Cause of by-election
Labor MP Kathy Smith resigned in early 2017 due to ill health.
Margin – ALP 50.2%
Geography
Central Coast. The seat of Gosford covers western parts of the former City of Gosford (now contained in the Central Coast council area), including the Gosford and Woy Woy areas.
History
A district with the name ‘Gosford’ has existed since the 1950 election. Prior to that period the southern parts of the Central Coast were combined with a seat covering the Hawkesbury.
The seat was held by the Liberal Party from its creation in 1950 to 1971, when it was won by the ALP.
In 1973, the seat of Gosford was broken into the seats of Gosford and Peats. The seat of Peats is the most immediate predecessor of the current seat of Gosford.
Keith O’Connell, who had won Gosford in 1971, moved to the safer Labor seat of Peats in 1973. O’Connell held the seat until his retirement in 1984.
O’Connell was succeeded in Peats by Paul Landa. Landa had been a Labor member of the Legislative Council since 1973 and had served as a minister in the Labor government since 1976. Landa held the seat for only nine months before his death in December 1984.
The ALP’s Tony Doyle won the 1985 by-election. He was re-elected safely in 1988 and 1991, and held the seat until his death in 1994. No by-election was held due to the impending 1995 election.
In 1995, the ALP’s Marie Andrews won the seat of Peats. She won re-election in 1999 and 2003.
In the lead-up to the 2007 election, the redistribution shifted the boundaries of seats on the Central Coast, moving the centre of Gosford from the original seat of Gosford into Peats. In response the seat of Gosford was renamed ‘Terrigal’ and Peats was renamed ‘Gosford’. Andrews was elected to the newly-renamed Gosford.
In 2011, Marie Andrews retired, and Liberal candidate Chris Holstein won Gosford with a 16.7% swing.
Holstein was defeated in 2015 by Labor’s Kathy Smith, who won the seat by barely 200 votes after a 12.2% swing.
Candidates
- Abigail Boyd (Greens)
- Andrew Church (Christian Democratic Party)
- Skyla Wagstaff (Animal Justice)
- Liesl Tesch (Labor)
- Larry Freeman (Shooters, Fishers and Farmers)
- Jilly Pilon (Liberal)
Assessment
Gosford is extremely marginal, and it is easy to imagine the Liberal Party regaining the seat. But there has been a general shift towards Labor in state polling since 2015, and this suggests that Labor are likely to increase their majority.
2015 result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Chris Holstein | Liberal | 20,535 | 42.5 | -7.6 |
| Kathy Smith | Labor | 18,654 | 38.7 | +11.0 |
| Kate Da Costa | Greens | 4,346 | 9.0 | -2.9 |
| Jake Cassar | Independent | 2,698 | 5.6 | +5.6 |
| Andrew Church | Christian Democratic Party | 1,091 | 2.3 | -1.2 |
| Matthew Maroney | No Land Tax | 938 | 1.9 | +1.9 |
| Informal | 1,573 | 3.2 |
2015 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Kathy Smith | Labor | 22,029 | 50.2 | +12.2 |
| Chris Holstein | Liberal | 21,826 | 49.8 | -12.2 |
Booth breakdown
Booths in Gosford have been split into three parts: north-east, south-east and west. Most of the seat’s population lies in the two urban areas in the east, while ‘west’ covers a large rural areas.
Labor won a 54.5% majority in the south-east area, which makes up the largest part of the seat’s population. The Liberal Party won a slim 51.8% majority in the north-east and won a large 64% majority in the sparsely-populated west.
The Greens came third, with a vote ranged from 8.6% in the south-east to 12.5% in the west.
| Voter group | GRN % | ALP 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| South-East | 8.6 | 54.5 | 15,964 | 33.1 |
| North-East | 9.2 | 48.2 | 13,100 | 27.1 |
| West | 12.5 | 36.2 | 1,978 | 4.1 |
| Special | 11.2 | 46.8 | 8,205 | 17.0 |
| Pre-poll | 6.7 | 51.4 | 9,015 | 18.7 |
Two-party-preferred vote in Gosford at the 2015 NSW state election
Just a note, you need to change the Party name for Larry Freeman, it should read Shooter, Fishers and Farmers Party. Thanks. Good to see you back, I hate moving.
Shooters, Fishers and Farmers Party. (I left off the “s”.
Love the booth map. It’s always interesting to see the vote spread in a 50/50 seat.
That more voters come from Woy Woy than Gosford seems a little contrary to the logic of the seat’s name.
Also notable is the number of booths outside the boundaries. The Entrance being the most prominent example. Two booths in Erina for some reason; the disparity in the 2PP presumably owing to nothing more than the small sample of voters. Even Empire Bay is weird; that can’t be any Gosford voter’s closest booth.
Can’t see Labor losing here, with a strong candidate and a general anti government swing they should win 54-46.
Manly should be held reasonably safely by the Libs, It doesn’t look like a strong independent has put their hat in the ring and the Greens will probably come second, and may even win some booths, my guess would be 58-42 Libs over Greens.
North Shore is hard to predict and I suspect the Libs will be putting maximum effort into this seat probably at the expense of the other two seats Gosford in particular.
Unlike many parts of Sydney, the Liberal brand was toxic on the Central Coast in 2015 due to ICAC, even if Holstein wasn’t implicated. I wonder if that will reduce the likely swing this time.
But a sick member sympathy factor is probably enough to see Labor win.