Have constructed another electorate table from George Megalogenis's excellent Oz data. This one has percentage of households paying off a mortgage. Am using for a piece I'm writing for the Fin Review.

The percentages range from 52.5 percent in Holt in Melbourne (which also tops this Parl House Census table, if you sort it, of couples with dependent children) to 18.7 percent in Sydney's Wentworth. I have also included current margin, AEC socio demographic classification and the swing in 2004. 

Outer and inner metropolitan

No surprises in "outer metro" accounting for 9 out of the top 10 seats. The odd one out is the rural seat of McEwen; you have to go all the way down the 31 to find an "inner metro" seat (and then each of the first three "inner metros" - Canberra, Fremantle and Fraser - is really a combo of inner and outer.) Continue reading below the table.

Electorates by percentage of families paying off mortgage

Seat (state) margin, AEC category (r = Rural; p = Provincial; o = Outer metro; I = Inner metro; see here and here), percentage paying off home, [2004 swing to Labor] Click any seat for Antony's page.

And all the bottom seats are "inner metro" except for Lingiari (which with 43.5 percent Aboriginal population is unique). 

The 2004 and 2007 swings

In general, seats at the top of the table swung to the Coalition much more than those at the bottom. In fact, while the top ten averaged 3.9 percent to Howard - twice the national figure - the bottom ten averaged small movement towards Latham, 0.2 percent.

Most commentators expect the seats that swung big to Howard in 2004 to "correct" this time. Antony Green, for example, near the bottom of his Holt page (under "Assessment") reckons that

"[a]fter the big swing in 2004, you would expect Holt to revert to being a safe Labor seat in 2007."

That is, they expect a standard "outer middle" victory for Labor. But I anticipate the opposite - that Holt, for example, will have a below average swing to Labor in 2007.

Latham factor?

Everyone agrees there was a "Latham factor" which blew out the government's vote in 2004. But broadly, there are two views about this. One is that the seats which swung big-time in 2004 experienced the Latham factor big-time. Therefore they should correct in 2007, which means they'll swing relatively big to Labor.  This is what most observers believe; see Antony, above.

On the other hand, you could see it as a national Latham factor - a swing to the government - with individual seats doing their own thing underneath that. That's how I see it. (Of course, a combo of both is probably closest to the truth.)

In general, I reckon the seats with most plasma tellies/mortgages/kiddies splashing around the blow-up swimming pool will stick, relative to the rest, with Howard. They'll be more scared of change. But overlayed on this is a national "correction" of the Latham factor, plus a mood for change.

If you know what I mean.

(AFR piece will put it all more succinctly.)

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