Around a 12 percent swing to Libs, according to Mr Green.
No sensible person would now apply that swing to November’s Victorian general election and declare John Brumby gone. (Queenslander John Black might do it.)
But it is a very big by-election swing. Recall, however, the large Gaven and Redcliffe results in Queensland in August 2005; Peter Beattie was easily re-elected the following year.
All in all this is mildly encouraging for the Victorian leg of 2010 anticipations.
Funny you mention Gaven and Redcliffe. The analogy with the Qld 2005-06 results had occured to me too, but the swing in those two seats was “only” 8.3%. The biggie was Chatsworth with a swing of 13.9%. The retiring member for Chatsworth probably had a significant personal vote – it’s been a cliffhanger at both eleections since.
Of course, Beattie Labor lost those three contests. Whereas Brumby Labor won last night’s contest due to it being a much safer seat. I wonder if the safeness of the seat may have amplified the swing. That is to suggest that typical Labor voters were much sanguine about delivering a protest vote, secure in the knowledge that they wouldn’t be handing the opposition a prize.
12% swing it hardly seems a Bass 75′ or Canberra 95′ does it Peter?
DW: I’m not sure by-election swingers would care if the seat went to the opposition (unless the government has a 1 or 2 seat majority).
PH: No, it’s not Bass or Canberra.
Peter,
I went and checked it was (according to Wikipedia) 16% in Bass and 14% in Canberra, so not that far off the mark.
Still a loss of a safe seat is that much more damaging – portents of doom etc.
Pat,
Altona is much safer than either of those two seats, though.
True MDM,
Altona was 60-40 but I think to put it on a scale out of 9,Bass or Canberra were a 8 or 9 but Altona is more a 5-7. Getting to 10 per cent swing gets you to about 5 but you really need the seat to change hands or something equally dramatic to make the impact beyond that.
Peter,
Does this
article – “The swing is on!” – qualify as predicting Brumby is gone? Bonus H-word, too.
Interesting result. From my quick count about 18,000 voted ALP first up and about 20,000 didn’t!! The electorate has become a mix of traditional & nouveau as can be seen in the booth patterns. The Libs only won one booth. Also, overall the Green preferences didn’t do them any favours. At least the Libs stood this time and got something out of it. There is still a big question about Bailleau, sort of ‘why bother’. You would think he could just bang on about the future costs on power and water from the DeSal plant and all the other stuff-ups. The shadow front bench is a bit too much of a shadow – almost invisible!. So in November, imagine the Green vote might/will increase (with people peed off with JB) but the prefs won’t follow, so we end up with more of the same.