Canning – Australia 2016

LIB 11.3%

Incumbent MP
Andrew Hastie, since 2015.

Geography
South of Perth. Canning covers urban fringe and rural areas to the south of Perth, including Mandurah and most of the Peel region. Canning covers the entirety of Boddington, Mandurah, Murray, Serpentine-Jarrahdale and Waroona council areas, as well as small parts of the Armadale, Gosnells and Kalamunda council areas.

Redistribution
Canning lost the Armadale areas to Burt and gained northern parts of Mandurah from Brand. These changes cut the Liberal margin from 11.8% to 11.3%.

History
Canning was first created for the expansion of the House of Representatives in 1949. For the early part of its history it was contested between the Liberal Party and the Country Party, and since the 1980s the seat has become much more of a Labor-Liberal marginal seat, usually being held by the party winning government.

The seat was first won in 1949 by Leonard Hamilton of the Country Party, who had previously held Swan since 1946.

Hamilton retired in 1961 and the seat was won by Liberal Neil McNeill, who was defeated by the Country Party’s John Hallett in 1963. Hallett held the seat until 1974, when the Liberal Party’s Mel Bungey defeated him.

The ALP’s Wendy Fatin won the seat in 1983 at the same time as the election of the Hawke government. Fatin transferred to the new seat of Brand in 1984, and the ALP’s George Gear transferred into Canning from Tangney, which he had held after the 1983 election.

Gear was defeated in 1996 by Liberal candidate Ricky Johnston, who had previously ran against Gear at every election since 1984. Johnston was defeated herself by Labor’s Jane Gerick in 1998.

Gerick was defeated narrowly by Liberal candidate Don Randall in 2001.

Randall held Canning for over a decade, winning re-election in 2004, 2007, 2010 and 2013. His narrow margin in 2001 blew out to 59.5% in 2004, shrinking to 52.2% in 2010 before growing out to 61.8% in 2013.

Randall died in early 2015, and the ensuing by-election was won by Liberal candidate Andrew Hastie.

Candidates

• Jason Turner (Nationals)
• Aeron Blundell-Camden (Greens)
• Janine Vander Ven (Australian Christians)
• Barry Winmar (Labor)
• Andrew Hastie (Liberal)

Assessment
Canning is a reasonably safe Liberal seat. While Labor did quite well in Canning at the 2015 by-election, the best Labor areas in the by-election have been moved into Burt.

2013 result

2013 two-party-preferred result

2015 by-election result

2015 by-election two-party-preferred result

2013 election booth breakdown
For 2013 results redistributed into the new electorate, a large proportion of the population lives in Mandurah (including those moved from Brand). Voters in this area have been split into Mandurah North and Mandurah South, and the remaining rural areas have been split into north and south.

The Liberal Party’s two-party-preferred vote was around 66% in the rural parts of the seat, 64% in southern Mandurah and 54.6% in northern Mandurah.

2015 by-election booth breakdown
2015 by-election results are based on the former electoral boundaries. These booths are split between Armadale, Mandurah, Murray, Serpentine-Jarrahdale and “South”.

The Liberal Party won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in four out of five areas, ranging from 58% in Serpentine-Jarrahdale to 63.5% in the south. Labor won 51% in the Armadale area (most of which has since been moved into Burt).