Voters double up for state and federal polls

If you tire of election campaigns, spare a thought for the people of South Australia.

This year, voters in SA will be forced to execute their democratic duty twice within two months – first, the state election on March 19, and then the scheduled Federal Election in May.

The date of the state election is known well in advance, with the South Australian Constitution stipulating that elections for each fixed parliamentary term be held on the third Saturday in March every four years.

Not so well known is the date of the next Federal Election, though it must be held by the end of May.

Even after the Federal election outcome is settled, state elections await the voters of Victoria, next November, and of New South Wales in late March 2023.

South Australia

March 19 represents the first opportunity for South Australian voters to cast their verdict on the premiership of Liberal Steven Marshall, elected in 2018.

Marshall rose to the Premier’s chair after the SA Liberal Party had spent four terms, or 16 years, in opposition from 2002.

Now, after some internal party defections, he fights the election leading a minority government, losing his 25-22 majority secured in 2018 through three defections to the Independent benches.

Those Liberal-turned-Independent MPs have swelled the crossbench numbers to six in SA’s 47-member Legislative Assembly, with Liberals now holding 22 seats and Labor 19.

Steven Marshall is the fourth State Premier to seek re-election since the onset of coronavirus in March 2020.

In Queensland, Annastacia Palaszczuk was comfortably re-elected in late 2020, while WA Premier Mark McGowan won a crushing second-term victory in March last year and Tasmania’s Peter Gutwein led the Liberals to a third term in May 2021.

Labor was also returned in the elections in 2020 in the Northern Territory and the Australian Capital Territory (where the Greens hold the balance of power).

Marshall will pin his re-election hopes on the government’s management of Covid-19 in SA, with the number of cases per capita considerably lower than that of Victoria or New South Wales.

In 2020-21, South Australia led the nation’s economic performance, recording an annual increase of 3.9 per cent in gross state product, against the nation’s 1.5 per cent growth figure. Stronger primary industry and manufacturing output contributed to the growth performance.

Meanwhile, the unemployment rate – as in other jurisdictions – has fallen in South Australia in the last two years. In December 2019, SA’s seasonally-adjusted rate of unemployment was 6.2 per cent, the highest state or territory rate in Australia, when national unemployment was 5.1 per cent. By January 2022, SA’s jobless rate had fallen to 4.8 per cent, albeit above the national rate of 4.2 per cent.

But historical economic performance and the Covid-19 management of 2020-21 will count for little in the eyes of SA voters if the current Omicron outbreak in the state is not adequately contained by the middle of March.

Federal poll

Prime Minister Scott Morrison must call a Federal Election by mid-April, to allow a 33-day campaign for a May election.

Senators must be elected by the end of May, to allow them to take up their seats before new six-year Senate terms start on July 1.

The 2019 election was held on May 18, meaning that the current term will be a full three years, as foreshadowed last year by Scott Morrison. 

Victoria

First elected in 2014, Victorian Premier Daniel Andrews is the longest-serving state or territory leader in Australia.

In 2018, Daniel Andrews increased Labor’s parliamentary representation, and holds a 55-33 majority going into the next election on November 26. Greens and Independents hold six of the 33 non-government seats.

But Andrews’ second term has been contentious, with seven ministers either standing down or being sacked and the management of hotel quarantine in Melbourne leading to a second wave of Covid-19 and prolonged lockdowns in the latter half of 2020.

If Scott Morrison is defeated in May, some Victorian electors may not want to vote for another strong Labor majority at state level.

And if Daniel Andrews is re-elected, he will have the opportunity to become the State’s longest-serving Labor Premier, ahead of the late John Cain Jnr and Steve Bracks.

New South Wales

Unlike Steven Marshall and Daniel Andrews, NSW Premier Dominic Perrottet has a little more time to plot a post-Covid recovery before facing the voters.

On March 25, 2023, Perrottet is due to contest his first election as the leader of NSW, after succeeding Gladys Berejiklian in October last year.

Berejiklian’s Liberal-Nationals Coalition secured a 48-45 majority at the 2019 state election. Since then, however, it has suffered two defections to the crossbenches, and following a round of by-elections on February 12, is on track to lose the seat of Bega to Labor and has suffered a major scare in the former Premier’s (previously) safe seat of Willoughby.

Labor presently holds 36 seats (37 with the Bega result), with 11 seats held by minor parties and Independents.

On these numbers, therefore, NSW Labor would need to pick up at least 10 seats to win government in its own right in the 93-seat Lower House.

Until the arrival of the Omicron strain, NSW had survived the first year of Covid with fewer cases and fewer restrictions. Daily cases in the tens of thousands, however, have tested the new Premier’s resolve in recent months.

Domenic Perrottet – or more specifically, the Coalition Government – would also have to withstand the ‘It’s Time’ factor in NSW.

If he wins in 2023, he will begin a fourth term for the Liberals and Nationals in NSW, emulating the last Labor government (1995 to 2011) in the state.