NAT 15.2%
Incumbent MP
David Gillespie, since 2013.
Geography
North coast of NSW. Lyne covers parts of the mid-north coast, including Taree, Forster-Tuncurry and Dungog. Lyne stretches from just south of Port Macquarie to the north shore of Port Stephens and northern Maitland.
Lyne was created as part of the expansion of the House of Representatives at the 1949 election. It was won by the Country/National Party at every election from its creation until the 2007 election. The Nationals lost the seat at a 2008 by-election, but won it back in 2013.
The seat was first won in 1949 by Country Party candidate James Eggins. Four Country candidates stood for Lyne in 1949, with Eggins polling first on primary votes, followed by the ALP candidate, and he comfortably won the seat on the preferences from his Country Party colleagues. He was re-elected in 1951, but died in 1952, triggering a by-election.
The 1952 Lyne by-election was won by the Country Party’s Philip Lucock. Lucock was the second-highest polling Country Party candidate at the 1949 election. Two Country Party candidates stood in 1952, one polling 30.2% and the other 29.2%, and Lucock overtook the Labor candidate on preferences.
Lucock served as Deputy Speaker of the House of Representatives under the Menzies, Holt, Gorton, McMahon and Fraser government, but never achieved ministerial office before he retired at the 1980 election.
The seat was won in 1980 by the National Country Party’s Bruce Cowan. Cowan had held the state seat of Oxley since 1965 and served as a minister in the last year of the Coalition state government from 1975 to 1976. Cowan held Lyne until 1993, and is the father-in-law of NSW Liberal leader Barry O’Farrell.
In 1993, the seat was won by Nationals candidate Mark Vaile, a Greater Taree councillor and former Deputy Mayor. Vaile joined the Howard government’s ministry in 1997 as Minister for Transport, adding a role as Minister for Agriculture in 1998 and became Minister for Trade in 1999. He became Deputy Prime Minister in 2005 upon the retirement of John Anderson, and continued in the Howard government’s cabinet until its defeat.
Vaile moved to the backbench upon the Howard government’s defeat in 2007, before retiring from Parliament in 2008, triggering a by-election.
The by-election was won by independent candidate Rob Oakeshott with a massive majority, winning almost 74% of the two-candidate-preferred vote. Oakeshott had previously held the state seat of Port Macquarie since 1996. He had originally been elected for the National Party at a 1996 by-election and was re-elected in 1999. During his second term he became disenchanted with the Nationals and resigned from the party in 2002. He managed to win re-election to Port Macquarie as an independent at the 2003 and 2007 state elections.
Rob Oakeshott was re-elected at the 2010 federal election. Following the federal election, he decided to support the Labor minority government.
Oakeshott retired at the 2013 elections, and the Nationals’ David Gillespie won the seat back. Gillespie was re-elected in 2016 and 2019.
Assessment
Lyne is a safe Nationals seat.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| David Gillespie | Nationals | 49,934 | 49.4 | -0.2 |
| Phil Costa | Labor | 24,371 | 24.1 | -2.5 |
| Stuart Watson | Greens | 6,589 | 6.5 | -2.9 |
| Dean Mccrae | Liberal Democrats | 5,864 | 5.8 | +5.8 |
| Jeremy Miller | Independent | 5,169 | 5.1 | +5.1 |
| Garry Bourke | United Australia Party | 4,098 | 4.1 | +4.1 |
| Ryan Goldspring | Conservative National Party | 1,986 | 2.0 | +2.0 |
| Ed Caruana | Workers Party | 1,676 | 1.7 | +1.7 |
| Catherine Zhao | Christian Democratic Party | 1,493 | 1.5 | -1.6 |
| Informal | 10,096 | 9.1 | +4.5 |
2019 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| David Gillespie | Nationals | 65,942 | 65.2 | +3.5 |
| Phil Costa | Labor | 35,238 | 34.8 | -3.5 |
Booths have been divided into five parts:
- Central – Greater Taree and Gloucester council areas, except for the Taree urban area
- North – Port Macquarie-Hastings council area, including Wauchope
- South-East – Great Lakes council area, including Forster and Tuncurry
- South-West – Dungog and Maitland council areas
- Taree – Taree urban area
The Nationals won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all five areas, ranging from just under 60% in the south-east to 69% in the north.
| Voter group | NAT 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| Central | 64.9 | 13,230 | 13.1 |
| South-East | 61.6 | 13,129 | 13.0 |
| North | 69.0 | 11,210 | 11.1 |
| South-West | 59.8 | 9,672 | 9.6 |
| Taree | 62.5 | 6,875 | 6.8 |
| Pre-poll | 67.6 | 37,784 | 37.3 |
| Other votes | 63.7 | 9,280 | 9.2 |
Election results in Fairfax at the 2019 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal National Party, Labor and Greens.
Interesting how the Lib Dems polled almost 6% here, do they have some sort of appeal here? Because if not I expect the minor party vote to decline and come back to the majors.
Gillespies margin is likely slightly inflated due to the 3.5% swing last time and I would expect the margin to correct itself and revert to it’s 2016 margin based on national polling and regional factors.
NAT hold with a 2-3% swing to Labor
I don’t know but I would guess at least some of that 6% is off name confusion by Liberal voters.
I think this and Cowper are both seats that demographically are moving away from the Nats. They really should have Liberals contesting these seats as it suits the larger towns of Poet Macquarie and Coffs Harbour as well as some of the other smaller beachside towns.
I think some of that Lib Dems vote is Liberal voters accidently voting for them or deliberately choosing then as they don’t want to vote Nationals.
Labor just won’t ever win this seat. Only Nationals will win here. Port Macquarie and the surrounding area have always voted Coalition, so historically speaking it’s had a longer history with the Coalition than Maranoa (believe it or not Maranoa was a Labor seat until about the 1930s).
@ Nether Portal
Agree Labor will never win this seat. Maranoa used to a Labor seat. Labor has struggled in the Outback seats such as Kennedy, Grey etc. A combination of population decline and redistributions has hurt Labor in those seats.
Anyway out of curiosity, why is Elands so strong for Labor as a local do you much about it?
Nimalan
My ex’s family live in the area. Elands is actually a Green booth. Often there is some aberrant outpost like this : Scotland Island -McKellar, Dangar Island/Brooklyn -Borowra , The Gap -Dickson. Hilariously the locals nickname the Elands type communities “Bush Ticks”.
Nimalan,
Disagree. Labor will win this seat. NSW is losing seats to states that are growing faster. Rural seats will continue to pulled towards the areas of fastest population growth. The fastest growing area of NSW, outside of Sydney, is Maitland and environs.
When Paterson was reincarnated in 1993, it included Forster-Tuncurry and was won by Labor.
Unless the Parliament is expanded, Lyne will continue to move south and eventually be won by Labor.
@watson lyne will move into liberal voting areas of paterson and paterson will lose labor viting areas around kurr kurri and cessnock both will become liberal
@ Paladin
Thanks for the insights, other examples include Bundeena (Hughes), Mount Nebo (Dickson), i am guessing Bellingen in Cowper is similar.
@ Watson Watch i actually did not factor future redistributions so you maybe right.
@ nimalan he’s wrong given how their growing their likely to shrink in size. Paterson will expand into lyne northwards not the other way around.
@Nimalan no Labor won’t win it still. As someone who grew up here and still has family here I can confirm that this is a very safe seat.
Also, Elands is an alternative lifestyle community so a lot of Greens voters and they preference Labor. The Nationals finish second here.
In fact, as someone who lived in the area, I can answer anyone’s questions about booths and why they voted a certain way by whatever percentage.
Also yeah Bellingen is similar I think but less so I’m not too sure as I don’t think I’ve been out to Bellingen. It’s a while out from Coffs and I grew up near Port Macquarie so yeah I’ve been to Coffs Harbour heaps and all the areas nearby like Woolgoolga but not Bellingen. I’m pretty sure they had a Greens mayor too?
@Watson Watch even if Lyne did move south (it probably won’t) then it would lose all the Nationals booths like all the rural booths so it wouldn’t really be the same seat. If it doesn’t have Port Macquarie, Taree, Forster-Tuncurry, the Camden Haven, Wauchope, etc then it doesn’t have any of the big conservative booths. If Lyne moved south it wouldn’t be able to include those places (it couldn’t even have Forster-Tuncurry tbh).
So that would be the reason it’d be potentially lost if it went south: it wouldn’t be the same seat. Like how in Queensland the seat of Hinkler was once based around Gladstone and its surrounds but then it moved to be based around Bundaberg, Hervey Bay and the Fraser Coast.
@ Nether Portal
Thanks for your first hand insights. Much appreciated.
Explanation of some of the towns and villages here:
* Barrington is a mountain village towards Stroud, popular for camping due to its natural scenery and snow
* Beechwood is a rural village just west of Wauchope
* Bonny Hills is a coastal town in the Camden Haven region
* Bulahdelah is a village with a golf course on the highway towards Newcastle
* Comboyne is a village in the Camden Haven, located on the Comboyne Mountain
* Cooloongoolook is a village on the highway between Taree and Newcastle, mostly existing as a stop for travellers going to or coming from Sydney
* Coopernook is a village on the highway
* Croki is a village that sits on the river
* Dunbogan is a coastal town in the Camden Haven
* Elands is a village in the forest, home to Ellenborough Falls; Elands is indeed traditionally a hippie town but I feel like this is slowly dying out
* Forster is a major coastal town in the Myall Lakes region
* Gloucester is a country town just west of Nabiac
* Hannam Vale is a village in the countryside, known for its dairy industry
* Harrington is a fishing village between the Camden Haven and Taree
* Hawks Nest is a village near Newcastle
* John’s River is a village in the Camden Haven, just off the Pacific Highway towards Taree
* Karuah is a riverside village towards Newcastle
* Kendall is a town in the Camden Haven
* Kew is a town in the Camden Haven, home to the Big Axe. Although it doesn’t have a primary school, it has the only high school in the area (Camden Haven High School, which opened in 2000 after Kendall Central School became Kendall Public School after the last Year 12s graduated in 1999)
* King Creek is a suburb of Wauchope
* Lake Cathie is a lakeside town in the Camden Haven
* Lakewood is a residential town in the Camden Haven between Kew and West Haven, mostly consisting of housing estates and a shopping village that has a Woolies, a petrol station and some other smaller shops
* Laurieton is a town in the Camden Haven that sits on the Camden Haven River; while the area has quite a high elderly population, Laurieton has a particularly high elderly population due to it having many nursing homes
* Long Flat is a village just west of Wauchope, home to a popular camping or 4WD spot with a creek located just off the Oxley Highway (behind the local pub)
* Moorland is a rural village in the Camden Haven
* Nabiac is a town on the highway, nice spot to stop and rest (interestingly it has one of the first EV charging stations in the area, but it isn’t at the petrol station, it’s in town)
* North Haven is a coastal town in the Camden Haven
* Old Bar is a coastal town just east of Taree
* Papinbarra is a village in the forest just west of Wauchope, located near Beechwood
* Rossglen is a village in the Camden Haven on the highway towards Taree
* Stroud is a town near Newcastle
* Taree is a major town in the Manning Valley region and is the largest town in Lyne
* Tea Gardens is a village near Newcastle
* Tuncurry is a twin town of Forster that is part of the Forster-Tuncurry conurbanation, which is the second largest full town in Lyne after Taree and the fifth largest settlement on the Mid North Coast (after Coffs Harbour, Port Macquarie, Taree and Kempsey)
* Wauchope is a major town just west of Port Macquarie
* West Haven is a town in the Camden Haven, mostly consisting of housing estates between Lakewood and Laurieton
* Wingham is a country town near Taree, just south of Comboyne; home to an abattoir and a large agricultural industry
Notes: “Camden Haven” has a definitive article (“the”) preceding it when we talk about the area but not when we talk about the high school.
Have I missed any?
And for the suburbs:
* Chatham is a suburb of Taree, apparently a particularly rough part of Taree (Taree and Kempsey are both locally known as “shitholes” with lots of crime, ”Would you rather live in Taree or Kempsey?” is a very hard question for locals)
* Cundletown is a suburb of Taree located on the highway
* Dumaresq Island is essentially a rural suburb of Taree on an island
* Purfleet is a suburb of Taree, home to the Taree servo on the Pacific Highway; however something only locals know is that it there’s a dirt road that goes down to the real Purfleet, a small Aboriginal community with a high crime rate (I’ve never been down there because it’s always been a “no-go zone”, not that there’s much down there anyway other than houses and a school)
* Sancrox is an industrial area and suburb of Port Macquarie, and although most of Port is currently in the seat of Cowper, Sancrox is a northwestern suburb that is in the seat of Lyne
* Taree East and Taree North don’t exist
* Taree South is a southern suburb of Taree
* Taree West is a western suburb of Taree
Interesting booths where Labor was so bad they finished third, fourth or even fifth:
* Greens first, Nationals second, Labor third: Elands
* Nationals first, One Nation second and Labor third: Burrell Creek, Johns River, Killabakh, Moorland and Rollands Plains
* Nationals first, One Nation and Greens tied second, UAP third and Labor fourth: Comboyne
* Nationals first, Greens second, Labor third: Wherrol Flat
In 2022, the Nationals won basically every booth in Lyne easily as it’s always been a very safe Nationals seat in rural NSW. But despite the small swing against the Nationals on TPP, the rise of minor parties actually helped them in a few tiny country booths.
Any thoughts as to whether or not this trend will continue in small rural towns?
Sitting Nationals MP David Gillespie has announced his retirement next election.
@James that is quite unfortunate. I knew David, he was a great local member for my old seat. I have family here in a little country town called Lorne.
The Nationals will still easily hold this, this is a safe Nationals seat and has been forever.
@lyneyou mean since rob oakshott?
@John even with Oakeshott on notional TPP it was safe for the Nationals.
Yesterday David Gillespie delivered his valedictory speech to Parliament.
As a former local of Lyne, I would like to thank David for his service as the MP for Lyne, as a Cabinet minister and assistant minister and as a shadow minister.
Before his election to the House of Representatives in 2013, Gillespie was a gastroenterologist. After he was elected in 2013, he spent a term as a backbencher before becoming Assistant Minister for Health in the Turnbull government. He then became Assistant Minister for Health and later Assistant Minister for Children and Families in 2017. In 2021, he was promoted to the role of Minister for Regional Health in the Morrison ministry.
@ NP
Best Wishes to David Gillespie
Who do you think may replace him for the Nats?
@Nimalan – I checked yesterday and there are 3 candidates for Nationals preselection in Lyne. In a big shock, former state MP for Oxley Melinda Pavey is contesting the preselection, a year after she left state parliament.
@Nimalan not completely sure, but there’s a big pool of talent given it’s a safe Nationals seat.
Pat Conaghan, the MP for Cowper, is an option. while the city of Port Macquarie is mostly located in Cowper, some of it including Gillespie’s home suburb of Sancrox is located in Lyne, and more of it could be transferred. Given the rural booths in Cowper as well as those in and around Port Macquarie, Kempsey and Nambucca Heads voted Nationals while Coffs Harbour voted for the local independent, while I think the Nationals will still hold Cowper they might want someone from Coffs Harbour (Luke Hartsuyker, the old member, was from Coffs). He is 53.
Melinda Pavey is another option. She was the member for the state seat of Oxley until she retired in 2023. Oxley is located in Cowper and Lyne and takes in towns such as Kempsey and Wauchope and the rural areas around them. She is aged either 54 or 55.
Or perhaps a completely new candidate could be selected. I don’t see Michael Kemp (the state MP for Oxley) or Tanya Thompson (the state MP for Myall Lakes) quitting anytime soon given they were both elected in 2023, and if Leslie Williams (the state MP for Port Macquarie) quits she’ll be retiring. Plus, Leslie Williams is a Liberal, not a National.
Thanks James and Nether Portal
Agree it is a prized seat so will attract Talent. The NSW and Vic Nats are usually pragmatic about climate change and Coal. The one exception is probably Barnaby Joyce.
@James doesn’t surprise me really to be honest, she’s only 55. She’s been in politics for over 22 years now though, having been an MLC from 2002 until 2015 and the state member for Oxley from 2015 until 2023.
@Nimalan speaking of Barnaby Joyce, despite only being 57 I wouldn’t be surprised if he retired too. He was involved in leadership spills and had some scandals, and while it’s mostly the leader of the Liberal Party’s responsibility if the Coalition lose an election (in the case of 2022 that was Scomo) given the Liberals are the senior party and the Nationals basically never lose many if any seats even when the Coalition is emphatically defeated, he still was there. Adam Marshall would be the favourite to replace him, I believe that’s why he resigned as the member for Northern Tablelands earlier this year, causing a by-election.
Barnaby Joyce is an interesting figure and I think he is one of the most geographically polarising in the Asia-Pacific region and that says something. Why? Because people in rural areas always think highly of him even if they don’t agree with some of his views because he’s the Nationals leader and Nationals stand up for rural people (the fact that he’s a farmer and high-profile also gives him lots of respect), whereas in the city they focus on his social issues and hate him.
Anyway, regardless of the candidate, both Lyne and New England are very safe Nationals seats and have been in conservative hands since Federation, so the Nationals will hold both, probably with swings to them because of COL and Albo’s progressivism being unpopular in rural areas.
@ Nether Portal
I think it is the Coalition’s long term interest for Joyce to exit the scene Gracefully he has already had 21 years in parliament.
He is a drag in the Teal seats and Darren Chester also pointed this out.