Political voids must be filled

In mathematics, the sum of all the parts always equals the whole, particularly in a sealed system where nothing can get in or out. Therefore, it holds true in our electoral system that the gain of one party must equal the loss for another. The question is where that vote lands after all the counting is done.

The swings and roundabouts that have characterised Australia’s federal elections have clearly delivered so much for the major parties in past decades. This has been slowly changing. Like the Rota Fortunae, or a political seesaw, fortunes will fluctuate in Canberra. What’s different now is that the major parties are not always in exclusive competition.

Consider the 2022 election, where the Liberal–National Coalition faced the potential loss of its urban support in Victoria. While the outlook appeared unflattering, it was a slew of independent candidates—not Labor—that converted metropolitan voters.

Prime Minister Albanese’s 2025 victory was monumental, particularly in the number of seats won. This can be seen both as support for Labor and as a damning indictment of the Coalition. But to better comprehend the outcome, we need to examine the primary vote as a sum of the parts.

Labor and Albanese have entered their second term in government with only 34% of primary votes, compared to the Coalition’s 31%, with the balance of 35% going to third-party candidates and parties to the right taking a substantial portion of that. Let’s remember that our system still requires 50+1% to actually win a lower house seat. These numbers reinforce the principle that while there is a shift, being on the left or right still requires support from the centre to win.

Labor has well and truly settled into government, and Albanese continues to rise in fortune. The same cannot be said for the Coalition, which faces an ongoing identity and policy crisis that seems irreconcilable for now. This self-imposed period of isolation and lack of leadership creates not only a political vacuum but also an opportunity for those looking to fill it.

The first to reap the benefits of this schism is Pauline Hanson’s One Nation Party, through its increased representation in the Senate and its obvious appeal to voters seeking to park themselves to the right. This outcome is more evident in the Senate, with its proportional representation model, than in the lower house, which has a higher individual bar to success. But the point remains: where a party creates a void, it will be filled by others.

Even at the peak of Hanson’s personal popularity leading up to the 1998 federal election, where she had the advantage of being the sitting member in Oxley, it was still an impossible task for more than half the electorate to place her higher on the ballot than anyone else.

Pauline Hanson’s attempt to reclaim Oxley was ultimately futile without the support of Coalition voters, so she headed for better fortunes by switching at the last minute to the neighbouring seat of Blair. While she boasted a strong primary vote (36%), there was never enough support from the centre for her to win.

This outcome emphasises the difficulties One Nation and other third parties face in their attempts to find success in the House of Representatives, although that has been changing through the wins of the Teals and other independents from a conservative base. Again, the change has been on the right of centre, where competition for votes has intensified with more competitors in the game. This is bad news for the Liberals and Nationals.

If the separation of powers was designed to hold political leaders accountable, preferential voting similarly ensures political parties remain responsive and engaged. Failing to do that, voters do not abstain—they go elsewhere. Whilst the Greens saw their far-left base shrink at the 2025 election, losing their only lower house seat, the right can only watch as frustrated voters abandoned the Coalition for independents or those further to the right.

The longstanding success of the Coalition often relied on the functional partnership between its more moderate and conservative members. However, as this arrangement grows increasingly volatile, the political void will be filled by the likes of Teals, independents, Bob Katter, Clive Palmer, and Pauline Hanson. Like fortune, fate, and the political seesaw, the sum of the parts both gives and takes away.

The three major parties should take note that in our sealed system of politics, whenever a void is created, it must be filled by someone else.