A State of Play

In light of the weeping and gnashing of teeth we've seen in the last 36 hours, I thought it would be interesting to glance at the NSW figures in this week's Nielsen poll.

This is the relevant part of the tables (as ever, leaked by @ghostwhovotes):

The Full Table can be seen here

This is to be compared with the results from December last year:

Full Table here

Now, there are countless problems with assuming anything as a result of a swing between one poll and another. The weaknesses in the entire polling model are well documented and a discussion for another time.

Suffice to say that the sample size for this entire poll was 1400. Focussing on NSW, and assuming that they selected respondents in proportion to the relative population of that state, this means that the NSW numbers are drawn from a sample of approximately 400 people. The SA/NT numbers are probably half that.

What I did want to think about briefly, however, are the NSW numbers, to the extent that we can be pretty sure they are just generally awful. Is there anything that NSW Labor can do to help? Moreover, would they be interested in doing so?

It has been my observation over the years that state leaders often appear ill-at-ease when purporting to support their Federal counter-parts. Either the State party is strong and therefore disinclined to support a weaker Federal campaign, or the Federal party is strong and disinclined to accept a weak state party's endorsement.

This translates to a lot of awkward photo-shoots as "worlds collide", where no one is really sure how to act and journalists unclear on how to frame the event.

My point, of course, it that Federal Labor probably doesn't really want John Robertson's help. He has no particular popularity (or even, let's be honest, profile) to draw on. His alternative government is monumentally unpopular. His presence, especially in light of the constant reminder's in the media of Labor's corruption, would almost surely do more harm than good.

As for Barry O'Farrell, what on earth does he have to gain? More importantly, he runs a major risk in being photographed with (on a personal level) the incredibly unpopular Tony Abbott. I think we can expect him to stick to voicing his support on twitter, and not a great deal more.

It's plain wrong to say that the election will be won or lost in western Sydney, except to the extent that any seats lost there will of course need to be made up somewhere else. Of course, that applies to every single seat that Labor holds, so I'm not sure it shows any great insight.

It's a pretty formidable challenge for Labor. I just hope that Gillard is not expecting any help from John Robertson, because I'm not sure he will be able to provide it.

A New (England) Beginning

It's hard to know what to make of Richard Torbay's recruitment into the Nationals.

In the Speacker's chair. Photo from here

On one hand, the "traditional" direction is the reverse - Robert Oakeshott and Tony Windsor were both Nationals before defecting.

Tony Windsor was elected as an independent in the state seat of Tamworth in 1991, having orignally sought pre-selection as a National. He eventually ran against the National candidate in the 2001 Federal election and was successful.

Rob Oakeshott was actually endorsed as a Nationals candidate and elected in 1998 in Port Macquarie. After disagreements on policy he resigned from the Nationals (thus losing a shadow-ministry) in 2002. When Mark Vaile resigned his Federal seat of Lyne in 2008 he ran as an Independant and won convincingly.

So Torbay certainly wouldn't be the first. But what chance does he have of suceeding?

Mumbletwits has written a great piece on that issue, and I'm not going to repeat what he has said. Read it.

The really interesting part (for me) is going to be the result of the consequent by-election in Torbay's seat of Northern Tablelands.

At the 2011 election, the results were as follows:

From Wikipedia

Those results were hardly an outlier:

Also Wikipedia

So we can rest assured that the Nationals should quite easily gain the seat. Given the general damage being done (rightly or wrongly) to the independent brand, there seems to be little prospect that some unknown independent could come from nowhere to take the seat.

It will be interesting to see what is made of the results. Given that the past results were skewed by an independant who had been sitting as a speaker from 2007 to 2011, Labor's vote (3.4%) could hardly be seen to be a fair reflection of their support in the region.

That said, if the ALP thinks they have a chance of winning the seat then they are hopelessly delusional. According to every poll since the election, their vote is still abysmally low. Labor's woes Federally are not going to do the State party any favours, and the Nationals will win the seat at a cantor.

Is there any way the Labor party can sell a result as a win? Sure. Their vote will increase to (at least) double figures - a farily pathetic achievement, but one that may wash with the less observant among us.

That said, one has to wonder whether any Labor members are starting to grumble about the astonishing lack of impact that Robertson is making on the electorate. Labor's numbers are not moving, he has zero profile, and despite O'Farrell making a number of unpopular decisions, no one seem to be moving out of the Coalition column.

Opposition Leader. No, seriously! Photo from here

I wonder whether the by-election (whenever that eventuates) may just be a momentum that is needed to replace Robertson with someone who can actually start winning back some voters from O'Farrell.

A Strayn Connection

The relationship between Federal and State branches of a political party must often be a fraught one.

We've read countless stories in recent years about whether a poorly performing federal party is having an effect on a state election, or whether a state party wracked by scandal is affecting the federal vote.

Of course, these things are impossible to determine, given that, even when they are specifically asked, no one can know why a voter ticks a certain box or answers a polling question one way or the other.

Not that that stops all those blasted columnists and bloggers.

In any event, it seems like the most common source of friction must be issues where an option is good for the country as a whole but effects states differently.

The infrastructure funding is a good example.  The Federal Government allocates a particular sum of money each year to Infrastructure projects, and the states jostle each other for the cash.

In the last year of the NSW Labor government a fairly half-hearted application was made for Federal funding. As a result of the sub-standard effort the state missed out entirely.  This was despite the fact that a large injection of cash may have significantly boosted NSW Labor's numbers in the lead-up to the 2011 election.

Of course, that didn't stop Federal Labor offering to throw great big wads of money at the NorthWest Rail link during the campaign, but that's another issue.

It's not often, however, that a State branch and a Federal Branch are perceived to be working at cross purposes.

Full Story here

Now, O'Farrell is on record as opposing the Carbon Tax.

Additionally, the NSW Liberal website has great big swathes of space dedicated to the issue. I went there to download a press release or comment, but found this instead.

In any event.

Now, despite some people's protestations, pursuit of clean energy will undoubtedly create jobs.  Whether those jobs will replace those lost because of the carbon price is all but impossible to determine, but it would be plain wrong to say that NO jobs will be created.

And, of course, those jobs will have to be created somewhere. So the NSW government has to chase those jobs for the state. I don't think anyone would argue with that.

The most interesting part, though, is the fact that this announcement was only the creation of 40 jobs. It's not an enormous investment in Sydney's future - in the face of approximately 3. 5 million people employed in NSW, it is a miniscule number.

Notwithstanding, a big fuss was made about it, including a joint press conference with O'Farrell and Gillard.

Brad Burden, O'Farrell's media man, had this to say:

He may be right, he may not be.  But the more I think about, the more I see this announcement doing very little help the NSW Coalition, but probably hurting the Federal Coalition quite a bit.

What it shows, in short, is NSW getting on with the job - accepting that there will be a price on Carbon, and that energy is best invested dealing with that rather than rending garments in protest.

No matter, what you think about the Carbon Price, I think NSW would be stupid to not try and ensure that as many of these new jobs as possible are in NSW.

Having said all that, it seems that the debate on the Carbon Price and in particular the reporting from certain segments of the media means that all reason may well have flown out the window, so what would I know?

A Gift From Above

Tonight's Federal Budget promises to be a good one for New South Wales.

It seems utterly ridiculous that there are two different levels of government responsible for the funding of major projects this state, but that's another matter.

According to a report in the Herald the following projects are going to be funded by the Federal government:

• $900 million on four highway bypasses and duplications
• $840 million on upgrading the freight rail network from the North Shore to Newcastle and
• Studies on "the Scone railway level crossing and the Richmond Bridge"

The $2.2 million should be contrasted with the $600 million that Victoria received.

The funding is trumpeted by the Herald as a triumph for O'Farrell, although precisely what he did to secure the funding is not clear.

There can be little doubt that he would have loved to see an allocation for the North West Rail link, an enormous funding headache he will need to address down the road.

One would have thought that the Premier of New South wales would have some say in how the Federal Infrastructure funding is distributed, but that would require a level of cooperation we seldom see between different levels of government, especially when the main players are from different parties

The allocation of Federal funding for such vital infrastructure projects should be above politics, but one only need think back to the joint announcement Kristina Keneally and Julia Gillard made during the election regarding the completion of the Epping Parramatta Rail link.

The difficulty that Federal Transport Minister Anthony Albanese has is that, on one hand, he wants to please NSW voters (especially those in the coveted Western SYdney seats) whilst doing as little as possible to help the NSW Coalition government.

It has been no secret that Tony Abbott was disappointed in the number of seats that the Coalition picked up in the 2010 Federal election, going so far as to insist that Arthur Sinodinos take over as the President of the NSW Liberal Party.

By implication, if Abbott was disappointed in the number of seats he picked up last time round, these will be first seats he eyes off next time we go to the polls.

Federal Labor of course realises this.  By the same token however, they don't want to deliver O'Farrell any more victories than the have to - every completed project in NSW (no matter who funds it) will help portray the Coalition as the party who actually gets stuff done in NSW.

I understand that here are a fair whack of people in NSW who refused to vote for the Coalition because the debacle that was the Greiner government.  Before my time, but I hear that things got pretty dire for a while back there.

If O'Farrell can really nail this goal of his to be the man who fixed NSW's transportation system, he will win a new generation of voters who vote Coalition at the state level.  In a state where the Coalition have seldom been in power, and have in the past not covered themselves in glory when they have been, this could be a major game changer.

The result of this is a Federal Labor who has to try to work out a way to fund NSW infrastructure without giving O'Farrell more than they have to.

So, you can rest assured that the North West Rail Link will almost certainly never get Federal funding whilst Labor holds the purse strings - there is no project that the Coalition government is more firmly wedded to.  O'Farrell is going to have to find that money elsewhere.

Of course, every other project that is funded Federally frees up more of NSW's budget to spend on said North West Rail Link, but not much can be done about that.

There's no knowing how much longer Labor will stay in power Federally (it's difficult to see them lasting longer than O'Farrell - that's for sure) - but you can be sure that for the rest of their reign we will see continued frosty relations, predictable sniping and little in the way of productive cooperation.

And, if we're lucky, a little bit of infrastucture building.

Swings and Roundabouts

If I got to ask one question to the leaders of our major parties, and I knew they would have to answer truthfully, the question I would ask is "What do you really think about swinging voters?"

I think the answers would be outstanding.

The thing is, most swinging voters are not, for the most part, discerning, skeptical folks.  Typically, they are disengaged from the political process.

LIke it or not, a major party who attracts the majority of these voters is probably going to triumph.

That said, the major problem with the poitical parties having to tailor their appeal to the swinging voter is this: given their level of disengagement with the process, often fundamental misunderstandings exist, rendering the process almost farcical.

O'Farrell's opposition to the Carbon Tax is a great example.  The tax has nothing to do with NSW government (directly) - on my understanding, no deal need be struck with the states.  Of'Farrell has peldged to fight the tax, but has not clarified on what basis he expects Gillard to care about what he thinks.

That's an example of a party using (and abusing) the ignorance of many swinging voters.  The problem for a party is when (what is perceived to be) poor governance from another level of politics "poisons" the electorate against you.

A great example of that was all the talk before the 2010 Federal Election about the reviled Labor governments in NSW and Queensland and their effect on the Federal Labor vote.

Of course it is all but impossible to measure the effect - but it seems likely that if the Labor brand was stronger in NSW and Queensland generally then Gillard would not have needed the support of the independants, and Federal Parliament would be a very different place at the moment.

Which all brings me to today's Sydney Morning Herald.

For a few weeks now the Herald has published a photo and quotes from the staff and the clientelle of a hairdresser somewhere in Sydney.  I suppose the series has been interesting, but really all it is is a reworking of the "man on the street" interview.

I was struck by the comment from one of the ladies.   She is 87, and voting Liberal, and said "I'm disgusted with Labor, the way they are throwing money around.  They came around offering me new pink batts... They're giving too much money away without actually doing anything."

Now, perhaps I'm being a little unkind here. Perhaps this voter actually has a nuanced view of the connection between Federal and State Labor, and is displaying an advanced analysis of the situation.

More likely, however, is that she completely misunderstands the roles of State and Federal Labor, and doesn't see that whilst there are many, many reasons to be angry at NSW Labor, none of them have anything to do with pink batts.

The real shock, for me at least, is that as far as this voter goes, Federal Labor has poisoned her against state Labor!  As if NSW Labor needed another obstacle - it must be enough to make a Labor staffer weep.

It's tough, I think, for a party to know what to do with this kind of voter, who I fancy is displaying a fairly common level of understanding of politics.

A careful, detailed reasoned argument managed over multiple news cycles is unlikely to have any effect.  Disengaged voters get their politics from television ads during reruns of Two and a Half Men, talk-back radio and gossip over a cup of tea.

This is why we get simplistic slogans, ads that cater to the lowest common denominator - because it is, like it or not, usually these swinging voters that are easiest to shift.

These people decide elections.  Parties are welsome to deride them, to despise them, and to despair of their disengagement.  But if you fail to respect their power, you won't get anywhere in politics.  These voters hold our state's futures in their hands.

A Higher Office

There has been a predictable flurry of chatter in the last few days about candidates not staying on after the election.

I wrote previously about the conspiracy theories regarding a Eric Roozendaal departure once he qualifies for his pension (here: http://bit.ly/f5c1lF). Many people are (predictably enough) are wondering how many Labor politicians will be moving on post election.

Presumably there will be less than one would normally expect when a party loses after 16 years in office, for two reasons.  First of all, the loss is inevitable, and it been that way for a long time.  No one from Labor could (plausibly) claim to be heading into this election still expecting to be in government - so there is little reason to expect the kind of exodus we say after Howard was punted in 2007 (Downer, Costello, McGauren and Vaile all jumped ship, Howard having famously lost his own seat).

Additionally, Keneally has been calling very publicly for what she has called "generational change" for some time.  Whether this is about renewing the party and trying to make sure they have a shot in 4 years, or rather just about trying to make the party look new and invigorated for this election is anyone's guess. 

This all means that most people who don't intend sticking out the 4 years have probably already jumped (or been pushed).  

During the Channel 10 debate last week, both leaders were asked questions about whether they will remain as leader after the election, which struck me as a particularly silly question. I've scoured the internet for a transcript but have been unable to find one, which seems typical of what seems to me to be the media's apathy to this election as a whole.

O'Farrell gave a rather cryptic answer that I didn't really follow about it being up to the party room and a vote having to be taken, when surely a simple "Yes" would have sufficed.

The question was difficult for Keneally because she knows that when Labor lose there will be people suggesting that she should no longer be leader of the party, despite the fact that no one really has much bad stuff to say about her leadership.  It may well not be up to her if she stays or not.

What she did guarantee is that she would be serving out her 4 year term as member for Heffron, she being one of the few Labor members all but guaranteed to retain her seat.

Today she is apparently refusing to comment on whether she will stay as leader if Labor are not returned (http://bit.ly/hi72Uq SMH online).  She was then asked whether she was considering a Federal career, to which she replied that she was not.

If she did go chasing Federal glory, she wouldn't be the first.  The most obvious example would be Rob Oakeshott, who quit NSW politics to run successfully for Mark Vaile's old seat in September 2008.  A number of current House of Representative members also cut their teeth in State politics.

There's also the question of whether the Labor leader who was at the helm of what may very well be the biggest shellacking ever handed out by a state in living memory would ever have a political pulse afterwards.

I recall discussion some years ago, back when the Liberals were at their lowest in NSW and Howard still seemed unassailable, that the party was going to struggle to get out of the doldrums in NSW because all the "talent" in NSW as heading for the Federal arena where there were opportunities to govern.

How times change.

That aside, it still seems that many people see Federal politics as the pinnacle for politicians.  I don't ever plan to run for anything, but if I did, and I was given the option of a job that would keep me in Sydney (for the most part) or job that would require me to spend much of my year in Canberra, I reckon it would take me at least 2 seconds to decide to stay in NSW.

I've also heard it said that it is State Governments that really get things done, and provide the services that people need - police, hospitals, roads, public transport, which surely must hold some appeal.

I guess what I'm trying to say is that it seems a shame that people often regard state politics as a "stepping stone" or an audition for greater things.  It remains to be seen how many of the Coalition's members take the same approach in the years to come.