The Buswell narrative

A few days ago I posted that WA Liberal leader Troy Buswell's was politically finished. The problem for Mr Buswell is that, after the now infamous chair sniffing revelations, the media have tagged him a walking joke, and everything he says or does from now on will be interpreted through that prism.

I make no comment on Mr Buswell's fitness for his job; I don't need to. The latest revelations, which I won't even mention here - read it for yourself, have been seized on by the conventional media and the blogosphere, variously with indignation or with a snigger. Check this selection out:
The West Australian
Nine News
The Age
Andrewlanderyou
Possum Comitatus

The media needs a narrative in political reporting, a framework into which they can readily place people and events. It enables a large amount of information to be processed without having to re-assess everything anew, and allows the reader a degree of comfort and predictability in what they read. The problem is that reality can move on leaving the narrative behind. Thus, for a long time, John Howard's narrative was that of a "conviction politician" who knew the Australian people and could win elections from anywhere. Reporters and commentators stuck with this almost to the last gasp of the 2007 campaign, even though the empirical evidence for months prior pointed elsewhere.

I don't criticise the media for using narratives. They are a form of stereotyping and we human beings use stereotypes all the time as a standard socialisation tool. In the case of Troy Buswell, the media's account of him as a figure of ridicule has now become so dominant that there can be no resurrection. The WA Libs will shed him; it is just a matter of when. If they don't act soon, premier Alan Carpenter will call a snap election and they will be stuck with him.

UPDATE: Now we are told via The West Australian that the quokka story is a fake, started by a [gasp] blogger, who now admits his guilt. The problem for Troy Buswell, as I point out above and as Possum Comitatus also alludes to in today's Crikey, is that he has entered that media state where very action is now analysed through a received narrative:

When a public figure is found to have acted in a breathtakingly ridiculous fashion, like, say, sniffing a staffer's chair before cavorting with it around the office, then the presumption of normality gets suspended. If he did ridiculous things before, then other ridiculous allegations cease to sound, well, ridiculous.

Who could imagine any other political figure in the country being asked if they had ever done anything inappropriate to a quokka? But to Buswell, it’s now fair game regardless of the fact that it’s a completely fabricated rumour that started from a blog. The damage gets done by the simple existence of the story – by the simple act of Buswell being forced to deny the ridiculous because he’s no longer protected by a cloak of normal human behaviour.

UPDATE 16 May: Another day, another Buswell "revelation". Trust me, this won't stop. The media and Buswell's (seemingly many) opponents smell a terminally wounded animal and know that they can say anything they like now. And they will. The facts, unfortunately, aren't relevant any more: the party will have to move to stop the hemorrhaging.

Parliamentary Library Research Papers

The Federal Parliament's library produce a chain of fabulous, indispensable research papers for the pollie junkie.

Bookmark this page http://www.aph.gov.au/library/pubs/rp/index.htm which will take you to the index page. It includes an archive going back 13 years.

The latest offering just released is their summary of the 2007 election, written by Scott Bennett and Stephen Barber. 153 pages of well written, objective analysis here. You can also get similar reports written for the previous three federal elections.

While at the index page, download these recent releases too:
Electoral division rankings: Census 2006 second release here; and
State economic and social indicators here.

It is difficult in Tasmania to get the range of social data available in other states, largely becuase we are often off the data collection map and we don't have the the level of opinion polling done here. So these types of reports above are indispensable.

The Liberals' base vote

There is a broad assumption in the analysis of electoral and campaign politics in Australia that both the major parties (the ALP and the Liberal/National coalition) enjoy a "base vote"; that is, voters who will vote for a party just about no matter what. Campaigns, the wisdom holds, are very much about attracting the group in the middle that have the propensity to "swing" between the major parties.

But what is the base vote and does it change over time? That's a PhD-size question so I won't attempt an answer here. But I will say, given that the percentage of parliamentary seats in the country has shifted from 60/40 in the conservatives' favour in 1996, to 60/40 in Labor's favour today, and that Labor is now in power in every parliament in the country, that it is fair hypothesis that the Liberal/National base vote has diminished in that time.

Possum Comitatus has a stab here at estimating the coalition's base vote as it stands now. His item expounds on a view that Brendon Nelson is taking the Federal Liberals below the "natural" base. That is interesting and insightful stuff, but my focus here is the next Tasmanian state election due in 2010.

Here is Possum's key graph (click for clearer view):



Possum estimates the Liberal base vote in this country stands at 36%. See his item for his logic. The blue line plots the federal primary vote since 2001.

The question is, what will be the primary vote in Tassie be at the next election? Below is the primary vote at elections over the past 20 years.



The vertical line marks the start of the current Labor government.

It can be seen that the Libs have been in steady decline since 1992, although they recovered somewhat at the last election under Rene Hidding to about 32%. Despite the problems the Liberals find themselves in around Australia, I expect the Liberal vote to recover a bit more in Tasmania in 2010. (It should recover, that does not mean to say it will.) My key reasons are:

The low thirties is too low for the "natural" base vote for the Libs. It may have steadily dropped over the last decade Australia-wide, but I don't think we are into the low thirties yet in Tasmania. Poor leadership kept it artificially low in 2002 and to an extent in 2004, but we know now that in Wil Hodgman the Libs have a popular leader (although it remains to be seen if that will translate into primary votes). Possum Comitatus indicates an Australian base level of 36%, and I think that is pretty well about right for Tassie too.

Labor are going for four straight wins. History tells us that governments in Australia seeking a fourth term only win 30% of the time. That is an indicator that the Labor vote has gravity dragging it down and therefore that the Liberal should rise.

An EMRS poll from March this year put both major parties on 31%, but with a huge 21% undecided. If these fall 3:1 to Labor come election day, which historically they have, then that puts the Libs up to the high thirties and Labor down in the low forties.

Overall, putting together what we know this far out, I think we are on track for a Labor vote in the low forties, I'll stab at 44%, a Liberal vote in the mid to high thirties, let's say 37%, and a Green vote of about 17%. From the data we have now, that is the best sensible guess.

I'll post soon on what that might mean on a seat by seat basis, but it is clear that the most likely outcome is a hung parliament. (A word of caution though: if the Liberals stuff up the "majority government issue" in the campaign like they did last time, then I don't expect them to improve on the current 32%, which not only means a continued Labor majority government, but a forcing down to even lower levels of the Liberal base vote.)

Harriss and Finch (3)

And lo, it came to pass. Without any surprise at all, two incumbents were re-elected to the Legislative Council. Paul Harriss (Huon) and Kerry Finch (Rosevears) can continue as upper house members until 2014.

The results in both seats gives some comfort to all candidates. In Huon, Mr Harriss can be reasonably pleased with his 62%, given that a significant number in his electorate are not going to support his pro-logging views. The Greens, likewise, will be pleased with 38% - an excellent result on face value - but it has to be recognised that not all that vote is genuine Green support. An (unknown) portion will be normally Labor voters who could not bring themselves to vote for a conservative like Mr Harriss (who has previously been a Liberal candidate) and a further number will not be Harriss supporters for other reasons. If there had been a third candidate in the race I believe the Green vote would have been hurt more than Mr Harriss's.

In Rosevears, Mr Finch scored a solid 73% against independent Colin O'Brien's 27%. For a first-timer and unknown, Mr O'Brien did well, so expect to see him bob up again, maybe at the 2010 state election, now he has got the taste.

Over at Poll Bludger, my co-author, Kevin Bonham on this subject previously, had this to add:

Typically when an MLC retires there is a big bunfight for their seat, often with several candidates contesting and the winner polling only 30% or so (if that). Then after that the incumbent can comfortably retain the seat more or less forever unless they are perceived to be doing nothing or to have too much on their plate, in which case they can be knocked off by a sufficiently high-profile opponent.

Wellington (as it is now known, although the name may soon revert to Hobart) is the big one for Green chances of ever breaking into the Upper House - the current redistribution is likely to make it easily the greenest of the seats and knock at least four points off Labor’s margin in it. I’m not sure how long Doug Parkinson intends holding this seat (it’s next up in 2012) but whenever he steps down Labor will need to find a strong replacement to be sure of holding off the Greens in the seat.

Buswell survives ... for now

Well, WA Liberal head, Troy Buswell, has stared down the leadership spill and will continue to lead the party. I predicted below that he is finished politically, and despite surviving so far I just can't see it continuing.

Buswell is now seen as a joke. Maybe that's unfair - I don't know - but as we all know it is perceptions that count in politics, and the media's view of Buswell has now ordained him as a walking joke. Everything he says and does will be interpreted from that angle. And the local Perth paper, the West Australian, has turned on Buswell after earlier supporting him when he first got the job.

One of the most interesting aspects of this whole tale is that is not the ALP or even the press that have done Buswell in: it's leaks from his own party, as the Piping Shrike observes and this news item confirms. The next set of opinion polls in WA should finish Buswell off. He literally is dead man walking.

For pollie junkies this far removed there is a sort of macabre pleasure in watching it all unfold. Like a Greek tragedy.

UPDATE: Carpenter hints at an early election. The Libs better make the change quickly!!

Harriss and Finch (2)

The second part of a two-part piece, co-authored by me and Dr Kevin Bonham, on this Saturday's Leg Council elections is up over at Tasmanian Times.

We see no reason to believe that both sitting members, Paul Harriss in Huon and Kerry Finch in Rosevears, will not be returned.

Buswell - Deader than a can of spam

Diverting for a moment from Tasmanian politics, to WA which is the next state to hold an election. (WA sometime before May 2009. NT is due in October this year so may be first, although I expect WA to be sooner rather than later - see below).

I imagine readers here by now would have heard of Liberal opposition leader Tony Buswell's chair sniffing escapade. As the politics and mechanics of winning from opposition are a special interest of mine, I offer the following observations:

First, Buswell's political career is over. Some scandals are survivable for politicians (eg. Latham and breaking arms or Rudd and pole dancing) and some are not. There is a line and once it is crossed there is no going back. Exactly where the line is and how it is defined is difficult to say for certain. The criteria are movable and fickle, and seem to vary depending on all sorts of variables: the crime, the time or the person that committed it. I suspect it has something to do with what me might call the "ordinary person rule". If it something that happens to the average person or at least someone the average person might know on a day-to-day basis, then it's OK. Getting in a bit of dust-up? Having an affair? Every-day stuff. But crawling around the floor sniffing chairs for laughs? Yuk. I have no doubt there is no return for Buswell. He will probably be replaced on Tuesday, if he doesn't resign before.

Second, is that it might be time to recall past leader Colin Barnett. I have been critical of Barnett's political nous in the past, but providing he's learned some lessons he might be the best they have over there. Barnett had a good record in the polls at times in his previous stint - just a fortnight out from the 2005 election Westerners were prepared to embrace him as their premier (until he self-immolated over the big canal scheme) .

Third, Don't write the Liberals off in WA at the next election. They certainly aren't favourites - a long way from it - but they have some chance. The problem is settling on a leader. Paul Omodei was a flop and now Buswell. But despite this, the party has managed to score in the high 40's, even over 50%, at times on a two-party preferred basis in opinion polls over the past three years. Other state Liberals would kill for results like that (although NSW is showing close to a line ball now). And don't forget that WA voted 53/47 FOR the Liberals at the 2007 federal election, when the nation went 53/47 the other way. WA was the only state or territory that returned a 2pp result in the conservatives' favour. That means that voters have a propensity to vote Liberal, in stark contrast to Tasmania for example, and that counts for a lot. To pluck a figure out of the air, I give them a 20% chance of winning.

Fourthly, and related to the above, expect Labor to call the election early to take advantage of the Lib's turmoil. The earliest possible date is 21 June, so expect a winter election.

UPDATE: An observant reader has alerted me to the fact the Centrebet has odds up on the the West Australian election, apparently for some time.

Current odds are $1.25 Labor and $3.50 Coalition. That translates to (after eliminating the bookie's vigourish) a 74% chance of a Labor victory and 26% chance for the Coalition. As I said, the Blues are far from favourites but in with a chance.

UPDATE 2: The Poll Bludger, William Bowe, who lives in WA has an excellent discussion on his site. William suggests Alan Carpenter is constrained by the mechanics of upper/lower house election terms and is unlikely to call an election before August, leaving us with a September election day.

To-ing and fro-ing in the ALP

Sue Neales had a great item in the Mercury on Saturday about how the appointment of new deputy premier, David Bartlett, came to pass. She clearly has good sources from within the ALP, and it is interesting having a glimpse inside the party.

Ms Neales hasn't always been 100% correct in the past, but it's a cracking read anyway. And a very funny Kudelka cartoon into the bargain. (Click on the image to enlarge.)

Think outside the Square ... sell Treasury building too

Me in the Mercury 23 April on the pending sale of "Heritage Square" (no web link available - click for clearer image):

Text ...

Reports recently in the Mercury that the state government intends to sell off a prime development block, bounded by Murray Street, Davey Street, Salamanca Place and Parliament House, should be great news.

Great news because now, after too many years of neglect and inaction from both Liberal and Labor governments, something appears to be happening at last.

Why get excited about what, to the casual observer, might be dismissed as a drab mish-mash of the worst of 1980s modernism, rather banal art deco and fading Georgian grandeur?

Why, because this precinct is vital for the future of Hobart as a workable city.

In terms of town planning and urban amenity, let me put this largely forgotten city block into context.

One of the main planning problems facing Hobart is that the two principal commercial districts, the CBD and the docks, have little pedestrian connection. By this I don’t mean that one can’t walk between them – that is easy enough (leaving aside for another day dodging eight lanes of traffic crossing Macquarie/Davey Streets) – rather that there is nothing to draw people between the two.

The two main pedestrian routes are via Murray Street and the top end of Salamanca Place and both at the moment only offer drab office doors to the street. Shoppers and tourists subconsciously see these facades as barriers and tend not to cross them.

So Hobart is currently developing two CBDs, one in town and one at Salamanca, and for a small city that is just not sustainable.

Think how much better it would be if there were shops, cafes, hotels and perhaps galleries or museums that continued to invite people to go on with their journey.

The real pity is that it has taken so long to get to even this announcement. And we haven’t seen the heritage or planning guidelines yet.

I recall in 1996 when I was a ministerial staffer for the Rundle Liberal minority government that the sale of this precinct was seriously discussed, only to be confined to the too hard basket.

I also know that when Jim Bacon became premier in 1998 it came back on the table, only to disappear again.

Where have the Liberals and the Greens been on this for the past ten years? The sale and revitalisation of this precinct should have been a hot political issue and part of every party’s policy platform at the past three elections.

The Liberals in particular, supposedly the party of free enterprise and commerce, could have stolen the march on the government over this years ago.

Anyway, it is on the agenda now, so it is important we get it right.

The treasurer, Michael Aird, has apparently dubbed the precinct “heritage square” which is news to me and probably the rest of Hobart but no-doubt a good move when marketing to interstate buyers.

The government included the site within the boundaries of the recently formed Sullivans Cove Waterfront Authority and it is that organisation which will issue the permits and set the limitations.

High on the list of development control criteria is sure to be protection of the many heritage values on the site, including 12 Murray Street and the old St Marys Hospital in Davey Street.

I know some people argue to keep heritage buildings in government ownership but that has proved to be a fool’s gambit; governments of all political persuasions in Tasmania have a terrible record in conserving heritage assets.

The deplorable condition of the buildings we are talking about here is stark testament to that fact, so the sooner they are passed to private hands the better.

The best way to protect a heritage building is for it to have a viable, commercial use. The best role for government is to set development control and permit conditions.

The government must also closely control the use the buildings are put to.

From a planning perspective, the best outcome would be a mix of uses: this would be much more interesting at street level.

Think of all the great pedestrian cities in the world – London, Seville, Hong Kong, even Melbourne – and what makes them appealing and exciting. It is walking from shop to shop, “discovering” laneways and routes that are always taking you to something more interesting.

Hobart is half-way there, and the proper development of this site will help plug an important gap.

If I had my way I would sell off the Treasury building in Murray Street as well to complete the pedestrian link from city to water – why should a few public service office workers occupy such a strategic site? – but that, like what to do with Davey and Macquarie Streets, is a discussion for another day.

Electoral division rankings: Census 2006 first release

It is not always easy to get socio-economic data for Tasmania. Here the ABS has broken down the 2006 census data by all 150 Australian electorates, which is very useful information.

TIP: You only need to open up the spreadsheet once. If you scroll along the tabs at the bottom you will see that all 40-odd tables are on the one Excel file.

Settle, people, settle ...

I’ve held back on posting on the whole Kons saga to let the dust settle a bit. When things like this happen in politics, events occur so quickly that there is little to do other than report the news. And I guess those who read this site are interested enough in politics to follow the daily media, so there wasn’t much for me to add.

But now Steve Kons has gone and David Bartlett has been promoted to deputy premier it is time to take stock. That is not to say that this story has finished. There are still the rumblings from the various legal agencies – the DPP, the Solicitor-General and the police. And who knows what next might come from the shedder?

Notwithstanding, some observations can be made.

Most commentators, journalist and pundits have vastly over-rated the effect on the voting public. Both the Mercury and the Examiner editorials have spoken of Paul Lennon’s “last chance”, of Labor being annihilated at the next election, of complete loss of public confidence in the government, and so on. And a somber Richard Flanagan thinks democracy as we know it is at an end:

There is a great and terrible sadness abroad in Tasmania today born of the knowledge of what we might be in sorry contrast to what we have become.

This, and most of what else that has been written, is rubbish. Nothing but hyperbole and misconstruction of reality. I’m not saying the Kons affair is not bad for Labor, and I am not saying there is not a general feeling of unease in the broad community, and that each “affair” builds on that perception; but let’s all get a grip.

What tends to happen in the world of political commentary is that those that have a real interest in it – let’s not call them (us) “elite”, how about the “AB demographic” – tend to have conversations with each other, while the rest of the community get on with their lives. Believe me, the resignation of the deputy premier for lying in parliament is NOT a barbeque stopper for most people. They don’t care that much.

Who watched the ABC television news on Wednesday? The cameras did a vox pop of people on the main street in Burnie. All those interviewed were variously disappointed and shocked. But to me, the most interesting aspect of that exercise was that half the people approached by the ABC had never heard of Steve Kons! Another indicator of public disconnection: on Friday, of the three dailies, only the Mercury covered the appointment of David Bartlett on the front page; the Examiner had it on pages five and six, and the Advocate on pages four and five. Why? Because the editors know what their readers want and it ain’t politics. People with a passion about politics and especially political probity never quite understand how the rest of the community care so little.

I like to draw my conclusions from what we know to be fact. First, we know that there is a tendency over the past decade for Tasmanians to vote Labor. We know at the most recent state and federal elections Tasmanians vote Labor at close to the highest rate in the country. We know that 50 percent of federal/state seats in Tasmania are ALP, and the Liberals’ 20 percent. Tasmanians are Labor voters - anyone who thinks that is likely to change overnight, despite the shenanigans of our state government, just doesn't understand campaign and electoral politics. In politics, anything is possible, but I prefer to deal in the plausible rather than impute my values and prejudices to the general voting public.

People will not keep on voting Labor blindly but, on the balance of probabilities based on the teachings of history, there is unlikely to be a wholesale ditching of the Labor vote. Firstly, modern day Australian voters do not swing in large numbers. As I have pointed out previously, there has not been an election in Australia in the past 30 years where an opposition has gained a double-digit swing to win government. Second, we know that the high undecided vote in Tasmania (around 20 percent at the recent EMRS poll) are soft Labor voters. Certainly, they might not return to Labor but the odds are that a decent proportion will. That’s because it is these very voters, these undecided fence-sitting swingers, who are the most dis-engaged from the political discourse. These are the ones who, largely, couldn’t give a fig about Steve Kons or shredders - the ones who don’t want politics on the front page of their paper. Or as George Megalogenis wrote in the Oz a few years ago:

Elections are normally decided by passive voters, not partisans. These punters are given the flattering title of swinging voters. But it is code for not really caring one way or the other.

There is two whole years to go to the next election. Labor could have done without the Kons affair but it should be a plus to have the much more urbane and astute David Bartlett in his place. It is going to be harder for Labor to win the next election than it was the last, but talk of a wholesale rout is not based on reasoned analysis. Recently, but before the Kons resignation, I took a punt on the Poll Bludger site on the 2010 election probabilities. This is what I wrote:

If I was framing a market now I would have a hung parliament favourite. There are only three remotely possible outcomes, and here is how I rate the probabilities:

Labor majority: 29%
Liberal majority: 2%
No majority: 69%

I think the Liberals vote at around 32% is below what their support “should” be. It has been kept this low by, first, an amateur-hour campaign in 2002 by an unelectable Bob Cheek as leader, and then, as Kevin points out, a very poor campaign in 2006 under Rene Hidding where they gave votes to Labor by rejecting a minority outcome.

At the most recent state elections around the country most Liberal parties scored in the high thirties on primaries. All states are in roughly the same position: generally poorly performing over the past decade against a dominant ALP. Tasmania is not directly comparable, of course. The other states don’t have the Greens sucking up 17% of the vote. But providing leader Will Hodgman maintains reasonable levels of popularity, and providing the Libs don’t self-destruct with their campaign again, another 5-6% should be almost a gimme.

Anything more than that … I don’t know.

Have this week’s events changed my thinking? Not really. My best guess still, two years out, is that Labor will drop somewhere between 3-8 percent of their vote, the Libs pick up about the same, and the Greens stay within a 15-18% primary vote band.

It is also worth noting that the affair (and we can call it that) has further concentrated ALP power and influence in the south. From these charts you can see that although the Labor MHA’s split 7/7 each side of Oatlands, the four Labor Leg Councillors are all from Hobart. The carve-up of the ministries skews heavily south: six in the south and only two from the north. (It is worth noting, though, that having three backbenchers and no ministers in Braddon is not necessarily a negative for Labor. Backbenchers can spend much more time in the community and work the electorate which is vital for re-election under Hare Clark.)

Settle, people, settle. Just because you feel something deeply, don't assume the rest of the community does too.

Nothing to see here. Yet.

How to beat the majority government scare.

The next Tasmanian election will of course be fought, like all elections since the late 1970’s, around one central issue – majority versus minority government.

Forget about health, education or government propriety; how each party handles this one issue will largely determine its fate.

Very broadly in Tasmania, about 80% of voters vote for one of the major parties, about 16-18% vote Green, and the rest for the odd independent or minor party. For the majors, the conventional wisdom on election tactics is that swinging or “soft” voters can be “scared” into basing their vote choice largely around which party can best form majority government. The belief is that “stable” government is the overriding issue for most main-stream voters.

Largely, I agree with this view of the electorate behaviour. During the 2006 election campaign we saw a huge undecided block of voters, about 25% by one EMRS poll, vote 3:1 Labor over Liberal come election day. Remember that many of these “soft” voters are not particularly engaged in the political debate so are susceptible to a scare campaign on something as fundamental as stability of government.

So there is a tremendous advantage for the major party that can convince the electorate that it has the best chance of delivering a majority. Recently, that party has been Labor and it will be again in 2010. We are now almost exactly half way between election days and, true to form, the latest poll shows a large undecided vote and the government down close to the opposition on primaries. But because Labor currently has the majority, it is in the box seat to convince these waverers that only it can deliver majority again.

So 2010 will be a re-run of 2006? A lot remains the same, including many of the personnel for all three parties and exactly the same mix in the House (14 labor/7 Liberal/4 Green).

I don’t think it will be the same.

Labor will run an even bigger scare campaign over minority government than last time. In 2006 Labor had the advantage of the Liberals making the tactical error of running hard on the issue too. The Libs signed a “declaration” that they would govern in majority or not at all. There were two problems here: first, the task was just so monumentally out of the question (a swing of over 15% needed) that no voter, even the disengaged, soft voter, believed it could be done. So the Libs broke the first rule of campaigning: don’t promise something you can’t deliver. Second, they talked up an issue they didn’t “own”. That is the second rule of campaigning: if you elevate an issue that the other guy owns, all you do is give the other guy the votes.

I’ll come to the Liberal’s tactics in a minute, but regardless Labor will have to crank up the scare campaign for 2010. This is for two reasons: first, it is harder for government to keep winning - the “it’s time” factor naturally starts to favour oppositions; and second, the Liberals’ leader, Will Hodgman, is about the most popular opposition leader the state has seen for some time. If that popularity holds come election day, and voters like Mr Hodgman as an alternative premier, Labor will have to have the big scary guns blazing.

That’s Labor’s tactics: scare the pants off the voters. Claim at every instance that anything other than a Labor majority will see the Liberals dance with the devil – the dreaded Greens – to get into government. Premier Paul Lennon has started already, two years out from election day! Here is an extract from Hansard 2 April. The Premier is answering a question from Nick McKim:

Mr LENNON - I thank the member for his question. I might say at the outset that what the people of the north-west coast would not like is the prospect of a Liberal-Green minority government.

Members laughing.

Mr LENNON - That is the thing that they would dislike the most, the prospect of a Liberal-Green partnership.

Members laughing.

Mr SPEAKER - Order.

Mr LENNON - You can laugh it off but your Deputy Leader is not laughing it off because he knows that what I say is right and that is the people of the north-west coast know only too well what will happen to them and what will happen to the mining and forestry industries in this State should it ever come to pass that you had the Hodgman-Putt alliance in Tasmania. Make no mistake about it, that is what the people of the north-west coast will not like and they know that is the prospect.

Then to add fuel to that fire, up pops Green Leader Peg Putt in Monday’s Examiner pushing for cabinet posts in a minority government! This is manna for Labor.

So what do the Liberals do? They are in the classic poo sandwich: if they go hard on majority, à la last time, no one will believe them and they’ll just push votes to Labor; but if they go soft and say they will accept minority government, they’ll get mauled by Labor going the big scare.

In my view, the Libs have no choice: they have to tell the electorate, and tell them now, that if the the election does not return them a majority of seats, then they will govern in minority. It might seem like an anathema to the party, but the alternative, to push hard for majority or nothing, is an outcome they just can’t sell. As I mention above, in politics if you don’t hold the card then you just can’t play it.

My logic goes something like this:

Labor will put the frighteners on the voters anyway. By the Libs announcing now that they will accept minority government takes a lot of wind out of the scare campaign. Otherwise Will Hodgman will spend a lot time denying it, and the more he denies it the more Lennon will push it. Coming clean now and saying (something like) “a Liberal minority government is better than any Labor government” allows Hodgman to go on the attack over Labor’s record.

Having declared they will take minority government, the Liberals MUST make it clear they will NOT govern in any form of partnership or coalition with the Greens. I say this purely from a position of electoral pragmatism: minority Liberal government may be saleable to that mythical average voter, but Greens in the government? Definitely not.

I think the major parties put too much store in the conventional wisdom (I think they listen to their membership too much). Majority government matters to some voters, but I think the strength of its influence is diminishing. I don’t have hard evidence for this, but I am sure it will happen as voters become accustomed to, and tire of, the incumbent. The “cost of government” means voters will look for change no matter who the government is or how it is formed. And the more time that passes since the last minority government (Liberals 1996-98) the less scary it seems to voters. Voters have notoriously short memories, and a decent swag of them weren't voting in the 1990's anyway. How many Tasmanians could tell you who the last Liberal premier was? It just becomes harder to make minority government the bogey man.

Those voters for whom majority is so important that it is the key determinate of their vote, are almost certainly already voting Labor. So the Libs can't lose more votes accepting minority government, only gain them.

If the Liberals bite the bullet and accept a minority outcome now they will take a lot of wind out of the debate. Yes, Will Hodgman will get asked about it constantly, but as long as he sticks to his lines, that there will be no coalition with the Greens, no Green ministers, no Peg Putt deputy, he can then steer the debate to issues he CAN win on, like health, law and order, water, government proprietary and so on. It also allows him to take the high moral ground: paint Paul Lennon as arrogantly refusing the will of the people. If he goes down the majority-or-nothing path then he guarantees the majority government question dominates the campaign. It will be a re-run of 2006 and that is just what Labor want.

Which brings me to the final question. Can the Liberals conceivable win a majority? I don't think so. They need a swing of at least 12% and modern Australian electorates just don't swing that much. I had a look over the past 30 years for all elections in Australia and could not find one case of a double-digit swing for an opposition to win government. Even the famous "Wranslides" of the late 1970's in NSW were in single figures.

To win a majority the Liberals will have to win three seats in three electorates and two seats in two. They have a remote chance of three seats in each of Bass and Braddon, but where is the other three seater going to come from? In Lyons, Franklin and Denison the Libs currently only have one seat - to go from one to three is just a dream too far. It will need that double-digit swing, and I just do not see this election being the one to set post-war history in this country.

That doesn't mean that Will H should admit it, though. His public face has got to be that he is shooting for a majority, that his team of candidates can deliver, that the Libs are the best thing since canned beer, etc, etc. But of course he should be humble and say he will accept minority if that is what the people deliver. There is a kind of Zen in all this for the Libs: their best chance of getting a majority, or at least maximising their seat return, is by not being rabid on majority, but rather accepting of the peoples' vote. You know what your mum used to say: the less you ask for something the more chance you will get it.

Numbers game

The ABS has released demographic figures for Tasmania, by local government resident population as at 30 June 2007.

The Mercury and the Examiner covered the news, both emphasising that Brighton is the fastest growing municipal area in the state with 3.2% growth over 12 months. (You will need a subscription and 20 cents to access the Examiner story on-line.)

The ABS table is here. I have re-arranged the data to sort the municipalities from the smallest to the highest. Worth printing off and sticking on the wall.

Local Government Area	Est. Popn at 30 Jun '07	Change over prev year	Change over prev year (%)
Flinders	877	-4	-0.5
King Island	1723	20	1.2
Tasman	2301	-16	-0.7
Central Highlands	2315	-1	0
Glamorgan/Spring Bay	4383	54	1.2
West Coast	5148	-23	-0.4
Southern Midlands	5871	26	0.4
Kentish	6052	87	1.5
Break O’Day	6234	16	0.3
George Town	6740	-4	-0.1
Dorset	7245	-8	-0.1
Circular Head	8228	40	0.5
Latrobe	9071	183	2.1
Derwent Valley	9770	78	0.8
Sorell	12428	297	2.4
Northern Midlands	12482	-23	-0.2
Waratah/Wynyard	13889	74	0.5
Huon Valley	14628	186	1.3
Brighton	14791	462	3.2
Meander Valley	19124	186	1
Burnie	19692	-9	0
Central Coast	21253	-6	0
West Tamar	21833	290	1.3
Devonport	24961	81	0.3
Kingborough	32228	522	1.6
Glenorchy	44250	71	0.2
Hobart	49720	164	0.3
Clarence	51173	365	0.7
Launceston	64931	311	0.5
TOTAL TASMANIA	493 341	3 419	0.7

Dr Natalie Jackson from UTas makes the most sense of anyone going around on population and population projections. Read her contribution on Stateline last year on Tasmania's aging population. Whenever Dr Jackson comments on demographics, it is worth taking notice of.

EMRS poll - what's it telling us? Part 1

I agree with Assoc Professor Richard Herr's observation that neither major party can really take too much from the EMRS poll. See Richard reported in the Mercury and the Examiner today.

The headline result for the newspapers was that support for Labor has slid 9 percent since August 2006 while the Liberals have increased 4 percent. Today, support for the major parties is neck-and-neck which means the next election is up for grabs ... or is it?

As in anything to do with politics, it is not that simple.

The first thing to consider is the extraordinary high undecided response to the survey: 19 percent (which is much higher than Newspoll, for example, ever gets when it polls on the mainland). EMRS produce a table which excludes the undecideds, thus assuming undecided voters will vote the same way as decided voters (although that's not to imply EMRS's Tony Hocking believes this will happen):

Table 3 – Percentage of Respondents Supporting a Party after Excluding Undecided Voters

Party	% Support in May 2007 (N=858)	% Support in March 2008 (N=853)	% Change Since May 2007
Labor Liberal Greens Independent Others	40 35 21 4 0	39 37 22 3 0	-1 +2 +1 -1 =

If this outcome was reproduced at an election it would almost certainly produce a 10 Labor/10 Liberal/5 Green, or four Greens with one of the major parties returning 11 seats; either way a certain "hung" parliament. But I don't believe we can treat the undecideds this way.

The Green vote is highly unlikely to be anywhere near 22% at an election. Two reasons: the Greens always do better in opinion polls than they do at elections (and this is true Australia-wide); and the Greens vote has been fairly static for the past decade at about 16-17%, so a sudden 5% jump is not likely. The most the Greens can hope for is five seats (one in each electorate), although I give Braddon less than a 10% chance. They can't realistically win two seats in Denison, and certainly not two in Franklin.

Let's see what happened to undecided/other voters before the last election. The graph below is mine, using EMRS data that extends outside that covered in this current report.

EMRS opinion poll and 2006 election results

	Feb 2006	Election March 2006	March 2008
Labor	32	49	31
Liberal	25	32	31
Green	17	17	18
Other/undecided	26	2	21

We can see that the situation prior to the 2006 election was very similar to that now: Labor scarcely over 30 percent, and undecided/other voters at 20 percent plus. At the 2006 election these non-major party voters went Labor at about a ratio of 3:1, enough to deliver a Labor majority government again.

So the pattern appears to be that between elections a large swag of Labor voters peel off Labor and siton the fence for a think. At the election these voters mainly go back to Labor, but the danger must be that this won't happen to the same extent this time: they could transfer to the Libs.

As Richard Herr points out, Labor will console itself that it has been in this position before mid-term; the undecided voters are really "soft" Labor voters registering a protest and will come back. This viewpoint has some currency: there generally is a drift back to the incumbent in modern Australian elections (the "narrowing"); and there is also is a tendency for undecided votes in opinion polls to have a protest element that returns as votes for the government when the voter has to vote "for real".

But there is a strong feeling about that the undecideds will be much harder for Labor to win back this time:

1. "Cost of government". It is a fact that each election gets harder for the incumbent to win. Last time Labor was seeking a third term, so now it is a fourth. Everything else being equal, this one will be harder.
2. Leader popularity. Premier Paul Lennon is not a popular leader, he has admitted that himself (we "don't understand him very well") in launching a "new direction" for the rest of this term. The Liberal leader Will Hodgman, by comparison (in fact, against any current Australian comparison), is a very popular opposition leader. This has to be a factor if it holds come March 2010. (See the EMRS report for leadership survey results.)

It is a piece of received political wisdom in Tasmania that the need for majority government is the most powerful vote determinate among the "average" voting population. This wisdom says that the undecided voters can be "scared" into voting for the party that can best win a majority. Part 2 of this posting (expect mid-May) will discuss how this might play out, and I will include a probability guide of the outcomes at the election.

Also, see the Poll Bludger for a discussion of the EMRS poll. You can post comments there if you wish.

COAG - ulation

Me trying to make a dry subject sound interesting on Stateline last Friday.

"These new special purpose payments, the way I read it, will be outcome based rather than the Commonwealth dishing out the money in the small amounts and telling the states what they have to spend it on. So the states will be able to get one bucket of money for health, housing or early childhood education and spend it the way they want, as long as the outcomes are testable and auditable by the Commonwealth. I honestly think it's a new federalism and new relevance for the states."

A new relevance for the states? More on this soon.

Politicians close and personal

Got a beef? Wouldn't it be handy if you could just phone your local politician anytime - even better on his/her mobile?

But where do you get a politician's mobile number from? Surely that would be kept from the hoi polloi?

Not in Tasmania. Twelve of the fifteen Legislative Councillors give a mobile phone contact on this official list available from the Parliament House website. I must admit I was surprised to see mobile phone numbers so I had a look at the House of Assembly pages, and the party pages (see the margin on the right for links) but drew a mobile blank. Also had a brief but not complete scan of a few other state parliament/members sites and came up with zero for mobile numbers.

Do published mobile phone numbers for our Leg Councillors make them the most accessible parliamentarians in the country? There's even one for Treasurer Michael Aird, so if you have a view on the way the government spends your money you can have a chat to him about it.

Now THAT'S accessible.

In a recent piece (co-authored with Dr Kevin Bonham) I made the point that one reason the major parties find it hard to compete with independents in the Legislative Council is that the small electorate size allows the member to get close and personal with the voters. And in modern society you can't get more personal and direct than mobile phone contact: most of us have them glued to our ears (or to our texting digits) 24/7.

I think it's a good thing. More politicians should publish a mobile phone number.

Having said all of the above, I must point out that I haven't tried any of the mobile numbers (got nothing to say) so I don't know how many go straight to the respective pollie, or if a staff member carries the phone. If anyone does try, let me know the outcomes at peter.tucker(at)tdctasmania.com.

What's in a name?

What's in a name? That which we call Paterson by any other name would smell as sweet.

Apologies to the Bard.

The TEC will hold inquiries this week into proposed changes to Legislative Council electoral boundaries. According to their website:

"The inquiry will be conducted at the Tasmanian Electoral Commission, Level 2 Telstra Centre, 70 Collins St, Hobart from 10:00 AM on Wednesday 26 March 2008 and will continue at Henty House Auditorium, Launceston from 10:00 AM on Thursday 27 March 2008.

"Media and the public are welcome to attend."

Well, something to do I suppose.

It is interesting to note that several submissions support changing the name of the division of Paterson to "Launceston" including the member for Paterson, Council President Don Wing.

That must add a fair bit of weight to that change getting up.

Evolution, not revolution wins in politics

It annoys the you-know-what out of many people eager for change that that change just does not come quickly enough. By way of illustration, read the strident (although all too often pious) contributions on just about any issue over at Tasmaniantimes.com.

I don't blame people for wanting wrongs to be righted quickly - count me in as someone who would like to see change in many things in the state and country. But one thing I do recognise is that effective policy change in a modern, pluralistic, democratic state does not come - cannot come - quickly.

Idealism is dead in modern politics. Successful governments have turned to pragmatism because the general voting population are pragmatists. Over the past generation or so Australians have dropped causes like hot bricks. The social progressives and "elites" don't like it; but the debates they have through the opinion outlets in the print, television and on-line media occur largely outside and above the majority of voters.

And it's those voters, those ordinary, disengaged, pragmatic voters, who decide elections.

The words of Annabel Crabb, Janet Albrechtsen, Dennis Shanahan, Robert Manne, Phillip Adams or any one of the dozens of opinion-makers out there actually make very little difference to policy formation or public thought.

Kevin Rudd and Labor were largely successful at the last elections, not for any great policy vision or "conviction", but rather because they tapped into the emotions - the fears, needs and perceptions - of the ordinary voter. They had messages that fixed, or at least looked like they might fix, every-day worries.

Voters are interested in what politicians can do for them. That is why, for example, Liberal soul searching for some lost "purpose" for the party is a waste of time. I have noticed several senior Liberals saying things like "people don't know what we stand for anymore". What rubbish. Voters want political parties to address the issues that effect their daily lives; I don't think they give a toss for party idealism.

Don't believe me? Try your own straw poll. Ask any 10 people - relatives, workmates, people at the footy - the following 5 questions:

What was on Lateline last night?
Who were on the couch on The Insiders last Sunday?
Which paper does George Megalogenis write for?
Who is the deputy prime minister?
Who is the Tasmanian governor? (Bit of a trick, that one. Depends which side of 2 April you ask it.)

OK, maybe these are the wrong questions. But my point is still valid: most people are disengaged from politics and political debate.

Possum Comitatus, in kicking off probably the best debate on fixing housing affordability I have seen to-date, had the sense to make this point up-front:

"When it comes to debating policy change, not enough attention gets paid by independent policy pundits (professional and amateur alike) to the political realities that surround any change in policy. It’s all good and well spruiking some grand policy proposal that could well be economic perfection on a stick over the longer term if, over the shorter term, it would kill the government that implemented it."

Political realism. Well said.

All Tasmanian parliamentarians

Recent posts on the distribution of members of parliament have caused a degree of feedback. The main table shows all Tasmanian members from both state and federal chambers, sorted by party and location of electoral offices.

The information in summary is the most revealing. Below you can see how, relatively, Labor are stronger in the south than the north.

	Labor	The Rest	Total
North	13	17	30
South	15	12	27
Totals	28	29	57

Statewide, Labor hold 28 of the state's 57 seats, or 49%. North of Oatlands it is 43% while south of Oatlands 55%.

	House	Labor	Liberal	Green	Independent
North of Oat-lands	House of Assembly (State)	Brenton Best (Devonport) Heather Butler (St Helens) Jim Cox (Launceston) Bryan Green (Burnie) Steve Kons (Burnie) Michelle O’Byrne (Launceston) Michael Polley (Longford)	Peter Gutwein (Launceston) Rene Hidding (Longford) Sue Napier (Launceston) Jeremy Rockliff (Devonport) Brett Whiteley (Burnie)	Kim Booth (Launceston)
	Legislative Council (State)	Nil	Nil	Nil