LABOR and Liberal campaign strategists expect the preferences of Western Australia’s six minor parties to play determining roles in deciding the outcome of February’s State election.
Both have concluded neither major party commands the clear-cut electoral margin needed backing to win power in its own right.
Twenty-nine of the State’s 57-member lower house seats must be won to form government, with neither major party assured of winning 50 per cent plus one vote required in the 29 seats.
All up, WA’s six minor parties – the Greens, One Nation, the Citizens Electoral Council (CEC), Australian Democrats, Family First Party (FFP), and the Christian Democratic Party (CDP) – attracted nearly 16 per cent of the statewide primary vote, or more than one in six electors, at October’s Federal election.
Maximising second preferences from this sizeable non-Labor and non-Coalition bloc is the honey pot the majors are presently eyeing off.
Premier Geoff Gallop has signalled the seriousness with which he views the crucial preference issue by becoming personally involved in negotiations with the emerging conservative FFP.
The discussions were held in State Parliament and involved FFP national president, Peter Harris, and its senior electoral tactician, Darren Keneally, both from Adelaide, where the party was founded.
The FFP, which has shown considerable adeptness in negotiating preference swaps, has one member in the South Australian Parliament – Andrew Evans MLC – and Victorian Senator-elect Steve Fielding.
According to one Perth insider who met Mr Harris and Mr Keneally the FFPs’ primary aim was to thwart the Greens, who hold so much sway over Labor.
This means the FFP is both keen and willing to deal with Labor and the Liberals.
And its wheeling and dealing may well mean seat-by-seat deals rather than an across-the-board or statewide arrangement with either major party.
FFP WA president Robert Greaves, a former State and national Master Builders’ Association president, also participated in the talks with Dr Gallop. Sources said the candid discussions with Dr Gallop lasted 90-minutes with another meeting likely.
The FFP plans to contest seats in five of the State’s six upper house regions and standing candidates in all lower house seats.
Traditionally, WA Labor’s State secretaries or assistant State secretaries negotiate preferences deals with minor parties.
But because the coming State election was set to be a cliff hanger, and will almost certainly be determined by minor party preferences, Dr Gallop has decided not to leave these crucial negotiations to lay party lieutenants.
And the Liberals have not been slow off the mark, either.
Their party’s State executive has also met with the FFP’s negotiating team, and Opposition leader Colin Barnett is scheduled to become personally involved at a later stage.
Another reason Dr Gallop has taken the preference issue so seriously is because of Labor’s dismal total primary vote at the last State election.
He is keenly aware that he became premier four years ago with just 37 per cent of the statewide primary vote.
And the latest Westpoll shows Labor registering one percentage point below that low figure, with the Coalition registering 41 per cent.
On Federal election night Federal Labor frontbencher Stephen Smith said if Labor was unable to attract at least 40 per cent of a contest’s voters it couldn’t expect to win government.
The only reason this otherwise accurate assessment didn’t apply in WA’s 2001 State election was because the conservative-oriented minority One Nation Party scored a solid 9.6 per cent of the primary vote, with most preferencing away from Coalition candidates.
Moreover, most of those who backed One Nation were former Coalition supporters, and they appear to have now returned to the Liberals and Nationals, meaning Dr Gallop cannot expect their second preferences.
He and Labor’s master strategist Jim McGinty are aware of two crucial factors that have prompted the premier to become involved in the preferences talks.
The first is that Labor cannot expect a big leakage of preferences from One Nation, since that party’s backing slipped to just 2.52 per cent at the Federal election.
Secondly, Labor also cannot expect a significant preference lift from the Democrats, whose WA Federal election vote dropped to a dismal 1.49 per cent, even less than One Nation.
Labor traditionally attracts more than 65 per cent of Democrat preferences and, in the 2001 State poll, gained nearly 60 per cent of One Nation’s.
As well as the slump in the One Nation and Democrat primary vote, Labor strategists believe they’re only likely to attract about one in four preferences from Christian Democrat and CEC candidates.
Labor’s only bright spot is the WA Greens, who scored a respectable 7.67 per cent of the Federal vote, or half that won by all the minors, with about 80 per cent of these preferencing to Labor.
Even so that’s hardly adequate to fill the gap needed for Labor to be assured of retaining government. That’s why a preference arrangement with the FFP hasn’t been written off.
The opening gambit in such moves is firstly to convince the leadership of each minor party to agree to a preference deal.
That Dr Gallop has decided to negotiate with the FFP – which averaged just 1.17 per cent of the vote in the three Federal House of Representatives seats it contested on October 9, and 0.9 per cent in the Senate – shows how keen Labor is to attract every possible preference vote.
