PIMBY #5: The 2025 Federal Election

From salmon to stadiums, from health to housing, there’s no shortage of big issues for Tasmanians to wrestle with during the federal election campaign. Nationally, the polls have been improving for the government, but most outlets are predicting a hung parliament driven by a modest swing against Labor. This outcome would continue the broader trends of decreasing party loyalty and voters turning away from the two major parties – making preference flows more important than ever in deciding the winner in each seat.

Preferential voting isn’t just about who gets the most primary votes – it’s about how preferences are distributed when no candidate secures a majority of the vote. After the first count, the candidate with the lowest number of votes is excluded. Their ballots are then redistributed to the next candidate listed on each voter’s ballot paper. This process continues until one candidate has more than 50% of the votes. For more on how preferential voting works, check out this explanation from the AEC and this visual overview from the PEO.

Over the past few elections, increasingly complex preference flows have determined who represents Tasmanians in Canberra. To help understand this, we’ve created a chart for each Tasmanian electorate that shows how preferences moved through each round of vote counting at the 2022 Federal Election. These charts help us see how voters allocated their preferences and what it might mean in 2025.

Bass

Wildcard: The JLN vote. The party won 6.7% of first preferences in Bass in 2022, but won’t be fielding any lower house candidates in 2025 following its troubles in state parliament. The chart below shows that JLN preferences were split fairly evenly between the Liberals (35.1%), Labor (34.3%), and the Greens (30.6%) last time. So, where JLN voters send their primary vote – and cast their preferences – could swing the result.

^{Source: Australian Electoral Commission}

Braddon

Wildcard: The ‘anti-salmon’ vote. In 2022, anti-salmon farming Craig Garland (IND) secured 7.9% of the vote. When he was eventually excluded, nearly half of his preferences (48.6%) went to the JLN. With no JLN candidate and Garland now in state parliament, those votes are back in play. The major parties both support salmon farming in Macquarie Harbor, so the anti-salmon vote is likely to drift toward the Greens. Ironically, this would end up helping Labor, who picked up just over 44% of Greens preferences in 2022.

^{Source: Australian Electoral Commission}

Clark

Wildcard: This year, nada. No wildness.

But longer-term, when Wilkie finally decides to hang up the pig costume, expect a scramble. The Greens will surely be eyeing one of the most progressive seats in the country. However, if state independent Kristie Johnston decides to step up – backed by Wilkie – she’d be a formidable contender.

^{Source: Australian Electoral Commission}

Franklin

Wildcard: Could Peter George pull a Wilkie? He would need to stay in front of the Greens to secure their preferences, then overtake the Liberal candidate and hope Liberal voters preference him over Labor. It seems a long shot given that his pro-environment platform is likely to put off both Liberals and blue-collar Labor voters. Then again, concerns about the impact of aquaculture on Franklin’s beautiful waterways cuts across traditional political lines. That makes him worth watching.

^{Source: Australian Electoral Commission}

Lyons

The Liberals are again running Susie Bower, who was somewhat unlucky to lose in 2022 after winning a healthy 37.2% of the primary vote. She’s remained in campaign mode ever since.

Wildcard: The narrative battle over White replacing Mitchell. The Liberals are framing her as a celebrity candidate who is parachuting in to take over from a hard-working incumbent. Labor is positioning her as the future of the party and a potential cabinet minister. The seat may well be decided by which story sticks.

^{Source: Australian Electoral Commission}

Preference whispering?

One clear pattern from our charts is that preferences take time to flow to either major party. Look at Lyons, for example. When minor parties such as the Animal Justice Party, United Australia Party, and One Nation are excluded, their preferences mostly go to another minor party (see below). It’s not until the Greens preferences are shared out and the field has slimmed down that one of the major parties gets more than half of the preferences on offer.

^{Table 1: Preference flows for non-major parties in Lyons, 2022 Federal Election}

This dynamic is consistent across the state. It shows that people aren’t just giving their first preference to a minor party or independent as a form of protest, then dutifully giving a major party their second preference. Instead, they’re often deliberately putting both major parties at the bottom of the list. And that doesn’t bode well for fans of majority government.

With a hung parliament on the cards, Tasmania could once again punch above its weight. The outcomes in Bass, Braddon, Lyons, and Franklin will be key to deciding which major party gets closest to a majority. And, if we end up with a hung parliament, Wilkie could play a crucial role in determining which party has the opportunity to govern in minority.

Tasmania may only send five Members of the House of Representatives to Canberra, but each seat is a miniature version of the national story: declining trust in major parties; rising support for independents and minor parties; and the emergence of issues that defy the traditional ‘left-right’ divide.

More candidates are likely to be announced before election day – keep an eye on the ABC’s guide for Bass, Braddon, Clark, Franklin, and Lyons.

To subscribe to the PIMBY mailing list