05-05-2025
Tasmanian Liberals reflect on how Coalition campaign didn't 'read the tea leaves'
A Liberal senator for Tasmania says the party's campaign headquarters did not "read the tea leaves" and ignored warnings that the campaign was not going their way.
In Saturday's election, the Coalition failed to win any Tasmanian lower house seats.
Labor took both Braddon and Bass from the Liberals with
Labor also looks set to keep Franklin, leaving just Clark, held by independent MP Andrew Wilkie.
Election essentials:
From two lower house seats to none. The Liberals in Tasmania are facing a crushing defeat.
(
ABC News: Manika Champ
)
Liberal senator Jonathon Duniam, whose seat was not up for re-election, told ABC Mornings that things went clearly wrong.
"Frankly, I think there are a lot of questions to answer, particularly on the mainland," he said.
"Our campaign headquarters in Paramatta didn't read the tea leaves, didn't talk to us in Tasmania, didn't understand Tasmanian issues.
"We'd been pleading with them for quite some time to allow us to run our Tasmanian-specific approach to campaigning, which worked well in 2022.
"You'd remember, we bucked the trend and
Senator Duniam has been a Tasmanian senator since 2016.
(
Supplied: Jonathon Duniam
)
Campaign HQ 'in genuine shock'
Senator Duniam said there were a range of policy ideas and projects that the Tasmanian Liberals wanted to advance but were blocked by the party's campaign headquarters.
Photo shows
A young couple
From the outer suburbs to the seaside, the Coalition was abandoned by its core base. The ABC spoke to voters in key changing seats to ask why.
"We didn't get to talk about the local health issues that we wanted to talk about," he said.
"And there are people in genuine shock in our campaign headquarters wondering how we did this … we knew weeks ago we were in trouble … you only have to go out and gauge feedback at listening posts or out door-knocking.
"There was a degree of politeness but it wasn't the warm embrace that the pollsters that we were using internally were telling us we should be expecting.
"
We did our own polling here in Tasmania and that is when we knew we were in trouble.
"
Bridget Archer was not expected to lose her seat in Bass, according to election analysts.
(
ABC News: Manika Champ
)
Move from Canberra-centric focus needed, former MP says
The retired Liberal Member for Braddon, Gavin Pearce, also commented on what went wrong for the Coalition.
Photo shows
Labor supporters in red t-shirts put their fists into the air and cheer.
It was something no-one saw coming — not even Labor dared dream the election would go this well, writes Lucy MacDonald.
He told ABC Mornings the lack of a locally focused campaign was a significant factor in the party's loss.
"I've also been a local-centric politician. I don't care much for Canberra. I go there for a job, for a reason and my main focus is the electorate," he said.
"I think if there was more of that and less of Canberra-centric focus we'd be in a different place."
Mr Pearce also said the party's loss was a "federal trend" and a "demographic issue" that was not helped by the impact of "Trumpism".
Former opposition leader Peter Dutton also lost his own seat in Dickson.
(
ABC News: Manika Champ
)
"All of these things added up and I don't think it was any one thing — I think it was a combination and a culmination of many things put together,"
he said.
"My advice at the moment is we just need to settle and remove the emotion … the 'I said, he said, she said', emotional side of it needs to be removed … we then need to have a critical look at what went wrong and where did it go wrong.
"We need to listen more to the electorate, to the constitutes, to what they need and what they want."
Loading
