More notes on the Western Australian election

One Nation failed to win a seat even though they came second in two seats after distribution of preferences. The Liberals for Forests won one seat against a controversial minister and came second in another (against the former Premier in his seat of Nedlands).

As spectacular as the ALP’s win may appear, in fact, they enjoy a margin in the lower house of only 7 seats, compared to the previous government’s margin of 13. While this is more than sufficient for the ALP to govern without difficulty, the final years of their government in the early 1990s saw several sitting ALP members resign from the party and become independents. The then Premier Carmen Lawrence held on to government with only a slim margin, causing instability and finally forcing her to call a royal commission into her predecessors’ business dealings (the WA Inc. years).

Many of the new ALP members never expected to win their seats and I suspect they may not be as beholden to the union movement as most other ALP members. The first month of the new government has already seen the Minister responsible for road safety admit to two drink-driving convictions and a loss of driver’s licence due to accumulated traffic offences, so indications are that the next four years will be interesting.

Returning to the February 10 election, however, what were the true influences of Greens WA and One Nation on the outcome? The ALP is denying that they were handed power because of One Nation’s preferences, instead claiming that it was Greens’ WA preference support that won them enough extra seats to push them into government.

I suggest that the ALP is falsely trying to take the high moral ground by denying the reality of support from a party whose policies they largely reject.

Of the 57 lower house seats, my less-than-exhaustive analysis indicates that preferences from minor parties were important in deciding the winner in 22 of them. Of these, One Nation preferences flowed to and were important in deciding the outcomes in favour of the ALP or Greens WA in 13 seats and to Liberal or National Party candidates in just four. By comparison, Greens WA preferences flowed to the ALP in just 8 seats where their preferences helped decide the final result. Another four seats were decided at least in part by preferences coming from or going to some other combination of political parties (the total is more than 22 due to some seats being decided by preference distributions from more than one party).

My assessment of the bottom line is this: that One Nation helped the ALP win 13 seats, as opposed to Greens WA helping the ALP to win 8 seats. Whether the ALP likes it or not, they won government more because of One Nation’s refusal to direct preferences to sitting government MPs than because of support from their natural allies, Greens WA.

There are many other nuances and interesting comments that could be discussed at length. But the big picture shows that it was a huge drop in support for the Liberal Party, rather than a significant rise in support for the ALP. It was this, combined with One Nation’s preferences, which saw a change of government in WA on February 10.

The Future

The crystal ball is always hazy when trying to look four years into the future. But a number of outcomes appear likely, assuming two things: that the ALP wins office at the next federal election and that One Nation and Pauline Hanson are still in existence.

First, with both WA and federal elections due in the 2005 calendar year, it will be ALP and not conservative governments trying to decide what to do about One Nation. If the ALP puts One Nation last in all its seats, then One Nation is likely to react in the same way as they did in the recent WA election: they will generally put sitting MPs last. This decision will impact most severely on the party with most seats, i.e., the government of the day, so with One Nation preferences flowing back to the major non-government parties, the ALP should lose the 2005 election in WA.

Second, Greens WA have won their biggest ever battle (no logging in old-growth forests), but on what issue will they have to fight their 2005 campaign? I can’t see an emotionally charged issue like forests on the horizon and, short of Greens WA developing sound policies on a range of issues important to main-stream electors, their support should fall at the next election.

Third, if the new WA government fully applies the principle of one vote, one value into the electoral system, the biggest losers will be the National Party in the lower house (two or three of their current seats will disappear completely) and Greens WA in the upper house (fewer preferences are likely to flow their way for various reasons).

The ALP in WA will need to work very hard over the next four years to have a reasonable chance of retaining office in 2005. Unless they come up with a strategy that effectively negates the impact of One Nation, an unlikely outcome given their strident criticism of the party in the past, they are likely to lose 10 or more seats for no other reason than their unwillingness to confront the One Nation bogey.

On the other hand, the Liberal Party should have a greater willingness to negotiate and deal with One Nation over the next four years or, at worst, to respond constructively to the issues of importance to One Nation supporters. This won’t mean that the Liberal Party will move to the extreme right of politics. Instead, the party will simply need to broaden its policy base to cater for a wider range of attitudes, while developing the skills to better communicate with the electorate on sensitive and important issues such as globalisation, high fuel prices and illegal immigration.