Good, bad or indifferent: State Libs hit the phones
If the Libs are forced to conduct polling in Bragg, how worried must they be about neighbouring Hartley, Morialta and Unley? asks Mike Smithson.
Almost anyone, anywhere in the state could expect an automated phone call or text message from a mysterious and unknown mobile phone number over the coming weeks.
If you choose to answer or respond to this suspicious-looking communication, there’s every chance it’s authorised political polling from the state Liberal party.
There’s nothing illegal about this process, but it’s likely that you’ll receive it during evening mealtime and it’s almost certain to be a nuisance you can do without.
How and where pollsters access personal mobile phone numbers in specific electorates is another question altogether.
Adding to the secrecy and intrigue is that there’s no obvious political branding articulated by the gormless, mechanical Robocall voice which left me scratching my head as to which major or minor party had initiated it.
My wife’s text message approach the following evening allowed her to dig deeper and discover it was authorised by Alex Hyde, the State Director of the Liberal party.
Hyde wouldn’t be drawn into specifics but told me this week the party “never takes a single vote for granted”.
He promises a statewide approach to winning or retaining seats, as he and many other party- faithful recover from the recent federal election train wreck.
“As would be expected, the South Australian Liberal Party undertakes a continuous research program throughout each electoral cycle,” he said.
There’s another reason why the polling will be ramped up over the coming weeks.
Under changed legislation, political parties’ campaign spending is capped at $4.025 million for the election year.
That might seem like a pretty penny, but it’s been wound back since the last state election where the spending cap was $4.48 million.
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That allowance comes from a complex formula based on how many votes a party scored last time around, and that cash handout comes from the taxpayer’s purse.
Have the Liberals already hit the panic button given the federal election disaster and the commonly predicted wipeout in SA next March?
Hyde certainly won’t concede defeat on any level, preferring to say the research is aimed at finding a way to make undecided voters move in the Lib direction.
I’ve lived in the state seat of Bragg for almost 20 years and have never been polled by the Liberals.
Over that journey, Liberal supremacy was guaranteed.
Graham Ingerson held the blue-ribbon seat with a handsome margin.
The first glimpse of a changing trend emerged when Vickie Chapman’s margin halved from 16.9 per cent to 8.2 per cent after the 2022 election
Liberal incumbent Jack Batty, who won a by-election after Chapman’s resignation, now moves into the marginal, rather than safe column.
In my opinion, if the Libs are forced to conduct polling in Bragg how worried must they be about neighbouring Hartley, Morialta and Unley?
Let alone winning back Dunstan and Waite.
In short: very worried.
That’s why they’re keeping the polling method as secretive as possible.
The six questions are multiple choice with a heavy emphasis on the economy and Labor.
It invites respondents to list their greatest concern.
I suspect most will give the nod to cost of living, as I did.
It then asks the obvious question of who you would vote for if an election was held today?
It lists Labor, then the Libs and then all others.
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How do you rate the government’s performance?
Your first choice is: excellent.
As for best premier it almost invites you to give a big tick to Peter Malinauskas.
All this points towards a Labor slant, until almost the end of the tedious process.
It asks you if you’ve ever heard of incumbent MP Jack Batty as well as rating him as good, bad or neutral.
With those odds, Batty’s only likely to get 25 per cent of people favouring his public persona with the rest being negative, indifferent, undecided or asking Jack who?
I briefly saw him and his wife Charlotte at an art gallery exhibition opening last week and got the impression that he was a little sheepish about this polling.
If it returns a bad result for him and a good one for a Labor, where does that leave his confidence going into the business end of campaigning for the next nine months?
The Libs know any money spent in trying to sandbag formally safe seats means resources are spread thinner elsewhere.
They also know that any Labor polling might confirm the notion that they’re virtually home and hosed and therefore why waste the expense.
The other lurking issue is that Labor’s war chest is always more plentiful with major unions often chipping into the campaign.
But Labor hasn’t done any polling in state seats ahead of the 2026 election.
That could be a result of the federal Labor party recently doing all the work here in key seats, especially in its successful quest to win Sturt.
State secretary Aemon Bourke says state Labor has a reputation for distributing flyers and targeting specific needs in key electorates rather than expensive polls.
“A telephone poll ain’t going to change anything,” he quipped.
“Fatigue in the electorate and phones having been in meltdown (during the federal campaign) are other factors,” he said.
Costs can skyrocket to get these results.
Bourke says a Caller Assisted Telephone Interview (CATI) poll could cost up to $25,000.
He says cheaper Robocall polls don’t necessarily provide the specific information required.
Never-the-less, expect Labor to conduct other intensive research in its attempt to seize a swathe of state seats which it doesn’t already control.
Mike Smithson is weekend presenter and political analyst for 7 News.
