Samantha Maiden: So is the Prime Minister’s political career dead, buried and cremated?

Even Liberal MPs are lining up to write Morrison’s political epitaph but Labor knows one key factor is keeping the government in the game, writes Samantha Maiden.

Scott Morrison will call an election by the end of the week and the smart money is on the idea that he’s a goner.

There’s a last days of Rome feeling to the proceedings as old foes disgorge secrets and lies about the Prime Minister.

It’s a bit like that moment in a Grand Prix where a driver comes hurtling around the corner before the wheels come off the car and the tyres are on fire.

Lesser mortals would have sustained some form of psychological injury this week from the long line of Liberal Party operatives who have lined up to attack the Prime Minister.

From conservative Liberal Senator Concetta Fierravanti-Wells calling him a “ bully”, to the man who ran against him all those years ago in the 2007 Cook preselection Michael Towke.

Then of course there was NSW Liberal MLC Catherine Cusack, who attacked him over his “pettiness” and “clueless” approach to women. And those text messages calling him a “complete psycho” and a “horrible, horrible person.”

So is the Prime Minister’s political career dead, buried and cremated?

There’s a few reasons to exercise a degree of caution about calling the priest to perform final rites or assuming that the election campaign is over before it starts.

The biggest issue to contend with is that right now, Labor’s primary vote remains dangerously low. It’s worth taking some time to unpack why that’s significant and what it means.

When most voters consume opinion polls, they want to know the answer to one question: Who is going to win?

Prime Minister Scott Morrison poses for the cameras at William Adams CAT in Clayton. Picture: David Geraghty.

It’s a fair question. In terms of public opinion polls, it means paying attention to the two-party preferred results. Right now, those results suggest Opposition Leader Anthony Albanese will win comfortably.

The latest Newspoll has Labor in an election-winning lead of 54:46.

If that result was replicated on election day, Albanese will be sworn in as the nation’s 31st prime minister.

In fact, he would win 17 seats and he only needs to gain a net result of seven seats to form a majority government. However, dig underneath those numbers and the picture is not as rosy. Labor’s primary vote fell three points in the latest Newspoll to 38 per cent.

The major parties’ own internal polling known as “the track” focuses solely on the primary. It’s the only measure that counts. They don’t even have two-party-preferred results.

They do the primary in the “tracking” poll, seat-by-seat polling and focus groups. Newspoll doesn’t explain why the primary vote has changed but you can have a guess, cheaper petrol and tax cuts in the budget for starters. And of course disengaged voters taking a closer look at Albanese.

The conventional wisdom has always been in Australian politics that you can’t win an election with a primary vote with a three in front of it.

Basically, you want a primary vote at least in the low 40s to win a majority of seats in the House of Representatives.

But take a look at the Liberal Party’s primary vote. That’s got a three in front of it as well.

While the Labor primary vote is 38 per cent, the Liberal primary vote is 36 per cent.

What that tells you is that both of the major political parties’ primary vote is in the toilet.

The support for the Greens and independents is higher than usual – the Greens are on 10 per cent, One Nation is on 3 per cent and the United Australia Party is on 3 per cent. And there seem to be a sizeable group of voters who are undecided.

Generally speaking, it’s those voters who will decide the outcome of the election.

If Albanese runs a great campaign and the undecideds break hard in his direction, this entire discussion is moot and he could win the seats suggested by Newspoll.

Right now, I don’t see a victory of that magnitude. And that means he is vulnerable to Morrison running a disciplined campaign.

Labor candidate for Boothby, Louise Miller-Frost and opposition leader Anthony Albanese. Picture: Emma Brasier.

Labor still needs to pick up the swing it needs in the states and the seats it needs to win.

It’s no good getting a massive swing in a state where you already hold the majority of seats.

Once again, if you go around the country, Labor needs to win seven seats. So where are they right now? If you start in Western Australia, there’s hopes of winning two to four seats. Let’s stay conservative and assume they pick up two.

Then, we move to South Australia where let’s say we give Labor Boothby, despite the fact that hasn’t happened since the 1940s.

Dropping down to Tasmania, there’s optimism the Liberals will hold their seats, and could even pick up Lyons.

In Victoria, Labor will pick up new seat Hawke and could nab Chisholm. That only gets them to five seats. In the Northern Territory, Labor is already at a high water mark and won’t pick up extra seats.

So basically it all comes down to NSW and Queensland. All roads to victory for Labor run through NSW and into Queensland.

There’s simply only five seats in the rest of the country right now.

The danger in NSW is there’s a couple of marginal Labor seats that could fall to the Liberals.

That means that Albanese’s task is tougher. He doesn’t need to win seven seats, but nine or 10.

It’s not impossible, and if the undecideds break his way, it could happen.

But right now, I don’t see a landslide victory.

Originally published as Samantha Maiden: So is the Prime Minister’s political career dead, buried and cremated?