LIB 17.8%
Incumbent MP
Dominic Perottet, since 2015. Previously member for Castle Hill 2011-2015.
Geography
North-western fringe of Sydney. The seat covers the entirety of the Hawkesbury local government area and northern parts of the Hornsby and Hills council areas. The seat covers Richmond, Windsor, Kurrajong and surrounding areas.
History
Hawkesbury has existed since 1859. Except for the 1940s, when it was held by Labor, the seat has been won by the Liberal Party and its predecessors since 1927.
The original district of Hawkesbury elected two MLAs from 1859 to 1880. It became a single-member district in 1880. As parties developed in the late 19th century, Hawkesbury was dominated by Free Traders. It was then held by the early Liberal Reform party, but was won by an independent in 1917.
In 1920, it was merged with other seats to form the three-member Cumberland district.
Hawkesbury was restored in 1927, and won by Nationalist Bruce Walker, who had been one of the Members for Cumberland since 1920.
Walker retired at the 1932 election, and was succeeded by his son Ronald Walker, who won as a United Australia Party candidate.
The younger Walker retired in 1941, and the seat was won by the ALP’s Frank Finnan by only 130 votes.
Finnan became a minister in 1947. In 1950, a redistribution made Hawkesbury solidly conservative, and Finnan won the new inner-city seat of Darlinghurst. He served as a minister until 1953, when Darlinghurst was abolished, and he retired.
Bernie Deane won Hawkesbury for the Liberal Party in 1950. He held the seat throughout the 1950s and 1960s as a backbencher. He retired in late 1972.
The by-election was held in early 1973, and was won by Liberal candidate Kevin Rozzoli. He held the seat throughout the 1970s, 1980s and 1990s. He was Speaker of the Legislative Assembly from 1988 to 1995.
In 2003, Rozzoli intended to run for another term, but he was challenged for preselection by former Hornsby Shire president Steven Pringle. Pringle’s preselection was controversial, creating deep animosity in the local Liberal Party.
In 2006, Pringle faced his own preselection challenge from Baulkham Hills Shire councillor Ray Williams. Williams defeated Pringle in late 2006. Pringle resigned from the Liberal Party, and contested Hawkesbury as an independent. Williams won the seat with 56% of the two-candidate-preferred vote.
Ray Williams was easily re-elected in 2011.
Ray Williams swapped seats in 2015 with Dominic Perottet, who had won the neighbouring seat of Castle Hill in 2011.
Candidates
Assessment
Hawkesbury is a safe Liberal seat.
2015 result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Dominic Perrottet | Liberal | 26,530 | 56.6 | -9.9 |
| Barry Calvert | Labor | 10,520 | 22.4 | +7.1 |
| Danielle Wheeler | Greens | 3,534 | 7.5 | -2.8 |
| Kate Mackaness | Independent | 2,845 | 6.1 | +6.1 |
| Caroline Fraser | Christian Democrats | 1,250 | 2.7 | -1.1 |
| Victor Alberts | No Land Tax | 935 | 2.0 | +2.0 |
| Ralph Harlander | Independent | 733 | 1.6 | +1.6 |
| Tania Rollinson | Independent | 518 | 1.1 | +1.1 |
| Informal | 2,063 | 4.2 |
2015 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Dominic Perrottet | Liberal | 27,866 | 67.8 | -10.6 |
| Barry Calvert | Labor | 13,246 | 32.2 | +10.6 |
Booth breakdown
Booths in Hawkesbury have been split into four parts. Polling places in the Hills shire have been grouped as “East”, and three booths in the north of the Hawkesbury region have been grouped as “North”.
The remaining booths in the heart of the seat have been split between those around Richmond and those around Windsor.
The Liberal Party won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all four areas, ranging from 53.9% in the north to 83% in the east.
| Voter group | LIB 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| Windsor | 68.3 | 15,350 | 32.8 |
| Richmond | 62.7 | 12,556 | 26.8 |
| East | 83.0 | 4,534 | 9.7 |
| North | 53.9 | 723 | 1.5 |
| Other votes | 68.5 | 8,353 | 17.8 |
| Pre-poll | 65.5 | 5,349 | 11.4 |
Two-party-preferred votes in Hawkesbury at the 2015 NSW state election
Robyn Preston, from Hills Shire Council, has now been pre-selected from the Liberal Party to run in Hawkesbury, replacing Dominic Perrottet, who has moved to Epping.
Bowyer is the serious independent here. Corflutes everywhere.
Transport the big issue. Road commute times are blowing out and the rail service is unreliable.
Former Penthouse centrefold Preston will retain for Libs, but wouldn’t be surprised if it went to preferences.
Kevin Rozzoli refused to open an office in the electorate, requiring voters to travel to parliament to see him, but voters didn’t seem to mind.
the liberals need to lose this seat, the previous member refused to see constituents during the greyhound fiasco, liberal/nationals are responsible for water mis management, roads mis management, the destruction of Sydney with no help to shop/store owners whilst the light rail is being built, the attempted bribery of other electorates, selling state assets, attempting to sell other state assets defined as Crown Land.
as well as increased travel time for any one that lives further out than marsden park on one side and rouse hill on the other. road congestion is terrible
building of stadiums for inner city mates.
Berowra will never go Labor or at least not for ages
ALP out in numbers at the pre poll in South Windsor today. Never seen the Libs outnumbered here before! Shooters, independent MJ Bowyer, KSO and a large Greens contingent as well!
fred is right. The sitting member Perrottet cleared out when the Kurrajong horsey mob went feral for him over the M9 extention proposal. The Windsor Bridge fiasco has burned a lot of love. That said, to paraphrase John Howard, the Hawkesbury lives like Tregear and votes like Turramurra*.
I’ll try and get some HTV’s and upload them here.
Prue Carr very low key in Londonderry. You wouldn’t know Penrith was marginal – I’ve seen more corflutes in Richmond and Windsor than in all of Penrith!
* Howard’s original quote concerned the ACT voters: “They live like Wahroonga and vote like Cessnock”.
This should be a Liberal retain but see a huge drop in first preference vote. Also wonder how Robyn Preston’s past as a Penthouse Pet has done nothing to bite her.
@Echt: why should it matter? She hasn’t done anything illegal.
Perrottet shouldn’t have been in Hawkesbury in the first place. He should have moved to Epping back in 2015. It was stupid for him to go to Hawkesbury.
We felt that at the time Hawkeye, but no one listened. No one cares about the poor Hawkesbury, beset by threat of flood, fire, economic deprivation, Parramatta supporters and Liberal hacks. The last time me we had a friend in government was Governor Bligh.
Independent Eddie Dogramachi has the best. election. slogan. ever:
END THE MISERY!
what were the Federal figures here? is it all in Macquarie?
Its mostly Macquarie, apart from the goat farmers at the back of Maralya and the closely related people down the river.
But the ALP only won two booths 2PP at this end off the electorate last time, and one of those (St Albans) hardly mattered. Additionally, the Liberal Macquarie candidate, Louise Markus, had a bad reputation.
If Libs go to preferences it will be a surprise, but they should win this easy.
According to PollBludger, federally Hawkesbury is a 87% Macquarie and 13% Berowra split.
Hawkesbury has been a safe Lib seat for about 69 years, and we’ve lost a hospital, police stations, fire stations, ambulance services – we’ve been promised a duplication of our train line for over 60 years.
They’ve treated us like fools for long enough. Threatened our homes, threatened our agricultural industry, destroyed our heritage, dumped the North West Growth Centre on our doorstep, leaving us to fight our way to work, left us with poisoned ground and water through PFAS contamination and Acid Sulfate Soil sludge, dump Western Sydney’s recycled sewage into our river (which is also our source of drinking water), abolished the Hawkesbury-Nepean Catchment Authority leaving our waterways to the devices of developers and resource miners.
The Hawkesbury is woke.
We’ve had a gutfull.
We don’t want any more Liberal party puppets. Change is coming.
They even labelled us as ‘Resource Value’ in the major planning documents.
So Robyn Preston is touting about raising her kids locally, considering our mate Dom was supposed to move into the electorate once he won it (his words not mine), does she actually live in the Hawkesbury or is she another North Shore wannabee like Dom ?
Easy Liberal hold.