Gaven review

When we compare like for like, and look at Gaven relative to the 2001 by-election for another Gold Coast seat, Surfers Paradise, we see only 77.7 per cent of Surfers Paradise enrolled voters actually voted at their 2001 by-election, despite there being 12 candidates to get out the vote, and with candidates from all three major parties and a very strong field of independents, including the ultimate winner Lex Bell.

The persistent low turnout in Gaven, compared to the formal roll, means nothing other than Gaven, with 32,223 enrolments, is a faster growing, younger Gold Coast seat, with a huge turnover of voters and many of them nominally on the Gaven roll on election day would have moved out in the previous months.

ALP campaigners knew this, which is why they letterboxed the seat urging electors to get out and vote just before the poll.

Many of the Labor votes that swung against Labor in Gaven went first to an independent, Daren Riley, instead of directly to the National candidate, Alex Douglas, who nonetheless polled a primary vote of 42.5 per cent.

This in no way contradicts the fact that this 42.5 per cent primary vote was a stunning improvement on the Nationals’ starting position on March 1 and 2, of only 8 per cent, according to the TNS Gaven poll.

Whichever way you slice this statistical cake, the Queensland Nationals, led by Lawrence Springborg, came from nowhere in one short month, to win a comfortable Labor seat in Labor’s outer urban, blue-collar heartland.

Apart from Labor, the real losers of the Gaven campaign were the Queensland Greens, who gave Labor preferences they couldn’t deliver for a cruise terminal they didn’t want, lost primary votes as a result, and now have a post-Gaven state government decision to review uranium mining in Queensland.

Point Two

Gaven is an extremely volatile seat, in terms of its demographic profile, but the headline swing in Gaven last Saturday seemed to be less than that observed last August in Chatsworth and Redcliffe, indicating to some that the swing against the State Government was moderating.

When we look at the likely swing in any electorate, we first look at the demographic profile of the seat, to see if it contains disproportionate numbers of politically volatile groups. If it does, it will tend to swing more than average.

In Australia, if you’re a political candidate looking for swinging voters, you should begin your search at Child Care Centres and simply wait for the mums to arrive.

Mothers of pre-school age children have typically moved from two incomes and a highly geared mortgage down to a single income and child birth, and then slowly back to sustainable family incomes, as the mother moves from being a permanent at-home carer, to a part time carer and then a full time worker.

This is why every Government since the post World War II baby boom has come up with similar policy initiatives for young mums and why we now have federal government family tax packages. It’s a cost effective way of buying swinging voters with our tax dollars.