The two-party-preferred vote is the simplest statistic we have in Australian elections – just two numbers that always add up to 100%. While it has reduced relevance for calculating the result in some seats, it still has predictive power and also plays a role as a sort of barometer of the relative popularity of the two major parties. Despite the increase in the vote for minor parties and independents, the choice of who forms government is still binary.
For today’s post, I am looking at what makes up that figure today. How preferences flow between Labor and the Coalition, both in aggregate and from particular minor parties, and once we calculate this we can look at which votes actually make up the 2PP vote for each of the major parties.
Let’s start with preference flows. The AEC now calculates 2PP preference flows for each party – ie how many Greens votes flow to Labor or Coalition. But this data has only been collected since 1984. To go back further, we can just calculate how the total pool of all preferences flowed between Labor and the Coalition, by comparing the primary vote to the 2PP.
The Coalition used to do best out of preferences, but since the 1980s they have favoured Labor.
There was a lot of talk about preferences becoming more favourable to the Coalition in 2025, but that didn’t happen. There was almost no difference, with preferences shifting in Labor’s favour by 0.03%.
The story is a bit more interesting if we look at the flow of preferences for particular parties.
It may be hard to believe, but the rate of Greens preferences flowing to the ALP continues to climb, up from 85.7% to 88.2%.
On the other hand, One Nation preferences have become substantially more favourable to the Coalition, increasing from 64.3% to 74.5%.
It appears that, while the major party vote has continued to drop, there is increasing polarisation of voters into two groups – Greens voters overwhelmingly favouring Labor, and One Nation favouring the Coalition. These two parties polled more than half of the minor party and independent vote between them.
Meanwhile independent preferences continue to become more Labor-friendly in their make-up, with 67% preferencing Labor over the Coalition. This vote category had given a majority of preferences to the Coalition up to 2010, but the wipe-out of rural independents in 2013 seems to have flipped the ratio. The independent vote now has a strong teal tinge, with a lot of centre-left independent candidates who take votes that would have otherwise gone to Labor or the Coalition.
While not every independent fits the mould, there is an increasing number who can be described as “teal-adjacent”. Using Kevin Bonham’s classifications, I found that this group had polled 5.4% at the 2025 election, which is just under three quarters of the total independent vote. Unfortunately 2PP preference flows are only published by party bloc at the state level, so it’s not possible to isolate particular independents. However I think it’s likely that this bloc preferences Labor at an even higher rate, so combined with the Greens and One Nation it suggests an increasing polarisation of preference flows for minor parties and independents.
Since we can split the votes for all the other groups between Labor and the Coalition, we can see what votes make up each of the 2PP coalitions.
When I did this analysis in 2022, there was a more stark difference, with the Coalition’s primary vote making up a bigger part of a smaller pile than for Labor. But the dropping Coalition vote means that it is starting to look similar.
Labor’s primary vote ended up on 34.6%, out of a total 2PP of 55.3%. That means that 20.7% of the electorate voted for someone else but preferenced Labor over the Coalition.
For the Coalition, their primary vote of 31.8% made up just over 71% of their total 2PP of 44.7%. So almost 13% of the electorate voted for someone else but preferenced the Coalition.
I finally decided to calculate the proportion of each party’s 2PP that came from preferences, dating right back to 1958.
Since the late 1980s, Labor’s 2PP has had a more significant contribution from preferences, but the number has gone up for both parties.
Interestingly the proportion of Labor’s 2PP that came from preferences dipped slightly this year, but the Coalition’s figure reached a new height. The Coalition’s 2PP is now as influenced by preferences as Labor’s was in the 2013-19 era.
That’s it for today. Still to come: what made up the 2CP in key crossbench seats, and the distribution of 3CP.
I well remember in my teens, first becoming involved in politics and some Labor people strongly advocating ‘first past the post’ while Liberals and Nationals (then called the Country Party) strongly defending compulsory preferences. This changed, and your chart nicely shows exactly when it changed – after 1977 when the DLP influence ended and the Australian Democrats began to rise. What would be interesting would be to do this analysis state-by-state, so that we could see whether some states are different from the average. For example, in regional Queensland it might be the case that stronger votes for One Nation and weaker votes for the Greens have the LNP ‘advantaged’ by preferences. In Flynn, the LNP got 61% of preferences, just one case in point. Of course in reality there’s no advantage or disadvantage built into the preferential system, it’s the fair and reasonable expression of the voter’s will. And the voters make up their own minds about preferences.
Interesting analysis Ben
I wanted to point out Family First they ran for the first time in 2004 and came back in 2025 they did not run in the 2019 and 2022 elections. There preference flow has been consistantly 2:1 in favour of the Coalition so not much change
Good job Ben.
I wonder about this.
If you’ve already done it, let me know.
What is the split of the 150 Seats: How many seats are led by either – ALP // L/NP // Others? (Primary vote only).
And how do the trends look on that from prior elections.
In terms of 3CP.
That’s it for today. Still to come: what made up the 2CP in key crossbench seats, and the distribution of 3CP.
I guess you could create a 3CP for each electorate if you have the distributions – would all seats end up as ALP // L/NP // Other?
Are there any seats in which ALP or L/NP did not make the 3CP?
And how does this compare to prior elections as well.
Obviously the simplest way to do a 3-Way Breakdown is just to use the Primary votes of ALP // L/NP // Others and compare that back to prior elections.
Using the redistributions you could do a trend on 3CP going back elections by going seat-by-seat. A bit more work.
Why were One Nation preferences to the Coalition relatively weak between 1998 and 2016?
Yes I have 3CP data for every electorate, dating back to 2004. Basically you just need to work out which count is the second-last count. You can either do that by calculating the number of candidates running and subtracting two, or by identifying what the final round of the count was in each seat and subtracting one. Then you just take that count round for each seat from the DoP files.
I’ll be coming back to this, probably on Friday, but there are 2 seats where Labor didn’t make the 3CP. In the seats of Indi and Calare, it seems to be the first time since at least 2004 where two non-major party candidates made the 3CP – every other time when Labor hasn’t made the 3CP it’s because it is Lib vs Nat vs Ind. That has only happened three times from 2004 to 2022.
And yes you could convert 3CP data to reflect redistributions, like we do with 2PP and primary, but I haven’t done that.
@Julian – I believe in Calare Labor missed out on the 3CP. It was made up of the Nationals, Andrew Gee and Kate Hook.
“It may be hard to believe, but the rate of Greens preferences flowing to the ALP continues to climb, up from 85.7% to 88.2%”
That is very much an unrequited love.
Regarding the growing Greens to Labor preference flow rate, here’s my guess. It could be partly due to the targetting of traditionally safe Labor seats and winning over Labor voters. In the 2000s, the Greens started making in-roads outside Tasmania and onto the mainland particularly inner-city Sydney and Melbourne. The party also moved more into human rights and social issues and some economic issues. I heard a joke back then about how people in the inner-city voted Green where there’s not much greenery or forests.
The average Greens voter has shifted away from being primarily a Boomer or Gen X ecology voter, and they are attracting a significant number of cost-of-living voters under 40. Those people are not going to preference Liberals with their current offers.
In 2016, ON received 175,000 votes, and the difference between Malcolm Turnbull and Bill Shorten was less pronounced. In 2025, ON received almost 1 million votes; the election was lopsided, with stark differences between Dutton and Albo. Like the Greens, I suspect the average ON voter in 2025 is different than the one from 2016.
As the primary vote continues to drift downward on average, nationwide preferences will rise, but it seems that the electorate as a whole is drifting slightly leftward as the generations shift. The question that arises in the eventuality that Labor comes to power is whether those voters return to the Liberals, go to the current minor parties, or some independent Labor wedge group emerges.
I think Craig and Votante are right. I think demographic of the Greens voter has changed. I think they are less asset owners/wealthy than in the past. They are also making inroads in seats like Spence which is a very economically deprived seat. That is probably improving the preference flow. At the 1990 election, the very first one Labor won from being behind in primaries. Labor openly ran a strategy calling on Democrats and Greens voters to preference Labor which they no longer need to.
Agree Nimalan, the results from recent elections at all levels show the Greens making more inroads into the red/green ‘socialist’ type seats such as Footscray/Fraser (Victoria) and Greenslopes/Moreton (Queensland). At the same time, they seem to be slipping somewhat in the more affluent teal type seats (Macnamara/Albert Park and Ryan/Maiwar).
@ Yoh An
Interestingly, in Fraser they did quite well in the St Albans part which is not gentrified and is economically deprived and outpolling the Liberals. They also did well around Springvale in Hotham so they are making inroads into poor ethnic areas not just Muslims.
It was at this election where the Greens have made huge in-roads in more traditional working-class electorates despite having economically left-wing policies for several election cycles. The Greens vote would be a lot higher if you add the primary vote to VIC Socialists voters’ preferences. The issue of Palestine also made voters in these electorates switch to the Greens.
One Nation got their best result since 1998. It was helped by the decline in the Coalition vote. Those who switched from Coalition to One Nation still directed their preferences to the Coalition. One Nation also ran in more seats than any other right-wing party and benefitted from the decline of the UAP/TOP and Libertarian vote. I think the uptick in preference flows to the Coalition was partly due to the preference deal that Dutton and Hanson agreed on. One Nation gave Dutton and the Coalition much better preferencing this time. For example, One Nation put Dutton as 2nd on their HTV card in Dickson.
The Greens also campaigned almost exclusively on cost of living, housing affordability & the rental crisis which is what would have increased their vote among less affluent voters and potentially reduced it among the more affluent voters.
It’s why their vote went backwards in affluent/gentrifying suburbs like Northcote, Richmond/Cremorne and Fitzroy North where there are an increasing number of high income home owners, while their vote increased in more economically deprived seats like Fraser and the northern part of Wills.
In my own seat of Macnamara, they went backwards the most in the more affluent suburbs like Windsor (-8), Elwood (-4) & Middle Park (-5) but their vote held up in St Kilda (no swing) which is a lot more renter-dominated and where most of the seat’s disadvantaged communities are concentrated.
@ Trent
I would say the results for the Greens in spence is Stunning as it among the Top 3 most economically deprived seats full of Public housing. They are outpolled the Liberals in suburbs like Davoren Park which is extremely poor. It is interested Spence voted so strongly against the Voice but the Greens are doing well there in suburbs full of misery and broken families.
Also i agree Windsor is different from the St Kilda Triangle there are no cheap walk up flats there.
I wonder if the increased flow of greens preferences to Labor is due to “teal” independents getting previous voters who would vote 1 for the Greens and then preference Liberal. More of the remaining/new Greens primary voters would be more rusted on favouring the ALP