The five federal Australian by-elections of 28/7/18: Eligibility crisis causes no party crises
Whilst I was away in Lourdes, France, famous for the visions of the Virgin Mary by St Bernadette (1844-79) there was a "Super Saturday" of five federal by-elections in Australia caused by the parliamentary eligibility crisis. Australian law forbids anyone with dual citizenship from being MPs or Senators; only those with only Australian citizenship may sit in the Australian Parliament. Many Senators have already been replaced as a result, and four Australian MPs were forced to renounce non-Australian citizenship and stand for re-election.. The divisions affected were Braddon, Fremantle, Longman, and Mayo, with a fifth by-election in Perth being for family reasons.
All five were held by the defending parties despite Braddon, Longman, and Mayo all being marginal in terms of 2 party preference votes. As is the tradition in federal by-elections in Australia, the Liberal Party did not contest the by-elections in the safe Labor divisions of Fremantle and Perth. Both those by-elections produced similar results-easy Labor holds with the Greens a distant second, although the Liberal Democrat (a libertarian Australian party, not to be confused with the UK's Liberal Democrats) share of 14% in the Fremantle by-election merits mention, as does the 9.59% vote share of former Liberal councillor Paul Collins in the Perth by-election.
In Braddon, Tasmania, saw the lowest swing out of the five by-elections, where Labor only managed a 0.27% swing in their favour in the two party preferred vote. The intervention of independent Craig Garland, who unsuccessfully tried to win a seat at the Tasmanian state election earlier this year, hit the votes of all three main Australian parties, including the Greens. However, the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, despite only polling 4.78% to Craig's 10.63%, did more to prevent a recapture of the seat by former Liberal MP Brett Whiteley from Labor's Justine Keay, since their votes mostly come from Liberal and National voters.
In Longman, Queensland, the revival of One Nation, which in 1998 managed to win as many as 11 state assembly seats despite the Alternative Vote system being stacked against smaller parties, was largely responsible for the Liberals slipping back in a key marginal seat; the Liberals still only have a majority of 2 in the Australian House of Representatives and rely on crossbenchers in the day to day business in parliament. The One Nation vote increased by 6.51% in 1st preference terms and the Liberal vote dropped by 9.42% in 1st preference vote terms. However, Wyatt Roy, Liberal MP for the division from 2010-16, also did not try to regain the seat he lost to Susan Lamb, the Labor MP alleged to be a Scottish citizen in the context of the parliamentary eligibility crisis, and was replaced by former state MP Trevor Ruthenberg. During the campaign, Trevor was found to have wrongly claimed an Australian Service Medal, when he in fact only received an Australian Defence Medal, although he stated that he had made an "honest mistake" in listing the wrong medal on the Queensland Parliament's website. The result of this by-election shows many voters clearly were not convinced that it was an honest mistake, although the intervention of the Liberal Democratic and Country Parties also harmed the Liberals despite those two parties only polling 1.97% and 1.57% of the 1st preference vote.
Mayo produced the most interesting by-election out of the five. The Centre Alliance (formerly Nick Xenophon Team)'s MP, Rebekha Sharkie, managed to retain her seat and increase her 1st preference vote share by 10%, meaning she overtook the Liberals in the 1st preference vote count which she had not done against Jamie Briggs (who she once worked for) in 2016. The daughter of long-serving Liberal MP Alexander Downer, Georgina Downer, became the Liberals' candidate but tactical voting from Labor ensured the Centre Alliance held the division. In fact, Labor dropped to 6% of the vote and fourth place behind the Greens (whose vote share increased by 1.1%, but only to 9.1%), and this is the first time either the Liberals or Labor have ever finished fourth in a federal by-election in Australia. By contrast in Britain, there have been a considerable number of by-elections where the Conservatives or Labour have finished fourth or worse (Labour finished fifth in the Henley by-election of 2008 and the Conservatives finished fifth in the Rotherham by-election of 2012 back in Britain, for example). The next Australian federal election must take place within a year from now, since no Australian Parliament can last longer than three years, and the Centre Alliance has clearly learned from its narrow failures in the South Australian state election of 2018 (which it contested as SA-BEST), the personal vote of Rebekha Sharkie not withstanding. This result stands it in good stead to win at least one extra division in South Australia, and the 2019 parliament could see a greater number of "crossbench" MPs than ever before, and potentially lead to STV being used for House of Representatives elections in the future as it is used for Australian Senate elections now.
All five were held by the defending parties despite Braddon, Longman, and Mayo all being marginal in terms of 2 party preference votes. As is the tradition in federal by-elections in Australia, the Liberal Party did not contest the by-elections in the safe Labor divisions of Fremantle and Perth. Both those by-elections produced similar results-easy Labor holds with the Greens a distant second, although the Liberal Democrat (a libertarian Australian party, not to be confused with the UK's Liberal Democrats) share of 14% in the Fremantle by-election merits mention, as does the 9.59% vote share of former Liberal councillor Paul Collins in the Perth by-election.
In Braddon, Tasmania, saw the lowest swing out of the five by-elections, where Labor only managed a 0.27% swing in their favour in the two party preferred vote. The intervention of independent Craig Garland, who unsuccessfully tried to win a seat at the Tasmanian state election earlier this year, hit the votes of all three main Australian parties, including the Greens. However, the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party, despite only polling 4.78% to Craig's 10.63%, did more to prevent a recapture of the seat by former Liberal MP Brett Whiteley from Labor's Justine Keay, since their votes mostly come from Liberal and National voters.
In Longman, Queensland, the revival of One Nation, which in 1998 managed to win as many as 11 state assembly seats despite the Alternative Vote system being stacked against smaller parties, was largely responsible for the Liberals slipping back in a key marginal seat; the Liberals still only have a majority of 2 in the Australian House of Representatives and rely on crossbenchers in the day to day business in parliament. The One Nation vote increased by 6.51% in 1st preference terms and the Liberal vote dropped by 9.42% in 1st preference vote terms. However, Wyatt Roy, Liberal MP for the division from 2010-16, also did not try to regain the seat he lost to Susan Lamb, the Labor MP alleged to be a Scottish citizen in the context of the parliamentary eligibility crisis, and was replaced by former state MP Trevor Ruthenberg. During the campaign, Trevor was found to have wrongly claimed an Australian Service Medal, when he in fact only received an Australian Defence Medal, although he stated that he had made an "honest mistake" in listing the wrong medal on the Queensland Parliament's website. The result of this by-election shows many voters clearly were not convinced that it was an honest mistake, although the intervention of the Liberal Democratic and Country Parties also harmed the Liberals despite those two parties only polling 1.97% and 1.57% of the 1st preference vote.
Mayo produced the most interesting by-election out of the five. The Centre Alliance (formerly Nick Xenophon Team)'s MP, Rebekha Sharkie, managed to retain her seat and increase her 1st preference vote share by 10%, meaning she overtook the Liberals in the 1st preference vote count which she had not done against Jamie Briggs (who she once worked for) in 2016. The daughter of long-serving Liberal MP Alexander Downer, Georgina Downer, became the Liberals' candidate but tactical voting from Labor ensured the Centre Alliance held the division. In fact, Labor dropped to 6% of the vote and fourth place behind the Greens (whose vote share increased by 1.1%, but only to 9.1%), and this is the first time either the Liberals or Labor have ever finished fourth in a federal by-election in Australia. By contrast in Britain, there have been a considerable number of by-elections where the Conservatives or Labour have finished fourth or worse (Labour finished fifth in the Henley by-election of 2008 and the Conservatives finished fifth in the Rotherham by-election of 2012 back in Britain, for example). The next Australian federal election must take place within a year from now, since no Australian Parliament can last longer than three years, and the Centre Alliance has clearly learned from its narrow failures in the South Australian state election of 2018 (which it contested as SA-BEST), the personal vote of Rebekha Sharkie not withstanding. This result stands it in good stead to win at least one extra division in South Australia, and the 2019 parliament could see a greater number of "crossbench" MPs than ever before, and potentially lead to STV being used for House of Representatives elections in the future as it is used for Australian Senate elections now.
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