South Australian Parliamentary Elections Thread (March 15, 2014)

[Smid]

The electoral boundaries are just horrible - 51.6% of the vote and still not winning the most seats... a smaller popular vote victory and failing to win isn't terrible, 50.5% or so, but winning by that sort of a margin...

[Smid]

The electoral boundaries are just horrible - 51.6% of the vote and still not winning the most seats... a smaller popular vote victory and failing to win isn't terrible, 50.5% or so, but winning by that sort of a margin...

Labor managed to hold on by means of an effective marginal seat campaign, their two most marginal seats (Light and Mawson) swung to them. On a brighter note, the Liberals did pick up Adelaide, Morialta and Norwood, the latter of which is the seat of Steven Marshall, likely the next Premier of SA.

The best thing about the last state election in SA, in my opinion, was the post-election resignation of Attorney-General Michael Atkinson.

The thing is, Labor still have a seats lead following the redistribution, despite losing the statewide 2PP and the "fairness" clause in the Electoral Boundaries Act.

I've almost finished the new base map. I should have it uploaded before Christmas.

[Smid]

The electoral boundaries are just horrible - 51.6% of the vote and still not winning the most seats... a smaller popular vote victory and failing to win isn't terrible, 50.5% or so, but winning by that sort of a margin...

Labor managed to hold on by means of an effective marginal seat campaign, their two most marginal seats (Light and Mawson) swung to them. On a brighter note, the Liberals did pick up Adelaide, Morialta and Norwood, the latter of which is the seat of Steven Marshall, likely the next Premier of SA.

The best thing about the last state election in SA, in my opinion, was the post-election resignation of Attorney-General Michael Atkinson.

The thing is, Labor still have a seats lead following the redistribution, despite losing the statewide 2PP and the "fairness" clause in the Electoral Boundaries Act.

I've almost finished the new base map. I should have it uploaded before Christmas.

Looking forward to the maps, and while it's crummy about the post-redistribution result, at least Bright is notionally Liberal now, and Light has had some of its strong Labor territory removed, while Ashford, Elder and Hartley are very much low hanging fruit now. Mawson, on the other hand, has become stronger for Labor, although should still go back to the Liberals.

So while the post-redistribution map might not be much of an improvement, at least there's some silver lining on the cloud.

Part of it is also that all three independent-held seats are notional Liberal seats vs Labor.

Anyway, no need to "look forward" to the maps, I'll post them in a moment!

[Smid]

2012 South Australian Redistribution - Notional 2PP Election Map



Obviously it's also available in the gallery for download.

[Smid]

The electoral boundaries are just horrible - 51.6% of the vote and still not winning the most seats... a smaller popular vote victory and failing to win isn't terrible, 50.5% or so, but winning by that sort of a margin...

Labor managed to hold on by means of an effective marginal seat campaign, their two most marginal seats (Light and Mawson) swung to them. On a brighter note, the Liberals did pick up Adelaide, Morialta and Norwood, the latter of which is the seat of Steven Marshall, likely the next Premier of SA.

The best thing about the last state election in SA, in my opinion, was the post-election resignation of Attorney-General Michael Atkinson.

The thing is, Labor still have a seats lead following the redistribution, despite losing the statewide 2PP and the "fairness" clause in the Electoral Boundaries Act.

I've almost finished the new base map. I should have it uploaded before Christmas.

Looking forward to the maps, and while it's crummy about the post-redistribution result, at least Bright is notionally Liberal now, and Light has had some of its strong Labor territory removed, while Ashford, Elder and Hartley are very much low hanging fruit now. Mawson, on the other hand, has become stronger for Labor, although should still go back to the Liberals.

So while the post-redistribution map might not be much of an improvement, at least there's some silver lining on the cloud.

Part of it is also that all three independent-held seats are notional Liberal seats vs Labor.

Anyway, no need to "look forward" to the maps, I'll post them in a moment!

Maps are all looking good, as for those 3 independent seats, here's some early insight:

Fisher (Bob Such) - A member since 1989, Such will be hard to dislodge, the Liberals will only pick this one up if he retires.
Frome (Geoff Brock) - He's won 2 elections, the second by a strong margin. Hard to say at this stage.
Mount Gambier (Don Pegler) - Just the one victory, very narrow as well, good chance of a  Liberal pick-up, although Mount Gambier was expected to return to form in 2010. Very dependent on Pegler's performance as a member.

I'll post my predictions of every seat sometime in the New Year.

I realised I should have clarified earlier. They're notional Liberal vs Labor 2PP, but still Independent ahead on 2CP. The map I posted was 2PP, obviously.

[Smid]

Let's suppose that Labor holds on -barely- to power this year.  In the long-term, would it be better for the Liberals to lose this year, with the certainty that four years hence they would be winning in a landslide due to voter fatigue with one-party rule?  

That's kind of the thesis from the 2007 NSW election. In fairness, the ALP had no right to win that election, it just so happened that Debnam was an awful leader and they couldn't provide a compelling argument to change government. That then led to hubris in NSW Labor, the dumping of Iemma for Rees and then Rees for Kenneally and the final straw for the voters... and the ALP losing Government for a decade. 

Much of the first half of that applies to the 2010 SA election, too. Labor got slapped around pretty bad in the popular vote, but still clung to enough seats to hold on.

[Smid]

I'm leaning toward predicting a hung-parliament

I believe the words are "You read it here, first"

[Smid]

My opinion is that whoever wins a plurality of seats should form government. So Lab stays, hopefully not for a full term...

Fixed election dates, so the Parliament will go full term unless there's a confidence failure or possibly some sort of state equivalent of a Double Dissolution (those are the only ways it can happen in Victoria, anyway, which also has fixed terms). Also note, the fixed terms are constitutionally set, so can't be ignored and an early election scheduled without following the provisions set out in the Constitution (again, that's how it is in Victoria, anyway).

[Smid]

Interim Results of the South Australian state election, pulled off Antony Green's site. I will update this map from the Electoral Commission website once they finish counting, and possibly if a seat flips in the meantime, but this will do for the time being.

Two Candidate Preferred Results (Winning Candidate)



Two Candidate Preferred Swing



For those interested, Holden's automotive manufacturing plant that is shutting is situated in Elizabeth, in the Northern suburbs of Adelaide (basically the far Western corner of Little Para, where it joins Ramsay and Taylor). If you're unfamiliar with electorates, Ramsey is the diamond/square-balanced-on-its-corner with a little chunk added on the Southwestern edge. Taylor is adjacent to Ramsay, stretching northwards along the waterfront.

[Smid]

Regarding the first point, that seat is Giles, which includes the mining town of Coober Pedy (copper, I think), which voted Liberal, plus aboriginal communities, however the vast majority of the voters live in Whyalla, a town made famous by Craig Emerson and which has a fair amount of heavy industry.

Edit: The largest booth in the electorate, Whyalla Norrie South, was 76.4% Labor (the largest booth was also Labor's strongest booth).