Well, we’ll know in a couple of hours if this post is a sharp bit of political analysis, or an embarrassing fluff. That’s because, by the time this goes live, Tasmanians will already be queueing up for their little pieces of paper and their little pencils – not to mention their democracy sausages.
Just don’t expect them to be happy about it.
As the Launceston Memes Facebook page put it: “Only three elections to go till Christmas!” This will be the third time in less than two years that Tasmanian voters have had to go to the polls (not counting various council elections). And even the last state election was earlier than strictly necessarily.
To say that Tasmanians are grouchy about being dragged to the polls again, because of a Labor opposition stunt that blew up in their faces, is an understatement. The big question is whether their resentment of Labor is high enough to overcome some pretty strong headwinds against the incumbent Liberals. High state debt, the debacle of the new Bass Strait ferries delay (brought about because government planners forgot that the new ships will be too big for the existing wharf at Devonport) and the fracas over a proposed new billion-dollar stadium at Hobart, the price of the state finally getting its own AFL team.
As Tasmanians queue up in what is typically the coldest month of the year, expect a lot of grumbling. It all depends who they decide to blame more.
The election was precipitated by what newbie Labor leader Dean Winter clearly thought was a clever bit of gamesmanship: moving a no-confidence motion against Premier Jeremy Rockliff. What they didn’t anticipate was that ‘Rocky’ would dig in his heels and refuse to resign, forcing an election instead.
While Tasmania has slid from its previous top-ranking in the Commonwealth Bank’s State of the States report, mostly due to its low population growth (which many residents might well see as a positive), the NAB’s Monthly Business Survey shows business confidence in Tasmania soaring high, well ahead of the Mainland states. Unemployment is at its lowest level in the state’s history.
Perhaps not coincidentally, then, talking to local businesses, there’s not much enthusiasm for Labor. Using the informal barometer of election hoardings, the Liberals are well ahead, especially on commercial buildings in the ‘northern capital’ Launceston. Notably, almost completely absent are the Greens. Which holds out hope that Tasmania may well repeat the trend seen in the recent federal election, where the Greens’ representation collapsed dramatically.
The other big issue in the election is salmon farming, which the green-left chattering classes are desperate to ban or tax into oblivion. Certainly in the electorates in Tasmania’s west, where salmon farming is a major economic contributor, the issue was poison for Labor and the Greens. In the tiny corner of the southern tip of the island around Hobart, green-left NIMBYism will likely deliver the opposite outcome.
In a state with a generational demographic overwhelmingly lopsided to the aged (due to both natural ageing and the flood of sea-changing Boomers to the state’s east coast, now known as God’s Waiting Room), health is a core issue. Labor are campaigning heavily on their ‘TassieDocs’ policy, a plan for the state government to set up and run bulk-billing clinics. Which sounds all well and good, but seems as likely to happen as Kevin Rudd’s ‘GP Super Clinics’. Does anyone remember those?
So, what’s my prediction? The likeliest outcome, given the political climate and Tasmania’s Byzantine Hare-Clark electoral system (which is geared to favour minor parties and make majority government difficult), is a hung parliament, with, probably, the Liberals in minority government. Of course, Labor may pull a surprise rabbit out of their hat and romp to a majority, but that seems a stretch. The simple fact is that they weren’t ready for the election that they forced on the state.
But then, neither were the Liberals.
The only certainty is that this is not an election to stake your reputation as a smart political analyst on.
