Today I’m focusing on three seats in the Sutherland Shire area, overlapping with surrounding areas. The map shows that one seat stands out from its neighbours in terms of swings.
The map shows Heathcote, Holsworthy, Miranda and the neighbouring safe Liberal seat of Cronulla.
Swing data thanks to William Bowe’s estimates of 2019 results by 2023 polling place.
The map is zoomed in on the Sutherland area, and shows a distinct jump in swing when you cross into the electorate of Miranda. It suggests there was something that made the swing here bigger than in Heathcote and Holsworthy, which were considered more marginal, and the safer seat of Cronulla.
Looking at Holsworthy, a majority of which is in the Liverpool council area, there were sizeable swings in the Sutherland part of the seat and those Liverpool parts east of the Georges River. Weirdly there were swings to the Liberal Party at the western end. Part of these areas were moved from Macquarie Fields, so it’s possible this is a demonstration of the loss of the local member’s personal vote there.
You also see some redistribution effects in Heathcote. This seat shifted south, losing parts of the Shire and picking up more of the City of Wollongong. These southern areas strongly favoured Labor, thus flipping the seat into a notional Labor seat.
Those southern areas remain strongly pro-Labor, but a number of those booths swung slightly to the Liberal Party, with the swings in the others being only small.
Looking at the Sutherland Shire’s results map (not the swings), there’s now a solid band of booths up the middle of the Shire where Labor won, although things might not look so good if you could add in voters in those areas who voted at a pre-poll booth or with a postal vote.
The Labor party is clearly under performing around Liverpool and Cabramatta especially the part West of the Georges River which is low socio-economic this in contrast to other areas such as Auburn, Mt Druitt, Bankstown, Campbelltown etc where Labor got solid swings
Labor had MPs retire in those seats.
@Nimalan why do you think labor is underperforming in fairfield/liverpool/cabramatta? they seem to have similar demographics (ie. ethnically diverse, young, low socio-economic) to seats like bankstown, auburn, blacktown, granville etc. which are some of labor’s safest seats. labor preselected local candidates with migrant backgrounds in the three aforementioned seats so it would appear candidate preselection likely did not have a large influence on the swing (unlike in fowler for example). these seats do have less muslims (who appear to be one of the strongest labor voting cohorts in the state) so perhaps this is partly indicative of the swings towards the liberals.
They are literally the only three Labor seats in the state where the local MP retired…
@Louis well retiring MP is one factor but the MPs retiring don’t seem to be particularly popular politicians. Of course in Cabramatta, there is the factor of Kate Hoang running which would have taken some vote off Labor and exhausted. My theory is for Liverpool and Cabramatta is a sort of identity politics situation where the selection of diverse candidates put off some white working class voters (the Labor-One Nation/UAP ones) who live in the electorates who would have otherwise voted for Labor.
Can you Ben or anyone else tell me where the Federal electorate of Cook sits, overlaid over these 3 state electorates, and what sort of prospect there might be of it going out of Liberals hands, should Morrison resign some time this year The margin is about 11 or 12%.
I think there were issues relating to the personal conduct of the member for Miranda which didn’t help her. There was an incident where a government car needed to be cleaned to remove vomit after she attended a football game with John Barilaro, plus some text messages exchanged with the former treasurer (who is married with young children) which somehow found their way into the Murdoch press. Also issues with alleged bullying of ministerial staff, loss of confidence in the minister by senior bureaucrats, and alleged favourable treatment for business interests represented by John Barilaro, which lead to Perrottet sacking her from the ministry. No wonder there was such a swing in Miranda.
Incoming Holsworthy MP Tina Ayyad is the wife of Liberal Mayor of Liverpool Ned Mannoun. My theory is they both have personal vote which resulted in Liverpool and the western Holsworthy booths swinging to the Liberals. Cabramatta has been a mess for the ALP on the federal and state levels for a couple of years now and I think that has had an effect electorally.
@ Louis. i think retirements had something to play but those MPs were quite low profile anyway so i dont think it explains all of it. There reason i am concerned is that in the federal seat of Werriwa labor saw a significant decrease in the Labor primary in May 2022 and there were some TPP swings to Libs in poorer booths. This was a pattern we saw in Melbourne but no other parts of the country. Werriwa is socially mixed like Macarthur, Greenway and McMahon. Hwoever, all those 3 seats saw an increase in the Labor primary. I feel Werriwa has been a neglected seat in the last 15 years. In the past it was represented by high profile senior Labor figures like Whitlam, Kerin and Latham. Fowler has been neglected since its creation and has had low profile MPs since its creation in 1984. These seats should always have high profile MPs. I feel Anne Staley should probably face a preselection challenge in 2025.
I wonder if part of the reason that the Mannons have made a big play on Holsworthy is part of their expectation that this seat could be redistributed again and lose Bardon Ridge and Lucas Heights, effectively making this a Liverpool Council Seat, potentially taking Casula and Prestons.
It’s not just the westernmost end of Holsworthy that is in the City of Liverpool, Holsworthy, Chipping Norton and Moorebank are all in that council and had sizeable swings to Labor.
Most of the seat of Cronulla is in the seat of Cook, along with the easternmost third of Miranda and southern parts of Kogarah and Rockdale.
I mean about 3/4s of the seat is in the City of Liverpool, so it already is effectively a Liverpool council seat.
@Nimalan yes i agree anne stanley could face a preselection challenge as she appears to be underperforming. the local member for macquarie fields (i forget his name) would make a good federal mp due to his impressive cv, multicultural background and existing personal vote.
i wonder whether any nsw mps will switch to federal politics in the next fed election to replace underperforming or retiring federal mps. i see jihad dib as a good replacement for either tony burke or jason clare when they eventually retire due to his strong community links and his personability.
I wrote about the ‘Dai Le effect’ in another thread as a possible explanation of the swings TO the Liberals in Cabramatta and Liverpool. A string of retirements and dysfunctionality in the local ALP branches did them no favours.
I recall reading an ABC article about public sector and essential workers swinging hard to the ALP. The Sutherland Shire has a high proportion to them, whilst Fairfield and Cabramatta have a low proportion.
This could explain why middle-class, mortgage belt suburbs east of the Georges River (Chipping Norton, Hammondville, Wattle Grove etc.) had swung to Labor. These are more similar to the Sutherland Shire. Conversely, the suburbs of Liverpool and Lurnea are economically and demographically similar to Fairfield and Cabramatta, and so there was a swing away from Labor.
Very interesting analysis. Thanks Ben!
@ Louis, i agree the Macquarie fields MP, Annoulack, will be a great MP for Werriwa to help rebuild its margin and keep the Libs out of it. I do agree Ned Mannoun has lifted the popularity of the Libs in areas like Lurnea which also have a significant muslim population but in Macquarie Fields, in the Casula High booth Annoulack received a 10% swing to him this is in contrast to Anne Staley who suffered a 2% swing against her in the Casula Public School booth in a year they were going to go from opposition to government. In 2007, there were preselection challenges in the seats of Maribiyong, Issacs and Corio all members are now senior ministers in the Labor government. If there is a good MP in Werriwa then they could likely be a senior minister like they members for Greenway and McMahon are.
The band of booths in the Sutherland Shire voting strongly for Labor is interesting. Every Sutherland Shire booth west of the Princes Highway but east of the Woronora River recorded a double digit swing to Labor and a Labor 2PP majority. Definitely an area that Labor should look to consolidate, particularly if they seek to gain Miranda and Hughes at a federal level at future elections.
Labor has been struggling for a while at the Liverpool end of the world. This election is just a continuation of this trend.nHowever I think a pre-selection challenge is unlikely. The issue with trying to launch a pre-selection challenge against Anne Stanley in Werriwa would be factions. Werriwa falls under the Paul Lynch soft left sphere of influence, whereas Annoulack comes from the right. It would be unlikely that the left would willingly give up one of it’s seats to the right, and it would be unlikely that anyone that wasn’t from the left would have the numbers to challenge Stanley anyway. The only way it would probably work is if the soft left was allowed to run candidates in both Fowler and Hughes in exchange for the right running in Werriwa. Again, very very unlikely.
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