Senate – Northern Territory – Australia 2025

A Redbridge poll for the 2024 NT general election has a huge lead for the CLP and all I can say is “holy shit”. The poll has Labor’s vote halved and would result in Lia Finocchiaro’s CLP winning in a landslide despite Dutton’s Coalition holding no federal NT seats, while Natasha Fyles’ Labor government would have their lowest vote share in history (and probably the lowest vote share the party has every received at a federal or state/territory election since Federation). Here were the voting intention results:

CLP: 40.6% (+9.3%)
Labor: 19.7% (-19.7%)
Independents: 14.0% (+3.3%)
Others: 24.8% (+6.2%)

To break down the “others” category:

Greens: 13.1% (+8.6%)
Shooters, Fishers and Farmers: 9.4% (+9.4%)
Animal Justice: 2.4% (+2.3%)

The TPP estimate based on preference flows that I’ve calculated using an online tool gives the TPP result as:

CLP: 56.5% (+9.8%)
Labor: 43.5% (-9.8%)

Many are sceptical of Labor only receiving 19.7% of the vote, but there’s no way this poll was rigged or disproportionate enough to have otherwise given Labor the lead. It’s clear that the CLP have an increasingly good chance of winning the next election.

Despite that poll, the bookies still have Labor as favourites last time I checked.

Theres no way the CLP is only on 56% on TPP with a 21% gap on the primary vote, I suspect preferences will flow more strongly to the CLP under that scenario and will be something like 61-39 or so and the CLP would win all but 3 Labor held seats in my opinion since it won’t be uniform.

Based on the poll I’d be putting money on the clp.

I think the crime wave did play a part on why NT has a high No vote for Voice referendum and may also play a role on ALP losing NT

@Daniel T the reason the CLP’s 56% TPP and a 40.6% primary vote would be because the margin between the Labor primary vote and the Greens primary vote is much narrower than the margin between the CLP primary vote and the Labor primary vote. As everyone knows, Greens preferences overwhelmingly flow to Labor.

My understanding is that Albanese and Fyles are deeply unpopular in the NT.

In the impossible situation of a uniform swing, using the 9.8% swing from the last election (excluding by-elections) and overriding the TCP with a notional TPP margin (i.e CLP vs Labor), the pendulum would look like this:

Government — CLP:
Fannie Bay: 0.2%
Drysdale: 1.8%
Arafura: 6.2%
Fong Lim: 7.2%
Port Darwin: 7.9%
Blain: 9.6%
Barkly: 9.9%
Namatjira: 10.1%
Brennan: 11.0%
Braitling: 11.1%
Katherine: 12.1%
Daly: 11.0%
Araluen: 22.4%
Spillet: 24.0%
Goyder: 24.2%
Nelson: 32.6%

Opposition — Labor:
Casuarina: 6.1%
Gwoja: 6.4%
Johnston: 6.7%
Wanguri: 7.5%
Arnhem: 7.8%
Sanderson: 9.5%
Nightcliff: 14.5%

Even split:
Karama — 0.0%

Impossible to calculate:
Mulka — only two candidates ran in Mulka in 2020: the independent MP (Yingiya Mark Guyula) and a Labor candidate (Lynn Walker). The CLP ran in 2016 but not in 2020.

This would mean the CLP would gain Arafura, Drysdale, Fannie Bay, Fong Lim and Port Darwin from Labor (as well as possibly Karama which is currently on a 9.8% margin so a 9.8% swing would make it 0.0%), as well as three independent-held seats (Araluen, Blain and Goyder). Labor would ultimately be cut down to just seven seats, though none would be marginal. However, geographically it would mean that Labor has been almost wiped out everywhere except the Northern Suburbs of Darwin, with Arnhem and Gwoja being the only Labor-held seats outside Darwin.

Jacinta Price was today confirmed as the clp candidate for nt senate spot

@John great pick. Jacinta Price is an excellent Senator.

Jacinta Price is under investigation for her potential misuse of expenses for the 14th time

What’s the situation here? Are these investigations routine for every Senator, or does there have to be a complaint made?

Fool me once, shame on you.
Fool me twice, three times, fourteen times….

Yea I’d say she’s just the target of a hate group particularly because of her role in the voice campaign. If she’s been investigated 13 times and cleared 13 times chances are it’s all up to standard. You’ve got to remember travelling from Alice Springs to anywhere is expensive due to its remoteness and how flights are not as frequent as anywhere else and generally more expensive.

Price hasnt been cleared 13 times, shes has paid the money back 13 times.

For a place with the population of just three average Sydney suburbs, the Northern Territory sure demands a lot. Do we need Jacinta Price in the Senate? I find her useless; not for her politics but because I’ve never heard a single valuable idea from her. But she is not alone in this. Price is but one of a tiny group of people running a place that should be ruled from Adelaide.

Price has made the decision to move from the National Party to the Liberal Party.

This is probably a diaster for the Liberal party room it is best to have the right flank in the National Party not the Libs she will undermine any moderates.

@Nimalan we can’t jump the gun here. She did say she wants to bring the party back to its values and not be extreme. She said: “We need to stop whispering our values and start declaring them again, not as fringe ideas, but as the foundation on which this country was built.”

Source: ABC News.

But there is a chance she could backflip on that promise of course.

Price’s entire history has been nothing but pushing conservative causes. Something tells me she won’t be “declaring” a return for moderate values!

Taylor’s running mate?

Matt Canavan has criticised Jacinta Nampijinpa Price for defecting from the Nationals to the Liberals, comparing it to Lidia Thorpe’s defection from the Greens to an independent.

Price is a Civic Nationalist, you can’t get any more small l Liberal than that.
Why the Liberal Party would allow it beats me, she hasn’t been a votewinner for the CLP in the NT, and Australia wasn’t voting for The Voice anyway, imo.

Jacinta Price might be the Federal Liberal Party’s Moira Deeming – Has her own agenda, not a team player and leaves a trail of wreckage. Sky After Dark will be salivating over this.

Deeming was a victim of her leader’s terrible decision-making and was shown by the courts to be absolutely in the right. Not even remotely comparable.

Will Price be able to stay at the top of the Country Liberal ticket next election?

I wouldn’t be surprised if she tried to run for the House, whether in Lingiari or a safer seat closer to her new constituency.

Price won’t have any trouble keeping her Senate seat. I doubt many people in the CLP are loyal to the Nats over the Libs, particularly if it gives her more influence.

It was a bit ridiculous for Matt Canavan to talk about “the will of the voters” when her party name was “Country Liberal”.

I would make the point that the Country Liberal Party has its roots as a division of the National Party (back when it was known as the Country Party), and “Liberal” was inserted into the name as a ploy to appeal to urban voters.

The party is called the country liberal party bazza it is effectively the same as the LNP in qld it’s a combined party. Usually the member for Solomon sits with liberals and the member for lingiari sits with the nats. The senator is free to choose.

Real talk if she wants to run for the house she will need to move interstate they won’t risk her on a marginal seat. She can’t run for lingiari because that’s a nats that the nats get to choose for and I think she’s burnt that bridge. Either way shed need to find a seat elsewhere. Durack might be an option when Melissa price retires or moves elsewhere

Senator Price is now gone from the ministry. She has refused to support Ley’s leadership, which I think was the final straw.

*Shadow ministry

Price will need to decide if she wants to be a squeaky wheel or an actual member of government. Both have pros and cons. I can only imagine that she switched from the Nats to the Libs, thinking that there would be more opportunity for her to hold a significant ministry in government (more so than she might have been able to get as a Nat on the numbers). With the turn of events after the May election and with the real prospect that the Liberals won’t be in government until 2031, I guess she has moved on to greener pastures.

The question is, does she continue to try to upset the apple cart from within the party room (i.e., try to install a friendly leader, possibly Hastie) or try to influence political dialogue from media exposure? Much like she did with the March business. The problem is that, IMO at least, the Liberal party won’t win any elections, barring a collapse or major split of Labor, on her kind of politics. Not now, and certainly not in 2031, with a different voter mix of primarily Millennials, Gen Z, and CALD. She rolled the dice by moving from the Nats to the Libs, and I am not sure she can easily go back.

Hastie can win, the man is infinitely more charismatic than Dutton and has almost no political baggage. The only thing I think he needs to change tack on is climate change.

But they do need Ley to make them competitive before that happens.

Susan Leys downfall is all but inevitable. She won by a narrow 4 votes. 3 of which are no longer in parliament. Taylor lost due to his factional and political baggage. He alienated members of his own party and when voting time came they voted against him. Hastie would collect those votes plus extras. Terry Young also did not vote last time around. Hastie managed to increase his vote in canning despite gaining unfriendly territory in the redistribution. Hastie would likely win Bullwinkle Moore and Pearce at minimum in WA.

He has also expressed his desire to lead one day but did not contest the ballot due to family reasons. Ley will be 66 by the next electionand has been in parliament since 2001 and this probably will be her last term once shes toppled.

@ Scart
I do agree with you that Hastie is more presentable than Dutton and does not have the political baggage. You are correct on Climate change he is very right wing and i think he may have already dug himself in a whole when he has come up and said Net Zero.
@ John
I do agree that Hastie would like Bulliwinkle, Moore and Pearce. However, the first two should be Liberal seats and the latter one is a traditional Liberal seat. He may win Hasluck but i dont this he will have appeal in Swan or Tangney the latter two have Tealish demographics and more ethnic diversity.

Andrew Hastie can’t win. No anti-net zero leader can win in this day and age. Just keep Sussan Ley and see how it goes.

And a vaguely non-controversial observation – don’t put leaders into the role if they’re in a marginal seat, which these days is anything less than 10 percent. Albanese in Grayndler has a 17.3 percent TPP margin.

@Mark that seriously blunts the talent pool. If a leader is losing their seat they aren’t winning govt to begin with.

Mark Yore
So, who is it to be;
Melissa Price

Tony Pasin

Philip Thompson

Rick Wilson

@Mark Yore – I believe you have gotten the 2PP in Grayndler mixed up: in 2025, the 2PP was 80.18% ALP, the 2CP against the Greens (who finished second) was 66.86%.

But either way, Albo is fine and shouldn’t have to worry here, unless he makes a huge gaffe/unpopular policy announcement here.

The liberal party chooses the best they can offer labor chooses the person with the best connections. And these people are usually also in safe seats.

Senator Price seems to have long-term ambitions and that’s why she tried to be Angus Taylor’s running mate at the post-election leadership spill. Now that she’s a backbencher, she can probably speak more willingly and agitate the party, especially Sussan Ley.

Like others, I also don’t think Sussan Ley will last the whole term but there won’t be a spill so soon. Members who didn’t vote for Ley might give her the benefit of the doubt. She has taken up a tough gig. On election night, someone (I forgot who) said that Dutton unified the Liberal Party but also shrunk the party. Ley has to both unify and broaden the base.

For a spill, the National Right would need firm numbers. There’s no point calling a spill if you think you’re only going to win by one vote. There also needs to be a serious contender, be it Taylor or Hastie. Taylor might be liked within the party but he has too much baggage. First off, he was the shadow treasurer last term and his economic narrative was partly why the Coalition lost.

How secure is Jacinta Price’s preselection? She may be popular with Culture warriors, Peta Credlins and Sky News – but how does she play in the NT? and with the CLP membership. I am not unconvinced that she will not say something totally outrageous that will make her unacceptable in the party room and she will be forced to walk. She can’t go back to the Nats as she has shat in that nest. She is being backed and talked up as a populist right leader – a populist right wing alignment can’t be ruled out but she might need to move south. To which state?

@ redistributed
Check out your comment on May 8th again. It seems you correctly predicted that she would be the next Moira Deeming.
I think she wants to move to lower house only thing is there are no safe Coalition seats in NT so it would probably have to a regional safe Coalition seat elsewhere like Durack etc.

They will probably wait until Melissa Price retires then move her over. She got way too much talent too be wasting on a sure seat in the nt senate.

After reading her statement I don’t think she was being racist she simply staged the govt was prioritising (certain groups) in this case Indians in order to boost its boost. If the govt were saying the lnp were prioritising Jews and white people/Christians are they then racist?

She probably shouldn’t have said it though. She should of used the words “certain groups”. As she stated her statement was c”clumsy” but she should have issued an apology.

@ Darth Vader
What lower house seat could be be moved to?

I don’t see the talent people say Price has, she comes across as disruptive and unprofessional which is a problem for the Liberal Party, as it’s supposed to be the natural home of the professional class.