Australian Federal Election, 2018 (Casting Shadows)

A Federal election for the Parliament of Australia was held on Saturday 6 October, 2018 and was the result of a call for a double dissolution by the Governor-General Sir Peter Cosgrove. As a result, all 150 seats in the House of Representatives, as well as all 76 seats in the Australian Senate were up for election.

The election saw the Liberal/National retain power despite a drastic decline in the number of seats in the House of Representatives, whilst the opposition made small gains, winning for a net gain of 2 seats in the lower house. One of the major reasons attributed to the electoral losses was that both the Liberal, National, and other Coalition parties ran in a number of electoral districts alongside each other, splitting the vote. Due to these circumstances, the Coalition would later go onto amalgamate into the country wide Liberal National Party (LNP).

Following on from their success in the 2016 election, minor parties/independents continued to make major gains, many winning the districts where the Coalition's vote split. The election saw the Palmer United Party (renamed the Australian United Party in August 2017) win big, gaining 5 seats for a total of 8. The Greens lost 1 seat due to a retiring ministers, leaving them with only 1 remaining in the entire house, whilst Bob Katter also resigned, leaving his party (Katter's Australian Party) with only 1. That leaved a the rest of the seats to be occupied by 12 independents, the majority of which would go onto support the LNP.