With nothing in the way of opinion polling to herald it, the scale of Labor’s defeat in the Northern Territory on Saturday came as a surprise — including, it seems, to the party itself, which did not engage in the expectations management customary for parties that can see the writing on the wall.
Labor can be confident of holding only five seats in the 25-member Parliament, with incoming Chief Minister Lia Finocchiaro all but assured of leading a Country Liberal Party contingent of 16.
In a sign of the times for Labor, it had to reckon with the double whammy of a highly effective CLP campaign focused almost entirely on law and order, and a backlash over gas developments and local planning that could give the Greens their first ever seat in the territory, with a further seat lost to a progressive independent.
This comes just three months after the Northern Territory News reported Labor insiders as being “buoyed by the party’s improved fortunes” since Eva Lawler succeeded Natasha Fyles as chief minister in December.
That Lawler herself faced a serious challenge in her own seat was well understood, but she would surely have hoped for better than the 65-35 drubbing she copped in Drysdale in the face of a 21% two-party swing — especially in the context of the territory’s pocket-sized electorates, where local popularity stands incumbents in particularly good stead.
Lawler can at least take consolation in the fact that the swing was in line with the Darwin and Palmerston average, such that the parliamentary party now stands to be dominated by Indigenous members for Indigenous majority seats.
While the federal implications of state and territory election results are apt to be overestimated, the downside surprise will do nothing for the morale of an already jittery Labor partyroom in Canberra.
Such feelings will be exacerbated by the fact that the blow was concentrated in the most demographically representative areas of suburban Darwin.
Even the encouragement federal Labor might draw from its relatively strong performance in the bush, with its implications for the 1% margin it must defend in the corresponding federal seat of Lingiari, comes with a qualification attached.
Labor’s unexpectedly close shave in Lingiari in 2022 was driven by a decline in turnout in remote areas, with the remote mobile teams that service them accounting for only 11,527 votes compared with 17,217 in 2019.
Labor has pointed the finger at funding cuts by the previous government that included the axing of staff in the Australian Electoral Commission’s Northern Territory offices.
However, the data from Saturday suggests a deeper problem, with the number of votes received by mobile teams falling from 11,936 in 2020 to 10,900.
This was down still further on the 12,324 remote mobile team votes from the Indigenous Voice referendum last October, which was itself reflective of a low turnout that No campaigners seized upon to dispute that the 73% Yes vote amounted to a mandate among remote communities.
Federal Labor at least can take comfort in the now well-established pattern of voters turning against whichever party is in power federally at state and territory elections.
But for the next state Labor regime to face the polls — that of Steven Miles in Queensland — the portents appear unmistakable.
Just like Eva Lawler, Miles will face the voters less than a year after assuming leadership of a party that has been dominant since the turn of the millennium, but now stands to carry the can for mounting public concern over crime.
Together with dire polling throughout this year, Saturday’s result reinforces perceptions that a heavy defeat for Queensland Labor on October 26 is all but inevitable — perhaps to the extent that Miles should not be taking for granted the 11.3% margin in his own seat in the northern Brisbane mortgage belt.
