Congrats Graham. Among commentators I've listened to this week on the QLD election, Graham is the only one to have called it.
There was even a hint of ridicule, I detected, from a fellow (female) prognosticator when Graham made his call, which it has to be acknowledged was brave. I mean who could have foreseen this incredible result?
Politically, I'm sure Graham wishes were wrong, though I'm revelling he was right.
What remains in prospect federally could be just as spectacular.

Really?

Did you call it like turned out, Graham?

Pretty amazing if you did!

If the Queensland election results aren't a loud wake up call to the Coalition and Abbott isn't dumped within the next 60 days, I predict the exact same results for the next Federal election. Abbott has to go!

I do like to skite especially when I can produce this post from 2012.
OK I was out on the fall of house prices but that will come.
It was not on this forum but another I frequent.
Prediction about Queens land for 2015
Save this letter and refer to it in three years time, because it will be spot on as a fulfilled prediction.
The People of Queens land will by then be really feeling the pain. Mining, Fracking, huge port building and displacing farms for mines will be getting into its stride.
There will be an influx of flyin/flyout workers that will be working for a lot less than their Australian counterparts used to.
Where feasible, even they will have been replaced by robot machinery to make even more profits for big business.
House prices will tumble because the workers who were paying off mortgages on high wages from Queensland mines will be out of work and no longer be able to service their loans.
A glut of houses will kill the housing market.
By then there will be most likely a further down turn in the World economy that will damp down the Chinese demand for minerals.
The Liberals will blame it on many years of Labour government.
What could the voters in Queensland have done?
Well vote for any alternative party to reduce the all-powerful mandate they have given the libnats. Yes even the Greens and Katter.
Too late now but keep it in mind for the next election.
Posted by Robert LePage on 26/03/12 at 09:52 AM

While I didn't vote for labor myself, I was not comfortable with the LNP's asset sale/lease proposal, mainly because we are about to enter unchartered territory, that being a huge revenue boost from the CSG royalties, which, up until now has been in infrastructure stage and very little revenue has gone to the government.

My only hope now is that labor have to ability to use the money wisely, and given even they have been caught off guard, along with their track record, I fear that confidence will be our biggest looser.

I hope I'm wrong!

Hi Poirot, Graham did indeed call it and he really should clain kudos and so develop his public/political profile.
I can only paraphrase as I don't have a recording, and don't even remember where I heard the interview. But I did also hear Graham opine that in the event Labor didn't get over the line, Anastacia Palaszczuk would certainly not be leading the party at the next election. I must admit I thought the same thing, but a female commentator contradicted that bringing Labor back from the brink, Palaszczuk was hardly going to be dismissed as a dummy-leader, only in that position because she put her hand up after the rout of Labor last time.
I think Graham (and me) got that wrong. Even if she fails to become Premier, she has presided over an unprecendted comeback that has to be respected. In any case, for me anyway, she's already gone up in my estimation.
Personally, I think there's far too much personality politics and I've always voted on ideology--not personalities, and only on policy when it's in keeping with my ideological position. I've thus been unable to vote Labor for many years (though of course my Green vote goes to Labor).
I think if more people voted on principle, rather than their own perceived selfish interests, our political parties would be able to pursue their real political agendas. As it is, Labor and LNP are virtually identical and for my money it's the fault of the electorate.
Anyway, kudos to you, Graham.

I think those of us who are interested may be placing too much expectation of rationality on our fellow citizens, when it comes to voting.

On the way to the pooling place, my well educated, but disinterested lady, asked me "which ones wants to sell everything to China". This indicates the power of a 30 second add, to get something believed.

When I wondered out loud how anyone, who had seen & heard her, could possibly vote for Palaszczuk to become premier, my 30 something, very busy daughter, educated, full time job, & 2 kids 6 & 8, asked who she was.

I think we are asking too much to expect seriously considered opinions on who is best to lead our state or country. I think it comes down, for many, to just a couple of 30 second commercials, which way they will vote.

I forgot to add that I am available for consultation on political futures at an enormous price.
This offer is only open to non Lib Nazi Parties.
I would not give them the benefit of my amazing foresight at any price.

Sadly, Hasbeen, I think you're right. Even most of those who do ostensibly vote on issues (hegemonically constructed), have merely adapted their 'concerns' to their own best interests. My anecdotal experience informs me that people either defend what suits them as 'a good in itself', or they're the unconscious minions of the elitist establishment. How else can we explain public indifference to our society's vast disparities between abjection, and wealth and opportunity. The bovine majority seem to just accept that society be arbitrarily divided between wealth and poverty; or they're meanly content somewhere in between--inanely believing the old lie that the phenomenon is the product of 'meritocracy'.

Robert LePage,
they wouldn't consider your prognostications anyhow. It's the hallmark of conservatives (of every persuasion) not to reflect and not to take council. We're seeing that in spades from the LNP, State and Federal, since the election. It's all Labor's faultt, and the electorate was deluded and taken in.

I know little of Queensland politics, nor much of the two leaders. But the thought that another Labour government has been voted in, absolutely stuns me ? Do we have that short a memory to recall the mess that Labour has created both in Queensland and federally ? I just don't believe it, no matter how bad the Libs are ! That old saying really does ring true ? The people only get the government they deserve ?

Oh Sung Wu, Wayne Swan on Q&A tonight made it clear he had not
changed his aims and he still doesn't understand what he did.

I remember something Barnaby Joyce once said;

"Manage your debt or your debt manages you !"

""Manage your debt or your debt manages you !"

"Manage your GFC or you end up in a deep doo doo recession"

(like all those European countries who opted for austerity instead of stimulus)

o sung wu,
As the senior LNP organizer for the recent disaster, thanks to Campbell Newman and the PM, I suggest everybody reads Ayn Rands "Atlas Shrugged"
I also believe that the LNP should hand over government to the Labor Party for the next ten years the watch them beg for the 'managers' to return.

It would be churlish of me not to comment on Squeers' very generous advertisement and reference, particularly given our frequently snarky exchanges.

I think he was most likely listening to ABC RN Breakfast where the other commentator was Lorann Downer, who is a former ABC journo, an academic at UQ, and involved with the ABC's Vote Compass.

But I did repeat the prediction later that morning on ABC 612, at which time Janine Walker represents the left side of the debate, and I the right, so it is a bit more ideological, although we often cross over from where people expect us to be.

I wasn't quite right - I expected a slim Labor government and have the betting slip to prove it. But I think I was about the only serious commentator who was anywhere near the money. It is also still possible that there might be a minority LNP government.

Anyway, it is just a reflection on how I do my analysis. I go with the figures, whatever they say, and I apply a bit of knowledge as to how campaigns are run and what happens. I long ago got over the idea that because a party has held a seat for a generation that it will always hold it, and any serious student of politics should have too.

Two years out I would have said Newman would most probably win, and if he hadn't been such a clod, along with a great number of those around him, he would have been returned.

I have been told that a lot of people on social media predicted it, but there is a difference between wish fulfillment and serious analysis. As they say, a stopped watch is still right twice a day.

Squeers, Graham,

I have to admit that I don't know too much about Queensland state politics, even though Newman was always in the news.

I'll give you a view from someone who, on twitter, is most of the time pretty much surrounded by a sea of lefties.

Because of that, I initially had the impression that Newman was so disliked that he would be comprehensively thrown out. It was only when the election was called that I realised just how mammoth a proposition that was. When I first saw Anastacia Palaszczuk, she appeared quite wishy-washy to me - as if she'd been cast in the wrong role. But as the campaign wore on, she hung in there and seemed to be going okay.

So, Graham, as you know, social media is more likely to be driven by ideological and personal enmities. Those on the left on my twitter feed were more likely, a year or so out, to believe Newman's govt would be turfed, than they were during the election campaign.

They were far more sober and realistic after the election had been called - and there weren't too many of the serious ones who really thought Labor could pull it off...they tended to concentrate a lot on Newman losing his seat.

Anyway, great call on your behalf to have read the tea leaves so well.

Who would have thought that Labor could gain so many seats
in Queensland when they started with only nine. Not me!

I knew
that Campbell Newman was not popular, and that the selling
of assets was a big issue. As were the cuts to essential services,
unemployment, and corruption.

However the Labor leader being a female - I was
sure would not get in considering the previous female leader's
demise. But there you go. The voters made their message loud
and clear. Congratulations Graham! Well done for calling it!

Now what are your predictions for 2016 federally?

Foxy,

"Now what are your predictions for 2016 federally?"

Lol!...shall we say the situation is a tad "fluid" at the moment.

Far too early to say!

That is most interesting Foxy.

You say you know the cuts to essential services were unpopular, but the fact is there were no cuts to anything but dead wood in offices. Essential service spending & employment actually grew.

In the same way, my lady believed they were going to sell off assets, but they weren't. It shows the power of the media, particularly the ABC, which no one listens too, but does tend to set the agenda for the commercial people, that these things are believed.

I thought the lying by inflection was so obvious that none would fall for it, but I was wrong.

I thought it was smart to not denigrate Labor by highlighting their incompetence with the health department payroll debacle, or the water grid, but I can now see I was wrong.

I did think not mentioning our huge debt, bequeathed by Beattie/Bligh & their stuff ups was wrong, & in that I'm proven right. People have now got used to high government charges & forgotten them. $960 to register a car should remind them, but it doesn't appear to.

So yes, most interesting how wrong many peoples perception can be, when not watching all that closely. This is particularly so as I expect, even from Melbourne, you would be watching more closely than most.

Hasbeen,

It is interesting what filters through on MSM.

My 13 year-old (who's reasonably politically savvy for his age) used to yell out "ASSETS" whenever Palaszczuk appeared on the screen.

And of course there was Newman's "STRONG".

All rendered somewhat simplistic in the wash-up.

Hasbeen’s ranty observation is the very thing that puts people in the frame of mind for change. Just like Abbott and Newman’s arrogance. They all get what they force on others.

It won’t do a thing blaming the QLD public for not having your lopsided ideas of how a fair govt; must act. Some are that blinded by their worship they can not see reality. Radicalism will always pay the price of their actions or their ambitions

Dear Hasbeen,

Perhaps you need to get out more and tell
the frontline staff at the hospitals that
no cuts have been made to essential services.
Also when the state is losing more jobs than
Tasmania - you know that something drastic is
happening.

Decisions made in the kind of authoritarian and
arrogant manner demonstrated by both Mr Abbott
in recent months and Mr Newman over the past 3 years
only serve to erode the fragile trust between the
government and the people. Politicians will learn
that they cannot appear deaf or indifferent to
voter's concerns

G'day there CHRISGAFF1000...

If Labour were to be in power for another ten years, the country would end up like Greece ? I don't know whether or not we'd survive with Mr Wm SHORTIN at the helm for ten years ? Perhaps one day soon, we may have the opportunity to find out, then we'll be in an irretrievable financial mess forever. God help us, what an outlook !

In just 18 months of this government there is no workable plan to stop spending. They had no plan before the election. They had a pocket full of lies and a naive belief that reducing revenue by getting rid of the Carbon Price and mining tax the economy would be OK.

The ALP had plans to reduce spending and raise revenue but the LNP in opposition blocked everything. Right now, at this very moment, Tony Abbott still cannot tell us what his plans to reduce spending are. He has been a dud in every portfolio he has worked in. He was an effective opposition leader. He is a destroyer, not a builder.