2018 Lower Austrian state election

The 2018 Lower Austrian state election was held on 28 January 2018 to elect the members of the Landtag of Lower Austria.

The ruling Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) fell just short of an absolute majority of votes, but retained its majority in the Landtag. Nonetheless, this was its worst result in the state since 1998. The Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) and Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) made gains, with the latter doubling its share of seats. The Greens took minor losses, while NEOS – The New Austria (NEOS) contested its first state election in Lower Austria, debuting at 5.2%. Team Stronach, which had won 9.8% in the previous election, did not compete.

Background The Lower Austrian constitution mandates that cabinet positions in the state government (state councillors, ) be allocated between parties proportionally in accordance with the share of votes won by each; this is known as Proporz. As such, the government is a perpetual coalition of all parties that qualify for at least one state councillor. After the 2013 election, the ÖVP had six councillors, the SPÖ two, and Team Stronach one.

Electoral system The 56 seats of the Landtag of Lower Austria are elected via open list proportional representation in a two-step process. The seats are distributed between twenty multi-member constituencies. For parties to receive any representation in the Landtag, they must either win at least one seat in a constituency directly, or clear a 4 percent state-wide electoral threshold. Seats are distributed in constituencies according to the Hare quota, with any remaining seats allocated using the D'Hondt method at the state level, to ensure overall proportionality between a party's vote share and its share of seats.

Contesting parties The table below lists parties represented in the previous Landtag. Name Ideology Leader 2013 result Votes (%) Seats Councillors ÖVP Austrian People's Party Christian democracy Johanna Mikl-Leitner 50.8% SPÖ Social Democratic Party of Austria Social democracy Franz Schnabl 21.6% FPÖ Freedom Party of Austria Right-wing populismEuroscepticism Udo Landbauer 8.2% GRÜNE The Greens – The Green Alternative Green politics Helga Krismer 8.1%

Team Stronach, which contested the previous election and won 9.8% of votes, five seats, and one state councillor, did not contest the 2018 election.

In addition to the parties already represented in the Landtag, four parties collected enough signatures to be placed on the ballot.

NEOS – The New Austria (NEOS) Christian Party of Austria (CPÖ) – on the ballot only in Amstetten, Melk, and Mödling We for Lower Austria (WFNOE) – on the ballot only in Baden

Opinion polling Polling firm Fieldwork date Samplesize ÖVP SPÖ FPÖ Grüne NEOS Others Lead 2018 state election 28 Jan 2018 – 49.6 23.9 14.8 6.4 5.2 0.1 25.7 Research Affairs 16–18 Jan 2018 413 45 23 21 5 5 1 22 OGM 8–16 Jan 2018 831 45 26 19 5 5 – 19 Public Opinion Strategies 2–11 Jan 2018 805 48 23 17 5 6 1 25 Market January 2018 ? 46 24 17 5 6 2 22 Unique Research 2–10 Jan 2018 500 47 23 18 5 5 2 24 Research Affairs 3–5 Jan 2018 410 45 22 21 4 5 3 23 SOZAB 30 Oct–25 Nov 2017 1,500 50 22 16 5 4 3 28 OGM 9–14 Nov 2017 784 45 25 20 4 4 2 20 2013 state election 3 Mar 2013 – 50.8 21.6 8.2 8.1 – 11.3 29.2

Results Party Votes % +/− Seats +/− +/− Austrian People's Party (ÖVP) 450,812 49.63 –1.16 29 –1 6 ±0 Social Democratic Party of Austria (SPÖ) 217,289 23.92 +2.35 13 ±0 2 ±0 Freedom Party of Austria (FPÖ) 134,085 14.76 +6.55 8 +4 1 +1 The Greens – The Green Alternative (GRÜNE) 58,401 6.43 –1.63 3 –1 0 ±0 NEOS – The New Austria (NEOS) 46,801 5.15 +5.15 3 +3 0 New Christian Party of Austria (CPÖ) 584 0.06 –0.03 0 ±0 0 ±0 We for Lower Austria (WFNOE) 367 0.04 New 0 New 0 New Invalid/blank votes 14,468 – – – – – – Total 922,807 100 – 56 0 9 0 Registered voters/turnout 1,386,356 66.56 –4.31 – – – –Source: Lower Austrian Government

Results by constituency Constituency ÖVP SPÖ FPÖ Grüne NEOS Others Totalseats Turnout % % % % % % Amstetten 52.7 2 23.0 1 13.8 5.5 4.6 0.4 3 69.4 Baden 40.1 2 29.0 1 15.9 7.8 6.6 0.5 3 61.5 Bruck an der Leitha 41.7 1 30.3 1 17.0 6.3 4.7 2 60.7 Gänserndorf 46.4 1 28.2 16.5 5.3 3.6 1 62.5 Gmünd 53.9 26.1 13.3 3.5 3.2 0 69.5 Hollabrunn 58.1 1 19.7 13.2 5.4 3.6 1 70.4 Horn 65.0 15.8 11.7 4.1 3.4 0 72.7 Korneuburg 49.4 1 22.7 13.3 8.2 6.4 1 65.0 Krems an der Donau 54.0 1 20.2 14.1 6.1 5.6 1 70.4 Lilienfeld 48.6 29.5 13.8 4.4 3.6 0 72.1 Melk 52.4 1 22.7 16.0 4.6 3.9 0.4 1 70.8 Mistelbach 57.1 1 19.6 13.8 5.7 3.9 1 70.5 Mödling 43.4 1 23.0 1 11.4 11.7 10.2 0.3 2 64.1 Neunkirchen 45.5 1 28.9 1 17.1 4.6 3.9 2 66.2 Sankt Pölten 45.8 2 26.6 1 14.1 7.8 5.7 3 66.2 Scheibbs 59.5 20.1 12.1 4.4 3.9 0 72.4 Tulln 50.9 1 20.1 13.4 9.0 6.6 1 65.7 Waidhofen an der Thaya 55.0 16.8 20.4 4.5 3.3 0 69.8 Wiener Neustadt 45.7 2 26.6 1 18.3 4.8 4.6 3 63.0 Zwettl 63.4 1 13.1 15.6 4.3 3.6 1 73.2 Remaining seats 10 6 8 3 3 30 Total 49.6 29 23.9 13 14.8 8 6.4 3 5.2 3 0.1 56 66.6 Source: Lower Austrian Government

Preference votes Alongside votes for a party, voters were able to cast a preferential votes for a candidate on the party list. The ten candidates with the most preferential votes were as follows:

Party Candidate Votes ÖVP 1 Johanna Mikl-Leitner 186,133 77.4 FPÖ 1 Udo Landbauer 41,461 75.3 SPÖ 1 Franz Schnabl 39,950 58.8 ÖVP 2 Stefan Pernkopf 18,465 7.7 ÖVP 4 Karl Wilfing 7,491 3.1 ÖVP 6 Ludwig Schleritzko 7,091 2.9 GRÜNE 1 Helga Krismer 7,079 42.4 NEOS 1 Indra Collini 6,959 59.7 SPÖ 2 Karin Renner 4,309 6.3 FPÖ 2 Gottfried Waldhäusl 4,133 7.5

Aftermath The ÖVP retained its Landtag majority and six out of nine state councillors; the SPÖ also retained its two councillors. With the disappearance of Team Stronach, the FPÖ moved into third place on a strong swing, and won one state councillor.

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