Economy
The Day of Decision … and it’s Will in a landslide
After weeks of being bombarded by campaigning, Tasmanians can now finally make up their own minds with more than 350,000 expected to cast their vote today …
… and they voted overwhelmingly for Will Hodgman’s Liberals … Conceding, (former) Premier Lara Giddings said: “We do have to accept after 16 years that Tasmanians have voted for change. I’ve congratulated Will Hodgman on becoming the 45th Premier of Tasmania.”
Nick McKim said: “We should give thanks for our democracy … even if we did elect a Liberal Government …”
He pleaded with Premier Hodgman to keep the Tasmanian Forestry Agreement … not to go back to four years of war …
Will Hodgman said: “Tasmanians have voted for change … to a majority government.”
Read the full ABC story with links to tonight’s ABC coverage, here
• It’s all over, says the peerless Dr Kevin Bonham, here
• … follow Dr BONHAM’s blow-by-blow analysis on MERCURY website here 8.20pm: Looking at something in the area 15-7-3, 15-6-4 as about where we might end up at the moment.
• Dr Bonham’s Election Night Wrap: LIB 51.4 ALP 27.4 GREEN 13.5 PUP 5.0 OTHER 2.7 LIBERAL 14 (1 of these very likely but not quite confirmed) LABOR 6 GREEN 3 (1 of these very likely but not quite confirmed) UNCLEAR 2 (1 ALP vs GREEN, 1 very probably LIB vs ALP). The Liberal Party has, as expected, won a decisive majority victory in the Tasmanian state election with over half the vote. In the process Labor has probably been reduced to its worst primary vote since the advent of the Hare-Clark system in the state in 1909, but can manage a sigh of relief that the onslaught wasn’t quite as bad as the polls were predicting. The Greens have again performed poorly relative to their polling (even more so than my attempts to compensate for this tendency suggested) and the Palmer United Party has very likely failed to win a single seat … Full analysis here. All comment on Dr Bonham’s website.
• … Follow the progressive results on the TEC website, here
PLUS,
• The Tally Room 8:21pm – I’ve done some estimates on the South Australian results so far, and I have got: 19 – ALP 18 – LIB 2 – Others 6 – Too close to call 2 – No results so far One of the two seats with no results is Stuart, which will be a safe Liberal seat. There’s a serious prospect of a hung parliament at this point. • 8:33pm – Let’s look at Tasmania again. A majority of votes have been counted in four out of five electorates. The ALP has lost a seat to the Liberal Party in Bass, and another in Franklin. In Braddon, the Liberal Party has won a third seat off the ALP, and the final seat is a race between a fourth Liberal, and the Greens and the Palmer United Party. In Lyons, the Liberal Party has gained a third seat. The ALP and Greens are competing for the final seat. The possible range now is: LIB – 14-15 ALP – 6-7 GRN – 3-5 PUP – 0-1 • SA: 8:42pm – Two of those marginal seats have moved into the Labor column for a topline figure of 21 Labor, 19 Liberal, 2 independent and 5 too close to call in South Australia. Those five close seats are:
• Mumble
• Adrian Beaumont, The Conversation
• TT Media here for reaction MRs, including Vica Bayley, Rodney Croome, Australian Christian Lobby etc