A quicksand of changed voter priorities, electoral boundary changes and taking past success for granted may undo the historic Teal wave which swept independent candidates into power in the 2022 election. Andrew Gardiner reports.
Polling and data research are sounding alarm bells for the Teal independent movement, whose remarkable cross-bench gains at the 2022 election face erasure at the hands of a resurgent LNP.
Privately commissioned and public polls from late 2023 have rung alarm bells for Teals in the electorates of Kooyong (Vic) and three seats on Sydney’s north shore, the latter facing an extra threat from mooted electoral boundary changes. “NSW (independents) will almost certainly lose numbers,” one insider told MWM.
“Not to put too fine a point on it, of the nine seats we’re looking at closely, only Clarke (Tas) and perhaps Indi (Vic) are in reasonable shape for the incumbent, independent MPs,” he added.
The rest, including Curtin in WA and both seats in metropolitan Melbourne, are absolutely at risk.
Only a “back to basics” approach of door-knocking and community engagement can protect the hard-won gains achieved by Teals in 2022, according to number-crunchers with connections to the Redbridge research group. Insiders fear it will be a battle to generate the necessary grassroots enthusiasm for such a strategy in seats like North Sydney, where MP Kylea Tink has adopted a different approach and faces competition with other independents should her electorate merge, as some expect, with a neighbouring seat.
After spectacular but hard-won successes in 2022, Teal MPs must convince their grassroots base that they’ve got to “do it all again,” to not take success for granted and, in one case at least, to convince them they’re not being taken for granted.
Seat redistribution
The first challenge first-term Teal MPs face as an election looms is redistribution. Population shifts away from NSW and Victoria over the past few years mean both states will lose one electorate each, and – while Victoria’s independent seats are not under serious threat – observers believe that North Sydney, held by Kylea Tink, could face a form of ‘merger’ with neighbouring Warringah (held by Zali Steggall) or LNP-held Bradfield to the north.
Changes to electoral boundaries pose an outsized threat to independent MPs, who rely on name recognition over party affiliation. “If, say, a Labor MP is forced to switch seats, they’ll still enjoy the support of rusted-on party support, whereas an independent must rebuild their profile, often from scratch,” Kooyong analyst and activist Brent Hodgson told MWM.
This is especially vexing for Tink. If North Sydney overlaps Warringah, she faces competition from Steggall, a two-term MP whose profile exceeds her own. If it’s Bradfield, there’s the matter of Nicolette Boele, who narrowly lost there in 2022 and has maintained her profile as the seat’s cheekily self-proclaimed “shadow representative,” complete with her own “electorate office” in Gordon.
A nightmare scenario for the movement would arise if nobody bowed out gracefully, and two Teals ran against each other in one seat. “All efforts will be made to ensure that doesn’t happen; Kylea Tink may be the one to miss out,” one operative told MWM. He added:
Kylea is in a spot of bother and hasn’t done herself any favours by drifting away from some of the movement’s movers and shakers.
Poor polling
While potential bad luck in the ebb and flow of electoral boundaries is something to be philosophical about, a recent set of poll results –and a shifting of voter priorities away from Teal-friendly issues like climate change and integrity in politics – will have set off the loudest alarm bells.
Private polling in Kooyong last November showed the LNP leading Teal independent MP Monique Ryan, 53-47 in a two-candidate preferred (2CP) match-up. At the time, the rumoured LNP candidate was former Kooyong MP and Treasurer Josh Frydenberg, but he has now officially dropped out of contention.
While it’s early days, this represents a swing of around six percent on the 2022 Kooyong result, which – if replicated in the nearby electorate of Goldstein – would also see sitting independent Zoe Daniel lose her seat.
Private polling in Kooyong (Vic., left) and in NSW (right) has alarmed Teal insiders. Sources: Kantar Group (Kooyong) Resolve Political Monitor (NSW).
Meanwhile, the LNP has rebounded in NSW – home to four Teal electorates in affluent parts of Sydney – since the last federal election. Recent history shows that in Teal seats with a strong Liberal history like Wentworth and North Sydney, fluctuations in voting intent have, for the most part, been a two-way exchange between LNP and Teals, meaning any rebound by the former is largely at the latter’s expense.
On 2022 boundaries, this means Mackellar (Sophie Scamps by 2.5 percent, 2CP) and North Sydney (Tink by 2.9 percent, pending redistribution) are especially at risk. Coupled with the peril facing independents in Victoria and WA, the Teal experiment could be a ‘one and done’ at the next election.
Voter priorities
Driving much recent polling is a shift in voter priorities. In 2022, the environment, the need for an anti-corruption body and the treatment of women were issues tailor-made for Teal candidates – almost all of them women – in affluent electorates described as “being able to afford a social conscience.”
Fast forward to 2024, and the sands of public predilection have well and truly shifted. Housing affordability, rental stress and the cost of living are now front and centre in our political debate, sparking demands for fewer migrants and a media-driven fear of asylum seekers.
Seizing on this shift, some former Liberal MPs tossed out in the Teal wave of 2022 are eyeing a comeback. Even affluent seats aren’t insulated from our current economic quagmire, with Kooyong insiders telling MWM that half of all mortgage-holders in that seat, formerly the “Jewel of the Liberal crown,” are under “significant stress.”
Tim Wilson (former Goldstein, Vic., MP) was first out of the blocks. In an interview announcing his candidacy, Wilson told Nine newspapers that his Teal nemesis, Zoe Daniel, and her cross-bench colleagues were “passengers with no connection to how a parliament works” and, therefore, little or no influence on the economic issues currently besetting Australians.
Conventional wisdom has it that the LNP eyes a return to power via the even-more-economically-stressed outer suburbs of Sydney and Melbourne, areas historically more susceptible to the asylum seeker fear-mongering and culture wars rhetoric Opposition Leader Peter Dutton has deployed in recent weeks. But affluent Wentworth or Goldstein – where each lost independent vote likely winds up in the LNP column – remain very much in play.
Peter Dutton’s angry crusades. You never know what you’re gonna get.
The fate of these Teal seats may well hinge on whether voters there feel comfortable enough about their finances to afford that aforementioned social conscience.
Most operatives associated with the various Teals agree one of the keys to addressing and influencing voter priorities and reassuring constituents that they’re responsive local members is a “back to basics” approach of community engagement and old-fashioned door-knocking over the media-and-advertising approach of the major parties. “It’s what won the day for us back in 2022; we can’t take grassroots support for granted,” one insider told MWM.
They have a way to go to convince punters. Bewildered criticism was a theme of focus groups held in mid-2023 and shared with MWM: “Where is she? She’s disappeared to Canberra.”
The Canberra bubble
The very nature of Australian politics means MPs are often away in the “Canberra bubble,” buried in tasks at odds with the concept of local representation. Such was the case after independent Kerryn Phelps won the Wentworth by-election (2018) and, some say, squandered a brief window to re-engage with her base before losing her seat the following year.
“They had seven months to regroup for another election, but her campaign dropped the ball. In contrast, Kooyong volunteers regrouped for a state election six months after the 2022 election, with nothing on the line (for Ryan),” one operative told MWM.
We stayed relevant to the Kooyong community, and you have to do that to combat the party machines we’re up against, he added.
“Wentworth in 2019 was a model for what not to do,” he added:
To one extent or another, Teal MPs have been trying to maintain a local profile, especially while door-knocking during the Voice referendum campaign. But insiders believe those to whom visibility is the primary focus have the best chance of re-election next time around.
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Teal-centric campaigning
In order to again overcome the LNP, Teal campaigns will have to combat the imposing influence of fossil fuel-funded groups like the Atlas Network and more familiar players in Australia’s corporate media, a bloc that can be relied upon to amplify fear, division and hip pocket worries that play into Peter Dutton’s hands. To do so, they must craft messages that resonate locally, conveyed for the most part by way of direct contact rather than expensive airwaves.
“Our message needs to be strategic, that we continue to be a point of difference from ‘politics as usual,” Sydney-based campaigner and commentator Denise Shrivell told MWM. “In that sense, it’s not that different to selling any commercial product; the (LNP’s) money and media volume is not all-important, but differentiation is.”
More locally, messaging to combat Tim Wilson’s “Teals are passengers” rhetoric is quite doable, Zoe Daniel’s campaign manager, Sue Barrett, told MWM.
“Independents like Zoe make the Labor government braver through nuanced, evidence-based input like applying a gender lens on workplace reforms,” Barrett said. “Zoe’s voice is heard in Canberra; we have clear proof of that.”
The task facing independents in around 18 months is daunting, but by no means insurmountable.
It involves smart messaging, the selling of accomplishments and – most importantly – a lot of shoe leather.
Ascending the mountain in 2022 was a monumental achievement for Teals, founded primarily on grassroots toil. To stay at the summit, another herculean effort is required.
An Adelaide-based graduate in Media Studies, with a Masters in Social Policy, I was an editor who covered current affairs, local government and sports for various publications before deciding on a change-of-vocation in 2002.