The numbers for the upcoming NT redistribution

By
Ben Raue
-
8

Everyone including myself is closely focused on the NSW state election, but I wanted to draw a bit of attention to an upcoming redistribution, for the 25 seats in the NT Legislative Assembly.

The period for public suggestions is now open, closing in late March. The process is meant to conclude in September, with the draft boundaries published in May. You can read more about the process here.

I’ve put together a map showing how much each seat deviates from the quota, and summarised the deviation by region.

The seat with the largest surplus at the moment is Spillett, a seat that surrounds the Palmerston area and covers the space between Palmerston and Darwin. Spillett is 16.7% over quota, while Mulka in the top end is 10.1% over quota.

The seat with the smallest enrolment is Gwoja in the outback. Gwoja is 7.9% under quota, trailed closely by Fannie Bay in inner Darwin, which is 7.2% under.

I’ve grouped the seats into five regions. The Darwin area is about 17% short of the ninth quota, but the five seats have enough surplus population to cover that deficit. So we should see the Palmerston seats contract and likely see Spillett shed its western edge to bring the Darwin-area seats up to quota.

Region Seats Deviation
Alice Springs 2 -0.49
Darwin 9 -17.26
Outback 3 -12.51
Palmerston 5 21.01
Top End 6 9.25

Outside of the Darwin area, the outback seats are under quota while the top end seats are over quota. That top end surplus is entirely in the seat of Mulka – the remainder of the region is slightly under quota.

Finally here is the map. Now back to our NSW coverage.

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8 COMMENTS

  1. The electoral commission should take up your data maps. They’re alot more helpful however I did manage to navigate their data in order to provide a submission

  2. Arafura gains 600 voters from Mulka
    Araluen – no change
    Arnhem – no change
    Barkly gains 200 voters from Gwoja
    Blain – No change
    Braitling – no change
    Brennan – no change
    Casuarina – gains 400 voters from Wanguri
    Daly gains 100 voters from Katherine, 200 from Arafura, 200 voters from Goyder
    Drysdale – no change
    Fannie Bay – gains 400 voters from Fong Lim
    Fong Lim – gains 1000 voters from Spilett
    Goyder – 200 voters from Spillett
    Gwoja gains 700 voters Daly
    Johnston – gains 100 voters from Casurina
    Karama – gains 200 voters from Wanguri
    Katherine – no change
    Mulka – no change
    Namatjira – no change
    Nelson – no change
    Nightcliff – gains 200 voters from Casurina
    Port Darwin – unchanged
    Sanderson – gains 300 voters from Fong Lim
    Spillett gains 200 voters from Drysdale
    Wanguri – unchanged

  3. Very interesting, thanks for covering. NT seat changes are always a big deal – 400 voters is well over 10% of a seat’s actual voting population a lot of the time.

    Ben, in your submission, how did you redraw the Darwin region? As always the airport is a big problem and can result in some big boundary changes with very small actual population transfers.

  4. @josh in this case 400 votes is about 6.67% the airport is in Sanderson whihc is under quota so will be getting additional territory

  7. While, we’re on the topic of redistributions, here are my federal proposals:

    * New electorate called “Hastings” (after the Hastings River) encompassing Port Macquarie, the Camden Haven and maybe Kempsey and Wauchope, thus making Cowper only Coffs Harbour, Nambucca, Macksville, etc; also making Lyne just the Manning Valley (Taree) and Forster-Tuncurry
    * Maybe a split between New England, one half including Tamworth and the other including Armidale

    Any other thoughts?

Comments are closed.