Thursday 8:55am – I should probably make one more post here with now that the AEC has finished their 2CP count. Labor’s Basem Abdo is on 55.08%, which is a comfortable victory after a lot of doubt.
Here is the final version of the chart I’ve been posting.
Tuesday 12:20pm – The AEC has started publishing 2CP counts between Labor and Carly Moore on their standard reporting platform. About two thirds of votes have been added to the count and Labor has 54.82%. While that will likely bounce around, it looks like a clear Labor win, and more so than other independent races like Bean and Fremantle.
Monday 11:36am – The Greens preferences have been distributed and we can call this as Labor retain.
68.6% of Greens preferences flowed to Labor, 24.7% to Moore and 6.6% to the Liberal.
The current standings are
- Abdo (ALP) 48.0% (+11.4%)
- Moore (IND) 29.7% (+4.1%)
- Ghani (LIB) 22.3% (+1.1%)
Based on the Fowler preference count we would expect about 70% of Liberal preferences to flow to Moore, leaving her on about 45-46% of the 2CP. Moore would need over 91% of Liberal preferences to win.
Friday 11:51am – Joseph Youhana’s preferences have just been distributed, and Carly Moore has gained over 58% of these votes, with just 16% going to Labor.
The new standings are:
- Abdo (ALP) 36.6% (+2.2%)
- Moore (IND) 25.6% (+8.1%)
- Ghani (LIB) 21.2% (+2.2%)
- Garcha (GRN) 16.7% (+1.4%)
Carly Moore’s chances of winning now look very good. She needs just 64.4% of the remaining preferences to win.
We don’t have a lot of great parallels ofr this race. The best one I can consider is Dai Le in Fowler in 2022. She likewise won a seat off a new Labor candidate in a multicultural area with Liberal preferences but not with Greens preferences. Moore is an ex-Labor mayor while Le was an ex-Liberal, which may help her a bit with the Greens.
Le gained 71.93% of Liberal preferences and 35.53% of Greens preferences. The distribution of preferences is slightly different because these candidates have gained other preferences through the count. In Fowler, 69.14% of Liberal preferences flowed to Dai Le in the distribution. For the Greens, they were knocked out before the UAP and flowed 52.5% to Labor, 24.8% to Le, 13.5% to Liberal and 9.3% to UAP.
If I apply 71.9% preferences to Moore to the Liberal vote and 35.5% to the Greens vote, she ends up losing with 46.7%.
But perhaps Moore will do better than Dai Le did? She seems more likely to peel away Greens voters, and apparently the Greens favoured her on the how-to-vote at pre-poll before changing their mind on election day.
This looks very close.
Thursday 12:55pm – Preferences from the Muslim independent Moslih have been distributed, and the Greens have overtaken Youhana. Youhana will now be knocked out.
The new standings are:
- Abdo (ALP) 34.4% (+1.0%)
- Ghani (LIB) 18.9% (+0.4%)
- Moore (IND) 17.5% (+1.1%)
- Garcha (GRN) 15.3% (+5.1%)
- Youhana (IND) 13.9% (+0.7%)
Youhana’s how-to-vote recommends preferences to Moore, so it seems likely that she will overtake the Liberal and stay ahead of the Greens, but really we just have to keep watching.
Wednesday 5pm – The count has now been updated with all votes for the One Nation candidate distributed to the next choice. Carly Moore picked up 1.7%, Labor 0.6%, Liberal 1.4% and Youhana 1.1%.
The next exclusion will be Muslim independent Moslih, who is on 8.2%. The Greens are on 10.2%, and Youhana on 13.2%. It is possible his preferences could push the Greens ahead of Youhana, but I doubt they will flow that strongly.
Wednesday 1:28pm – The fifth elimination has now been concluded, with Legalise Cannabis preferences being distributed. Moore has picked up another 1% of the formal vote, up to 14.7%, Youhana has picked up 0.2%, Labor is up another 0.7%, and the Liberal is up 0.2%.
One Nation will be excluded next, with 5.6% to distribute.
6:56pm – Two more counts have been conducted, distributing Family First and Citizens Party preferences. Legalise Cannabis are next. The full stats for the four lead candidates are at the bottom, but in short Carly Moore has picked up 1.8%, Labor has picked up 1.6%, Youhana 1.1% and Liberals 1.2%.
25.4% of the vote is sitting with the other four candidates:
- Greens – 9.1%
- Moslih – 7.6%
- One Nation – 5.0%
- Legalise Cannabis – 3.7%
Greens preferences flow to Moslih (who will already be out), then Youhana, then Labor, then Moore, so it is entirely possible that if many voters follow that how-to-vote it could still disrupt things. Moslih was endorsed by Muslim Votes Matter, who published a HTV ordering Greens, then Labor, then Youhana, then Moore, then Liberal. Moslih published his own how-to-vote card, but it had all the candidates polling more than him in the same order. So it is quite possible Moore could do poorly from voters following how to vote cards. But many will make up their own mind, and a popular independent may continue to attract more preferences.
Original post, 2:48pm Tuesday – The AEC has now commenced the distribution of preferences for the seat of Calwell. Normally the AEC does not publish distribution of preference data until the count has concluded, but in recognition of the great deal of public interest the AEC has published a page where they will post the latest DoP data after each round of the count.
There are 13 candidates running, so there will be eleven counts. So far the first three counts have been conducted, with independent candidates Peach and Ragupathy and Trumpet of Patriots candidates Issa already excluded with their votes distributed. Family First candidate Bengtsson is next in line.
You would expect each round of the count to take longer, as more and more votes need to be moved.
This table shows the share of the vote for the four leading candidates on the primary vote and each subsequent round:
Independent candidate Carly Moore is off to a strong start. She has already increased her primary vote by 0.8%, whereas fellow independent Joseph Youhana is only up 0.2%, Labor is up 0.5%, and the Liberal is up 0.4%.
The first question is whether Joseph Youhana can overtake Carly Moore and make the 3CP. Right now that looks pretty unlikely, as Moore is widening her lead over Youhana.
Moore right now looks quite plausible to overtake the Liberals, and if so I think she would probably be in a position to gain a strong flow of preferences and potentially beat Labor.
I’ll keep this post updated as we learn more.
what is the lowest primary vote that has gone on to win a seat under preferential voting?
I think that the lowest primary vote ever recorded for a winning candidate in an Australian federal election was 17%, achieved by Arthur Hewson of the National (then Country) Party in 1972. Hewson won the seat of McMillan from third place, relying on preferences from independent, Democratic Labour Party, and Liberal voters to ultimately defeat Labor with 52% of the final count.
More recently, in the 2022 federal election, independent Kylea Tink won the seat of North Sydney with just 25% of the primary vote, making it the lowest for a winning candidate that year.
Jeez, The AEC could have formatted that spreadsheet a bit better – what a shocker. I guess they never thought they’d be publishing it like this.
The format isn’t that bad really, it could be much worse. I’d agree a % change would be useful, but it’s fairly easy to deduce.
@bazza:
It’s working as intended. The bottom line is 50%+ don’t want Labor in Calwell at any price, imo.
Thanks Chops, yes that’s my understanding.
Penny, that’s a pretty standard for DOP, it has all the crucial info. But yeah I think they’re having to print an excel to PDF. It does the job.
Ben
Is there any word about whether AEC is doing the same for Bradfield?
GeoffL they will do this for all of the seats eventually, but this is the only one they’re publishing step-by-step because the DOP is so important here.
Notwithstanding the question of how many people will have received or followed them, I’d be reluctant to rule Youhana out just yet given he was above Moore on the HTVs of the Greens and the 6th placed Samim Moslih
@Gympie – not complaining about the process – just interested to know what is the current lowest primary vote that resulted in a winning candidate. If someone other than Labor wins this one then I would guess it would be one for the record books/trivia quiz
@bazza
The Federal FPTP system was changed after a WA candidate won with 18% in 1919, so I guess no one’s cracked that yet or there’d be calls for a new voting system?
Andrew Wilkie won Denison from 3rd with 21% in 2010, so he’s the recent leader.
Chops answered this question at 3:45. The Country Party won McMillan in 1972 with 16.6%.
… and that record-low looks like being broken if Labor’s Basem Abdo does not win, as Independents Moore and Youhana and the Liberals’ Ghani are (percentagewise) all under Arthur Hewson’s 1972 percentage.
A couple more rounds done, I see. Fourth exclusion was good for Moore, fifth was good for Labor and Youhana.
I think it’s looking increasingly likely that Moore will outlast Younaha to make the 3CP, it’s not completely impossible that Cannabis + Moslih prefs put the Greens above Younaha though that is highly unlikely.
Greens + Moslih leakage to Labor once they are both eliminated probably doesn’t leave enough juice left for Younaha to make up that 2% gap I’d imagine, especially since Moore has the donkey vote behind her.
Greens alone are almost 10%, I’d say probably half of those at least will follow the HTV, along with palestine protest voters who will probably have labor either last or at least below the inds. I reckon Youhana’s still in with a shot.
if the ind gets up its gonna extremely diffiult for labor to dislodge because unlike the fractured vote this time youd think that independent vote will solidify behind the one canddiate
Agree John, Carly Moore or Joseph Yohanna if they win would be like either Dai Le or Cathy McGowan, independents who successfully built a local profile and held on despite strong challenges against them.
AEC has now completed the distribution of the LCP preferences, but has inadvertently failed to upload the new document one the relevant page
The new PDF is on the AEC website; Moore picked up 25% of LCP prefs, Greens 20%, Labor 18%, One Nation 15% and Youhana, Liberals and Moslih single digits
Moore is still doing well on preferences; I’d say her main issue at this stage is Labor is also doing well and she may end up in a position where she needs an unreasonably strong flow at the 2CP stage to win; Basem Abdo is therefore definitely the odds-on-favourite at this stage but it’s still up in the air.
likely the greens will push Youhana over moore though
Is Moore getting a top-of-the-ballot boost? I’d love to know how many of the preferences she’s getting go straight down the ballot after one or two deliberative choices.
Also, if anybody has a theory on the ALP getting 27% of the distribution on the elimination of the CEC candidate, I’m all ears.
labor probably has the edge because moore hasnt got any preferences, and greens have basically preferenced youhana, labor, then more and moslih has put labor above both.
I mentioned this on the poll bludger chat earlier, but since Joseph Youhana is still a possible for this seat, if he did win, it would be the first time that a candidate won who had fewer first preference votes than the Informal vote. It would be interesting to have an idea of what proportion of the informals in Calwell were votes where the voters intention was clear (votes that would be formal under optional preferential).
and given moslih is preferencing the greens they may get over youhana
Interesting where ONP preferences go i think Youhana has the best chance of knocking Labor out
Nimalan yes but give n moslih is preferencing greens they may knock out you hand in which case Moore will face off against labor
@ Yep you are correct. I wonder if ONP preferences will help keep Libs in the 2CP it is the only right wing party apart from Family First and TOP which have already been eliminated
The ON votes have just been distributed. Moore picked up a greater percentage than the Libs did.
@Nimalan Seemingly not, Moore has done better than the Libs now ONP have been distributed (~30pc to ~25pc). A lot of voters voting for their first preference and then donkeying 2-13 it seems.
@ Mark
Can you give a breakdown of the ONP vote distribution?
Also just a formality but Labor has now made the 2CP
@john interested to get your prediction on this one
I don’t think Youhana can win from here. Even with HTV cards favouring him, I don’t think he can gain enough ground on from Moslih and Greens preferences to avoid following them out.
@ Nimalan the AEC publishes full details here https://www.aec.gov.au/election/fe25/calwell-dop.htm
The ABC is currently calling this as an ALP ‘likely’ hold where Moore makes the 2CP. Make of that what you will, keeping in mind they’ve had to revert a few seat projections throughout this election.
@bazza Labor will face off against either Moore or youhana. It will depend on how strongly Muslims preferences flow to the greens if the greens jump over youhana Moore will make the 2cp and probably lose. Due to grn and moslih preferencing Labor over her. If they don’t youhana will jump over Moore and the libs. Moore preferences however will split die to no preferences could be an interesting one.
Thanks Mark
I really underestimated this count. Most complex count ever, wow.
@ NP see the Spence thread
Muslim independent Moslih did quite poorly compared to similar independents in Watson and Blaxland. If I had to guess why, it would be vote-splitting by two other independents as well as a retiring Labor MP and the loss of her personal vote. Both Watson and Blaxland have popular long-term MPs who are senior ministers.
Moore has gotten a huge boost from preferences. Maybe people put 2 to 13 in sequential order after their first preference.
There’s little left to boost the Liberals with One Nation, FF and ToP already excluded from the count.
TBH i think Moslih did not get anywhere near enough media attention as those in Watson or Blaxland. I think Joseph Youhana has captured the support of Assyrian Community who are Christian. Just like the MVM candidate in Werriwa was a Flop and it was actually the Greens who picked up a lot of the votes.
It seems like Moslih didn’t get much traction. In Watson and Blaxland, the Muslim independents ran solid campaigns given the circumstances and high-profile sitting members. They are also of Arab backgrounds and in their electorates, Arabic is one of the top three languages spoken other than English. Moslih is originally from Afghanistan.
In Calwell, there were 13 candidates and so there was a lot of potential for vote splitting. There were several candidates vying for a vacant seat.
The MVM candidate in Werriwa was an interesting character – he’s a former UAP candidate who wanted to sue the party for non-reimbursed campaign funding.
In calwell the Muslim vote fractured between 3 candidates.
@ Votante
There is no large Afghan community in Calwell or NW melbourne generally. In melbourne, the Aghan community is based in Bruce and Holt
There was no MVM candidate in Werriwa. Jamal Daoud was put #5 on their HTV. They went straight to the Greens.
I think the fact that the Labor candidate in Calwell was Muslim, and wasn’t a sitting minister with a strong identification with the government’s approach to Israel, would have helped a lot, but the other independents were probably more of a factor.
If Moore overtakes the Liberal Party and moves into second place, she needs 66.2% of preferences to defeat Labor.
Since minor parties and independent voters also tend to preference other minor parties and independents, and Liberal preferences have flown strongly to independent challengers in safe Labor seats unless the Liberal Party’s HTV tell voters to do otherwise, the preferences of all other candidates except the Greens should favour Moore over Labor.
Notably, Moore received the largest share of distributed One Nation preferences, followed by the Liberal Party, despite One Nation HTV putting the Liberal Party above Moore. Moore also received the largest share of distributed LCP preferences, followed by the Greens and Labor. Considering all these, 66.2% of preferences is not unachievable for Moore. However, the ABC has estimated a Labor vs Moore 2CP of 54.2% Labor vs 45.8% to Moore and said Labor was likely to win.
Regardless of whether Labor or Moore wins, Calwell will become a marginal seat for the first time in its history and Labor cannot take this seat for granted anymore. The 14.35% primary vote swing against Labor is also the largest in Australia (correct me if I’m wrong), which should raise alarm bells for both federal and VIC state Labor.
I don’t necessarily think Moore will be favoured on every distribution. The MVM card for example put Abdo above Moore and a good number of voters are likely voting on ethnic grounds which should give Abdo a decent amount of votes off Moslih and Youhana.
If the greens fail to overtake youhana I will be youhana that makes the 2cp most likely. Labor likely chose Abdo to stop the hemorage of votes.