:
Labor appears to have grown its primary vote (I told you single seat byelection polls were often bupkis) but it doesn’t mean the party has won it as yet. Just that things are looking good.
“I don’t think the Liberals saw the field campaign coming - we would have done more doorknocking today, then the LNP would have done all campaign”.
Murph is hearing the same intel as me:
And those figures?
Labor folks also sounding hopeful in Longman @AmyRemeikis #auspol #SuperSaturday
73,180 phone calls
Over at the Caboolture RSL, my colleague Ben Smee, who I bet is not wearing a million layers of clothing, given how many smug posts my Queensland friends were sending me today has confirmed the carpet is quite the sight to behold.
35,870 door knocks
He’s also just told me a Labor volunteer is now doing the Walk Like An Egyptian dance - so it is safe to say, they are feeling pretty good up there right now.
I’m being told that’s the biggest field effort for a single seat, ever. They also think today will be the biggest day campaign ever, with more than 1000 calls and doorknocks today, alone.
Labor has always had a better ground campaign. It’s why they were pissed when six pre-polling booths were opened up - it took volunteers from the ground and sent them to the booths.
But still. I can think of a few people in Labor HQ - and United Voice - who won’t be paying for a drink for a while.
Labor increasingly confident in Longman.
The Susan Lamb campaign party has just heard about swings to Labor on Bribie Island, an LNP stronghold with a large community of retirees.
Labor says they’ve won two Bribie Island booths, Bellara and Bongaree.
“The message to Malcolm Turnbull is you can’t scare the pensioners,” rings out over the loudspeaker.
Followed by ... “Big Trev, you’re a big flop”.
Labor is feeling pretty good in Longman (not good enough to call it, but good) and they are pointing to their research showing “Malcolm Turnbull should not have campaigned here”
“He came here over eight weeks (five times) and we got 10 points on the back of that),” one source is saying.
