Kevin Rudd may have inadvertently helped the Greens. Their Senate balance of power was endangered by the prospect of a landslide Coalition victory. But a revitalised Labor will now almost certainly poll much more strongly in the Senate. This will ensure the continuation of a Labor-Green Senate majority regardless of how well the Greens themselves poll. Only three Green Senators out of nine are up for re-election. Surplus Labor Senate votes will flow to the Greens improving the chances of Green candidates even without a stronger Greens performance.
But a strong Green vote is also now more likely because of the major government policy changes to heartfelt Green concerns about carbon pricing and asylum seekers. The Greens' chances don't even depend upon majority opposition to these new policies, but just strongly-held minority views. This appears to be the case, especially with asylum seeker policy which is more clearly seen as a 'lurch to the right'.
At the moment, according to the Newspoll published in The Australian last week, the Greens are polling at 10 per cent, less than the 11.8 per cent vote they achieved in 2010. For some time the Greens' polling has been below their 2010 vote, but it is not that far below, and the issues are moving in the Greens' direction. Rudd has been pitching for the youth vote since his return. But his new PNG solution to asylum seeker arrivals is unlikely to be attractive to young voters, which is where Green strength lies, especially among younger women aged 18–30.
The Greens now offer a clear alternative outside the mainstream on asylum seeker policies, opposing PNG and favouring onshore processing. The same Newspoll showed considerable scepticism about the approach of the major parties to asylum seekers. Rudd has gone some way to balancing the ledger as far as Labor and Coalition voters are concerned. Voters still favour the Coalition by a seven per cent margin (33:26) but back in February it was a 27 per cent margin in the Coalition's favour (47:20).
But almost half of the electorate are still unconvinced by either of the major parties. Ten per cent favour no party, 12 per cent favour another party, including the Greens, and a whopping 19 per cent remain uncommitted. The bigger the asylum seeker issue becomes the more likely that a considerable minority of voters will look for an alternative approach. The Greens only have to attract some