While the overall seat numbers in the Tasmanian House of Assembly have been very stable, that disguises more changes at the level of the individual MP.
For today’s post I am going to look at the statistics for how many MPs were replaced at each Tasmanian election, and how 2025 compares to the historical trend: MPs retiring before or at the election, or losing their seat, either to another party or to their own.
If you’ve been following my live blog, you would have seen that the preference count in the Tasmanian state election finished on Saturday, with the count in Bass being in doubt right up until the end.
Tasmania’s Hare-Clark system is proportional, but it’s not purely proportional. Each division elects seven members, and results are not just about how many votes each party receives – results are dependent on how preferences flow and how votes split within each party’s ticket.
1:33pm – In the electorate of Lyons, Liberal candidate Guy Barnett was elected first, but with only a very small surplus. His colleague Jane Howlett was just 22 votes short of a quota, so his surplus has elected her. She now has a surplus of 172 votes, and those will be distributed next. That shouldn’t take too long. After that, they’ll start knocking out the lowest-ranked candidates.
During the federal election count, I identified a number of issues with the data being published by the AEC. Two main issues emerged, where the AEC’s estimates did not seem to be correct.
Now that the Parliament has officially opened for its first sitting after the federal election, we’re off to the races with redrawing the electoral map for the next federal election, expected in 2028. No rest for the wicked.
Ben is joined by Kevin Bonham and Chris Monnox to discuss the results of the Tasmanian state election and prospects for the formation of a new government.
Tasmanian election results can often be simplified to totals for each party in each electorate. But votes aren’t cast for parties, they’re cast for candidates. When candidates are elected or excluded, preferences don’t always flow to fellow members of the same party (or “leakage”). A particularly efficient distribution of votes within a party group can also allow a party to compete for an extra seat beyond what the party totals might suggest.
There were some noticeable swings in the Tasmanian election, and there will be some changes in the Assembly, but overall the result seems to have produced a Parliament with a similar balance of power. That’s not great news for the government, because the outgoing Assembly had just voted no confidence in that very government.
6:00 – Polls have just closed for the 2025 Tasmanian state election. I’ll be live-blogging the results here tonight. I’m also going to have a go at posting some video updates on Instagram if you’re interested in that sort of thing. Stay tuned for some results updates right here.