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South Australian Parliament Research Library South Australian PARLIAMENT RESEARCH LIBRARY REPORT ON THE RESULTS OF THE SOUTH AUSTRALIAN STATE ELECTION 18 MARCH 2006 by Jenni Newton-Farrelly Research Paper No 1 of 2007 © 2007 SOUTH AUSTRALIAN PARLIAMENT RESEARCH LIBRARY Not to be reproduced in part or whole without the written permission of, or acknowledgement to, the South Australian Parliament Research Library. This Information Paper has been prepared by the Research Service of the South Australian Parliament Research Library. While all care has been taken to ensure that the material is both accurate and clearly presented, the responsibility for any errors remains with the author. ISSN 0816-4282 TABLE OF CONTENTS The State election of 18 March 2006 Introduction 1 Overview 2 The election date 3 Voters, turnout and informality 4 The Legislative Council election 4. 1 How the Upper House count works 4. 2 Above-the-line votes and tickets 4. 3 Below-the-line votes 4. 4. The Australian Labor Party 4. 5 The Liberal Party 4. 6 The Australian Democrats 4. 7 The Greens 4. 8 Family First 4. 9 IND Nick Xenophon No Pokies 4.10 The National Party 4.11 Dignity for the Disabled 4.12 One Nation 4.13 The Shooters Party 5 The House of Assembly election 5. 1 Overview and swings 5. 2 The Australian Labor Party 5. 3 The Liberal Party 5. 4 The Australian Democrats 5. 5 The Greens 5. 6 Family First 5. 7 The National Party 5. 8 Dignity for the Disabled 5. 9 One Nation 5.10 Independents 5.11 Summary: the effectiveness of How To Vote cards. 6 Country and city seats 7 Are the major parties till losing market share? 8 Ticket votes in the House of Assembly ballot 9 Proposed changes to the Legislative Council 10 Implications of the State election for the coming Federal election Attachment 1: How does the Legislative Council voting system work? Attachment 2: Distribution of ALP preferences, 2006 Distribution of Liberal Party preferences, 2006 Distribution of National Party preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Attachment 3: Distribution of Democrat preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Attachment 4: Distribution of Greens preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Attachment 5: Distribution of Family First preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Attachment 6: Distribution of Dignity For the Disabled preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Distribution of One Nation preferences to ALP and LIB, 2006 Bibliography i Introduction The State election of 2006 was interesting for all sorts of reasons. On election night the Tally Room was galvanized by the level of support shown for Nick Xenophon in the Legislative Council ballot, interested to see that Family First would win a second seat and quiet witness to the decline of the Democrats. As the results for the House of Assembly firmed during the night it became apparent that the ALP would not only be returned to government in its own right but would have a comfortable majority. Then it became clear that the ALP would take not only most of the Liberal marginal seats but also several that commentators had not considered to be vulnerable. It was a Rann-slide, they said. This paper summarises the results of the election. It covers the results in both the Legislative Council and the House of Assembly, for each of the parties. It also looks in some detail at the flow of preferences, and how the parties tried to control this flow through their tickets and How To Vote cards. Parties trade preferences in the Legislative Council election for preferences in that ballot and also in the House of Assembly election, and even when a party is too small to expect to win seats it is useful if it can claim to have delivered the seat to someone else. So this paper looks at who received the preferences, and how much control parties were able to exercise over them. Then the paper looks at what those results can tell us about elections in South Australia. In this second section the paper considers several continuing questions: is it still the case that country seats swing less than city seats? Are the major parties still losing market share? And what should we do about ticket votes in the Assembly? Finally, the paper addresses two very current questions, one State and one Federal. The State question relates to the Premier’s proposal to reduce the size of the Legislative Council and reduce the term of an MLC to 4 years: if we had elected 16 MLCs in 2006, who would have won those seats? The Federal question relates to opinion polls which currently show levels of voter support for the Federal ALP that are comparable with voter support for the State ALP. Which seats would change hands if South Australian electors voted at the coming Federal election in the same way that they did at the State election? Where are the voters who have supported the ALP at State elections but not at recent Federal elections? And what would our Senate vote look like? i Table 1: Legislative Council and House of Assembly results, 1997 to 2006. Legislative Council House of Assembly First preferences Quotas Seats First preferences 2PP Seats won won won won vote won (No.) (%) (No.) (No.) (No.) (%) (%) (No.) State election of 11 October 1997 ALP 274,098 30.6 3.67 4 312,929 35.2 48.5 21 LIB 339,064 37.8 4.54 4 359,509 40.4 51.5 23 DEM 149,660 16.7 2.00 2 146,374 16.4 NAT 9,233 1.0 0.12 15,488 1.7 1 Greens 15,377 1.7 0.21 1,910 0.2 UAP 11,920 1.3 0.16 13,569 1.5 IND No Pokies 25,630 2.9 0.34 1 All Others 71,521 8.0 0.96 40,135 4.5 1 IND, 1 IND LIB TOTAL 896,503 100.0 12.00 11 889,914 100.0 100.0 47 State election of 9 February 2002 ALP 306,450 32.9 3.95 4 344,559 36.3 49.1 23 LIB 373,102 40.1 4.81 5 378,929 40.0 50.9 20 DEM 68,317 7.3 0.88 1 71,026 7.5 NAT 4,412 0.5 0.06 13,748 1.5 1 Greens 25,725 2.8 0.33 22,332 2.4 One Nation 16,829 1.8 0.22 22,833 2.4 Family First 37,443 4.0 0.48 1 25,025 2.6 IND No Pokies 11,984 1.3 0.15 SA First 9,567 1.0 0.12 16,902 1.8 All Others 76,633 8.2 0.99 52,678 5.6 2 IND, 1 CLIC TOTAL 930,462 100.0 12.00 11 948,032 100.0 100.0 47 State election of 18 March 2006 ALP 340,632 36.6 4.39 4 424,715 45.2 56.8 28 LIB 241,740 26.0 3.12 3 319,041 34.0 43.2 15 DEM 16,412 1.8 0.21 0 27,179 2.9 NAT 6,237 0.7 0.08 19,636 2.1 1 GREENS 39,852 4.3 0.51 1 60,949 6.5 One Nation 7,559 0.8 0.10 2,591 0.3 Family First 46,328 5.0 0.60 1 55,192 5.9 IND No Pokies 190,958 20.5 2.46 2 D4D 5,615 0.6 0.07 3,974 0.4 Shooters 5,991 0.6 0.08 All Others 29,545 3.2 25,884 2.8 3 IND TOTAL 930,869 100.0 11.62 11 939,161 100.0 100.0 47 SOURCE: my calculations based on data from: SA. State Electoral Office, 1998, Statistical Returns: General Elections 11 October 1997, SEO, Adelaide. SA. State Electoral Office, 2003, Statistical Returns for the South Australian Elections 9 February 2002, SEO, Adelaide. SA. State Electoral Office, 2006, Results and Outcomes: 3, State Election 18 March 2006, SEO, Adelaide. REPORT ON THE RESULTS OF THE SOUTH AUSTRALIAN STATE ELECTION, 18 March 2006. The State election of 18 March 2006 1 Overview For the first time in decades, the election results for the Legislative Council were at least as exciting as the results in the House of Assembly. In the Legislative Council: • Nick Xenophon was re-elected. Back in 1997 when he had originally been elected to the Legislative Council, it was the first time that an Independent candidate had been elected to the Legislative Council in his or her own right. Nick Xenophon was a candidate again in 2006, unsure of whether he would be re-elected. On the day, his support was so strong that he was re-elected, the second person on his ticket was elected and it was a real possibility that a third person from his group would have been elected. • Meanwhile the Democrat vote in the Legislative Council was greatly reduced – neither of the two Democrats up for re-election was returned. • South Australia’s first-ever Greens MLC was elected. • A second Family First MLC was elected. • The ALP won 4 seats in the Council, which re-elected or replaced the 3 ALP Members whose terms had expired and also returned to the ALP the position which Terry Cameron had occupied as an Independent since 1998. • The LIB vote in the Council was so low that only 3 LIB MLCs were elected – the lowest number since 1975 when the Liberal Party won only 3 seats (and even then the Liberal Movement won another 2).
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