South Australian Senate race tightening, new The Australia Institute Poll shows

The race for Senate seats in SA is shaping up to be a four-cornered contest for just two seats, with support increasing for One Nation but falling for the Nick Xenophon-founded Centre Alliance party, new polling shows.

The race for Senate seats in SA is shaping up to be a four-cornered contest for just two seats, with support increasing for Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party but falling for the Nick Xenophon-founded Centre Alliance party, new polling shows.

The research, conducted by thinktank The Australia Institute, reveals support for Centre Alliance — founded by Nick Xenophon in 2013 — is wavering.

Senate voting intentions across the nation, captured by the poll last month, show just 5 per cent of respondents would give their vote to Centre Alliance candidate Sky Kakoshke-Moore.

This is down from the 21.7 per cent of votes the party, then named Nick Xenophon Team (NXT), polled at the 2016 election.

Centre Alliance Senator Stirling Griff said the party had a brand-awareness problem because “very few people” knew that Centre Alliance was the old NXT party.

When this was made clear to them in the recent poll, support for the party rose to at least 17 per cent.

Centre Alliance Senators Stirling Griff and Rex Patrick in the Senate. Picture: AAP / Mick Tsikas

Senator Griff said NXT had spent $1.2m to promote its brand duing the last federal election, but Centre Alliance had yet to spend any money this time around.

Meanwhile, support in South Australia has doubled for Pauline Hanson’s One Nation party, from 3 to 6 per cent.

The Australia Institute’s South Australian projects manager Noah Schultz-Byard said both Liberal and Labor should comfortably win two seats each of the six available.

However, he said it was “extremely unlikely” that the next government, whether it be Coalition or Labor, would also gain control of the Senate.

“That means the outcome here in SA will have a major bearing on the next government’s ability to deliver on their campaign promises,” Mr Schultz-Byard said.

“It is likely that there will then be a four-way contest between One Nation, the Greens, Centre Alliance and the Liberal Party to decide who will take the two remaining seats.”

A nationwide advertising blitz from Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party is also believed to be behind it out-polling Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives — who is running candidate Rikki Lambert — Mr Schultz-Byard said.

“But on the current figures neither are expected to take a seat,” he said.

SENATE VOTING INTENTIONS IN SOUTH AUSTRALIA AHEAD OF 2019 FEDERAL ELECTION*

Liberal — 31 per cent

Labor — 32 per cent

Greens — 8 per cent

Pauline Hanson One Nation — 6 per cent

Centre Alliance — 5 per cent

Australian Conservatives — 2 per cent

United Australia Party — 3 per cent

Liberal Democratic Party — 1 per cent

Independent — 10 per cent

*According to figures in a February-March poll conducted by The Australia Institute