It’s a common topic on this blog that I analyse how many men and women are nominated for each party, but it’s not really the most important measure. Ultimately candidate nominations are simply a means to an end, which is the final elected parliament of representatives. So for today’s blog post I’m analysing the likely gender balance of the next NSW parliament. Now that nominations have closed and we have some sense of the range of seats in play, we can gain some sense of the likely gender balance.
For this exercise I have classified seats as ‘safe’, ‘likely’ or ‘marginal’. 55 seats are safe, 13 are likely, and 25 are marginal. For the likely seats, I think it’s reasonably clear who is expected to win but I am cannot be completely sure. Seats in this category include Oatley, Ryde, Myall Lakes, Badgerys Creek, South Coast, Epping, Monaro and Drummoyne, along with Ballina, Kogarah and a handful of traditional safe Liberal seats with less impressive independent challenges.
The ‘marginal’ category includes Balmain, Heathcote, Leppington, most other marginal Coalition seats and the Liberal seats with more serious independent threats.
In plenty of these seats, even where I’ve classified as marginal or likely, the gender of the new MP is clear. Indeed I can identify at least three seats where it’s not clear who will win the seat, but we know a sitting male MP will be replaced by a woman: Balmain, Drummoyne and Parramatta.
So I’ve identified 43 seats definitely electing a man and 27 definitely electing a woman. There’s a further five men and five women I’ve classified as likely. Then there are 13 others that are marginal. For what it’s worth I am tipping the woman as more likely to win in 4 of these seats. Overall that would produce a total of 36 women and 57 men in the 93-seat Assembly.
So how does that compare to historical numbers?
The number of women in the Assembly was tiny right up to 1988, when an expansion in the size of the Assembly and a landslide Coalition victory swept in seven women, more than triple the previous number.
The Assembly contracted to its previous size in 1991 yet the number of women increase and it continued steadily increasing to a peak of 28% in 2007 before dropping back in 2011.
The last election elected 33 women and 60 men, or 35.5%.
My estimate of the likely number suggests the most likely outcome will see a small increase, but it is plausible that the number of women could decline. We're certainly not seeing a major step change.
Of course these seats are not random: if the teals do particularly well that would see a number of seats elect women instead of men.
I also decided to try a similar exercise for the Legislative Council. In one sense it's simpler, since there are no individual races, you've just got to make some guesses about how much of the vote each party will poll and then draw a line about how conservative you want to be.
While the change int he Assembly is small and could potentially go backwards, that is not at all true of the Council. The number of women elected will likely reach a new record, and we could potentially see more women elected than men.
I presumed that both major parties will poll seven quotas, along with two Greens, one One Nation and one Shooter. That leaves three more seats undecided.
Labor is running three women and four men in their top seven spots, but the Coalition is remarkably running five women and two men. The Greens are running two women, along with one man each from One Nation and the Shooters. That adds up to ten women and eight men.
In addition, a number of the other candidates next in line are women. One Nation's second candidate and the Greens' third candidate are women, as are the eighth Labor candidate and the Animal Justice candidate. Legalise Cannabis is running a man and the eighth Coalition candidate is a man.
Still it is easy to imagine scenarios where women make up a majority elected - if One Nation gets a second, or Labor, Animal Justice or the Greens win one of those extra seats. You could even see a 12-9 split.
This is how this compares to the history of the Council. Note this is the number elected, not the number sitting, and that the number elected increased from 15 to 21 in 1995.
The number of women in the first decade of the Council compares very favourably to the Assembly. Indeed the highest ever proportion of women elected remains in 1991 when 40% of those elected were women. We reached 38% of the larger contingent in 2019.
Even if all three of the undecided seats went to men (say Legalise Cannabis, the Coalition and a different right-wing minor party), the number of women elected would still smash the previous record.
Tomorrow I will use the same classifications to judge: how many councillors are likely to get elected, and how does that compare to past elections.
Gender Balance is only part of issue. Most of the women nominated are 22 year olds who have spent more time worrying about their hair than their career.
The balance of female candidates is a balance on a binary level but there are how many female candidates with work experience, plenty of lawyers, social workers, teachers and public servants but no meat workers, factory hands or shop assistants. The Australian Labor Party has been taken over by inner city yuppies with neither work nor family experience. There is greater balance in Liberal and National candidates because they do not all come out of the same mould. Some of them even have run businesses or bought houses.
@ Andrew Jackson
Cassandra Fernando started working at the Woolworths Dandenong from the age of 15. She lived in the working class suburb of Dandenong North and worked at the Woolworths for 15 years including as pastry chef she may have also worked in the Deli section (i dont know) she has a diploma in hospitality but no University degree. She became one of the first South Asian women to be elected and her seat has one of the highest percentage of South Asians. Interestingly, Tim Smith said the Libs should forget about Kew and focus on Cranbourne which could be their new stronghold. Cranbourne is the heart of Holt, tell me how that went for the Libs in November?
Andrew Jackson, that’s a rather condescending comment. I’m sure plenty of young women running for office take their careers seriously. The blue collar professions you mention tend to be very male-dominated, except for shop assistants who rarely ever make it to public office due to classism and other structural factors.
can i get peoples opinion if they care if their representtive is a man or woman? what does it matter what gender they are? im pretty sure the only people who make a fuss about the issue are left wingers, feminists and people looking to make a storm in a teacup instead of presenting policy debate
I can confirm I don’t care about gender but then I’ve had the advantage of having a woman be my federal MP for all but 10 years of my life.
Anyone who thinks that women are incapable of being in parliament in any capacity should take a long hard look at themselves.
@hawkeye I’m not against women in parliament I’m against nominating and electing a candidate based on the fact they’re a woman and their opponent is a man. I’m against voting incompetent people into parliament just because they are a particular gender race etc. Next thing you know we will being forced to have quotas for race disability orientation identity.
@:)
I think there are 3 types of people who care:
* Leftists as you say who can only think in terms of race and gender
* Those on the far right who can only think in terms of race and gender
* Some of the rest of us who don’t like this stuff being pushed down our throats
There are some very valid reasons for wanting to have a diversity of people in the parliament, but I worry that you end with something like ‘The Drum’ on the ABC – a bunch of very diverse (as in non white male) people who angrily agree with each other.
@:) you might not, but you are an outlier in terms of your political interest and engagement simply by being on this website and discussing this State Election. A lot of voters are not making a “sophisticated” decision relating to “rational policy considerations” when voting on election day. I think you would find a lot of voters are in fact turned off by the presentation of “policy debate”. Most people are not perpetually thinking about politics (especially state politics).
A disengaged swing voter’s reasoning is sometimes often banal. “I like X leader”, “that MP looks like me”, “I like their name”, “they seem nice/relatable”, “they complimented me at the polling place”, “would be nice to have a woman in charge for a change”, etc.
Of course, there is a segment of highly engaged voters invested in gender-equality who might also be factoring this into their informed rational decision making but this segment are also outliers in terms of engagement.
The coverage on this issue has becoming pretty disappointing. It’s all so binary – ‘X party has Y% of women, which is very good/very bad’
It does a disservice to everyone. Because we should be striving for the best representation possible, and gender is only one part of that equation. An important part, but not nearly as important as general competence.
@clyde its the same with a job. how would you feel if you were passed over for a job/promotion even though you ere more qualified and that person was a dud employee who was only promoted/got the job because of their gender?
It’s funny how all the complaining I get about “why should anyone care?” always comes from blokes. Easy to say it doesn’t matter when you’re not the ones under-represented.
There are plenty of capable women who can do a good job in parliament and I see no evidence that the calibre of women in parliament is less than men. Rather the opposite. There’s also plenty of evidence that in close elections where women are nominated they perform strongly – voters are happy to elect women, but they have trouble getting through the party systems.
But you’ve also got to consider what the job of an MP is. Their job is not to be the expert, the most knowledgeable or talented person. They’re meant to represent their constituents – listen to people, form alliances and get stuff done. There are many more people capable of doing that job well than there are seats in parliament, and since part of their job is representation we should ensure that those who are actually put in that job diversely represent the community. There is no loss of ability through this.
I’m happy for a woman to get the job if she’s the most qualified but you see multiple examples of a conservative woman going up against a labort man and then they vote for the man and say “they don’t have any female representation” and I do understand where they are coming but if you vote for a woman purely because she’s a woman that’s discrimination. If I vote for a man because he’s a man and the other person is I’d never hear the end of it but in reverse noone psaysp anyhtping
Fitness and ability to do the job should be the most important criteria. Bits below the waist don’t do the job. Would have thought this was obvious.. but maybe genital gazing is more important?
But what does “fitness” and “ability to do the job” mean? Their job is to represent the community. There are plenty of women who are smart enough to do the job. Beyond that it’s a question of which people best give representation. A parliament that is mostly men isn’t doing that job well. Politicians with different life experiences prioritise different things and work differently.
As to the previous commenter, it’s not about one candidate, it’s about the overall balance. And this is yet another problem with single-member electorates. In multi-member seats there’s an incentive to achieve an overall balance on your ticket or in some systems voters have the ability to individually choose someone who is both like them and meets their policy preferences. But you don’t get that choice in our system. It’s silly to blame the individual voter for choosing a man who they agree with over a woman they don’t. It’s the fault of the system for limiting those choices.
@ben raue. That’s quite a screed. We know what fitness and ability to do the job means. It means can you operate in parliament, represent your electorate , and deliver. This is not a “what does that mean” question. I think you know that. And we both know that genitalia isn’t attached to those deliverables. And as for your ending on blaming the system … well… you work with what we have, not what you wish. Otherwise it’s screaming into the void.
All of that is still in the eye of the beholder. Note that my original article was simply recording the proportions of women in parliament, not commenting on particular methods of increasing numbers. Yet even that brings out the troglodytes bemoaning that merit is more important than gender. Merit isn’t some objective standard, and I don’t agree that party processes that don’t attempt to improve gender balance follow any concept of merit. The job goes to the guy who has the numbers, who knows the right person etc.
And yes, on this blog I talk about the flaws in our system and how they should be improved. I guess you’re new here?
The political or electoral system is organised within and by the society it claims to represent. It is not something cast down from the gods, well you’d hope so, unless we live in a theocracy.
It is entirely within any thinking persons brain capacity to analyse and question just how representative and functional it really is and even change it so that it is more genuinely representative of the population, community and public interest.
Rather than remain subject to limitations, vested interests or lazy habits of some parties.
The capability of many people to more genuinely represent their communities is not the limitation. Dealing with the moribund party machines, personal egos and vested interests who buy influence of the major parties are far bigger problems in poor governance than the number of capable people of any gender
I don’t care how many men or women are elected, I want people winning based on policy/merit, While we on here cannot control who the parties nominate, we can only vote. I may not like the coalition, but they are right on quotas, they are not needed, and it should solely be based on the candidates quality/achievements.
The reason historically that there are more men in parliament is mainly because more men enter politics than women, but the gap is closing. Anyone who is up for it, should be encouraged and should run for a seat in parliament.
I believe there are only a few countries in the world that have a majority-women parliament, I think Cuba, Iceland, PNG, and South Africa might be some although I may have got one mixed up.
I also want to see a members-vote/rank-file vote for all candidate selections in all seats. The parachuting and captain picks of candidates must end and pre-selections must be held so the best candidate is selected for the party.
It’s not about “fitness” and “ability to do the job” but, rather *perceived* fitness and ability to do the job. We know that the people making candidate selections in certain political parties tend to perceive blokes to have greater fitness and abilities since they continuously select more of them as candidates. And they increasingly experience the political consequences.
@Ben Raue, I think the biggest issue is the one Andrew Jackson pointed out in the opening post. While some love to point out how great diversity is, it very often has the effect of limiting socio-economic movement. The people who benefit most are people who are already in a good position in life, and those who are struggling along are ignored. The whole thing is very aristocratic, who you are is more important that hard work/talent.
Also, this comment:
“Yet even that brings out the troglodytes bemoaning that merit is more important than gender.”
This comment is one of the greatest self owns ever (not just you Ben it is a very common refrain). The whole idea of merit was to replace male, stale and pale who were there wholly because they were white males with a diverse group of much more talented people. If you are now saying that merit = white male, isn’t that tacitly endorsing the idea that white males are better?
I absolutely did not say that merit = white male. I am responding to people who assume exactly that. You write a blog post noting the trends towards more women in parliament and they say “oh no we should care about merit instead”. The implication is that merit is taking a back seat.
But more broadly I don’t really think merit exists as a concept when you’re talking about choosing an MP. You don’t need the smartest person to be an MP. You need a person who does a good job of representing their constituents.
I think all of these people work hard. I don’t think making an effort to find good candidates who are women needs to conflict with finding candidates of a more socioeconomically diverse background (which all parties are doing poorly with).
@Daniel, ask yourself, why is the gap closing? I’d say that Labor’s gender quota is a big reason why, not just because of the opportunities it directly provides, but because having more women in parliament changed the old, sexist, boys club mentality of parliamentarians, making it a more comfortable place for women. On top of that, it has forced the Liberals to get proactive about including more women in winnable seats, to avoid looking stale and backward.
For those who think merit isn’t being factored in enough, I ask you, are men inherently better than women at representing their constituents? If not, why are there more men in parliament?
@Ben Raue is there anywhere where you can see the full list of what you’ve classified as ‘safe’, ‘likely’ or ‘marginal’?
males have a long history of being incompetent members of parliament. It is only fair to allow women to show that they can be useless as well
If Dominic loses, would Matt Kean be the opposition leader? I do believe Matt Kean could win over many socially progressive (and slightly fiscally conservative/centrist) voters that would otherwise vote Labor/Greens/Teals but may cost more conservative votes to One Nation. Kean does seem similar to Charlie Baker who was the governor of Massachusetts in an otherwise Blue state.
all this talk about “merit” and who “best represents their constituents” but in reality the nomination for the major parties is who is best at playing the political games to get the nomination – which is often harder than actually getting the people to vote for you
@RoadRunner,
Oatley Likely
Ryde Likely
Myall Lakes Likely
Badgerys Creek Likely
South Coast Likely
Epping Likely
Monaro Likely
Drummoyne Likely
Vaucluse Likely
Willoughby Likely
Davidson Likely
Kogarah Likely
Ballina Likely
East Hills Marginal
Upper Hunter Marginal
Penrith Marginal
Goulburn Marginal
Tweed Marginal
Winston Hills Marginal
Wollondilly Marginal
Riverstone Marginal
Holsworthy Marginal
Parramatta Marginal
Camden Marginal
North Shore Marginal
Kiama Marginal
Manly Marginal
Lane Cove Marginal
Port Macquarie Marginal
Pittwater Marginal
Wakehurst Marginal
Leppington Marginal
Lismore Marginal
Heathcote Marginal
Murray Marginal
Barwon Marginal
Balmain Marginal
Orange Marginal
@Ben Raue. Thanks!
Ben Raue
The balance of women cndidates reflects the interest women show in politics. Three years ago I ended up on an ALP invitation list and was invited to a number of ALP organised unlicensed meetings held in Caboolture with speakers including Bill Shorten and Sally McManus. Less than 10% of audience at both of these functions were women. In fact a Liberal public meeting held a Deception Bay in set of Ryan had a much larger percentage of omen than any of the Australian Labor Party meetings.
The point that I originally made that you can not make the parliament more diverse by formula has been carefully avoided by all but one respondent.
Nimalan in one sentence did more to dammage my assertion than the rest of the respondents have done in thirty posts.
If diversity is the goal then quotas for race, occupation, sex, income, age and colour of hair will be needed. Diversity of course is north the gol the last thing that Emily’s List advocates want is a god fearing married woman with experience raising 4 children in Parliament. Their desire for diversity is only for diversity in uniformity.
One thing that’s does stand out about NSW election is lack of interest in it by all of media.
My prediction is ALP win with an outdide chance of a hung parliament. The Liberals have not done anything wrong in campaign but they have just reached the bay before date on the label.
If this is th case we will return to the ituation of Brisbane City being the largest Liberal government in Australia.
The Liberals can not win by pandering to inner city voters they have to realise tht it is the deplorable who will decide the election.
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