Solomon – Election 2010

ALP 0.2%

Incumbent MP
Damian Hale, since 2007.

Geography
Solomon covers the Darwin metropolitan area, as well as the nearby city of Palmerston.

Demographics
Solomon has a high concentration of defence facilities, and the largest concentration of defence employees in the country.

History
The Northern Territory first elected a Member of the House of Representatives in 1922, but this person was only given full voting rights in 1968. The seat was held by the Country Party and then the Country Liberal Party from then until 1983, before Labor and then the CLP each held the seat for one term, before Warren Snowdon won the seat for the ALP in 1987. Snowdon lost the seat for one term in 1996 before being returned for one more term in 1998. The 2000 redistribution saw the Northern Territory gain a second seat for the first time, and the seats of Solomon, covering Darwin and Palmerston, and Lingiari, covering the rest, were created. In 2001, Country Liberal candidate Dave Tollner won the seat by only 88 votes. In 2004, he increased his margin to 2.8%. The 2007 election saw Tollner lose his seat to the ALP’s Hale.

Candidates

  • John Kearney (One Nation)
  • Emma Young (Greens)
  • Damian Hale (Labor) – Member for Solomon since 2007.
  • Natasha Griggs (Country Liberal) – Deputy Mayor of Palmerston.
  • Trudy Campbell (Citizens Electoral Council)

Political situation
Solomon is the ALP’s third most marginal seat in Australia.

2007 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
David Tollner CLP 24,109 46.80 -1.95
Damian Hale ALP 21,581 41.90 +3.37
Debbie Hudson GRN 4,672 9.07 +2.30
Maurice Foley IND 545 1.06 -0.44
Jacques Chester LDP 358 0.70 +0.70
Trudy Campbell CEC 245 0.48 +0.01
FF 0 0.00 -2.09
DEM 0 0.00 -1.86

2007 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Damian Hale ALP 25,853 50.19 +3.00
David Tollner CLP 25,657 49.81 -3.00

Booth breakdown
Solomon’s voters clearly divide into geographical areas. The northern suburbs of Darwin, which made up 40% of the voters, strongly voted for the ALP. In contrast, the southern suburbs of Darwin, as well as the satellite city of Palmerston, voted strongly for the Country Liberal Party. Tollner also won a majority of other votes cast, which mainly consisted of postal votes.

Voter group
 ALP 2CP %
 Total votes cast
 % of votes
North Darwin 55.94 21,029 40.83
Palmerston 47.04 10,578 20.54
South Darwin 45.66 10,018 19.45
Other votes 45.92 9,885 19.19
solomonbooths3
Polling booths in Solomon. Pink booths were won by the ALP, blue booths by the CLP. The size of each number is roughly scaled according to how many votes were cast at that booth.

4 COMMENTS

  1. Do you know what makes Palmerston so much stronger for the conservatives? Is that where all the defence personell are located?

  2. Looking at the census figures, yes, there is a higher proportion of defence employees in Palmerston (11% of the workforce). Also Palmerston, compared with Darwin city, is less ethnically diverse, has significantly less people employed in professional occupations, and appears to have a very low proportion of fully-owned private dwellings (7.5% vs 32.6% across Australia) – could that be due to defence housing? I’m not familiar enough with the NT though to offer any other observations there.

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