Erik Reuter wrote:
What was the margin of error of the poll? Quantify your "landslided", how much did the winner get?
Different polls gave different margins, but they were all way short of the actual result - way short.
The most prominent polls were talking 50:50 with margins of 3% for Newspoll, 2.6% for ACNielsen and Roy Morgan at 2.2% a week out.
In September, ACNielsen and Morgans had the Labour party (the more socialist of the two) leading by more than the margin of error, Newspoll had Labour ahead, but by less than the margin.
In the last few days, Newspoll and ACNielsen increased their sample size and came down to just over 2% margin, but still giving the conservatives only the smallest of margins (I think 50.2% and 48.8%).
Australian voting is VERY different for a number of reasons:
- Preferential voting (as Andrew described)
- No direct vote for leader (we elect our members of the House of Representatives, and whichever party has the most seats puts their leader in as the Prime Minister
- and the big one - Compulsory Voting - every citizen over 18 MUST vote.
But the end result was completely unexpected by everyone except the bookies (Morgan and Newspoll have poor success rates in forecasting the election winner. In its election-eve polls, Morgan got it wrong on three of the past six elections (1990, 1993, 2001), while Newspoll did only marginally better, incorrectly calling two of the six (1993, 1998), whereas Centrebet and other bookies have got it right every time).
The Conservatives look like increasing the number of seats they hold in every state bar one, including quite a number of seats always considered safe seats for Labour. The swing toward the sitting conservatives was 3.4% at this stage - ALL polls predicted a swing away from them, varying from 2 to 4% over the campaign - the only question was whether the swing away would be enough for them to lose government.
No polls at all even considered the possibility of the Conservatives gaining control of the Senate, which now looks quite likely (counting continues as I write this) and which hasn't happenned in 20 years.
Interestingly, I believe that had the polls indicated that it might happen, it wouldn't have happenned (a self-reversing prophecy?) because Australians were generally pretty happy with the idea of a minority party holding the balance of power in the Senate (traditionally called "keeping the bastards honest" here). (We only elect half our Senators at each election - they sit 6 year terms - so gaining control will be an extraodinary feat if accomplished)
Cheers Russell C.
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