Maxine Newlands, James Cook University
Minor parties were all the rage at the last election when, along with independent candidates, they secured almost a third of votes.
But they have failed to build on that success at this election. The biggest and best funded of the minor parties – the Greens, One Nation and Trumpet of Patriots – have all had disappointing results.
Few green shoots
The Greens are the largest party outside of the traditional two-party system. But they failed to launch on Saturday night.
In 2022, the Greens secured 12.2% of the primary support which returned a record four members to the lower house. This time around, their nationwide vote is up – but only marginally and not where it matters.
The party has lost big in Queensland, with Stephen Bates in Brisbane and Max Chandler-Mather in Griffith relinquishing their seats to Labor. Elizabeth Watson-Brown could hold on in the neighbouring seat of Ryan, though preference flows will be critical.
Peter Dutton might not be the only party leader to lose his seat, with Adam Bandt on a knife’s edge in Melbourne, which he has held for 15 years. Again, it will come down to the spread of preferences.
The Greens had high hopes for two other Melbourne-based seats. They remain a chance in Wills, but got nowhere near it in Macnamara.
And it is unlikely to snatch the New South Wales seat of Richmond from Labor despite running a close second on primary vote.
Balance of power
The Greens have performed much better in the Senate, where they will once again be the largest cross bench party with a predicted 11 seats.
While the ALP will clearly dominate the lower house in the 48th parliament, the Senate is looking to be more of a two-way spilt between Labor and the Coalition.
The Albanese government will likely require only the support of the Greens to pass legislation. This is a much better scenario for Labor than the previous parliament when it needed to stitch together all the Greens and four independents to navigate the Senate.
Once again, the Greens will effectively hold the balance of power. However, Labor will have other crossbench options, such as independents David Pocock, Lidia Thorpe and Fatima Payman if the Greens obstruct bills that are also opposed by the Coalition.
Minor party fizzers
Despite their disappointing result in the lower house, the Greens easily outperformed the right-wing minor parties, most of which flopped.
None more so than Clive Palmer’s newly registered Trumpet of Patriots, which fielded candidates in most lower house seats and in the Senate. It scored 1.8% of the vote, the highest positive swing of all the minor parties.
But it misfired everywhere, despite Palmer’s reported $A50-60 million advertising spend. While Senate votes are still being counted, Trumpet of Patriots is lagging behind both One Nation and the Legalise Cannabis Party.
Pauline Hanson’s One Nation recorded just over 6% of first preference votes, up only slightly on its 2022 result and nowhere near enough to win any lower house seats. However, there are enough disaffected voters in Queensland to return Malcolm Roberts to the Senate. Hanson won’t be up for reelection until 2028.
Hanson’s daughter Lee Hanson is an outside chance of securing a Senate spot for One Nation in Tasmania. Her main rivals are Jacqui Lambie and Legalise Cannabis, which is also in the mix to win the final Senate seat in Victoria.
Gerard Rennick’s People First party also failed to make an impression. So too, Fatima Payman’s Australia’s Voice.
What next for the minor parties?
Minor parties play an important role in the Australian political landscape, and have long been players in federal parliament.
The previous two elections have seen shifts away from the two-party system, with one in four voters preferring minor parties or independent candidates in 2019, and one in three in 2022.
On the numbers counted so far in this election, voters have favoured either the traditional major parties or the array of independent candidates.
The trend towards minor parties has been halted, at least for now.
Maxine Newlands, Adjunct Senior Research Fellow, Centre for Policy Futures, University of Queensland, Adjunct Principal Research Fellow, Cairns Institute, James Cook University
This article is republished from The Conversation under a Creative Commons license. Read the original article.
