Small parties forecast to have big impact on Australian election

More than 18 million Australians will head to the polls tomorrow to choose between the incumbent centre-left Labor party and its conservative-leaning Liberal-National Coalition challenger.

- Tory Shepherd

But one in three voters will brush off the major contenders - led by the prime minister, Anthony Albanese, and the opposition leader, Peter Dutton - in favour of another party, in an election marked by a cost of living crisis and the spectre of Donald Trump.

A typical polling day in Australia means heading to the local school or church on a Saturday, and scarfing down a democracy sausage - a banger on a slice of bread, often topped with onion and sauce.

Next is running the gamut of volunteers handing out how-to-vote cards, a feature of the country's preferential voting system. There will be volunteers in red, for the ruling Labor party, which is ahead in the polls. In blue is the Coalition opposition, whose promising start in this five-week election campaign seems to have unravelled.

The final Guardian Essential poll has 34% of voters giving their first preference to the Coalition and 32% to Labor. But once preferences are distributed, Labor would be ahead of the Coalition on 52.1% to 47.9%.

Depending on where the swings are, that is likely to put Labor in minority government, but potentially in majority government, a position consistent with other polls throughout the campaign.