Thread by @kevinbonham

Tasmania has the last Liberal state government in the country now so does that mean Tasmania is politically conservative? NO!

A thread following #NSWvotes to explain this issue.

#politas

1. It's easy to see from federal stats that Tasmania is not "conservative". Tasmania had Labor's highest state 2PP at every federal election from 1993 to 2019 (but not 2022).

2. The Tasmanian Liberal government has been dominated by moderates. The "moderates" have had the numbers and supplied all three Premiers from 2014 onwards. The current Premier, Jeremy Rockliff, is the most moderate so far, to the point of having been conspicuously so.

3. Yes there are very "conservative" MPs in the Tas Liberals and it's obvious who most of them are, but it has been a remarkable period of harmony at state level with very little public moderate/conservative conflict.

4. Another reason this Liberal govt has lasted so long is the Labor opposition. Labor's last govt (2010-4) was a fourth-term govt with an unpopular arrangement with the Greens and was smashed at the 2014 election. Recovery has not been easy.

5. Tas Labor was always going to find it hard to win back office after one term. It is debated to what extent a radical poker machine policy contributed to them losing in 2018 or whether they would have lost anyway.

6. In 2021 Tas Labor were up against pandemic incumbency, the handling of which had made then-Premier Gutwein stupendously popular.

They also spent much of the early campaign embroiled in faction fights and duly received a very poor result, especially in Clark.

7. It also doesn't help oppositions that Tasmania has Hare-Clark. It's really easy to get minority governments here and a lot of voters hate them, and will tend to vote for whoever looks like winning to avoid them.

Maybe Labor can win next time. We will see.