Blair – Election 2010

ALP 7.0%

Incumbent MP
Shayne Neumann, since 2007.

Geography
Blair covers most of the City of Ipswich as well as  Somerset Regional Council. The seat covers the urban area of Ipswich and rural areas to the west, and towns such as Esk and Kilcoy.

Redistribution
Blair moved north, losing Lockyer Valley council and all of its parts of Scenic Rim council to the new seat of Wright. In exchange it gained more territory to the east of Ipswich, as well as Somerset Regional Council to the north. The former Shire of Esk was transferred from Dickson and the former Shire of Kilcoy was transferred from Fisher. These areas had previously been included in Blair before the 2006 redistribution. The redistribution saw Blair contract, losing conservative areas to the south and west of Ipswich and gaining more of the strongly pro-Labor Ipswich area.

History
Blair was created at the 1998 election, one of a number of seats created in Queensland over the last few decades. The seat was held by the Liberal Party until 2007, when the ALP won.

Blair took over territory in Ipswich in 1998 from the seat of Oxley. Oxley had a long history of being held by the Labor Party but was lost to disendorsed Liberal candidate Pauline Hanson in 1996. Hanson formed One Nation in her term in the House of Representatives, and contested Blair in 1998. Hanson came first on primary votes, but lost on preferences. Liberal candidate Cameron Thompson came third on primary votes, but overtook the ALP on Nationals preferences and then overtook Hanson on Labor preferences.

Thompson held Blair at the 2001 and 2004 elections, but lost in 2007 to Labor candidate Shayne Neumann. Neumann was assisted by a redistribution which saw Blair take in more of pro-Labor Ipswich, losing rural conservatives areas to the northwest, although it gained areas to the southwest which have since been shedded.

Candidates

Political situation
The ALP’s margin has been increased by the recent redistribution. If there is a backlash against the ALP in Blair it is possible that the 7% margin could be overturned, but it will be hard for the LNP to win in a seat so concentrated on Ipswich.

2007 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Shayne Neumann ALP 40,663 48.83 +11.99
Cameron Thompson LIB 35,133 42.19 -5.17
Peter Luxton GRN 3,262 3.92 +0.68
Bevan Smith FF 1,718 2.06 -1.56
Dale Chorley IND 1,429 1.72 +1.72
David White DEM 735 0.88 -0.44
Doug Swanborough LDP 196 0.24 +0.24
Robert Theis CEC 143 0.17 -0.41

2007 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Shayne Neumann ALP 45,369 54.48 +10.17
Cameron Thompson LIB 37,910 45.52 -10.17

Results do not take into consideration effects of the redistribution.

Booth breakdown
Blair includes booths in two local government areas: Somerset Region and the City of Ipswich. There is a relatively small population in Somerset, so that area has been kept as a single area. Booths in Ipswich LGA have been divided into four areas. Those in rural Ipswich have been grouped together and those in urban Ipswich divided into North, East and Central.

The ALP won large majorities in all three urban Ipswich areas, with 67% in the east, 61% in the centre (an area covering over 40% of Blair’s population) and 56% in the north. They won a slim majority in rural Ipswich council area, while the Liberal Party won a 52.8% majority in Somerset.

Polling booths in Blair. Somerset in yellow, Rural Ipswich in blue, North Ipswich in red, Central Ipswich in green, East Ipswich in orange.
Voter group GRN % ALP 2CP % Total votes % of ordinary votes
Central Ipswich 3.91 61.25 24,461 41.04
North Ipswich 4.11 56.23 11,180 18.76
Somerset 4.07 47.24 9,824 16.48
East Ipswich 4.31 67.69 8,125 13.63
Rural Ipswich 3.33 50.95 6,006 10.08
Other votes 4.64 52.73 12,197
Results of the 2007 federal election in Blair.
Results of the 2007 federal election in Ipswich.

21 COMMENTS

  1. Jimmy, I agree with you that voters out near Esk and Kilcoy couldn’t be described as progressive. But with the redistribution, three are very few of them. The vast majority of voters live in Ipswich itself. Many rural areas have been cut out of Blair.

  2. Dumbfounded of Ipswich Says: I have met with Shane about some personal issues and I have found him very open and frank and genuine, yes I guess he is still learning the ropes having only been elected for a few years but I think he’s the type of guy who tells you what he believes and doesn’t just tell you what you want to hear now and acts differently later

    Yes I’ve heard the same and many have suggested that we target Bernie Ripoll. Not known for standing up for anything and certainly should be our option to try and knock out.

  3. Tony, I haven’t heard anything negative about Bernie Ripoll. You might know him personally so have more information than me. As far as I’m aware he is well known and well liked, by members of his own party and the wider community. The LNP respect him for being a decent guy. Behaves himself during campaigns. Have never met him so I’m only going on what others tell me, locals in the ALP, LNP, what I read about him etc.
    I also haven’t met Shayne Neumann. So again, I’m only going on what others say, again local ALP members, LNP members, what he’s said in the media, what everyone is saying about the dirty politics. Also his role in Pauline Hanson’s demise.
    I hasten to add, although Bernie Rippoll is well liked, well as far as I can tell, inside and outside of the ALP I think there will be a swing against him. He’ll get in, but probably only because of preferences. The ALP is on the nose in Oxley too.

  4. Agree with Ben. Also, is the LNP really ‘against the sale of public assets, anti-development, need for climate change, prevention of drought.’ Doesn’t sound like the Liberal/National Parties that I know.

    Wotif, you are right that I am not familiar with the situation in Blair, but you contend that 1) The LNP is more ‘left’ than the ALP in Blair; and 2) That enough people have noticed this; and 3) That this will make people desert the ALP for a more ‘left’ party.

    As I said, I don’t know the local situation, so, while an odd situation, the first may be true. But I doubt that 2 or 3 can be. People just don’t care enough to follow local politics with any depth and, as established, being conservative isn’t exactly a black mark in Blair. However, I will take you on your word and watch this space closely. Afterall, every election has a wildcard seat – it may as well be Blair.

  5. And one last note before I get back to work. I think Stewart here sagely noted that even MPs some distance to the left or right of their party have to toe the party line when push comes to shove (i.e when a vote happens), so you have to remember that in the end a vote for your local candidate is a vote for the caucus of the party that they represent. Which is why (and this is the last time I’ll say this, I promise), I can’t see Green votes going to the Libs.

  6. I’m sure I read in the local paper The Queensland Times this week that Neil Zabel from the Somerset Council was the LNP candidate. I think he’s a real estate agent. Don’t know much about him though. Be interesting to see who else comes out of the woodwork.

  8. Would not have cameron thompson, the former member for Blair have developed a 1% or so personal vote as marginal mps tend to do
    ? This would provide a bit of a buffer for labor even if it experience a 5 or 6 percent swing in queensland. Same with the new areas coming in from Dickson ect.

  9. I’ve unapproved about 80 comments on the Blair and Wright thread. Any future comments slagging off either Neumann or Petersen will be subject to deletion.

  12. Hmm, a prediction.

    1/ The majority of Green voters in Blair will preference Labor, regardless of what the HTV ticket says (and on a side note, isn’t it up to the local branches, not the candidate to decide how to lodge a HTV card?)

    2/ Dr Petersen will not be a Green candidate in the future.

  13. Hamish – yes, Green preferences would by nature generally go labors way no matter what she does on her how to vote card. I thought it was up to the branch on how to preference, but was not sure on that…… Can anyone confirm what the ‘go’ is with that??
    Why do you say she won’t be a candidate in the future?? She’s been endorsed this time, why not next time?? Dr Petersen is unlikely to win a seat this time, however given her past history of many attempts in other elections/seats no reason to think she would not go again?

  15. An interesting stat: Blair neighbours NINE other federal seats. Thats the most for any electorate in the country. Blair neighbours: Dickson (Lab), Wright (Lib), Oxley (Lab), Ryan (Ind/Lib), Maranoa (Nat), Longman (Lab), Fisher (Lib), Fairfax (Nat) and Wide Bay (Nat).

    Heres the thing, six of those seats are marginal, held on paper by less then 5%. Phwoa! No wonder its a bellwether!

  17. There was a swing away from the LNP of about 2%, a significant swing away from the ALP of about 9%. Neumann is only back because of preferences from the Greens. Had Patricia Petersen preferenced the LNP he wouldn’t have retained the seat. I bet the ALP are breathing a sigh of relief.

  18. Here are the figures taken from ABC website:-
    Neil Zabel LNP 23,287 votes 37.3% -1.5 Swing
    Joshua Olyslagers FFP 3,118 votes 5.0% +3.0 Swing
    Shayne Neumann ALP 26,465 Votes 42.4% -10.0 Swing
    Brad King IND 2,716 votes 4.4% +4.4 Swing
    Patricia Petersen GRN 6,849 votes 11.0% +7.0 Swing

    The fact is that there was in total a swing of 11.5% away from Labor (10%) and the LNP (1.5%), with the greens achieving a 7% swing to them….
    I would have thought the surprise here would be the performance of the independent who got 4.4% of the vote without much of a campaign.
    I would also have thought that 7% towards the Greens is pretty much on a par with what happened in rest of Australia??

  19. Two party preferred figures from same webite:
    ABC Predicted Final Result:
    ALP RETAIN:
    2.7% swing to LNP Party
    % Vote
    ALP 54.3
    LNP 45.7
    So Nick was a little out on his prediction of a 3-4% swing to the LNP

  20. 7% is about 1.5% higher than the average Qld swing to the Greens, so a good result for Petersen (although the suggestion that if she had preferenced the LNP they would have won is ridiculous; Greens voters would have ignored the how-to-vote and preferenced Labor anyway, as they always do in these situations). This was a pretty good result for Neumann, who managed to limit the 2PP swing to 2.93% and also led on the primary vote. In fact the swing was the fourth smallest in Queensland (after Fisher, McPherson and Petrie).

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