SA state election 2018: Polls of Heysen and Giles show Xenophon candidates neck-and-neck in major parties’ heartland seats

SA Best leader Nick Xenophon threatens to snag seats in both the Labor and Liberal heartland, as two exclusive Advertiser-Galaxy polls show him making a charge in both the steel city and Adelaide Hills.

• State Election 2018: All our state political coverage
• Mad Monday #1: Two rising stars at risk in key seats
• Daniel Wills: An election almost entirely about power
• Matthew Abraham: Nick’s ad is so nutty it might just work
• Marshall analysis
• Xenophon analysis

SA Best leader Nick Xenophon threatens to snag seats in both Labor and Liberal heartland, as two exclusive polls show him making a charge in the steel city and Adelaide Hills.

Advertiser.com.au can exclusively reveal that SA Best is deadlocked with Labor at 50-50 in the Whyalla-based seat of Giles, and within striking distance of the Liberals in Heysen.

But it’s when you drill down below the headline figures that things get really interesting.

HEYSEN

Heysen is an Adelaide Hills seat held by retiring former Liberal leader Isobel Redmond. It is notionally safe for the Liberals on a 13.2 per cent margin. However, it has a long history of dabbling with independents and third parties and went strong for Mr Xenophon’s party at the 2016 federal election.

It is in the centre of Mayo, the Nick Xenophon Team’s only Lower House federal seat, which is held by former Liberal staffer Rebekha Sharkie.

On a two-candidate basis, the Advertiser-Galaxy Mad Monday poll in Heysen shows Liberal state election candidate Josh Teague a 51-49 favourite to defeat SA Best’s John Illingworth.

It follows last week’s Mad Monday poll that found Liberal education spokesman John Gardner narrowly ahead, by a 52-48 margin, over SA Best’s James Sadler in nearby Morialta.

Together, the polls suggest Mr Xenophon’s appeal in the Hills is sliding since his blockbuster performance in 2016. While SA Best is giving the Liberals a ferocious contest in both seats, he is failing to achieve a primary vote high enough to topple the Opposition’s candidates.

The numbers for SA Best also represent a marked slide since a Newspoll in December showed his party with 32 per cent of the primary vote, beating both Labor and the Liberals.

Other seats in and around the federal Mayo which had been considered SA Best targets include Kavel (Mount Barker), Mawson (McLaren Vale) and Finniss (Victor Harbor).

However, this poll raises serious questions about whether SA Best will ultimately capture any on the night — and if Mr Xenophon can win his own seat of Hartley in Adelaide’s east.

John Illingworth, SA Best candidate for Heysen.

Josh Teague, Liberal candidate for Heysen.

Liberal strategists have also suggested that Mr Xenophon’s strength in the Hills at the federal election was due to several specific factors which don’t transfer to the March 17 SA vote.

One is that toppled Mayo Liberal MP Jamie Briggs was caught in a scandal just prior to the federal election, which included the loss of his ministry over boozy night in a Hong Kong bar.

Liberals say this meant Mr Briggs dragged down the party vote, which is now stronger at the state election with his name no longer attached. They also hope heavy scrutiny being applied to Mr Xenophon in the state campaign will push down SA Best’s returns at the ballot box.

However, there is a complex story playing out beneath the headline 51-49 number in Heysen.

The Liberal primary vote has lost a huge 15 per cent since the 2014 state election, slipping below the 50 per cent mark to just 39 per cent. This means preferences will decide the result.

First to fall out of the count will be a group of 8 per cent “other” votes, which includes a modest 5 per cent for the Australian Conservatives and 2 per cent for the Dignity Party.

Next to go will be either Labor or the Greens, which are within 1 per cent of each other. If there is a strong preference flow from one to the other, it is possible that SA Best would be removed from the count early and the Liberals in line for a very comfortable win. However, it is also possible that Labor and Green preferences scatter early, giving SA Best greater hope.

Premier Jay Weatherill is the preferred leader of most voters in Heysen, at 33 per cent, likely being drawn from both intending Labor and Green voters.

There are again signs that intending Liberal voters are unconvinced by Opposition Leader Steven Marshall. In a near repeat of last week’s polls, he is the preferred premier of just 66 per cent of intending Liberal voters in Heysen.

Across all of Heysen, Mr Marshall gets 28 per cent as preferred premier. Mr Xenophon runs third at 20 per cent, well down on numbers he achieved in other seats just months ago.

The poll of 501 voters in Heysen was taken on Wednesday and Thursday evenings last week.

Both were taken after Mr Xenophon released his widely played and notoriously cheesy campaign ad.

GILES

In Giles, Labor faces the prospect of losing its only country seat as SA Best surges.

The huge seat sprawls northwest of Whyalla, sweeping through Coober Pedy and the APY Lands and has large borders with WA and the NT. It is held by Labor MP Eddie Hughes, who is now in a 50-50 race with SA Best candidate and Whyalla councillor Tom Antonio.

The race has already created fireworks, with Mr Antonio forced to deny old claims that he threatened Mr Hughes and related accusations of being linked to racist material circulated in the town.

Whyalla Mayor Lyn Breuer, a former Labor Speaker of State Parliament and Mr Hughes’ predecessor as MP, has been reported for allegedly assaulting Mr Antonio’s wife.

The seat has also been at the centre of the national debate on the future of steel, with Whyalla at risk of becoming a “ghost town” until the intervention of UK billionaire Sanjeev Gupta.

Worryingly for Labor, its primary vote has slumped to 37 per cent in Giles and SA Best is close behind on 31 per cent. It is very likely Labor and SA Best will be the last two parties left in the count, and preferences from the Liberals’ 23 per cent primary vote will be key.

Jay Weatherill and Giles MP Eddie Hughes. Picture: Dylan Coker

A simple addition of the Liberal vote to the SA Best count is enough to give Mr Antonio victory. However, even if Liberal how-to-vote cards recommend voters send their second preferences to SA Best over Labor, there is no certainty that individuals would do so.

While Giles is cut along political fault lines, there is also a strong and unique impact of personalities amid a so-called “blood feud” between supporters of the two leading candidates.

Giles has long been considered an SA Best target seat because of the party’s strong performance in the enormous seat of Grey at the 2016 federal election. Grey includes much of the state’s Mid and Far North, including Whyalla, and was almost lost by the Liberals.

SA Best had been assumed to be a bigger threat to Liberal than Labor seats at this election. However, with Labor’s vote suppressed across the state that theory may be cracking.

Nick Xenophon with his Giles candidate Tom Antonio. Picture: Dylan Coker

The notional margin for Labor in Giles is 5.7 per cent. With SA Best very competitive there, it raises questions about Mr Xenophon’s possible impact in other Labor-held electorates including a clutch in Adelaide’s north like Enfield (6.2 per cent) and Taylor (8.8 per cent).

Mr Weatherill is preferred premier in Giles, with 29 per cent of the vote. He has only 60 per cent backing from intending Labor voters, much less than in city electorates previously polled.

The Giles poll was of 504 voters, taken on Wednesday and Thursday evenings last week.

YouGov Galaxy managing director David Briggs said both seats were “hanging in the balance” and “preferences will determine the final outcome”. He said intending Liberal voters were “noncommittal” about if they would preference SA Best or Labor next. Labor would need a third or more of the Liberal preferences to win the seat with these primary votes.

OUR ANALYSIS OF LAST WEEK’S MAD MONDAY POLL

Follow @DanielWills