Election campaign gamble that may not pay off for PM

Scott Morrison was hoping a six week campaign would help revive his chances of staying in the The Lodge - but he didn’t see this coming.

In bad news for sales of democracy sausages, more than 12 per cent of the electorate have already cast their vote – days before the Government holds its official campaign launch.

Figures from the Australian Electoral Commission show record numbers have already voted at early voting stations, and millions more have requested a postal vote.

When Prime Minister Scott Morrison set the date for the May 21 election, strategists believed the six-week campaign was necessary to improve the Coalition’s polling numbers, and put pressure on Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese, who they believed would crack under the sustained pressure of a campaign.

And while Mr Albanese made several serious gaffes in the first week of the campaign, Labor’s campaign has since steadied, while the Coalition has failed to improve significantly in the opinion polls.

Coalition strategists privately concede they are running out of time and are now an outside chance to secure a majority victory, given that record numbers of voters have already made up their mind and cast their votes.

Traditionally, earlier votes and postals have come from demographics such as grey nomads who generally supported the Liberal and National parties.

However the sheer numbers of early votes this time indicates a much broader section of the community has decided to vote early, meaning it is less likely to significantly boost either major party.

There are 17,228,900 registered voters in Australia, equating to around 98 per cent of the eligible adult population.

The Australian Electoral Commission said that as of yesterday morning, 1,237,694 people had cast their ballot at early voting centres.

This equates to around 7.4 per cent of the voting public and is more than double the number who voted early for the same period in the 2019 election campaign.

Another 882,018 have already cast a postal vote, amounting to around 5.11 per cent of the voting public, meaning more than 12 per cent have already had their say and will not be influenced by anything that happens in the coming week, including the Coalition campaign launch on Sunday.

Record number of Australians will vote before election day.

A record 2,473,536 people have requested a postal vote so far this year.

This amounts to a record-breaking 14.35 per cent of the voting public seeking a postal vote rather than attending in person on May 21.

This compares to the total of 1.2 million people who voted via the post at the 2019 election.

If the election is close, the record number of postal votes could delay the declaration of the winner.

Unlike votes cast on the day, postal votes are not counted immediately after the polls close at 6pm on the Saturday night.

Instead, a small number will begin to be counted on Sunday afternoon, and counting of postal votes will begin in earnest on Monday, May 23.

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