McMahon – Australia 2013

ALP 7.8%

Incumbent MP
Chris Bowen, since 2010. Previously Member for Prospect 2004-2010.

Geography
Western Sydney. McMahon covers a central part of Western Sydney, covering parts of a number of local government areas. It covers parts of Holroyd, Fairfield, Penrith and Blacktown councils, with a majority of voters living in Fairfield. The seat covers the suburb of Fairfield itself as well as the suburbs of Smithfield, Bossley Park, Wetherill Park, Greystanes, Pemulwuy, Erskine Park and St Clair.

History
McMahon was created at the 2010 election, but was effectively the renaming of the seat of Prospect, and covered most of the same territory.

The original seat of Prospect was first created for the 1969 election, and has always been held by the ALP.

The seat was first won in 1969 by the ALP’s Dick Klugman. Klugman held the seat for 21 years, retiring in 1990.

He was succeeded by Janice Crosio, who had held a local state seat for the ALP since 1981, and had served as a minister for the last four years of the NSW state Labor government, from 1984 to 1988.

Crosio’s move to federal politics saw her serve as a Parliamentary Secretary from 1992 until the defeat of the Keating government in 1996. Crosio held the seat until the 2004 election.

At the 2004 election, the seat was won by former Mayor of Fairfield, Chris Bowen. Bowen quickly rose to the Labor frontbench and was appointed Assistant Treasurer in the first Rudd ministry after the 2007 election. He was promoted to Cabinet in 2009.

Bowen was quickly promoted through the ranks, serving in the portfolios of Immigration and Higher Education. He resigned from the ministry in March 2013 after his participation in a campaign to encourage Kevin Rudd to challenge for the Labor leadership.

Candidates

Assessment
McMahon would normally be considered safe, but Labor is currently in a lot of trouble in Western Sydney. Labor lost the overlapping seat of Smithfield and a number of other safe seats at the 2011 state election, and lost control of a number of local councils close to McMahon in the 2012 local government election. Bowen is a strong candidate, but if there is a strong swing it could overwhelm Labor’s campaign.

2010 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Chris Bowen ALP 40,933 51.26 -7.41
Jamal Elishe LIB 28,950 36.25 +5.29
Astrid O’Neill GRN 6,428 8.05 +3.37
Manny Poularas CDP 3,549 4.44 +1.72

2010 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Chris Bowen ALP 46,170 57.81 -5.96
Jamal Elishe LIB 33,690 42.19 +5.96
Polling places in McMahon at the 2010 federal election. Bossley Park in green, Fairfield-Smithfield in yellow, Greystanes in blue, Penrith in orange. Click to enlarge.
Polling places in McMahon at the 2010 federal election. Bossley Park in green, Fairfield-Smithfield in yellow, Greystanes in blue, Penrith in orange. Click to enlarge.

Booth breakdown
Booths have been divided into four areas. All of those booths in Holroyd council area have been grouped as ‘Greystanes’, while all the booths in Penrith City Council area have also been grouped together. Polling places in Fairfield have been split between Bossley Park in the west and Fairfield-Smithfield in the east.

The ALP won a majority in all four areas, varying from 52.8% in Greystanes to 66.2% in Fairfield-Smithfield.

Voter group GRN % ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
Fairfield-Smithfield 8.47 66.16 18,687 23.40
Bossley Park 7.75 56.21 16,935 21.21
Greystanes 6.95 52.80 14,764 18.49
Penrith 7.45 55.71 13,764 17.24
Other votes 9.43 56.16 15,710 19.67
Two-party-preferred votes in McMahon at the 2010 federal election.
Two-party-preferred votes in McMahon at the 2010 federal election.

55 COMMENTS

  1. I can’t see Labor holding on here. They lost Smithfield and barely retained Fairfield in the 2011 State Election. The Council Elections were moderately more encouraging, but against token opposition, after the Liberal candidates were disendorsed. By my rough numbers, Bowen would have lost 53-47 2PP had that state election incorporated Prospect (I cannot call it McMahon).

    The Liberals have selected, on the surface, a strong candidate. However, the fact that his local work incorporates Liverpool, not Wetherill Park or Fairfield might count against him. For the Liberals to win this seat, their groundwork must be strong. I fear, though, that the Liberals will be far too focused on winning Greenway, Lindsay, Banks, Werriwa, etc, to ensure that Prospect is a certainty. Also, the fact that the local Liberal Party, despite their recent successes, remains an organisational rabble, prone to allegations of wrongdoing is not helpful for them either.

    Bowen has the cachet of being a relatively successful minister and former Fairfield Mayor. There is still strong feelings of support for him east of Wetherill Park and Prairiewood (I saw evidence of this on the 7.30 Report recently). West of those areas, and into Greystanes are where Bowen’s problems begin. There has never been any indicator of personal support for Bowen, from his election figures. This is a seat – much like its state counterpart, Smithfield – which has always indicated what the overall electorate are thinking, even if the swing is small.

    If it’s a repeat of 2011, Bowen cannot win. If it’s the traditional Prospect/Smithfield swing with the Labor core still willing to vote, Bowen will win 51-49 2PP. I’d be leaning towards the former, unless there’s a major stuff up from the local Liberal Party.

  2. Ironically, being booted out of Ministry might be the best thing for Bowen, since he can put all his effort into holding his seat.

    Will be close, but a further 8% swing on top of a 6% swing last time won’t be an easy task.

  3. That is true, and the fact that he was the Immigration Minister wasn’t doing him any favours in the electorate. There have been an influx of migrants into the electorate in recent years, particularly from the Middle Eastern countries, replacing the old Catholic constituency which have been the backbone of Labor’s vote in this electorate for a long time. With Labor’s drift to the right on Immigration, you can imagine that Bowen had done himself a considerable amount of damage, particularly around Bossley Park and Wetherill Park where the growth of Middle Eastern migrants have been rapid in recent years. It’s one thing for Philip Ruddock to represent an older, conservative electorate like Berowra and suffer no backlash electorally; another thing for Bowen with an electorate that is changing from a core Labor-voting Catholic seat into what I think will be a permanently marginal seat.

    I think that 7.8% swing is achievable in this climate for the Liberal Party. The question will be whether the Liberal Party will do the local groundwork well. Their choice of candidate indicates, on the surface, that they are taking this seriously. I know that this is a very minor point, but the fact that Abbott is a Catholic and Gillard is an atheist will help the Liberal Party here, even with a rapidly changing demographic.

  4. I actually think Bowen is a better chance of holding on than Ferguson is in Werriwa, although the demographics are not terribly different. If polling stays where it is though, this will fall to the Liberals. I am told second hand that Labor’s internal polling, while not as dire as the recent Reachtel polls in Werriwa and McMahon (which indicated the Libs would win both on primary votes alone), do indicate very strong swings away from the Government in both of these seats.

    I fear in order for Labor to retain these seats in the current climate, it would have to win both seats from second place on primary votes, and historically, preferencing has been proportionately higher to the Coalition in both seats than the national average.

  5. I agree that Bowen removing himself from Cabinet may have been the best thing for him in order to save his seat from falling to the Liberals. The Labor Party retained Fairfield at the 2011 NSW State Election (only just). This seat will go down to the wire, however I think with the unpopularity of the Gillard Labor Government in Western Sydney will prove to be too strong for Bowen and he will lose this one.

  6. this is my question…. there are only 150 seats in parliament the 2 party preferred at the moment seems to be approx 55/45 the liberals way……… if there is such a supposed huge swing in nsw then 55/45 suggests either a very skewed distribution of the swing or nil to even positive swings to labor elsewhere……. I think losses of safe seats such as this seat and Werriwa are not likely

  7. Mick Quinlivan – yes but there is a 6.5% swing to the Coalition is NSW since the last election and I’d suggest most of that is concentrated around Sydney.

  10. Lay off Matt, every party, even the biggest, have trouble finding candidates and have to run very young people, it gives voters a chance to vote for their party and provide a voice for a group of people who never get represented by their peers in the Parliament.

    I myself ran for public office four times before I turned 20 – not because I particularly wanted to, but as a Greens member in Campbelltown there weren’t many options. Plus both sitting MPs in my area resigned in the one year.

  11. Mick Quinlivan you make an interesting point however a would advise you on three points of caution. The first it that the swings in Queensland and WA have been to certain degree been maximized and are unlikely to swing more then two to three percent. Second we are yet to see private polling being done in coalition held seats which in my opinion may also be close to their swing limit since the coalition did relatively well in them. Third the polling in labor held seats have all shown that the labor is in trouble in their safe seats as well as in their marginal seats. I thought that the last couple of polls which should Anna Burke with no swing and Wayne Swan holding his seat are relatively encouraging for Labor as it shows that they are not losing everything.

  12. Recent internal polling suggests Bowen cannot win this seat presently given the margin difference on primary voting intention. It will take some monumental shift in voting intentions in the last 90 days for Labor to retain McMahon. From a number of polls I have now seen it is becoming clear that the Liberal Party could go close to winning this seat on first preference, which means a primary vote shift to the Liberal Party from the last election of between 10-15%.

    This is one such seat that would be saved in my opinion if Rudd were to regain the Labor leadership.

    Some of the swings I am continuing to see in outer metropolitan Sydney can only be described as staggering.

  13. DB,

    In your opinion, what seats would the Liberals take in outer metropolitan Sydney based on these big swings you are seeing?

    And based on the idea that the swing must be less somewhere else, what seats in rural NSW do you see Labor saving?

  14. Mark Mulcair,

    I expect Labor to lose (80% chance):
    Banks, Lindsay, Greenway, Parramatta, MacMahon, Dobell.

    Probable (say 65% chance):
    Reid, Werriwa, Eden Monaro, Roberston, Page.

    Too close to call / 50-50 / ALP worth defending:
    Barton, Richmond, (any of the 4 Hunter seats).

    I expect at least 10 seats in NSW to change hands excluding the Independents. Windsor could win. Oakeshott won’t.

    As for Labor saving closer seats, probably best chances lie in Richmond, Page, Robertson, the Hunter, probably not Eden Monaro despite a good MP.

    A few points:
    – The swing in NSW is around 7% since the last election across the board according the average of the mainstream polls.
    – Labor won about 65% of the seats in NSW on 49% of the vote – a rare occurrence, which suggests it won’t happen again on such an even basis i.e.the Liberals would probably pick up seats in NSW even if the vote in NSW were to remain equal to the 2010 election vote.
    – The swing in the marginal seats is higher I suspect because the swing in the safer Liberal seats is probably very small. The swing in the rural/regional seats seems to be smaller than the metropolitan seats, but if you are on less than 6% regionally, there is a good chance it will go. I am a little more cautious in regional seats, because within these seats there is much more polling volatility due to greater demographic differences.

  16. There are five seats in the Hunter, one of which is Liberal (Paterson), so I assume DB is referring to Newcastle, Hunter, Shortland and Charlton.

  17. Ben, yes, that is correct. I reckon one will probably fall if the current voting intentions remain the same and it would probably be Newcastle.

    By the way, I expect the polls to narrow (given history), so what I am suggesting now could change considerably but I’ll update my views as we go.

  19. Morgieb
    Some expensive over 55s villages in Pemulwuy, & maybe other like development.
    Seems that Merrylands & Greystanes have changed in real estate, & demographic terms. eg An old labor voter sells up ,& is replaced by an aspirational couple, or family with significant mortgage. If we look at Parramatta there is a big blue 52 where Merrylands is.
    Edsenor Park is also interesting with its blue 58 the largest concentration of adult children living with parents in Australia !!!!.

  21. Last night’s events may well have saved Chris Bowen’s political career. Julia Gillard was as popular in this electorate as the Liberals used to be (I still remember their infamous candidate from Maroubra in 2001 for this electorate), and the fact that she is an atheist has a lot to do with it, even before you analyse the politics.

    By dints and rights, Rudd will be considerably popular in certain sections of the electorate because he is Catholic, thereby negating the advantage that Tony Abbott had built over Gillard. Don’t get me wrong, the more conservative Catholics will most likely vote for Abbott this time, but the bleeding among the majority of the core Catholic constituency will have been halted by last night’s events.

    Holroyd Council has ALWAYS been a soft area for Labor, even before the crumbling of the heartland vote. Labor have never had a majority in the Council. This has always been due to strong local independents like Allan Ezzy, Dr John Brodie and Mark Pigram (I resile having to call Pigram a strong independent, but I can’t argue against 20 years of service to the Council). Also, there is a great civic pride in Holroyd that’s largely underestimated by the major parties.

    Pemulwuy being developed has hurt the Labor vote a little bit, although Greystanes has never been a bastion of the Labor vote deep down. Greystanes and Horsley Park have long been the Labor weak areas in this electorate, and cannot be regarded as key to Labor retaining the seat

    Edensor Park’s interesting in a lot of ways. That and Abbotsbury are probably where the votes have come from, and I can tell you from considerable personal experience that this part of the electorate is relatively affluent, especially Abbotsbury. That 2PP figure does not surprise me in the slightest.

    Where the election will be won and lost is in places like Bossley Park and Wetherill Park, as well as the Penrith end of the electorate. The support for Bowen and Labor is soft at this end of the electorate, and it was Labor’s lack of support here to stem the bleeding from the other parts of Smithfield that caused Labor to lose the state seat in 2011. I actually think, that with Rudd now as leader, Bowen’s strong support east of the Cumberland Highway won’t drop markedly, if at all. It may even increase.

    Don’t rule out Green preferences here either. For the first time ever, the Greens outpolled the CDP, and if they finish third, may have a bearing as to whether Bowen survives or not.

    Finally, where’s the Liberal candidate? We know he’s there, but he has barely been in the media going after Bowen. As someone who lived in the electorate for an extremely long time, I can tell you that the electorate appreciates a Liberal candidate who will fight and is local. The fact that his work is in Liverpool will count against him, as well as his abnormal low profile.

  22. DLH
    Thank you for an absorbing,& facinating post.The coming re-distribution will be crucial for this seat. No doubt Bowen will go with the Fairfield core.
    On the catholic thingy issue. As a secular agnostic, it has always struck me how much sectarian prejudice Abbott is hit with. Rudd is far more of a god botherer, & cops nought !!. Julia squeals sexism over not much, & Abbott cops heaps & takes it. Lots of double standards. Just saying…..

  23. Originally had this seat pencilled in as a Liberal gain under Gillard, but I think will be safely retained by Labor now. Chris Bowen has a huge profile and personal following which is natural. The Liberals’ have a decent candidate but it will be too hard for him to defeat Labor this time.

  24. Agree with electionlova that McMahon should be retained by Labor now. The pessimism has gone away largely with Rudd’s return, and the fact that the Liberal candidate has been invisible will have helped Bowen.

    Glen’s post in Fowler with the link to the article written by Fr Kevin Lee is illuminating. Let’s just say that it confirms to me, not that I didn’t know this already, how much the local Liberal Party is a rabble. Interested in thoughts about that article.

  25. These would all be valid points if we were talking about like for like, or comparing oranges with oranges. But these days we need to be more astute and ask questions like, why did the Libs have so little concern about who represented them 3 years ago and this time they were more selective?
    Three years ago at McMahon they ran an Iraqi refugee with 4 years residency in Australia (and only passable comprehension of English) up against Chris Bowen. You just had to hear him attempt to answer questions by concerned citizens to know he is a stooge.
    The Party knew they couldn’t win so they allowed him to spend all his and his Assyrian friends’ money bankrolling a campaign they couldn’t win.
    Little known fact is that McMahon’s representative had nominated to Fowler. They have let an 70 year old Vietnamese refugee mortgage his house (again) to the tune of $300,000 to convince his pre-selecting buddies that he was the right person for the job. So the heavies tapped former Liverpool Police Commander Ray King on the shoulder and told him to pull out and run for McMahon as he had a better chance there.
    His very revealing story is told this weekend in the Independent Australia blog by his former best friend and now disaffected Liberal Party member the former priest Father Kevin Lee. http://www.independentaustralia.net/2013/politics/the-seedy-side-of-the-nsw-liberal-party/
    Ray King appears to have some skeletons which are surfacing from their shallow graves and that would be the reason both he and Nguyen are being ordered by party heavies to avoid the media or any stand up opportunity for people to ask them the sort of questions that unhinged Jaymes Diaz in Greenway.
    Its very sad…

  26. The latest ReachTEL poll that has just been released, is not good news for Chris Bowen at all. Ray King is in a very good position to win this seat, if the polling is true, despite not having mounted any type of campaign at all.

    While driving through the electorate tonight, I saw no Bowen corflutes, but saw Ray King corflutes at the garden centre on the Horsley Drive (the owner is a Liberal supporter, no surprises here), and at the intersection of the Horsley Drive and Cowpasture Road. Compared to the 2011 State Election in the same area, advertising appears to be very tame this around.

  27. http://www.theaustralian.com.au/national-affairs/election-2013/abbott-stands-by-police-officer-candidate-for-mcmahon-ray-king/story-fn9qr68y-1226698334379

    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/wood-inquiry-detective-stands-for-libs-against-chris-bowen-20130815-2rzn4.html

    I don’t know if the links work. The dirt is starting to be thrown at Mr King. Having said that, I don’t think that this will gain traction, unless there are voters in the electorate with especially long memories. I, for one, didn’t know about any of this. King should be okay, unless, this is just the start.

  28. Reachtel today released a poll indicating the Libs 53/47 ahead which is a continuation, albeit, not as bad as a poll conducted with Gillard was PM. What seems to have gone over everyones head here is that under that poll, even with Rudd as PM, the Coalition were still ahead.

    I still think Bowen will probably win this. I’ve seen no polling, but I’d suggest they may be starting to move more outwards as it appears this election is a fait accompli.

    I’ll stick with a Bowen ALP retain, but will be keeping an eye on this and anything from Werriwa.

  30. Ray King’s campaign is starting to gain traction. I’m going out on a limb and predicting this seat to be the Liberal bolter on Election Night. The polls I have seen are all pointing to a narrow Liberal win.

  31. The only internal poll showing this seat as too close to call. No wonder Labor is escalating their viscious attacks against the Liberal candidate.

  33. Prediction: With a less corrupt Liberal candidate their horse I think would actually win or at least go very close to doing so. However, for mine King has a little too many skeletons in his closet, and the Liberal party trying to gag him worries me about the sort of campaign he can mount. Labor hold, narrowly.

  35. To be fair, I don’t think that Father Kevin Lee could be described as a supporter of the Labor Party, DB, so the hypothesis that Labor are running a vicious campaign is not entirely correct; although they have certainly taken the ball and run with it, since Father Lee’s IA article.

    We’ll have to wait and see, if there’s any backlash from the SMH article. I actually don’t think it will hurt him in the crucial parts of McMahon west of the Cumberland Highway. In fact, it may well help him. East of the Cumberland Highway, where there is more of a Muslim presence, more so, although the Labor vote is already high enough in this part of the electorate.

  36. There was a better candidate. Father Kevin Lee was in the running. Lee was apparently undermined by his former friend Inspector Ray King who only applied for pre-selection (swapping from Fowler where he didn’t have the numbers) on the day pre-selection was closing.
    This story just gets more and more intriguing.

  39. “But one notable absence from the Cabinet line-up was Treasurer Chris Bowen, who is in danger of losing his seat of McMahon in Western Sydney, currently on a margin of 7.8 per cent.

    A spokesperson has told the ABC that Mr Bowen had longstanding commitments to attend community functions in his electorate”.

    If there were ever a question of a landslide in NSW, then this seems to indicate its possibility. Bowen was out seen campaigning in his seat today in Fairfield.

  40. Indications so far that King’s comments about burqas and microchipping crims with sniper rifles not doing him much harm. Any idea how these things might play out in the area?

  41. What about his current relationship-marital status? Heard some rumblings in the Assyrian Christian community that are not happy with him living with a woman he is not married to.
    They’re not just critical of his lack of morals, but they feel he broke up her marriage.

  42. Ray King, oh dear.

    “A Liberal Party candidate proposed a radical new policing system in which criminal suspects would be injected with satellite-trackable microchips shot from a ”high powered sniper rifle”.

    In 2011, Mr King outlined his ideas in a 12-page essay, Microchipping of human subjects as a productivity enhancement and as a strategic management direction of NSW Police.

    The most controversial part of Mr King’s plan was the means by which microchips would be inserted into the body. He named Danish company Empire North as having patented the ”ID Sniper Rifle” as the ”long-distance injector” of the microchip.

    But a search for Empire North in Copenhagen suggests the company does not exist and the ID sniper rifle is actually part of a plot of a Danish sci-fi docu-drama called Empire North.”

    http://www.smh.com.au/federal-politics/federal-election-2013/libs-plan-to-microchip-suspects-by-sniper-rifle-20130830-2sw8k.html

  44. Bowen is thropwing more dirt at King now BUT it is starting to bite Bowen as he has a past as well in that he supported paying Ngo when he was on bail for attempted murder some years ago.

    I still feel from Reach Polling that King if he keeps his mouth shut can beat Bowen ( who I dislike anyway)

  45. Has this electorate seen the filthiest campaign of the election?
    First Labor alleges that Liberal candidate and ex-cop Ray King was suss after appearing before the police royal commission, and after getting unbeknown support from crooked ex-cop Roger Rogerson.
    Second the Liberals allege that Treasurer Chris Bowen voted with Fairfield councillors to keep paying political assassin Phuong Ngo while he was on remand.
    Now a King figure is alleged to have lunched Ngo behind bars.
    And another thing – Bowen claims that there’s no serious scrutiny in an interview with King by 2GB host Ray Hadley. I reckon that he’s right – nowadays almost any interview by 2GB with a Liberal candidate is a akin to a Fox News interview with a US Republican, while Hadley always gets on his high horse when ex-cops run as Liberal candidates.
    I suspect that Bowen’s gone.

  46. Warren – I agree it is sad on both sides. While I am a Liberal supporter, it would be unfortunate to not see Bowen in a future ALP Government in my view.

  47. Father Kevin Lee would not have been in the running to win McMahon, unlike Ray King. The voters would never have stood for the way he has treated the Catholic Church since his leaving the priesthood (McMahon has the highest proportion of Catholics in the country; and believe me, they are probably among the most conservative Catholics in Sydney, to boot). Ray King is not a bed of roses as a candidate, and under normal circumstances, would not be a serious contender to win this seat, nor would the Liberal Party. The fact that he is, tells everything about where the ALP sit right now as a competitive political party.

    The other problem is Chris Bowen’s complete lack of engagement with voters west of the Cumberland Highway. He has not inherited the large personal vote that Janice Crosio, Dick Klugman and Carl Scully had in this end of the electorate. I know I bang on about this, but the numbers back me up here. Bowen suffered a decent swing against him in 2004, a swing towards him in 2007 when Rudd won, and a swing against him in 2010. None of this is evidence that Bowen has any type of personal vote overall in the electorate, although it appears from raw numbers and observation that east of the Cumberland Highway, he is relatively more popular.

    I can tell you, that on the Sunday that the launch happened, Bowen was at the St Hurmizid Church in Greenfield Park, and that it WAS a long-standing commitment. Bowen was telling the truth here. One of my Facebook friends posted a picture of her with him. Apparently Ray King was there as well, which would line up well with what Disappointed Liberal Voter was saying, that I won’t get into. Given that the Assyrian vote is so crucial here, especially with the splintering of the community into Liberal (Rohan/Elishe) and Labor (Khoshaba) factions, I would have preferred that Bowen be in Greenfield Park than Brisbane, to be honest.

    With the Phoung Ngo issue, what people need to realise is (and I hope somebody else know this too), is that Fairfield Council was a deeply divided Council in 1998. The 1995 elections saw a weird situation where there were an equal amount of Liberal, Labor and Independent representatives. Nothing got done during those four years to 1999, that I can remember. Now the fact that Ngo had friends on the Liberal side of politics as well, during this deeply divisive period, is telling about the compelling influence that Ngo had on Fairfield Council affairs. None of the Independents liked Ngo, from memory. Indeed, his and John Newman’s shadows still hang over Fairfield politics, and will continue to do so, until the last of the politicians with any type of links (intimate or association-wise) to him or Newman, and that includes the Khoshabas, Bowen, Lawrence White, Molluso, Oliveri, Lalich, etc, are completely off the scene. While Bowen voted with the Caucus bloc, to his eternal shame, no doubt, if that is the best the Liberal Party have in the locker with him, then it just confirms what was told to me years ago by somebody who is one of Bowen’s better friends, that there are no skeletons in Bowen’s closet. Bowen comes out of this with a lot more credit, than anyone else involved in Fairfield politics during this time, other than Maria Heggie and Ken Chapman, especially if the reported Phoung Ngo threats against Bowen are true. Fairfield politics has not been a nice place since around 1991, when Ngo was first elected, and for anyone to be surprised at this beggars belief. The days of gentle Fairfield politics belongs to the glory days of Janice Crosio (before she was a Federal member) and Dick Klugman.

    Now, as for Saturday, if there wasn’t a Palmer candidate, I would call a Bowen retain, especially given that the Greens outpolled the CDP in 2010 for the first time ever. Whoever finishes third here (I would put my money on serial candidate, Manny Poularas – did you know he ran for the Australian Democrats in at least one election that I know of?) will decide who wins the seat. Bowen needs 44% of the primary vote, minimum here to retain. The Palmer preferences will be interesting, but I suspect that the CDP and the Greens will be having a huge say as to whether Bowen survives, or not.

    If Bowen loses, I wouldn’t be surprised to see him go to the Senate at some point and replace Bob Carr. The ALP actually need him, more than any other candidate in a swinging seat, to be honest. Other than Albanese, he’s their strongest supporter. There’s no other ALP stronghold where Bowen could credibly run. Fowler is not an option, due to Paul Lynch controlling the branches.

    Based on historical trends, my prediction is King 50.8/Bowen 49.2, thanks to the CDP finishing third.

  48. DLH: “Based on historical trends, my prediction is King 50.8/Bowen 49.2, thanks to the CDP finishing third.”

    Really? You think that the CDP will finish 3rd over the Greens? Seems unlikely does it not given polls showing the Green vote is mainly holding. What do you think the Greens will poll? If you suggest they will go down a few % then perhaps. However, it not then the CDP would need to get a huge 50% style increase from 2010 AND gain nearly all of the PUP prefs whilst assuming that PUP would get 3-4%.

    I guess stranger things have happened….PUP could actually take votes away from CDP, not just the majors.

  49. Poularas ran as a Democrat here in 1996 and 1998, and in the state seat of Smithfield in 1995 and 1999. He was previously an independent candidate for Wentworthville in 1988. His first election for the CDP was in 2001 when he ran for Fowler. I would love to know the story behind it.

    I don’t think he’ll be outpolling the Greens here, for what it’s worth.

  50. In this seat, yes. The Greens have been stronger in recent years in the Fairfield/Liverpool area, but generally speaking, are not as competitive due to the demographics of the electorate. I’m not saying the 2010 election is an anomaly, as I think that, over time, the Greens will be more of a third place party in McMahon, but, historically, this is one of the best seats for the CDP, and they have every chance of finishing third here, with a candidate who is well known to the electorate, as is the Greens candidate. I do see the possibility of the CDP losing votes to the PUP, but I don’t believe this is an electorate that will embrace Palmer in Sydney.

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