North Shore – NSW 2015

LIB 30.4%

Incumbent MP
Jillian Skinner, since 1994.

Geography
Lower North Shore of Sydney. The seat of North Shore covers a majority of the City of North Sydney and all of Mosman Council. Suburbs include North Sydney, Wollstonecraft, McMahons Point, Kirribilli, Cremorne and Mosman.

Map of North Shore's 2011 and 2015 boundaries. 2011 boundaries marked as red lines, 2015 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.
Map of North Shore’s 2011 and 2015 boundaries. 2011 boundaries marked as red lines, 2015 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.

Redistribution
North Shore lost parts of Crows Nest to Willoughby. These changes slightly increased the Liberal margin from 30.3% to 30.4%.

History
The district of North Shore has existed since 1981. A previous incarnation was a five-member district from 1920 to 1927. The current seat of North Shore was held by independents from 1981 to 1991, and by the Liberal Party since 1991.

When North Shore was created in 1981, it covered a smaller area than the current seat, mainly covering the City of North Sydney. It replaced the previous seat named Kirribilli, which had been won by the Liberal Party at every election since it was created in 1962. The seat of Mosman covered the Mosman part of the current seat, as well as covering western parts of Manly.

Bruce McDonald had held the seat of Kirribilli since 1976, when he had defeated the sitting Liberal MP John Waddy for preselection, and then defeated him at the election, when Waddy attempted to win as an independent. McDonald became deputy leader of the Liberal Party in 1978, and became Leader of the Opposition four months before the 1981 election.

At the 1981 election, McDonald contested the renamed seat of North Shore, as well as leading the conservative Coalition into the election. He was challenged by the independent Mayor of North Sydney, Ted Mack, and lost the seat. McDonald polled over 41% of the primary vote, while Mack only outpolled the ALP by 127 votes on primary votes. After outpolling the ALP, Mack overtook McDonald on Labor preferences. McDonald also lost the statewide election in a landslide.

Mack was re-elected to North Shore in 1984 and 1988. He retired later in 1988, only two days before he would qualify for a parliamentary pension as a statement against the excesses of modern politics. Mack returned to politics in 1990, winning the federal seat of North Sydney off the Liberal Party. He held it for two terms before again retiring before qualifying for a pension.

The 1988 by-election was won by independent North Sydney councillor Robyn Read.

Prior to the 1991 election, the neighbouring seat of Mosman was abolished, with the Mosman area largely absorbed by North Shore. Mosman had always been dominated by the Liberal Party and its predecessors, except for two terms in the 1940s when it was won by an independent.

Phillip Smiles had served as Member for Mosman since 1984. He challenged Read in the seat of North Shore in 1991, and won the seat. He served as Assistant Treasurer from 1991 to 1992. He was convicted of tax evasion in 1993, and was forced to resign from Parliament.

The 1994 by-election was won by Liberal candidate Jillian Skinner. She was challenged by Robyn Read, but won with a larger margin than Smiles had in 1991.

Skinner won re-election with relative ease at the 1995, 1999, 2003, 2007 and 2011 elections. The ALP came second in 1995, 1999 and 2003, but in 2007 the Greens overtook Labor. Skinner still held a margin of almost 16%.

Skinner was elected deputy leader of the Liberal Party following the 2007 election. She has served as Minister for Health since the 2011 election. Skinner resigned as Liberal deputy leader in April 2014, following the resignation of Barry O’Farrell as Premier and party leader.

Candidates

Assessment
North Shore is a safe Liberal seat.

2011 election result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Jillian Skinner Liberal 30,424 67.3 +13.9 67.3
Andrew Robjohns Greens 9,143 20.2 +2.3 20.2
Tabitha Winton Labor 4,881 10.8 -7.0 10.8
David Kelly Christian Democrats 766 1.7 0.0 1.7

2011 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Jillian Skinner Liberal 31,305 73.2 +7.4 73.3
Andrew Robjohns Greens 11,460 26.8 -7.4 26.7

2011 two-party-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Jillian Skinner Liberal 32,416 80.3 +11.1 80.4
Tabitha Winton Labor 7,939 19.7 -11.1 19.6
Polling places in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election. Kirribilli in yellow, Mosman in red, Neutral Bay in green, North Sydney in blue. Click to enlarge.
Polling places in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election. Kirribilli in yellow, Mosman in red, Neutral Bay in green, North Sydney in blue. Click to enlarge.

Booth breakdown
Booths in North Shore have been split into four parts. The entire Mosman council area has been grouped together, while those booths in North Sydney council area have been split into North Sydney, Neutral Bay and Kirribilli.

The Liberal Party won a large majority of the primary vote in all four areas, ranging from 63.5% in Kirribilli to 73% in Mosman.

The Greens came second, with a vote ranging from 17% in Mosman to 24% in North Sydney. Labor’s vote ranged from 9% in Mosman to 13% in North Sydney.

Voter group LIB % GRN % ALP % Total % of votes
Mosman 72.9 16.8 8.7 12,968 30.4
North Sydney 61.0 23.8 13.1 8,518 20.0
Neutral Bay 67.6 21.0 10.4 6,348 14.9
Kirribilli 63.5 22.4 12.0 4,050 9.5
Other votes 66.7 20.2 11.3 10,735 25.2
Liberal primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.
Liberal primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.
Greens primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.
Greens primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.
Labor primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.
Labor primary votes in North Shore at the 2011 NSW state election.

20 COMMENTS

  2. Curious choice of Greens candidate in former Democrats MLC Arthur Chesterfield-Evans. He doesn’t have a high enough public profile to have a significant impact but his professional political experience may well help them hold their ground in this seat whereas current polling seems to be pointing towards a small drop state-wide.

  3. I’m not up to date with the polling (only what’s reported in the press), so wasn’t aware the Greens were down Nick C…. Is that party polling you are referring to?

    I don’t drive around Sydney much either, so would be interested if the Greens are also erecting the huge (paid for) advertising billboards that are now blanketing the inner west elsewhere…ie. in another high income area like the north shore and east, where they also have a high (and rising) primary vote.

  4. No I’m only talking about public polling. I haven’t kept my table of NSW polling up to date, but the most recent poll I saw last week had the Greens on 10%, and I’m pretty sure they’ve all been in the 10-12 range. Before 2011 they were all roughly in the 12-15 range, and it seems a rather clear trend now that the Greens vote is always a little lower than the polling.

  6. I hear that a senior doctor of Royal North Shore Hospital will run as an independent to highlight the proposed sell-off of land around the hospital.

  8. I wonder if that 5% ALP primary vote at the northern end of the seat is a record low, at least for an urban polling place? (There are tiny rural booths where Labor polls zero votes, but I don’t count them.)

  9. I wonder as well what booth would have the highest ratio of Greens vote to Labor vote – that booth is 3:1. I wonder if there are booths in Nimbin, Byron or Bellingen that would get similar ratios.

  10. I think the Greenest booth in Victoria is North Fitzroy, which voted 58 Green to 22 Labor at the 2013 federal election. Nimbin was 54 to 30. Byron Bay was only 40 to 32. Bellingen was 38 to 25.

  11. The 5% booth on your North Shore map is Balmoral (It’s a pity your maps don’t name the booths.) In 2013 it polled 71 Lib, 13 Green, 12 Labor. That’s rather different to the state figures you quoted. The “left” minority in that area must shift their votes back and forth between Labor and Green.

  12. Hi Adam,

    Unfortunately my maps aren’t currently dynamic (something I’ll look at for the federal election) and I think including labels would make them very hard to follow. The point is more to show general trends across an electorate.

    The Greens did relatively well and Labor did relatively badly across northern Sydney at the 2011 election, both compared to federal elections and the 2007 state election, so I’m not surprised that the numbers are much closer for 2013.

  13. At Wilsons Creek in 2011 there were 130 Greens votes and 14 for Labor. That has also been the best Greens booth % wise in the last few federal elections. That would be the highest ratio

  16. Dr Ruff is apparently an orthopedic specialist. One of my children was meant to see him on Wednesday but we didn’t see him in the end as the break wasn’t as bad as feared. The booking person said he had something like 37 referrals this week so I am not sure how much of a campaign he is running other than seeing lots of patients at the hospital!

    And I am not sure what the issue is about selling off the land around the hospital. They have just built what appears to me to be a fantastic new facility and if selling surplus land, raises funds for the Government, helps with the supply of housing – albeit more high rise apartments – then I struggle to see what the problem is. Can someone with a different view enlighten me?

    I also received a pamphlet from the labor candidate in the letter box. If I recall correctly both he and his partner (wife?) work at the RNSH. So the non-sitting member candidates seem to be running from a health perspective which I suppose is natural given Jillian is the health minister.

  20. Pollster the concern for RNS land is if we sell of all the remaining land then we are unable to expand in the future as the population grows. By Keeping some land aside we have the ability to increase more beds in the future which will benifit the community and prevent bed block and the need for a further site deveolpment

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