2004 Federal Election Diary What to Watch For

9th October, 2004  - Richard Farmer 
The best guide early guide as we sit at home tonight watching the television coverage of the election count will be the proportion of the vote gained by the minor parties and independent candidates. If their total vote is only 15% as the major polls predict this morning then John Howard will be staying on as Prime Minister. If the pollsters have underestimated the third party support by five percentage points or more as they have in past elections then the result will be a cliff hanger.
On the face of it the two major pollsters tell vastly different stories. In the Age and the Sydney Morning Herald AC Neilsen predicts a two party preferred vote for the Coalition Government of 54% to Labor’s 46%. Such a vote would see Howard returned with a huge majority. Newspoll in The Australian has it 50:50. Actual voting anything like that would make a hung Parliament a real prospect. On first preferences AC Neilsen has the vote for other than the Coalition and Labor at 14%. The Newspoll figure is 16%.
Our Glug election Indicator, based on odds at the betting exchange Betfair, has the Government a 77.8% chance of being returned with Labor at 22.2%. That looks a fair assessment to me. Probably a Liberal-National victory but no real surprise if the underdog effect, of which I have written a lot in recent weeks, enabled Labor to snatch victory.

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