Polling reveals Qld voters could help deliver Labor victory
Queensland could be the state that helps deliver Labor as close to a majority government as it will get, with new polling showing the famed 2022 “Green-slide” is on the verge of collapse.
Federal Election
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Queensland could be the state that helps deliver Labor as close to a majority government as it will get, with new polling showing the famed 2022 “Green-slide” is on the verge of collapse.
A new poll of the three must-win Greens seats in South East Queensland—Brisbane, Griffith, and Ryan — show a small overall increase in support for Labor, and a similarly small drop in support for the Greens.
But in such a tight three-cornered race every vote could mean the difference between whether the Greens, Labor or the Coalition ultimately take the inner-urban seats.
The poll by DemosAU, conducted in mid-April with an overall sample of 1087 people, found the Coalition has struggled to win back the voters it lost at the 2022 poll.
It means a stagnating primary vote of about 36 per cent for the LNP, which means they won’t be able to surpass either the Greens or Labor once preferences are distributed.
The Greens and Labor are locked at 29 per cent each in their primary vote across the three seats, so the party who wins will be decided based on who can come second behind the LNP.
DemosAU head of research George Hasanakos said The ‘Greens-slide’ of 2022 had receded at the edges, indicating that “some of the protest votes gathered by the Greens at the last federal election have gone elsewhere”.
“This poll indicates that Labor and the Greens are locked in a tight contest across inner Brisbane, with the LNP’s prospects fading in their targeted electorates of Brisbane and Ryan,” he said.
“Despite being the incumbents in all three seats, the Greens’ vote has moderately fallen in the poll, however they may still retain their seats.
“The LNP seems to have failed to recover the ground it lost at that election, significantly hurting Peter Dutton’s hopes of forming government.”
Mr Hasanakos said Labor, on DemosAU figures, could potentially pick up Brisbane and Griffith and was an “outside chance” in Ryan. Ultimately the Queensland seats will be crucial to the national result.
“A Labor win across these electorates would greatly improve the party’s chances of securing a parliamentary majority – while Brisbane and Ryan are a key part of the Coalition’s election hopes,” he said.
Labor remains bullish about winning Brisbane from the Greens and potentially Max Chandler-Mather’s Griffith, despite having a large 10 per cent margin to overcome in the south Brisbane electorate.
The return of former MP Trevor Evans in Brisbane was expected to boost the Coalition’s chances in the seat, with internal LNP research before the start of the campaign pointing to a dip in the Greens brand in Brisbane.
But the Coalition’s vote has been lacklustre since the start of the campaign, with the latest Newspoll showing a four point drop in its primary vote nationally to 35 per cent since the start of the year, while Labor has increased its first preference share to 34 per cent.
The Greens’ Stephen Bates holds Brisbane with a 3.73 per cent margin over the LNP, while Elizabeth Watson-Brown defends Ryan with just 2.6 per cent.
The LNP believes its chances are strongest in Ryan, where its candidate Maggie Forrest has been in the field longer than most challengers statewide.
There are some Labor true believers who are adamant the party can reclaim Griffith, though insiders from both major political parties accept Mr Chandler-Mather has the best chance of any Queensland Green to hold on to his seat.
Greens’ leader Adam Bandt and Queensland Senator Larissa Waters have been pouring time and resources into the three Greens-held seats, announcing big spending cost-of-living and health policies including free school lunches and Medicare-subsidised altruistic surrogacy in Brisbane.
All three party leaders — Anthony Albanese, Peter Dutton, and Mr Bandt, descended on Brisbane on the first day of the election campaign.
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