Balmain – NSW 2011

ALP 3.7% vs GRN

Incumbent MP
Verity Firth, since 2007.

Geography
Inner Sydney. Balmain covers the entirety of Leichhardt local government area, including Balmain, Leichhardt, Lilyfield, Annandale and Rozelle, as well as Haberfield in the City of Ashfield and Glebe in the City of Sydney.

History
Balmain has existed as an electoral district in various forms since 1880. In that time it has covered a variety of different areas all around the Balmain peninsula. The original seat was created as a single-member district in 1880.

Back in the 19th century, districts would gain extra MPs if the population in the area grew, instead of experiencing regular redistributions. Balmain quickly gained extra MLAs, gaining a second in 1882, a third in 1885 and a fourth in 1889. Ironically the four-seat district of 1889 bore a close resemblance to the modern seat’s boundaries.

In 1894, Balmain was abolished and replaced by the single-member districts of South Balmain, North Balmain, Leichhardt and Annandale.

In 1904, Balmain was re-created when Balmain Southand Balmain Northwere merged. It elected a Liberal MP in 1904, but in 1907 it was won by the ALP’s John Storey in 1907. He had previously held Balmain Northfrom 1901 to 1904.

The NSW Labor Party split in 1916 over conscription, with most of the Holman government, including William Holman itself, expelled. Storey became leader of the remnants of the ALP in 1917.

In the lead-up to the 1920 election the seat of Balmain was expanded to cover parts of the neighbouring seats of Annandale, Camperdown, Darling Harbour, Glebe and Rozelle, and became a five-member district elected by proportional representation.

At the 1920 election, the expanded Balmain elected four Labor members and one Nationalist. The ALP won a slim majority, and Storey became Premier. He served until his death in 1921.

Balmain elected three Labor and two Nationalist MPs in 1922, and again elected four Labor members in 1925.

The 1927 election saw a return to single-member districts, and Balmain reduced to a smaller single-member district. At that year’s election, the official Labor candidate, Harry Doran, was challenged by sitting Labor MLA HV Evatt, who had been elected as a member for the multi-member Balmain district in 1925. Evatt won re-election as an independent Labor candidate.

In 1930, Evatt was appointed to the High Court and didn’t contest Balmain. John Quirk, whose neighbouring seat of Rozelle had been abolished in the redistribution, was elected in Balmain for the ALP. Evatt later went on to serve as a federal MP, federal minister, and leader of the federal ALP from 1951 to 1960.

Quirk died in 1938, and the 1939 Balmain by-election was won by his wife Mary. She held the seat until 1950, when she ran as an independent after losing Labor preselection. She lost to official Labor candidate John McMahon.

McMahon served as a minister in the Labor government from 1959 until the government lost power in 1965, and he retired in 1968.

Roger Degen held Balmain for the ALP from 1968 until his retirement in 1984. That year the seat was won by Peter Crawford.

In 1988, Crawford lost Balmain to former Olympic swimmer Dawn Fraser, running as an independent and ending over 80 years of Labor domination in Balmain.

Fraser held the seat for one term. In 1991, Balmain was abolished, and Fraser was defeated in an attempt to win the new seat of Port Jackson.

Port Jackson was won in 1991 by Sandra Nori of the ALP. Nori held the seat until 2007. In 2003, Port Jackson was the main target for the Greens, with Jamie Parker reducing Nori’s margin to 7.3%.

In 2007, Port Jackson was again renamed Balmain, and shifted west to lose Ultimo, Pyrmont and Sydney CBD and gained Haberfield. Nori retired, and the ALP preselected City of Sydney councillor Verity Firth. Greens councillor Rochelle Porteous reduced the ALP margin to 3.8%.

Candidates

Political situation
Balmain is the strongest seat for the Greens in New South Wales. Despite a long history of ALP domination in the area, the Greens have made significant inroads in recent years. The Greens now hold six out of twelve seats on Leichhardt Council and have a strong presence with the inner western demographic that dominates Balmain and neighbouring Marrickville. When you also factor in the deep unpopularity of the Labor government, there is certainly a strong chance the Greens could win.

On the other hand, Firth has quite high popularity considering the state of the ALP, and could hold on to many voters who would otherwise consider voting Green.

2007 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Verity Firth ALP 16,562 39.2 -2.9
Rochelle Porteous GRN 12,471 29.5 +0.2
Peter Shmigel LIB 10,031 23.8 +2.7
Jane Ward IND 1,297 3.1 +3.1
Jane Hyde IND 987 2.3 +2.3
Edward Okulicz DEM 881 2.1 -0.3

2007 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Verity Firth ALP 17,933 53.8 -3.2
Rochelle Porteous GRN 15,431 46.2 +3.2

Booth breakdown
Booths in Balmain have been divided into four areas. The bulk of the seat is contained in Leichhardt local government area, and the booths in that area have been divided between Balmain, covering the suburbs on the peninsula, and Leichhardt, covering the southern parts of the council area.

Booths in Ashfield council area have been grouped as Haberfield, and booths in the City of Sydney have been grouped as Glebe.

The Greens won a slim 50.4% majority in the Balmain area. The ALP won majorities of 54-55% in Leichhardt and Glebe, and a larger majority of almost 65% in Haberfield, boosted by a large 31% for the Liberal Party. The Liberals got 27% in Balmain, 21% in Leichhardt, and their lowest vote was 16% in Glebe.

 

Polling booths in Balmain at the 2007 state election. Balmain in blue, Leichhardt in green, Glebe in orange, Haberfield in yellow.
Voter group Lib % ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
Leichhardt 21.6 54.9 13,705 32.5
Balmain 27.4 49.6 10,045 23.8
Glebe 16.4 53.9 6,166 14.6
Haberfield 31.8 64.7 3,622 8.6
Other votes 24.8 52.6 8,633 20.5
Two-party-preferred (Labor vs Greens) votes in Balmain at the 2007 state election.
Liberal primary votes in Balmain at the 2007 state election.

209 COMMENTS

  1. Imaginative Nickname – that is on primaries though isn’t it? It doesn’t allow for Sheehan’s preferences which will flow to Firth. By elmination, I think it might be difficult for the Greens to get above Firth after eliminations.

  2. Jane Ward’s preferences flow very strongly to the Greens: about 2 to 1. It will nullify a large amount of the Sheehan factor.

  3. deconst – disagree. Sheehan has more than double the primary vote of Ward and didn’t Sheehan place a ‘2’ for the ALP on her ticket? If she did, the ALP will most likely finish second here and then overtake the Libs I presume, but perhaps not.

  4. Jamie Parker -cest magnifique.

    We dont get to see alternate future but the social fascism of Verity looks to have been defeated.

  6. Mick,

    You can take it to the bank – Verity Kaput.

    The cynicism of Sheehan is the ultimate insider move from the ALP yet Parker has withstood it, pop the champagne and get out the macaroons!

  9. Any chance for a televised concession speech from Verity? Congratulations to the people of Balmain on their liberation !!!

  10. Settle down folks. The ABC projection of a Greens win is not based on an actual preference count. Parker is 218 votes ahead of Firth on primary votes, with preferences to be distributed tomorrow. It’s not a reliable projection as we still don’t know for sure who will finish second.

  11. Correct but with 1300-ish Sheehan prefs the only place where Firth may gain ground 218 votes is quite a bit of space to make up.

  12. There seems to be a lot of confusion about Sheehan’s HTV. For the record (once again) she issued no numbers or instructions. Just “suggested” progressives, listing (in this order) Ward, Firth and Parker, with complementary descriptions of each.

    Make of that what you will… another nail-biting day (tomorrow), save the triumphalism for then

  14. @ Millard. Verity Firth’s “social fascism”? Wow, that is more than just excited hypebole, that is actually quite offensive… Interesting that the Greens themselves (see Anthony Loewenstein’s story on New Matilda site) are threatening to sue for defamation anyone who makes similar comments about them.

    Jamie Parker this morning was on ABC 702 6am news sounding very confident. On 30% of the primary vote… one of the worst “endorsements” of a local candidate ever.

    If he is successful, Jamie Parker will be in for interesting (and short) term. That figure is a tiny fraction (less than one percent) higher than the Greens 2007 figures. No massive billboards then, nor massive disenchantment with Labor. This should be “soul searching” and chastening result for the NSW Greens whichever way it goes, and crowing comments like the ones above just look ridiculous.

  15. Assuming he wins, what impact can Jamie Parker have as a Greens MP, in a parliament dominated by the conservative forces?
    You wonder if O’Farrell will do anything much for the people of Balmain over the next 4 years?
    I think Verity losing is a great pity, but Balmain was always going to be difficut for Labor to retain in this political climate.

  16. What impact can Verity have in a parliament dominated by the conservative forces? We’re dogs fighting over the scraps that were ignored by the Liberal pillagers.

    Jamie Parker is important: he represents the first time in decades that a party-affiliated candidate not from Labor or Coalition has gotten into state parliament.

    For that alone, Jamie Parker should be applauded for a hard-won (almost-there) victory.

  20. Before I always thought that if we lose Balmain to Greens we lose it forever.

    But even assuming the worst and Parker wins, the fact that in a year of utter collapse of the Labor vote a good enough local grassroots campaign still managed to keep us so close in Balmain, gives me hope that a similarly good campaign for Verity or a similarly good candidate in four years can give it back.

    It’ll certainly be a symbolic victory, for the heirs of Labor to regain our birthplace.

  21. Balmain is likely to remain a highly contested seat, no doubt about it. Whoever wins will be likely to gain a certain advantage provided they do a good job as a local member. the other question I have relates to demographic shifts in the electorate – how are these likely to play out?

    Note Marrickville will remain highly contested – 2PP figures at the moment are ALP 50.9% to Green 49.1%

  22. Verity’s husband got a (non-recorded) conviction today (he had pleaded guilty). This is likely to be a trying day for her. As I have said before, I am not a party person and I don’t barrack for one side or the other, but can those who are and who regularly post here contain themselves at least for a 24 hours and not dance on her grave? She actually doesn’t deserve this, she probably should never have tried to “change the world” through politics at all.

    Verity, whatever happens today, know this: Balmain respects you.

  24. Lopo: well haha I asked because I am involved in organizing Young Labor, which is for under 26’s, and we always need good people in the North. However I wouldn’t have any jurisdiction/resource/right to organize for the senior party.

    However if you want to be involved in the rebuilding at all, tomorrow there’s something potentially big (potential being a key word, nobody really knows what it is, I’ll certainly be there to check it out) going on at AMWU near Central Station in the afternoon, after the pro-climate action rally. It’s a bunch of rank and file/more local level Labor members, branch presidents, councilors, organizers and activists meeting about rebuilding and reforming NSW Labor.

    So if you want to get involved in reforming NSW Labor, this may be the place, again I make no promises because I, and nobody really, knows what this meeting is going to be like.

    You can get more details here: http://ouralp.net/

  25. OH WAIT, this is in the wrong thread.

    Ben delete this if you want. I was trying to respond to Lopo on the other thread.

  26. This fuss should not have happened.

    The Greens and Labor, as loose coalition partners in the Federal sphere, should have made sure that one of the two easily won the seat by agreeing to swap preferences. This what the Liberal and Nationals do when they are both contesting an open seat.

    Further more, once a green or an ALP candidate is elected, the other party should desist from standing until the sitting member retires. This would ensure that a progressive gets a strong mandate in the seat.

    Now it is actually possible that the Liberals can win the seat if enough prefs exhaust.

    As the years go by and property prices go up in Balmain, it is likely to drift to being a seat that fought b/w the Greens and the Liberals.

  27. I should add that I think it’s time the ALP and the Greens merged and Labor moved to the left.

  28. Probably a good day for the Greens – I’d anticipate Buckingham will overtake Hanson for the last spot in the Upper House, as well as Parker winning?

  29. Evan – I suppose there has to be some light to what was otherwise a totally disasterous result for the Greens. They will be in the bin within a decade I expect unless they merge with the ALP at some stage.

    Don Chipp = Democrats
    Pauline = One Nation
    Bob Brown = Greens…..

    The trend is there.

  30. LOL – disastrous. It was the ALP who suffered a 16%+ swing, not the Greens who got 2%+ swing in their favor. That represents a 30% increase in Greens vote.

    It’s real gains, not expectations, that matters. And Jamie has (almost) really gained the seat of Balmain.

  31. Deconst

    Are you getting the Greens confused with the Nationals, the National increased their votes by 2.5% to 12.5% a 25% increase

    The Greens increased their vote from 9% to 10.2% a 13% increase not 30%

  32. deconst – fair enough, but let’s not get carried away. The Greens received a 1.2% increase against a 16% swing against the ALP. So they could only attract about 7.5% of that swinging vote away from the ALP. I’ll tell you now, if I were a Green supporter, I’d be pretty disappointed with that overall outcome. They could hardly cannabalise any of the ALP vote. Most of it went directly across to the co-alition. I mean let’s face it, if any Green supporter had granduer that the Greens would one-day be a major political force, I think this goes to show it can’t happen. They could never have had a better opportunity in Australia’s political history.

    I stand by my prediction that within a decade something else will be around to take much of its place when Bob Brown retires and particularly if we end up with a wreched ETS if the world doesn’t agree to one.

  33. Oh yes, and not to mention the treachery by Gillard on the Greens. Where the hell is Bob Brown to defend the Greens? Or is it a game that he is happy with? Would of thought it was time to stand up.

  35. The gentrification in Balmain is not happening at a rate or in a way to turn this into a Lib vs. Greens electorate fast, unlike Drummoyne. It may turn sometime but certainly not in the next few elections.

    I still don’t know that Greens are gonna go after Bob Brown retires because I think unlike Democrats and One Nation they have a really cohesive ideology which many people, many young people who have just started voting and are going to keep at it for a while, are attracted to. HOWEVER, I agree that leadership is a big issue. Or else you may see a Red-Green/Blue-Green split the same way the Democrats were unable to control their own party’s competing factions.

    I would agree completely with DB though that this election has been a pretty terrible result for the Greens. If they can’t make much ground off the complete and utter collapse of Labor’s vote, what can they do in the short term? And I reject the idea that Labor’s collapse cost the Greens. The voters Greens fights for are the progressive voters Labor has a historical hold on but is losing control of. It seems to me that this progressive bloc, which may be something like 15-20%, have by now either already defected to the Greens, or like me and a lot of my peers, are prepared to stand or fall with Labor.

    A lot of people thought a month or two ago that there was a chance Labor would cease to exist as a stand alone party as they are unable to form government without Greens, I never believed in it even when the Greens opinion polled at 15-17%, and I certainly don’t see the case for it now.

  36. Can we get back to Balmain? As I’ve said, I’m in the local media. I received two attempts to “smear” candidates. One was totally predicable and tired, but one new one, an amateurish and ham-fisted attempt on Maire Sheehan’s character and motivation came from a self described “friend” of Jamie Parker. Of course I did consider that it was a set up, and ignored it.

    When oh when will we know… I heard Jamie say it might be next week on ABC radio at 3pm… Please someone, put us all out of our suspense!

  38. I’m not convinced by the “if the Greens can’t do well in this election…” etc stuff. At the beginning of the campaign I was thinking 11-12% would be a good figure – I know the polls were coming off 16% & 17%, but what people say they will do in respect of non-major parties months out from a poll and what they actually do rarely line up (Hanson had the same phenomenon). In a tsunami election (which I guess you could call this one) I would not expect either independents or any minor party to do well. People were voting for a big change in government, saw the Libs as the ones who were going to take over, and voted accordingly. While the Greens might have expected some increase in their vote from dissatisfied ALP voters, a lot would have been travelling the other way, trying to shore up the ALP vote. So it would be a win-some, lose-some kind of effort with voters.

    As to the size of the rise in vote – as it stands the Greens vote has risen some 22% in the LC (from 9.11% to 11.13% when I last looked) kinda splits the diff between 13% & 30%!

  39. It is worth noting that, despite being a change-of-government election, the Greens were able to hold off the swing to the Liberals somewhat and increase their vote. The 2007 federal election had Grayndler actually lose votes. Overall, the Greens vote only increased by 0.60% at Federal in 2007 as opposed to 2.23% in 2004 and 3.94% in 2010.

    In change-of-government elections, minor parties suffer. In this election, their vote was reduced by 2.1%, but the Greens keep on pushing on.

    That the Greens can finally claim a lower-house seat (distribution tomorrow morning pending) despite the hostile political environment speaks mountains about the monumental effort they put in.

  40. Why is the discussion about the Greens not picking up swinging voters? The Greens do not, and never have, and never will, pick up swinging voters – they’re too far to the left to pick up swinging voters.

    The growth in the Greens primary vote is a reflection of sociological changes. As long as those sociological changes keep happening, the Greens primary vote will keep rising, and the ALP primary vote will keep falling in tandem.

  41. The gig is up for Labor in the inner-city. The only vote these people have left is the diminishing migrant vote and the friends and family vote. Jamie Parker will entrench himself with the benefit of incumbency – he can look forward to a Clover style term in office at the end of which he will pass on the torch to a democratically preselected succesor.

  42. Like may of you, I watched Stateline earlier, I saw Junaita beam as she announced “the making of history”.

    Hardly anyone has even mentioned the actual winner in Balmain, the Libs James Falk. Perhaps someone on Tally Room will give him a toast. He deserves it. In a sometimes grubby fight which i observed at close range, he displayed impeccable integrity throughout.

    Millard, you are dreaming. quite apart from the demography, there’s more to be played out here.

  43. Go back a page and you will actually find my post, Russell! Bravo!

    This seat is changing demographics and I think will be a Green vs Lib 2PP in the mid to long term. The people who move here are after a quick jump over to the city (or Pyrmont) and the area is becomming very affluent, very similar to Vaucluse, with the exception of the Parramatta Road run, which will be very heavy Greens territory (especially around Sydney Uni and UTS), full of students.

  44. Sorry, but Jamie Parker does nothing for me, and I doubt he’ll make much of a contribution to state parliament!
    Progressives are meant to take this as consolation for the Liberal mega landslide victory?

  45. Russell, saying the Libs were the winner in Balmain is a bit part one eyed…..

    You can’t win on preferences in one seat and then gag for FPTP in Balmain

  46. Hi Hawkeye I remember it, I think I’ve read every post on this very long thread… Its been a good and informative discussion and source of information (thanks Ben). As a part of that “changing demography” and being involved in a local business servicing it, I’m acutely aware of the way Balmain is changing. You are correct about it now being Grns vs Lib. From 2015 also I think the Libs will always have the ascendancy.

    Actually, it was Grns vs Lib before this election too. But everyone (including the Libs, who wanted the deeply unlikely underdog tag) had an interest in denying that. One of the reasons the Labor vote was still quite high was of Verity. She has been a good minister, she is very well-liked, and people felt sorry for her. Especially after her husband’s mad little escapade on the mean streets of Glebe…

    The next Labor candidate will have none of that going for them.

    Labor voters have left this electorate. Those who are replacing them are Anglo, rich and often older. Balmain “village” itself (and Annandale) are closer to Mosman now than Five Dock. The new arrivals (since the 80s) are not Labor voters, and never will be.

    btw, Imaginative Nickname. Don’t pigeonhole me. I’m sorry for the careless use of the word “winner” to describe James Falk. I like the guy. I like Verity too. If I could have voted in this electorate, I would have put (1) Verity (2) James. In fact I urged Lib and Lab voters to preference each other. Needless to say, no one took any notice of me.

  47. Parker leads Firth by 250 votes with 2994 preferences to be distributed. If you assume 30% of preferences exhaust and most of the CDP preferences go to the Liberal it means Verity would have to win a 250 vote plurality against Parker out of a total of about 1800 preferences to be distributed.

    If more people exhausted then 30% the task becomes harder. Sheehan was the last but unsuccesful card in Labor’s bag of tricks in Balmain. I’ll be interested to see what the ALP preference flow to the Greens will be as well.

  49. Welp, time for Verity to dust off that law degree.

    But the fact that this seat is so close in this of all elections convinces me that we’ll have a fighting chance in four years.

  50. Just what this means for the people of Balmain was explained in The Australian this morning:

    “Premier Barry O’Farrell said he would never applaud a victory by the Greens or Labor in a seat in which a Liberal candidate finished ahead on primary votes: “The good news is that, because of the trust shown in us by communities across the state, we can probably just cope with one Green in the lower house…”

    Or to paraphrase: Jamie Parker is irrelevant. Totally, utterly, useless. To. Everyone…

    From me, adieu. It’s been fun.

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