Malcolm Turnbull has preserved his one-seat lower house majority, with the Liberal John Alexander holding on in the crucial Bennelong byelection.
After a ferocious on-ground campaign in the north Sydney seat, Alexander prevailed on Saturday night over his Labor rival, Kristina Keneally, despite a two-party-preferred swing against the government of just over 5%.
The Liberals breathed a sigh of relief at the result, because the outcome was critical for the Turnbull government’s fortunes and for the prime minister’s internal authority, given Turnbull has battled both events and dissent for much of 2017.
As the brutal political year drew to a close, Turnbull used Barnaby Joyce’s return in the recent New England byelection and the subsequent passage of marriage equality legislation, as well as the recent bare-knuckle political assault on the Labor senator Sam Dastyari over his contact with Chinese donors, to shore up his position.
A defeat for the Liberals in Bennelong would have triggered a fresh round of internal instability, but the clear win allows the government to go into the new political year with its lower house majority intact.
Joining Alexander at his victory function on Saturday night, a visibly relieved and delighted Turnbull thanked the voters of Bennelong for the vote of confidence. The prime minister declared Alexander “the hero of the hour”.
“John Alexander had everything thrown at him, every lie that Labor could dream up was thrown at him, but John, as always, was straight and true and honest and he stuck to our principles and our policies and he talked about the 1,000 jobs a day we are creating in Australia,” the prime minister said.
A much more low-key Alexander took the microphone after Turnbull and thanked the voters and the volunteers. He characterised his experience on the hustings as a “unifying and humbling experience”.
Alexander said his overwhelming feeling was one of elation “but the immediate reaction that you have after that moment of elation is that you have a responsibility and that’s a responsibility to do your absolute best”.
Returning the compliment to his leader, with Turnbull highly visible during the byelection, Alexander declared the result “a renaissance of your leadership”.
Labor declared the loss a positive result. Keneally told supporters the ALP had achieved a swing of between 5% and 6% “in a safe Liberal seat”. She said if that result was repeated nationally, Labor would pick up more than 20 seats, and Bill Shorten would be the prime minister.
Labor’s star candidate said the Coalition had come to the contest with “no hope, no plans, only division and fear.”
She said Labor were always the underdogs, given she needed to achieve a 10% swing to claim the seat. “We needed to get 9,000 people to change their votes from how they voted a year ago.
“That is a huge ask in a 30-day campaign. Now, it is a big fight, but it is a fight worth having.”
Keneally urged Labor to maintain purpose and unity in the run-up to the federal poll, and said the anti-government swing was a direct reflection on Turnbull.
“I know when we do go to the next election, there will be millions of Australians who want to have their say on Malcolm Turnbull and his lousy government and what I say to them is, you have a choice.”
The Labor leader, Bill Shorten, who was with Keneally for the wash-up, said 2018 would be a year of “courage” for the ALP, and the party would continue to put people first.
The average two-party-preferred swing against an incumbent government at a byelection is between 4% and 5%. Historically, byelections triggered by MPs with constitutional issues have attracted something of a sympathy vote.
Labor had hoped for a swing of 5% or more, and while that benchmark was met, party insiders will be disappointed the swing wasn’t higher.
Speaking on the ABC on Saturday night, the manager of opposition business, Tony Burke, repeated Labor’s line that the Turnbull government had no grounds for complacency, because if the swing in Bennelong played out in a general election, the government would have been wiped out.
“The only accident of history the government’s got tonight is this byelection has happened in a 9% seat. Peter Dutton would be obliterated if a swing like this was on. Christian Porter would be gone,” Burke said.
Cory Bernardi’s Australian Conservatives party picked up more than 4% of the primary vote in Bennelong, a strong performance for a micro party which was only formed at the start of the year. The vast majority of those preferences flowed back to Alexander.
The positive result in the north of Sydney, while hard to replicate at a national level, given the party’s relative lack of infrastructure, boosts Bernardi’s status as kingmaker on the right, ahead of a state election in South Australia in March.