New figures from Labor’s post-election review shed light on a long-suspected pattern – extensive tactical voting by Labor supporters in Teal and independent contests, with implications for future elections.

The official ALP review of Labor’s federal election campaign, made public on Friday, includes statistics that provide important clues about one of the mysteries of the last two elections – the extent to which the success of Teal candidates has relied and been based on tactical voting by Labor supporters.

It has been known that most of the people voting for Teal candidates have previously voted for Labor and the Greens and that probably less than 10 per cent of the Teal vote has come from disaffected Liberal voters – mainly middle-aged women.

What has been less clear is how many former Labor voters switched their vote knowing that the Labor candidate could not win, but that voting directly for the Teal candidate would give victory to the Teal, rather than a sitting Liberal MP.

Just giving a second preference to the Teal would be insufficient. The Teal primary vote needed to be higher than the Labor primary vote – otherwise Labor’s second preferences could not be distributed to the........

© Pearls and Irritations