In response to Peter Brent's analysis in Inside Story (14 July 2016) of state-based voting trends witnessed at the 2016 federal election, Swinburne University's Paul Rodan offers a longer view of how electoral behaviour at state and federal polls has intersected at different times. Rodan argues that Queensland and Western Australia stand out in his analysis, in that incumbent state governments there, of either political persuasion, exert less influence upon the vote at federal elections, particularly in terms of support for federal Labor.