Hartley – SA 2026

I’m expecting the Liberals to be handed a drubbing at the SA state election given the serious internal divisions that only seem to be consistently getting worse.

Agreed the sa liberals are going down the same drain as the wa libs time for a clean out.

SA Labor are set for a historic landslide victory according to a YouGov poll released earlier today.

Poll results:

Primaries:
* Labor: 48.0% (+8.0%)
* Liberal: 21.0% (–6.3%)
* Greens: 14.0% (+4.2%)
* One Nation: 7.0% (+4.4%)

TPP:
* Labor: 67.0% (+12.5%)
* Liberal: 33.0% (–12.5%)

If the swing was uniform, the Liberals would be left with just five seats (Chaffey, Flinders, MacKillop, Mount Gambier and Narungga) and that’s assuming that none of the three ex-Liberal independents get re-elected (if all of them did then Chaffey and Flinders would be the only seats left). Either way, none of those five seats are in Adelaide, so they would be wiped out of Adelaide on both the federal and state level.

@NP: Correction for the swings:
Primaries:
* Labor: 48.0% (+8.0%)
* Liberal: 21.0% (–14.7%)
* Greens: 14.0% (+4.9%)
* One Nation: 7.0% (+4.4%)

TPP:
* Labor: 67.0% (+12.4%)
* Liberal: 33.0% (–12.4%)

Note that a 21.0% Liberal primary vote (without the Nationals contesting) will be even lower than in 2021 WA (with the Nationals contesting). The SA Liberals have adopted fringe politics, that’s why they will get fringe political party results.

@Joseph thanks for the correction.

The SA Liberals have been in the pits this term. They lost two seats due to by-elections and a Liberal MLC quit the party early this year. The YouGov result isn’t as lopsided as the WA 2021 result but still represents a wipeout if replicated on election day.

Federal Labor got a statewide 2PP of 59% in SA at the recent federal election. I read that the Liberals only won 3 or 4 booths in the whole of metro Adelaide.

@Votante that sounds about right, not very many booths even had the Liberals getting the most votes.

The only booths I could find in the metro Adelaide seats that voted Liberal were Unley Park (Adelaide), One Tree Hill (Spence) and the Myrtle Bank PPVC (both in Sturt & Boothby). Don’t think I found any others.

@James Unley Park is very affluent old money with lots of super rich boomers in the area (kind of like Toorak, Armadale, Rose Bay and Vaucluse but without the ocean view of course). Myrtle Bank is the same but it’s worth noting that the Myrtle Bank Election Day booth went Labor’s way. One Tree Hill is technically semi-rural as it’s basically farmlands surrounded by the hills and a long way out from the main road and urban sprawl (can attest this having driven around the area last month).

It’s a complete disaster for the Liberals in metropolitan Adelaide. Even the semi-rural Golden Grove booth in Makin (which really shouldn’t be called Golden Grove as the actual Golden Grove Central is much further south from it) went Labor’s way on an 11% swing when it’s been (the only) Liberal for as long as time existed. The Greens came second on primaries in many outer suburban Adelaide booths and pushed the Liberals to a distant third in many cases. The Liberals are facing an existential crisis here. I won’t be surprised if they get wiped out WA style next year.

As long as Alex Antic is pulling a lot of strings behind the scenes I don’t see how the SA Libs appeal to the broad centre. The Libs seem to be more interested in cocooning financial special interests and pushing a cultural agenda. I just looked at the writeup of the YouGov poll that had Labor on 67% 2PP. The comments are illuminating. Also interesting the comment about One Nation being a cash cow. I knew the Libs were in a bad way as soon as they lost Sturt last month.

Should opinion poll results like that continue – and with the Malinauskas government seemingly doing a good job quite likely – it will be hard for the Libs to get candidates to stand. And then only the desperate will and they will come with all sorts of baggage and scandals and depress the Lib vote further.

@Tommo9 – thanks for giving insight into the booths. It’s good to hear from locals about the characteristics of the suburb/booth.

I do concur with you that the Liberals are absolutely toast next election, especially in Adelaide.

If a seat like Bragg or Morphett flipped, safe to say the Liberals are practically done in Adelaide. If they can’t even hold demographically-safe seats then it really highlights just how incompetent they are.

A Labor 2PP of 67% would be close to the result the 2021 WA state election. WA Labor got 69.7% 2PP – higher than what the polling had. The polling towards the end of the campaign had WA Labor on 66% to 68%.

SA Liberals have more seats on lower margins than the WA Liberals had going into the 2021 election. For example, SA Liberals have 9 seats on margins of under 5% whilst the WA Liberals had 4 and Nationals had 1. This is despite WA having a much larger parliament. The SA Liberals currently have numerous seats on margins under 10%.

youve got to remember there were other factors at play in WA notably the covid stnace of the WA govt and the federal govts rhetoric towards wa voters that hurt the WA liberals. also there is still 8 motnhs to go. the libs will lose seats il concede that. but tbh idc about this election much sa is one of the states that has always trended labor

I agree that covid management helped WA Labor hugely.

SA Liberals, like Vic Liberals, has only had one election victory this century. Things can also turn around or at least the gap can narrow within the next 8 months.

lets face it the sa and wa labor govts were just better at winning elections. the vic labor govt didnt win the libs lost. the libs/nats have a small chance in 2029 but i think they will fall just short by a few seats. sa libs wont win in 2026 and i cant see them winning in 2030 either. in vic i think their is also a chance the libs could topple the allen govt but i think the most likely outcome is a very narrow labor majority or labor/greens minority at this stage