Big swing on?

[redandblack]

Latest poll

http://www.adelaidenow.com.au/morialta- ... 5835137517

[dedja]

I'm in that electorate ... No surprise to me really as Simmons is an absolute light weight, although John Gardner looks like he comes from the typical Liberal Nancy Boy stable that gave us Christopher 'poodle' Pyne.

Norwood, on the other hand, is a completely different matter. Ciccarello is a very strong local member and will be extremely hard to budge.

[Sojourner]

I think its inevitable that there is going to be a swing against the Labor party, I don't think it will be remotely enough for them to lose the election, yet there are always going to be a reasonable number of people that vote for the opposition simply because they are sick of the incumbent party or it suits them to prescribe them blame for any perceived problems in society. Its probably the best time and scenario for independent candidates to make up ground which then surprises me that the Democrats are only contesting 3 seats in the lower house. One would think that if they got a Democrat vote in a lower house seat that it would influence the voter to go with them in the upper house as well?

[Swamp Donkey]

A poll of just 547 people is hardly convincing, and wouldnt have too much significance IMHO

[ca]

The swing appears like it will be a lot more than I would have predicted this time last year. It won't be enough but the important thing is the Government are feeling some pressure both locally and to an extent at Federal Level which can only be a good thing.

[Squawk]

http://www.themercury.com.au/article/2010/02/28/130725_opinion.html
February 28, 2010 11:50am

Change is in the air

GLENN MILNE: There is change sweeping across Australia for the Australian Labor Party.

INSIDE the Labor Party they're calling it the year of the "Howard Syndrome". Though this time it's working against them, not for them.

That's a reference to the national mood that swept Labor leader Kevin Rudd into power at the 2007 election; where, after Peter Costello failed to step up to the plate and blast Howard out of the prime ministership, voters decided they were going to have to do it themselves.

This was a judgment call propelled by certain key issues, foremost among them Howard's failure to understand the politics of the environment and electoral fears about global warming. This was summarised by his failure to sign the Kyoto Protocol.

Second was WorkChoices, where voters had come to the conclusion that Howard was out of touch with the concerns of ordinary Australians.

This played irrevocably into the question of his age and the suspicion that he had been there too long and was from a different era.

But also remember this: voters threw out Howard while the economy was performing well, and unemployment and interest rates were low.

This is the message the three Labor premiers who are going to the polls this year would do well to remember.

All preside over healthy economies; all are reasonably competent and popular. But, like Howard, they all also rule over long-term governments asking for another term.

Tasmania and South Australia have already called their elections for March 20. Victoria, along with the Federal Government, must go to the people before the end of the year.

In Victoria, John Brumby is a Premier who has never faced an election. Power was handed to him by former premier Steve Bracks, who quit politics at the height of his powers.

On the basis of published opinion polls, voters respect the job Brumby has done, but they don't particularly warm to him.

His poll supremacy has rested largely on the abysmal infighting within the Liberal Party under the leadership of Ted Baillieu.

Ominously for Brumby, however, there are signs the Liberals are finally getting their act together under the electoral timeclock of an imminent fixed-term election.

Two weekends ago Brumby suffered a double-digit primary vote swing in a by-election for one of Labor's ultra-safe mortgage-belt seats - a swing that bypassed the Greens and went straight to the Liberals.

Victoria had been the jewel in Labor's crown, the state with the best-run public finances. The ALP would need to suffer a uniform swing of 6.3 per cent to lose power.

Yet the locals are obviously grumpy with Brumby. In Altona, the seat left vacant by the retirement of Lynne Kosky, the margin had been 20.2 per cent, so there was no chance of it changing hands. But the swing was much larger than expected.

The most likely state where Labor stands to lose is Tasmania, where "new boy" David Bartlett was parachuted in to replace Paul Lennon.

But since then Bartlett has been beset by his own scandals - and they have cost him two deputies.

He had a disastrous first week of campaigning where he was caught out asking his Facebook friends whether he should stop negative advertising. Not a leaf out of any book I've read on the subject of decisive leadership.

What's more, Tasmania has the Hare-Clark voting system, which could see the Greens holding the balance of power.

If there's a strong swing against the established order it would be hard to see the Greens supporting a Labor Government that has run out of puff and support.

In South Australia, Mike Rann was travelling well until the arrival of one Michelle Chantelois, a Parliament House barmaid with a Dolly Parton pouf of bottled blonde hair and jeans she's been poured into every morning. Which she says Mike Rann was fond of removing.

The emerging issue is whether Rann is trusted any more, especially up against the straight-talking, down-to-earth Opposition Leader Isobel Redmond, who has become one of the Liberals' key assets.

Redmond and Chantelois have fundamentally changed the dynamic in South Australia. Redmond is one factor and a potent one, but no one saw Chantelois coming.

Neither she nor the accusations of an affair are exactly vote changers, but the focus on the "he-said she-said" nightly exchanges has shifted the "can you trust Mike Rann" question from being an underlying issue with voters to something that is water-cooler conversation.

A key issue in all three state elections is service delivery, yet Labor does not rate highly in this area, with public transport ticketing debacles in Victoria and constant wrangling over water in South Australia and Tasmania.

Also in Tasmania, Bartlett simply has not been able to make good on his promise to convert his state into the food bowl of Australia.

Labor will almost certainly lose government in its own right in Tasmania and have to negotiate with the Greens; Brumby in Victoria and Rann in SA will probably be returned with reduced majorities.

Watch which premiers Kevin Rudd is seen campaigning with. That'll be the best indicator of who he thinks will win.