NAT 9.2%
Incumbent MP
Stephen Bromhead, since 2011.
- Geography
- Redistribution
- History
- Candidate summary
- Assessment
- 2019 results
- Booth breakdown
- Results maps
Geography
Mid-North Coast. Myall Lakes covers a majority of the Mid-Coast council area. It covers the towns of Taree and Forster, and surrounding areas.
Redistribution
Myall Lakes expanded to take in Lansdowne and Upper Lansdowne from Port Macquarie. This made no difference to the margin.
History
The seat of Myall Lakes has existed since 1988, and has always been held by the National Party.
When the seat was created, it partly replaced the seat of Gloucester, which had existed since 1880. Gloucester had been held by the Country/National Party since 1950.
Myall Lakes was won in 1988 by John Turner of the National Party. He held the seat for six terms before retiring in 2011. He served as deputy leader of the NSW National Party from 1999 to 2003.
In 2011, Myall Lakes was won by Nationals candidate Stephen Bromhead. Bromhead has been re-elected twice.
Candidates
Sitting Nationals MP Stephen Bromhead is not running for re-election.
Assessment
Myall Lakes has always been held by the Nationals but if Labor was on track to win a majority you’d expect the Nationals margin here to shrink substantially, and it could well be lost in that scenario.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Stephen Bromhead | Nationals | 24,367 | 48.4 | +1.6 | 48.5 |
| David Keegan | Labor | 14,691 | 29.2 | +1.3 | 29.2 |
| Paul Sandilands | Independent | 4,169 | 8.3 | +8.3 | 8.2 |
| Heather Elliott | Shooters, Fishers & Farmers | 3,518 | 7.0 | +7.0 | 6.9 |
| Ellie Spence | Greens | 2,797 | 5.6 | -1.0 | 5.6 |
| Quentin Bye | Sustainable Australia | 773 | 1.5 | +1.5 | 1.7 |
| Informal | 1,715 | 3.3 |
2019 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Stephen Bromhead | Nationals | 25,990 | 59.2 | +0.5 | 59.2 |
| David Keegan | Labor | 17,916 | 40.8 | -0.5 | 40.8 |
Booths in Myall Lakes has been split into five parts. Polling places in the two main towns of Forster-Tuncurry and Taree have been grouped together, with the remaining polling places grouped into “north”, “central” and “south”. Polling places in Forster-Tuncurry and South are in the former Great Lakes council area, while the remainder are in the former Greater Taree council area.
The Nationals won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all five areas, ranging from 51.2% in Taree to 61.4% in Forster-Tuncurry.
| Voter group | IND prim % | NAT 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| South | 7.9 | 57.2 | 7,690 | 14.0 |
| Central | 8.1 | 58.2 | 7,087 | 12.9 |
| Forster-Tuncurry | 10.5 | 61.4 | 6,203 | 11.3 |
| Taree | 10.3 | 51.2 | 5,795 | 10.6 |
| North | 7.1 | 56.3 | 4,251 | 7.7 |
| Pre-poll | 7.1 | 62.8 | 18,050 | 32.9 |
| Other votes | 8.0 | 58.2 | 5,833 | 10.6 |
Election results in Myall Lakes at the 2019 NSW state election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Nationals and Labor.
Curious this seat isn’t being commented on considering a retiring MP, the southern half of the seat sometimes held by Labor federally and a rather young and inexperienced Nationals candidate.
LNP Insider, Myall Lakes and its predecessor districts have always been held by the Nationals/Country Party so I think as an open seat it should still be retained by the Coalition, even with a somewhat weaker candidate.
The margin may take a trimming and could be sub 5% if Labor does have a stronger candidate.
The Nats have done pretty well in recent elections in VIC and federally so I don’t think they would be sweating too much about this seat. The Libs on the other hand might be pretty worried in some of their Sydney seats like Parramatta and Penrith.
This seat is entirely within the federal seat of Lyne and would not be competitive based on federal figures.
Driving through last weekend there seems to be more independent corflutes than Nationals ones. Is this seat NAT v IND competitive?
It may well be. Independents and doctors have a pretty good record at the ballot box recently, so an independent doctor is hard to write off. New NAT candidate, it’s not an enormous margin so it’s one that we maybe should be talking more about.
Southern half of the seat has been in Paterson before federally and might be more vulnerable than you think to a swing.
It looks like the local independent is really taking off with name recognition. If Labor and Greens direct preferences then this will be a very interesting race. A 6-7% swing would be enough for the independent to take the seat and even less if less votes are exhausted.
Would 7% really be enough? Wouldn’t it need to be more like 15% with that entire vote going to the IND?
Yeah Paul that’s an odd way to look at it. If votes were exhausting the swing would have to be greater, no? Because the Nats votes aren’t going to exhaust…
Given the seat is currently on a 9% margin, it takes some mental gymnastics to work out how a 7% swing will see the Nats lose the seat.
doubtful on the independant gain. most of their votes will comes from labor and greens in the first place.
To be fair to Paul it’s a 9% margin post a massive exhausted vote, looking at 2019.
The Nats will certainly take a haircut with a new candidate, and whilst most IND votes may well come from ALP and GRN, if the IND finishes second and the GRN and ALP voters preference IND 2, then it actually would only need to be a 6-7% swing against.
How?
7% from NAT would leave them with 41% Primary. If Labor lost a similar amount and the IND carried the votes from 2019 IND and SFF, it would look something like:
NAT – 41%
IND – 23%
ALP – 21%
GRN – 5%
75% preference flows get the IND elected on that margin, with room to spare, unless GRN preference ALP 2.
Fair enough. I think the issue with that projection is the ALP vote. Given the broad statewide momentum towards the ALP, I struggle to see a scenario where they lose that much of their vote to an independent. Stranger things have happened though.
Hi all, thank you for reply comments.
Interested follower has the numbers similar to my thoughts. If you take the IND and SFF votes from 2019, apply a statewide swing against NAT, new candidate and also consider the “never Labor” NAT voters (7% not unreasonable), a good campaign from an IND with good community credentials, some voting splitting off from Labor, it’s not inconceivable that the IND ends up with primary vote in high 20s. On the ground it feels like the IND campaign is stronger than ALP.
Assuming 40-50% exhausted and otherwise good preference flows from GRN and ALP then it would be very close but probably an IND gain. NSWEC will probably TCP NAT and ALP so will be days to know. I think this seat deserves more media attention given this.
Clyde: my understanding is that if less votes exhaust from GRN and ALP then it would be easier to overtake the leader and therefore a smaller swing would be needed. If 80% of ALP and GRN preference IND and only 20% exhaust, then even a small swing against NAT of 5% would deliver an IND with 3% margin.
I know nothing about this seat but how a 29% Labor vote in 2019 turns into a 21% vote in 2023, has got me beat? The base vote for Labor must be around 32-33% at least – why are 10 – 12% switching to and IND? Is he some sort of Local football champion?
I think a lot of people are forgetting that the March 2019 was a long time ago and Labor in NSW (both state and Federally) were not going well, St. Gladys was the Premier and people liked SoMo – that’s all changed now.
@follower but they wont carry those votes as they may well go to the nat as well. alos green would lose votes ff the primary
also that doesnt include exhausted preferences nat will easy win off those figures
Nah I disagree. The Nats aren’t easily re-elected with a primary much below 43%. No one on the current ticket will be giving preferences for them.
Labor and the Greens are giving out HTVs to fill every box. Labor has put the IND second.
If IND finishes second on primaries and NAT fail to get a primary above 43, I reckon IND wins.
I’m getting on the great odds available now (just a little flutter).
Independent is a one trick pony, clearly demonstrated in numerous candidate forums, Labor’s is a parrot for minns but does present more of a plan than Independents inability to deliver. I think it’s still a Nationals seat, this Candidate clearly demonstrates certainty for the constituency.
Result here was an absolute catastrophe for Labor, they went backwards severely here. What could have been the reason?
Daniel it might be becuase this area (foster and Tuncurry) has large numbers of retirees who are considered conservative leaning.
Similar areas in Queensland may be Hervey bay and some parts of Sunshine Coast which are likely to swing back to lnp.
The Nationals had some swings to them in their own seats in this election. This is in line with other recent elections (Federal and Victoria). I don’t think the ALP is really cares. They’re not going to win these seats anyway and they don’t need to.
@Daniel T sorry I’m over a year late but it’s just that Labor is shit on the Mid North Coast and always will be. Taree is obviously less conservative than Port Macquarie; however, Taree is like Grafton: trending more conservative over the years.
2023 saw rural areas vote more conservative and metropolitan areas voting less conservative.
Everyone also seems to be missing that 7.6% of the electorate as a whole is Indigenous. In Taree that’s 12.7% and in Purfleet (a suburb of Taree) it’s over 80%. Kempsey is similar 12.9% are Indigenous with that number being higher in certain suburbs. Note that 3.4% of NSW is Indigenous so that’s well over the state average and the national average of 3.2%.
Taree also has major issues with crime so Labor may be seen as not tough enough on crime.