Greens to win two Senate seats in Tasmania and other quarterly Newspoll results Wednesday, July 21, 2010

A collapse in the Labor primary vote would crush Labor in the Senate and give the Greens a serious chance of winning two seats in Tasmania if the results of the most recent quarterly Newspoll figures were repeated at the forthcoming federal election on 21 August 2010. The Liberals would stage a dramatic turnaround, beating their 2007 result after spending most of the last two years in the doldrums.

Despite these wild swings in the number of seats won in the Senate, the effective result has not changed. The Coalition will lose its blocking power in the Senate and the Greens will gain control of the cross benches, giving them balance of power along with Labor and the Coalition.

Read more after the jump...

I get these results by using apollo, my advanced Senate simulation software, I take the Newspoll figures and simulate the 2010 Senate election in each state. The results are as follows:

State	ALP	Coalition	Greens	Other
NSW	2	3	1	0
VIC	2	3	1	0
QLD	2	3	1	0
WA	2	3	1	0
SA	2	2	1	1
TAS	2	3	1	0
ACT	1	1	0	0
NT	1	1	0	0
Total	14	19	6	0

Leaving a Senate composition of:

Party	Seats	Gain
ALP	30	-2
Coalition	35	-2
Greens	9	+4
Other	2	+1
Family First	0	-1

I've been running simulations for eight or so months now, and so now have three data sets from Newspoll: one from last quarter 2009 (Q4), first quarter 2010 (Q1) and now second quarter 2010 (Q2). This means we can see which parties are doing better or worse as the current term ends.

Since last year, the Labor vote has continued to soften, in fact the drop has accelerated. This has allowed the Liberals to claw back seats all over the place.


Compared to 2004

Due to 6 year terms, the next Senate election is actually for seats last contested in 2004. As we can see from graphs 1 and 2, Labor is heading back towards their poor 2004 result, but the Coalition is not the beneficiary as they were last time. In 2004 the Coalition won control of the Senate, reaching the magical 39 seat mark (38 seats is required to block legislation, 39 to pass it). In 2010, the Greens are the main movers, doubling their representation.


Trend since March 2010

The trend has been bad bad bad for Labor. Going from a solid result that saw them setting up a 2013 tilt at outright control of the Senate, they are now facing a poor result in the Senate.

Let's look at the results from each state.


New South Wales
The most common result by far in NSW was 3 Coalition, 2 Labor, 1 Green. This scenario occurred in 17,301 simulations of our 20,000 (86.5%). The next two most likely outcomes are 3 Labor, 2 Coalition and 1 Green (5.68%) and 3 Labor 3 Coalition (5.47%).

On this result, you would have to say that reported 3rd place Labor candidate, Senator Steve Hutchins, will NOT be returned to the Senate. However John Faulkner and Matt Thistlethwaite will be safely elected. All three Coalition candidates (already sitting Senators) are likely to be returned: Concetta Fierravanti-Wells, Senator Bill Heffernan, Senator Fiona Nash (from the Nationals). Greens MP Lee Rhiannon will almost certainly make the transition from NSW parliament to Canberra - the Greens don't have any other declared NSW Senate candidates on their list.

Absolute outside chance of making it in: Paul Green, the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) candidate, who gets elected in 0.6% of scenarios.




 
Victoria
Last quarter, Victoria was an absolute lock on 3 Labor, 2 Coalition and 1 Green, with that combination occurring in some outrageously high number of scenarios (something like 99% of them). However, the softening Labor vote has dramatically changed the likely outcomes.

Now the mostly likely outcome, occurring in 12,552 simulations out of 20,000 (62.76%), is 3 Coalition, 2 Labor, 1 Green. The big loser is Antony Thow, who was a shoe-in for a Senate seat as Labor's #3. Now he gets elected in only 32.5% of simulations. The big winner is Julian McGauran, who was looking like getting turfed from the Senate as the Coalition's 3rd spot ticket holder. However, it is fair to say this contest is wide open between Labor and the Coalition. The Greens are a certainity, winning a seat in 100% of simulations.

Absolute outside chance: Family First's Steve Fielding winning a seat at the expense of the third Coalition member McGauran, which happens in 337 simulations, or 1.69% of simulations.



Queensland
Sadly, what was back in January looking like the big upset of the 2010 election - 4 "left wing" seats in Queensland - has now reverted to type. With Labor dropping back and now the Sunshine state giving us 3 Coalition, 2 Labor, 1 Green. This is bad news for Labor candidate David Smith who has seen his (small) chance of sneaking into the Senate fade away. It is good news for Coalition candidate Brett Mason. Overall this is a tough election for the Coalition in Queensland. Since in 2004 they won four seats and this time they will only win three, someone has to go, and that someone is Senator Russell Trood.

Absolute outside chance: This is a hard seat to predict because of Pauline Hanson's exceptionally high vote at the last election which is gone this time round. But once again, Family First's lead candidate, Wendy Francis, winning a seat at the expense of the third Coalition member Brett Mason is the most likely upset result.




Western Australia
The other possible upset in this election from earlier in the year, Western Australia, has also reverted to type now that Labor's high lead in the polls has evaporated. Now the state splits 3 Liberals, 2 Labor, 1 Green in all 20,000 simulations. However, it should be noted that these polls may be a) wrong, b) out-of-date (recent polls suggest an upswing in the ALP's vote) and c) unable to register the effect of the election. For example, Clive Palmer the Hutt is pumping some big money into the National's WA campaign, and I would not be surprised to see National's candidate John McCourt win at the expense of third Liberal senator Mathias Cormann.

Absolute outside chance: Discounting the National's upset as outlined above ... none! It's going to go 3 Coalition, 2 Labor and 1 Green in WA. Apollo has spoken!


South Australia
Without popular independent Nick Xenophon running a ticket, apollo suggests South Australia will split 3 Liberal, 2 Labor, 1 Green. However, I think I should rejig the scenario a bit to distribute Xenophon's vote.

Given that the Australian Democrats and their candidate Jeanie Walker win in only 31 simulations out of 20,000 (0.16%) in this their strongest state, you would have to say that is the last Senate election in which the Democrats will ever run.

Outside chance: Once again, winning in a very very very small number of simulations (but more than the other micro parties), is Family First's Bob Day.


Tasmania
The possiblitiy of winning two senate seats in Tasmania was erronously a common theme at the 2007 election. By far their strongest state and with the expectation they would comfortably clear a quota, some pundits discussed the possibilty of a second seat for the Greens. Unfortunately, clearing one quota simply means the votes you have left over for the second seat is your original vote *minus* a full quota of 14.3%. In 2007, this means the Greens, who polled 18.13% in the Senate, were effectively on 3.83% of the vote for their second seat ... making it a near impossible task in the low-micro-party-preference flow three horse race that is Tasmania at a federal election.

However, if the nation-wide swing of 5.3% to the Greens also holds in Tasmania, the Greens would poll 23.43% of the vote and are suddenly on a second seat quota of 9.13% ... making them a serious danger to the majors. Considering the Greens polled 21.61% of the vote at the most recent Tasmanian election you would have to say there is a very real possibility of the Greens getting an audacious second seat in Tasmania. It almost goes without saying this would be an unprecedently good result for a minor party.

Indeed, Apollo is as shocked as we are. In 9891 simulations (49.45%), Tasmania splits 3 Liberals, 2 Labor and 1 Green. However, in 9853 simulations (49.27%), Tasmania splits 2 Liberal, 2 Labor and 2 Green! This would see the Liberal's Guy Barnett lose to the Greens' number 2 candidate, Peter Whish-Wilson (great name btw).

Outside chance: There is an outside chance Labor winning a third seat at the Liberal's expense, returning 3 Labor, 2 Liberal, 1 Green. This would be unlucky for the Greens and ultra lucky for Labor's Lisa Singh.


ACT
The Greens are also an outside chance of winning a seat in the ACT, but I didn't run any simulations on the ACT. Maybe I should have, as it is a very real possibility.



 
Conclusions
So there you have it! A big brain dump of every state using random preferences - by far the most boring scenario there is. A good election for the Greens. An okay one for the ALP and the Coalition, but a disappointment for the ALP after their sky-high opportunities at the start of the year.

Now that the election is called and candidates are declaring and preference deals become known, we can start refining our scenario. I hope in the next few weeks to tease out some interesting scenarios. 



About the methodology:
I took the swings in the ALP, Coalition and Greens votes recorded in the most recent quarterly newspoll and applied it to the 2007 senate vote each party received. For each state, I run 20,000 simulations with random preference tickets (a similar run on the 2007 results shows a very high accuracy of simulation) and tabulated the results.