Where Dutton needs to win
With Labor turning around its fortunes since the start of this year, the Coalition is shifting resources in an attempt to get back in the race.
If yesterday's Newspoll is taken as an accurate picture of the national vote, then we are in a nearly identical situation to the 2022 election result, with Labor on a primary vote of 33% and the Coalition on 35%.
Newspoll currently shows Labor leading the national two-party-preferred vote 52-48% — the same as the last election result, which gave Labor a bare majority of 77 seats and the Coalition 58 seats.
But while the polls may be converging around similar primary and two-party-preferred numbers as 2022, the state of play around the country is quite different. Labor’s vote is way down in Victoria, about the same in NSW and higher in some of the smaller states.
This is why the Liberals have been pulling resources out of some areas in NSW, such as the Labor-held electorate of Parramatta, to focus on more winnable seats in that state. And they are doubling down on Victoria, where Peter Dutton needs to win more than half a dozen seats.
