Michael McGuire: Labor should win Florey comfortably, but the others are no certainties

You’d have to be silly to think the ALP’s got the state election won but its path to victory is clear. Michael McGuire runs the key numbers.

The figure connected to the Labor Party wasn’t bold enough to claim victory was in sight, that would just be silly, but there is a definite feeling they are right in the fight.

“Not confident of winning, but confident that we are in striking distance,’’ was the phrase used.

The logic goes something like this.

At the moment, Labor has 19 of 47 seats in the state’s lower house. Labor believes it is favourite to pick up three seats at the March 19 election. Adelaide and the northeast suburbs-based seats of Florey and Newland.

If it doesn’t pick up those three, it won’t win government. But that’s the building blocks of any possible victory.

It should win Florey comfortably, but the other two are no certainties. The Liberals give themselves every chance to hang on in Newland, where the margin is a rather tight 0.1 per cent.

Newland is a genuine three-way contest between incumbent Liberal MP Richard Harvey, Labor’s Olivia Savvas and independent Frances Bedford, who has been in parliament since 1997, and is shifting from Florey after a redistribution changed the dynamics of her former fiefdom.

South Australian Labor Leader Peter Malinauskas on the stage at the official Labor Campaign launch. Picture: Ben Baker

Member for Badcoe Jayne Stinson talking to South Road residents Picture: Sarah Reed

If Labor wins those three it will have 22 seats in the 47-seat house. Striking distance. It then needs to find two more to make it to the crucial government-forming number of 24.

Of course, elections are as much about the seats you lose as the seats you win, but Labor appears pretty confident that it will not lose any of its current 19 seats.

The Liberals believe they have a chance in Mawson (held by Leon Bignell by 0.8 per cent) and in the southern-suburbs seat of Badcoe held by Jayne Stinson. Some of the more wildly optimistic have also mentioned Torrens and Wright.

So, back to how Labor thinks it can turn 22 into 24.

There are quite a few theories here. Some are more credible than others.

Elder (2 per cent margin) in the south and King (0.8 per cent) in the northeast raise a few Labor heartbeats.

In their wilder flights of fancy, names such as the beachside enclaves of Colton and Gibson get a mention. Transport Minister Corey Wingard holds Gibson by a very snoozy 9.9 per cent but Labor is convinced he is vulnerable after repeated run-ins with residents worried about the Hove level crossing.

Then there is Davenport. It’s a southern-suburbs seat held by Liberal MP Steve Murray by 8.4 per cent. Here Labor believes its candidate, Onkaparinga mayor Erin Thompson, has enough of a local following to push Murray.

Labor candidate Erin Thompson. Picture Dean Martin

If it doesn’t pick up at least one, Labor will need to rely on charming two independents to form government.

Both sides agree there are four independents with a decent chance of winning. Fraser Ellis is favourite to win in Narungga on the Yorke Peninsula, as is Dan Cregan in Kavel in the Adelaide Hills and Troy Bell in Mt Gambier.

The hardest seat to read is probably Stuart in the state’s north. It is being contested by Deputy Premier Dan van Holst Pellekaan and long-time independent and former Labor cabinet minister Geoff Brock. Brock has moved to Stuart from Frome after the electoral commission’s last redistribution moved Brock’s Port Pirie base into Stuart.

Brock polls about 70 per cent of the vote in Pirie, while van Holst Pellekaan is equally as popular in Port Augusta, although he lost half of the city in that redistribution. It’s a shame both can’t remain in parliament.

A recent opinion poll put Brock’s support at only 11 per cent in Stuart, but neither Labor or the Liberals believe that number, especially when it said the independent had polled zero per cent in the 18-34 age group.

Former Liberal MP Troy Bell departs the Adelaide District court. Picture: David Mariuz

Speaker of the South Australian House of Assembly Dan Cregan. Picture: Emma Brasier

But Labor needs Brock to win. Labor needs him to balance out Ellis’s unbreakable allegiance to the Libs. That leaves Cregan and Bell to potentially decide the next state government. Both are conservatives but Labor has a history of wooing conservative MPs.

Political parties, though, can talk themselves into anything. At this stage, the maths is still difficult for Labor. The jump to 24 from 19 is big. Voters may also be persuaded the Marshall government deserves more than one term after 16 years of Labor.

Perhaps even a month ago that would have been different. Marshall could have faced an electorate angry at the resurgence of Covid-19, new restrictions and long-testing queues. Some of that has dissipated as normal life returns.

Labor will try to keep that anger burning, focusing on health and its conviction the “basketball stadium’’ is politically toxic. For a while Labor went quiet on the arena, worried that Marshall may dump it, but now it’s gracing every second Stobie pole.

Perhaps the election will turn on the persistence of memory.