I bang on a lot about proportional representation on this website. Part of the argument for PR is about ensuring the representation of smaller parties and preventing the construction of false majorities, where a party that hasn’t won a majority of the vote still wins a majority of seats and claims a mandate on that basis. But there is another argument: that shifts in voting trends should be matched by shifts in seat trends. That often doesn’t happen under a single-member electorate system, and the Victorian election is a good example.
As of last night, Labor was leading in 56 seats, just down one from the post-redistribution seat count based on 2018 election results. The Coalition is leading in 28 seats (including Narracan, which hasn’t yet voted), compared to 26 before the election. The number of crossbench seats has dropped by one from five to four. For the purposes of this piece I’ve taken the results as of Tuesday night as frozen in place. I’m sure the final results will look slightly different but the trends should not.
So from a seat perspective, this was largely a status quo result. But that isn’t the story you get from the vote counts.
On a two-party-preferred basis, the ABC estimates Labor at 54.2%, down significantly from 57.3%. The swing against Labor on primary votes is currently 5.8%, with the Coalition down 0.1%.
If you look at the pendulum, a swing of 3.1% should have cost Labor eight seats – seven to the Coalition and one to the Greens. My pendulum also includes Morwell in this range but that is the Labor vs Independent margin – the Labor vs Nationals margin fell just outside this range. Yet they have lost one seat, net.
This result can be explained fairly simply – a majority of Coalition seats were marginal before this election, and the Coalition largely built up margins in these seats, while also chipping away at Labor’s hold on its safest seats. Labor no longer has any seats with margins over 20%, with a lot more seats in the 4-12% range. But when it came to the most marginal Labor seats, they either didn’t move much, or they moved towards Labor.
This chart demonstrates this very clearly. It shows the 2018 results (adjusted to 2022 boundaries) on the left-hand side, with 2022 on the right. It shows how many seats each cluster held within a given two-candidate-preferred range, with each column representing a range of 4% (so 50-54%, 54-58%, etc).
Prior to the election, Labor held eleven seats by margins of over 20%. These seats were almost entirely concentrated in the northern and western suburbs of Melbourne. The map I posted the morning after the election shows the swings in those areas. Following the election, Labor’s safest seat is now Dandenong, held with a 19.6% margin.
While Labor had a substantial cluster of marginal seats, it held almost no seats between 4% and 8%. That gap has been filled in, without increasing the size of the sub-4% column. There are also a lot more seats with margins between 8% and 12%.
Most of the Coalition change took place at the most marginal end. The median Coalition seat had a margin of 3.6% before the election. That median is now 6.25%. While the Coalition still has plenty of marginal seats, the numbers in the 4-8% and 8-12% range have increased.
In one sense, the diagram on the right is more encouraging for the Coalition – they have safeguarded their own seats and have more Labor seats in reach. But it’s unclear if there is more room to grow in many of the seats that swung to the Coalition, and they still are 17 seats away from a majority.
Prior to the election, the Coalition needed to gain 19 seats for a majority, which required an 11% swing in Wendouree. That figure is now 8.3% in Sydenham. So that is slightly easier.
| Pre-election seat | Margin | Post-election seat | Margin |
| Hastings | 0.4% | Pakenham | 0.0% |
| Hawthorn | 0.5% | Bass | 0.4% |
| Nepean | 0.6% | Hastings | 0.7% |
| Pakenham | 2.0% | Ripon | 2.3% |
| Ashwood | 2.3% | Glen Waverley | 2.7% |
| Box Hill | 2.8% | Yan Yean | 3.9% |
| Ripon | 2.8% | Bayswater | 4.1% |
| Ringwood | 3.7% | Melton | 4.8% |
| South Barwon | 3.7% | Eureka | 6.0% |
| Morwell | 4.0% | Ashwood | 6.3% |
| Melton | 5.4% | Greenvale | 6.6% |
| Eltham | 8.8% | Sunbury | 6.6% |
| Monbulk | 9.0% | Niddrie | 7.4% |
| Cranbourne | 9.1% | Box Hill | 7.5% |
| Eureka | 9.7% | Mordialloc | 7.6% |
| Frankston | 10.1% | Bentleigh | 8.0% |
| Narre Warren North | 10.2% | Sydenham | 8.3% |
| Narre Warren South | 10.7% | ||
| Wendouree | 11.0% |
There has also been a notable shift in the geography of these seats. Prior to the election, only one out of nineteen seats lay in Melbourne to the north-west of the CBD, that being Melton, which swung to the Liberal Party against the statewide trend in 2018. Now there are six: Yan Yean, Melton, Greenvale, Sunbury, Niddrie and Sydenham.
We don’t yet know if this is the beginning of a trend or an aberration. We do know that lists of marginal seats shift over time – some seats trend into a party’s safe seat list while others become more competitive – and I suspect these areas won’t become as safe for Labor again, but I also think COVID-19 accelerated trends and it might be hard for the Liberal Party to build further on them in 2026. Certainly I think it will be harder for them having to shift the type of electorate they compete in.
I’m thinking the swings in the north and west of Melbourne were actually a correction from the very high-water mark the 2018 “Danslide” brought. A lot of those seats moved into extremely safe Labor in 2018.
With that knowledge, there was room for voters to shift primary votes to Liberal knowing it won’t really have an effect on the outcome. Labor were never going to lose those western and northern seats. They are now on a more comfortable and normal looking margin.
Agree somewhat Darren, this election is like SA 2010 where Labor was seeking a third term with Mike Rann. They had just come off a landslide win the previous election and many seats had inflated margins (traditional marginal seats like Elder and Colton with 10%+ margins) going into the election.
In that election, Labor successfully sandbagged its marginal seats (especially Light and Mawson) whilst allowing its other seats to return to their usual status.
Also voters in Labor suburbs know that if a liberal or a right
Wing independent is elected
It will only be one off. As the conservatives cannot represent
Working class areas properly
Eg.. Fowler nsw
I’m not as bearish on the prospects of the Liberals winning some of these north-western seats as many seem to be.
Yan Yean, Sunbury, Sydenham, Melton and Point Cook at least should all be semi-realistic targets for them in 2026. Depending on the type of leader they have, Niddrie wouldn’t be completely ridiculous either.
Melton is a bit of a special case. It not only had about 27% non-voters, plus 9.5% of voters either unwilling or unable to properly number their ballot papers from 1 to 14. But there was also a 20% slump in the independent vote as two locally prominent indie candidates from 2018 did not run again in 2022. Many of those homeless voters made their way to one of the 12 minors, micros, and independents. A total of 14 was a huge and confusing ballot paper.
Independent favourite Birchall upset some of his voters with a sudden announcement mid race that he would change his 11th preference from Libs to Labs. Then he changed this back again to Libs on 11 over the weekend.
As to proportional representation, this is unsuitable for a model where we have a rep per district. I strongly believe local peeps still want a local rep to be their target for praise or punishment.
For a state-wide upper house representation, you’d need to introduce minimum thresholds, as you can’t grow overall seat numbers out of proportion. In the old country they had a 5% threshold for an upper house parliamentary seat. If I translated this to Victoria, unless your party can win around 200,000 votes, you have buckleys to be represented in parliament.
Neigh impossible for any growing or smallish party, or any independent candidate.
I find nothing wrong with the current GVT system. Least worse of the possible options.
If you can’t be bothered to number five boxes below the line every four years, then stop whining. Just make mark your fav party above and let them deal the preferences as they see fit to get their best candidates elected.
However, we’re let down by an utter lack of education on how this reasonably fair electoral system works, as we’re lacking engaged voters. A third of eligible citizens not casting a valid vote can only leave more room for the highly motivated followers of radicals, agitators, and propagandists.
Describing the results in Labor heartland as a “correction” doesn’t work as an explanation. These seats swung in line with the rest of the state in 2018, as they typically always have (see the seat graphs on this website). The question is why they swung back so much harder than the rest this time. We didn’t see this dynamic in 2006 for instance.
Agree Mark, the areas covered by some these districts were Liberal held when the Coalition was in office under Jeff Kennett (notably Gisborne and Tullamarine). I believe Sunbury and Sydenham are the districts that are either partially or fully covered under the former seat of Tullamarine, so could be vulnerable if Labor is weak by the next election.
It’s incredible to think that in the early 1990s there were only two districts (Altona and Werribee) covering the Point Cook area. Today there are four that cover this part of Melbourne (Point Cook, Werribee, Tarneit and Laverton).
Wow Ralph that’s a lot of bad opinions in a single comment.
In 1976 the seat of Werribee was won by the Liberal party by fewer than 30 votes. It was a very different area then almost semi-rural. Dr Ken Coghill returned it to the ALP in 1979.
One factor I have been wondering about is migration from Victoria to the other states since the last election and how it might impact on TPP results.
From a quick search of the internet (took Adam Bandt’s advice – google it Pollster) it appears that net migration from Victoria to the other states was about 30k. How this is measured is a mystery to me but anecdotally it seems correct given the number of people I have met in Sydney from Melbourne in recent times telling me that they moved up due to the lock down. Conversely, I have not met anyone who has said that I am moving to (or back to) Melbourne. I also noticed the advertisements at the AFL games by Qld (and WA – I think) trying to attract tradies to their states.
Given there are about 4.4m registered voters in Victoria a move of 30k is not insignificant. The gross departures / arrivals are also relevant but I couldn’t find an estimate of these. But if I make a guess of 100k departing Vic and 70k arriving that gets a net 30k.
In the normal course internal migration in Australia shouldn’t impact too much in voting over one election cycle (long term look at migration from country to city and the country has become “safer” LNP) as the internal migrants will largely be representative of the population (ie 50% labor / 50% coalition on a TPP basis). However, we have not lived in normal times.
It follows that if over the last two years the average leaver from Victoria was a LNP voter (after distribution of preferences) and the average arriver was a labor voter (again after distribution of preferences) then it is not difficult to get to a position where the labor TPP has been boosted by 1-2% (44k to 88k votes) solely due to interstate migration.
How this would impact on a seat-by-seat basis I would suggest is almost impossible to tell. But I would suggest that the areas that were hardest hit by lock downs would lead to more migration out of Victoria than less. Which broadly matches the seat by seat swing noting that causation and correlation are often not related….
PS: ABC has just declared Libs winning in Hawthorn which potentially has significant implications for 2026 with Pesutto taking the leader’s baton.
Best,
Pollsters
Yeah many of the results aren’t a “correction”. Greenvale, next to Broadmeadows, is now a borderline marginal seat. Some seats in the north and west had 15-20% swings against Labor in the 2PP. That has never been the case.
Most of the north/west swung 5% to Labor on avg in 2018, and now many have swung like 10%+ against. That’s a reversal.
As Kos Samaras said, if Labor don’t stop the bleed, the north/west will start falling to the Libs over the next couple cycles.
Thank you for a clear explanation of why proportional representation would be a better system than single member districts. While it is clear that the ‘two party preferred’ vote of around 54.1% gives a very comfortable majority to Labor, it is also clear that there is an absolute majority in Parliament is held by a party with not that much more than one third of the votes. Will you be doing a PR analysis of the result similar to what you did for the Federal election?
It’s not impossible that at some point in the future there will be a swing back to the major parties; we’ve been there before. In the 1972 Federal election (50 years ago on Friday), around 9% voted for minor parties and Independents and this fell to only about 4% in 1975. The vote for third parties, including the Greens, was about 27% at the state election, well below the Federal election. But that said, the 27% are not well represented in the Legislative Assembly by the candidate of their first choice, though much more so in the Legislative Council.
https://www.tallyroom.com.au/50503#comment-779812
It appears, at least as far as I can tell, from Psephos`s 1992-2002 Legislative Assembly Map, the current district of Sunbury contains none of the 1992-2002 Gisborne, only a bit of the 1992-2002 Melton (the Melton part of Diggers Rest) and a large chunk of Tullamarine. Sunbury was in Gisborne 1967-1992, when it was Liberal held and ALP held Macedon 2002-2014. Greendale appears to contain only parts of the 1992-2002 districts of Tullamarine, Broadmeadows and Yan Yean.
http://psephos.adam-carr.net/countries/a/australia/states/vic/maps/vicmapsindex26.shtml
https://www.tallyroom.com.au/50503/comment-page-1#comment-779824
What became the district of Werribee in the redivision that came into effect at the 1976 election had been in Gisborne since the 1965 redivision/the 1967 election, which was Liberal held at the time (including by Seeker Athol Guy from the 1971 by-election). Prior to the 1967 election it was in Grant, which was ALP held (it had lots of then outer western suburbs in it, moved into Deer Park, Williamstown and possibly Sunshine in the 1965 redivision).
It takes two elections to confirm if a big swing is a trend or will be reverted in the election after. I would say there are encouraging signs for Labor in the results in the 3 western seats targeted (Melton, Point Cook, Werribee). Swings in these seats were small or even towards Labor in Werribee. The big swings, meanwhile, happened in safer seats with much bigger margins.
If Labor follows the same strategy as those three electorates, where it takes the challenge seriously and is seen as paying attention to those seats (plus the pandemic will be firmly in the rear view by then), it’s fully possible that it’ll hold the margins in its heartland or revert.
https://www.tallyroom.com.au/50503/comment-page-1#comment-779844
Part of the swing in Werribee would have been the loss of Joe Garra`s personal vote, as he ran in Point Cook this time (he lives in Werribee South, which moved seats in the redivision).
Fair point on Werribee. Actually it’s 3-4 percent swing in two-party preferred terms there so not as small as I was thinking. But Melton still had very little swing despite much expectations of Labor losing.
There are a few factors in the north and west I would be looking at. Northern and western suburbs were traditionally very Labor because they had factories and migrant workers, and not much middle class. I don’t think that is true any more. There are fewer factories, and they employ fewer people. There is more housing, and it is not all low cost, so the profile of people moving into those areas has changed. And we have made it so much harder to get citizenship that a substantial number of our marginal workforce are actually not entitled to vote. I think these factors are contributing to an evening out of voting patterns across suburbia.
The inner suburbs are following a different path, with an increasingly distinct culture that ties to voting Green and also apparently now Socialist (not a particularly foreseeable consequence of gentrification, but there you go).
In most seats in the Northern and Western suburbs, the Libs got a drop or a small increase (<2%) in primary votes (Broadmeadows, Mill Park and Thomastown are three seats with big LIB primary vote swings). All over, many minor parties and independent candidates scored at least 5% in at least one seat – DLP, Freedom Party, Family First, the Greens, Victorian Socialists.
My view is that traditional, working-class Labor voters were attracted to many parties that better represented their interests. Some types of Labor voters who switched votes include:
1. Social conservatives who voted Family First or DLP.
2. Rust Belt voters who voted for far-left (e.g. Vic Socialists) or far-right or populist parties.
3. Those who voted for "freedom" candidates because of their pandemic experience.
4. Those who voted for community independents.
Votes for these parties and candidates would've sent preferences to the Liberals most of time.
A bunch of the marginals that moved towards Labor would partially be explainable by sophomore effects, yeah? New Labor MP, gets a bit of a personal vote.
Though there does seem to be an overall demographics thing (see also Evan Scrimshaw’s “Global F***ing Realignment” theory).
In the rest of the western world, there seems to be a correlation with Uni Educated people moving left and those with high school or less moving right. I suspect that is what we are seeing here. But because many of the former see Labor as the party of the unions, and the latter the Libs as the party of the toffs, the movement only happens when one side moves too far from their old base or makes gains but is unable to hold their new voters as their membership/funding structure is based on the old order. This can be seen most prominently with the UK Tories.
I have long thought the endgame is for the Coalition to split, with the Libs merging with the Teals and Tree Tories, the Nats focussing as much on outer suburbs as the regions, and Labor caught in the middle ring suburbs.
SiobhanH, if I have noticed one thing is that Socialists tend to be concentrated in the more, but not most, affluent suburbs. I can only think that the common driving factor is that the ideology is most supported not by people who want equality but people who want to supplant the current ruling group – so lesser aristocrats, or those with hereditary wealth who have been bypassed in the social order by those who have made money.
@ mostly Labor vote
I agree the realignment is happening in USA but that is really only the white working class. On Saturday election Labor actually went backwards in elite areas such as Hawthorn, Caulfield, Sandringham etc. it strength was really middle Australia such as Ringwood, Bayswater, GW. the only place I can see a sustained realignment is the La Trobe Valley. also Hastings has the highest percentage of tradespeople but had a swing to Labor. I don’t believe what happened in North West Melbourne is sustained and just a protest vote over lockdown.
The libs did better than expected in seats such as Brighton and Evelyn. The teals
Changed the contest probably
Net against Labor. Morwell Waa
an unexpected result. All else stayed much the same. There was a minor swing to the libs in Polwarth which will be swamped by future pro Labor demographic change. The independent in South west Coast helped the libs in net impact. The big swings in safe safe alp seats impact has again been discussed and explained well
@Nimalan,
I sort of agree – if you notice I think these areas will trend towards Teal/Green (probably more Teal) over time, and indeed a Liberal party shorn of its more socially conservative outer suburbs MPs might well be the more natural home. In fact I think they will eventually split from the Nats to appeal to the Teals (and I suspect as much as 50% of greens voters). But I don’t agree on the ‘white working class’ voters being the only movement in the US. This is also happening with Latino voters (and others on a smaller scale), but the WWC suits the narrative of all brands of the media so it gets a lot more play. The needs and wants of inner urban areas don’t coincide with the needs and wants of outer urban areas, and that will play out over the next 10-20 years (economic upheavals notwithstanding).
@Mick Quinlivin – I don’t agree with your premise about demographic change. These are not pro Labor but pro Green (and maybe Teal) demography’s. Labor can expect preferences currently, but that is always very soft and can change with the composition of the parties.
One thing this election (and the recent Fed one) exposed is just how soft the pro Labor votes are, and I don’t think it will take much for Labor to be crushed from both sides. The coalition are suffering from this too.
@ Mostly Labor voter, in terms of the Teal trend I 100% agree with you.i feel if a Teal ran in Albert Park then Labor PV will fall under 30% and Teals and Libs will probably between themselves get 43% of the Primary vote. The only point i would make is that i dont feel the trend to Teal is left ward shift as some like Tim Smith suggest it is more about a return to the centre. Good point about Latino voters this was picked up in 2020 but not in 2016. Do you see an area in Victoria with the exception of the La Trobe Valley which is still working class but has a long term shift away from Labor.
I guess technically the Libs doing better with the tradie vote over time is also a realignment away from Labor.
And ladies and gentleman, this is precisely why the electoral system needs changing. You can’t legislative fairness, but you can make it fairer. A proportional representation system like thr upper house without group-voting tickets would be ideal.
Why should a party who got a 4% swing against it pick up 1 seat? Similar thing happend in 1996, a decent swing against the Kennett government but the seat count didn’t really change. Almost 1/20 Victorians switched their preference from Labor being higher than Liberal, for them to be lower at this election, yet it didn’t translate in terms of seats. This needs correction, desperately.
Of course any change to the system should go to a referendum first.
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