Well I put up this piece of info on polls. Last month PM Howard was being told that he was close to toast according to the polls. For those not in the know Prime Minister Howard sent troops to Iraq over the supposed wishes of the general public as told by the left leaning media in Australia. Well look at the election results from Australia today.
http://www.news.com.au/common/story_page/0,4057,11019497%5E36596,00.html
Nation puts its trust in Howard
By Paul Colgan and wires
October 9, 2004
PRIME Minister John Howard has claimed victory in the federal election that returned him to office for a fourth term in a vote that saw surprise gains for the Coalition across the country.
Maybe next time ... Mark Latham waves to supporters. Speech
Labor failed to make any significant gains and senior party figures were conceding defeat just hours into the counting tonight.
Labor leader Mark Latham conceded defeat in a phone call to Mr Howard around three hours after polling finished in the eastern states.
Soon afterwards Mr Howard addressed supporters in Sydney and said he was "truly humbled" by the result and promised to "rededicate myself and all of my colleagues to the service of the Australian people".
He acknowledged Mr Latham's concession and thanked him for "the gracious things that he said."
"There can only be one winner when an election is held," Mr Howard said.
"We are joyful that the verdict has been given by the Australian people but never forget the fact that governments are elected to govern not only for the people who voted for them, but also for the people who voted against them."
The strength of support for the Coalition surpassed all expectations as Labor's vote collapsed in Tasmania and nationally the Coalition looked set to increase its majority in Parliament.
Early Senate results show the Coalition may also command a majority in the Upper House, which would allow Mr Howard to proceed with the sale of Telstra and other controversial Government plans held up by the opposition over the past three years.
Speaking to party faithful in Sydney, Mr Latham said Labor had run a positive campaign that supporters wanted and enjoyed, but it had fallen short.
"We ran on principle, we ran on our positive beliefs about hope and opportunity in this country," he said.
"We wanted to put forward hope and opportunity for the Australian people, and we'll continue to advance our beliefs and our policies in the Parliament in the coming three years."
He closed his address saying: "Thank you very much and I'll see you again."
As if to draw a line under the story of Labor's night, however, a car crashed and burst into flames around the corner from where Mr Latham was speaking.
The Greens increased their share of the national vote, with senior party figures lauding the expected win of a Senate seat in Tasmania as proof the Greens were "the third force" in Australian politics.
Senior Labor figures quickly doused any speculation of a challenge to Mr Latham's leadership. Defence spokesman Kim Beazley said he believed Mr Latham had in fact saved the party from electoral meltdown, based on disastrous internal party polling figures he had seen last year.
"I have mixed feelings (about the result)," he said from his electoral office in Rockingham, south of Perth.
"I have been dreading this night for the last 12 months.
"I assumed from a close study of our polling results late last year that we were likely to lose 25 to 30 seats whenever an election was held, so any seat less than 25 seats that we lose I regard as a stay of execution."
Nationally, the Government achieved an overall swing of 2.13 per cent on a two-party basis.
Election results showed:
THE swing was strongest in Tasmania where there was a 3.6 per cent two-party swing to the Government.
THE Prime Minister suffered a swing of almost 3.5 per cent against him in his own electorate but held his seat;
LABOR struggled to make significant ground in marginal mainland seats and appeared set to lose others;
LIBERALS Trish Worth in Adelaide and Ross Cameron in Parramatta looked set to lose their seats as some of the few comforts for Labor.
The pro-Government swing was weakest in South Australia, where it gained 0.4 per cent support.
Even the Nationals, who had been expected to fare badly, were on track to hold all of their seats and even pick up a Senate seat in New South Wales.
Labor's challenge collapsed early in Tasmania, where a voter backlash against Opposition Leader Mark Latham's promise to save the old-growth forests handed two seats - Bass and Braddon - to the Liberals.
Labor needed to win 12 seats to win power. But the losses in Tasmania made the task that much more difficult.
There were some gains.
Labor could also pick up the New South Wales seat of Richmond.
The ALP was on track to pick up the marginal Adelaide seat of Hindmarsh, where Labor candidate Steve Georganas was ahead by 1.2 per cent with almost 40 per cent of the vote counted.
But in the nearby Adelaide seat of Makin, sitting Liberal Trish Draper was holding on to a narrow 0.7 per cent lead with almost 30 per cent of the vote counted.
In the nation's most marginal seat of Solomon, based around Darwin, the Country-Liberal Party's sitting MP David Tollner was ahead by 5 percentage points with half of the vote counted.
In Dobell in New South Wales, sitting Liberal member Ken Ticehurst was almost 10 points ahead with half the vote counted.
