Articles from The Tally Room

How the swing was distributed, and how the pendulum performed

Now that we have a complete two-party-preferred vote for all of Australia, we can look at the distribution of seat margins and swings across the country.

For this post, I have produced a number of charts which show the distribution of seats by two-party-preferred result, and also by two-party-preferred swing. I also attempt to chart out the two-candidate-preferred swings in non-classic seats, or at least those which have a valid swing compared to 2022.

Tasmanian candidates rush out

It has barely been two weeks since the no confidence motion passed, and just over a week since the Tasmanian state election has been called, but the candidates are coming out of the woodwork very quickly.

I have now updated my election guide to feature those candidates announced so far.

How seats changed relative to Australia in 2025

I’ve previously posted a number of times before about the dataset I have compiled of election results since 2004, adjusted for 2025 electoral boundaries.

Most recently, prior to the election, I specifically did a comparison of the 2007 and 2022 electoral map: two elections with similar two-party-preferred votes and a similar number of seats with a two-party-preferred majority for each major party.

Getting closer to the Bradfield 2PP

Last week I wrote about the dilemma of how to estimate a two-party-preferred vote in Bradfield. An actual two-party-preferred count has not been conducted between Liberal and Labor in that seat, and may not be conducted for some time.

Podcast #151: Tasmania goes back to the polls

Ben is joined by Kevin Bonham to discuss the collapse of the Tasmanian government just 15 months after the last election, and to look at some of the early moves for independents to find a new party home.

What might the 2PP be in Bradfield?

The Australian Electoral Commission conducts a two-party-preferred vote in every seat, which is a count between Labor and the leading Liberal or Nationals candidate. In seats where the two-candidate-preferred vote is not Labor vs Coalition, they do the count later. With 35 seats now “non-classic”, the AEC needs to conduct those notional 2PP counts in more and more seats.

The House-Senate vote difference

While there’s a lot of similarities in how Australians vote between the House and the Senate, they’ve never voted exactly the same. For a start, there are more options on the Senate ballot paper than the House ballot paper. Small parties will not run in all House seats (sometimes they run in very few) and thus can only attract Senate votes in many seats. This means the bigger parties have traditionally done better in the House, where they have less competition.

Tasmanian election guide launched

While my focus has been very much on the federal election, events have been developing in Tasmania, which culminated in a vote of no confidence on Thursday.

Podcast #150: Bradfield was a draw, for a moment there

For this podcast Ben interviews two scrutineers about their experience in the recounts: Adelaide, a Liberal scrutineer from Bradfield, and KJ, an independent scrutineer from Goldstein. Ben also discusses the recount procedures he saw in Bradfield last week and the latest count updates from Monday afternoon.

Are seats getting closer? Maybe not

We are still waiting for the final 2PP figures – they’ve finished in 149 seats and have even started the 2PP count in Bradfield now – but we now have basically all of the two-candidate-preferred figures in. We may not know the final Bradfield outcome, but for the purposes of today’s post it is close enough.

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