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Last month, David Pocock became the first Independent senatorto represent the ACT.

His victory was improbable but not entirely unexpected: the former rugby union star hasan international profileand many Canberrans volunteered to help him.

In the weeks before his election, his main opponents showed signs they were nervous about his growing support.

Labor invested significantly more effort (and money) than it usually does to rally support for its senator, Katy Gallagher.

Advance Australia, a Liberal-aligned lobby group, spent even more it told Canberrans repeatedly that Senator Pocock was an extremist who was disguising his Greens sympathies.

Look back at how the 2022 Australian federal election unfolded

Ultimately, Senator Gallagher was re-electedbut with Labor's lowest-ever vote in the ACT.

And the Liberals' Zed Seselja became Australia's first territory senator to lose their seat at an election.

The ABC has analysed every ballot cast in the ACT Senate race.There were some surprising results and not just Senator Pocock's victory.

It took three-and-a-half weeks to formally declare the ACT Senate results,but the outcome was obvious on election night.

While Senator Pocock's party had significantly fewer first-preference votes than the Liberals(21.1 per cent to 24.8 per cent), his victory was a fait accompli.

Below is a simplified view of how the votes flowed, over dozens of preference distributions, to elect two senators.

Collectively, Labor's two candidates had more votes than the quota required for election in the ACT, which isone third of all votesplus one (or about 33.3 per cent).

However, Senator Gallagher fell 313 votes short. For the first time, an ACT Labor candidate needed to rely on preferences to be elected.

Mr Seselja's vote also dropped to a record low. And, as expected, only a trickle of preferences from minor parties went to the Liberals.

Senator Pocock's first-preference haul was not unprecedented: the Greens have done better twice (Kerry Tucker in 2007 and Lin Hatfield-Dodds in 2010).

The difference this time was that otherchallengers the Greens' Tjanara Goreng Goreng and independent Kim Rubenstein also polled well.

Ultimately, Senator Pocock won easily as he was the preferred choice of minor-party voters, who were more influential this election than in any other.

Senator Pocock was always seen to be targeting Mr Seselja's seatrather than Senator Gallagher's.

So it was a surprise when ACT Labor became so spooked by Senator Pocock's campaign that it significantly ramped up efforts to secure votes.

While Labor was never close to losing, perhaps its fear was reasonable.

This chart shows that the vast majority of Senator Pocock's supporters, when pressedto choose a major party, opted for Labor or the Greens rather than the Liberals.

Only one in six preferenced Mr Seselja above Senator Gallagher and Dr Goreng Goreng.

This suggestsSenator Pocock convinced more Labor voters to switch to him than Liberal voters.

There may be other explanations for example, he might have attracted large numbers of "tactical" voters, whose loyalty is still with Labor.

Either way, Senator Pocock's supporters are generally progressive rather than conservative.

Similarly, Professor Rubenstein who, like Senator Pocock, had the support of the Climate 200 advocacy group was of almost no interest to conservative voters.

Professor Rubenstein's "Kim for Canberra" campaign attracted a not-insignificant 4.4 per cent of first preference votes.

Analysis of those ballot papers suggests only one in eightof them supported the Liberals.

The 2022 election was a clear success for left-of-centre candidates.

But while the progressive vote expanded, it also fractured.

Senator Pocock's election and the rise of minor parties more broadly poses electoral challenges for Labor and the Greens.

How? That's best explained by looking at a hypothetical election in which Senator Pocock did not stand.

This year's federal election was always going to be difficult for the Canberra Liberals.

The Morrison governmenttanked across the country (except in Tasmania), and local debate centred on Mr Seselja's unpopular opposition to territory rights.

Yet while federal Greens leader Adam Bandt called the national outcome a "greenslide", this was untrue of the ACT.

This chart maps which major parties Canberrans preferred in 2019 and 2022.

Underlying support for the ACT Greens did not budge at all, despite the "greenslide", Mr Seselja's unpopularity and a deep swing against the Coalition nationally.

In fact, Mr Seselja would likely have beaten Dr Goreng Goreng to the second Senate seat had Senator Pocock pulled out of the campaign.

How do we know? The ABC re-ran the ACT Senate election, using Canberrans' ballots as a guide but filtering out preferences for Senator Pocock's party.

Senator Gallagher coasted in, and Mr Seselja pipped Dr Goreng Goreng for the final seat (34 per cent to 30.5 per cent).

Of course, there are limits to this hypothetical exercise: Canberrans might have voted very differently in a campaign with different candidates.

But the results suggest that Mr Seselja didn't lose the election Senator Pocock won it.

If Senator Pocock fares poorly over the next three years, or decides against running for re-election, the Canberra Liberals will be very well placed to regain a senator.

The question for them now and all other Liberal branches is: what kind of Liberal do Canberra voters want?

The ACT Greens, meanwhile, face their own challenge. How do they mobilise the kind of support that Senator Pocock did?

Posted6h ago6 hours agoSun 19 Jun 2022 at 8:45pm, updated1h ago1 hours agoMon 20 Jun 2022 at 1:58am

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Which Canberrans voted for David Pocock, and what does this mean for the Liberals' future? - ABC News