Sandringham – Victoria 2010

LIB 8.7%

Incumbent MP
Murray Thompson, since 1992.

Geography
Southern Melbourne. Sandringham covers the southern half of the City of Bayside, covering suburbs along Port Phillip Bay, including Beaumaris, Black Rock and Sandringham and parts of the suburbs of Cheltenham, Hampton, Highett and Mentone.

History
Sandringham was first created for the 1955 election. It has been won by the Liberal Party at all but one election, with the ALP only winning the seat in 1982.

The seat was first won in 1955 by the Liberal Party’s Murray Porter. He became a minister in the Liberal government in 1956, and served as a minister until his retirement in 1970.

He was succeeded by Maxwell Crellin at the 1970 election. He held the seat until 1982, when he lost his seat, defeated by the ALP’s Graham Ihlein.

Ihlein held his seat for one term. Following a redistribution, he contested the seat of Evelyn unsuccessfully, with Sandringham won by the Liberal Party’s David Rea.

Rea held the seat until 1992, when he retired. He was succeeded by Murray Thompson. Thompson served as a Liberal frontbencher from 2002 to 2008. In 2006, he saw off a challenge from Labor member for the upper house Higinbotham province, Noel Pullen, who was unable to gain preselection for a seat in the reformed upper house.

Candidates

Political situation
Sandringham is relatively safe for the Liberal Party.

2006 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Murray Thompson LIB 17,342 52.63 +3.60
Noel Pullen ALP 9,676 29.36 -4.70
Bruce McPhate GRN 4,197 12.74 -0.30
Sonia Castelli IND 1,037 3.15 +3.15
Stuart Campbell FF 700 2.12 +2.12

2006 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Murray Thompson LIB 19,332 58.68 +5.65
Noel Pullen ALP 13,615 41.32 -5.65

Booth breakdown
Booths in Sandringham have been divided into four areas:

  • North-East – Highett and Holloway
  • North-West – Hampton and Sandringham
  • South-East – Cheltenham and Mentone
  • South-West – Beaumaris and Black Rock

The Liberal Party won their largest majority (66%) in the southwest. They won smaler majorities in the northwest and southeast, but the ALP won a slim majority in the northeastern corner of the seat.

The Greens polled most strongly in the northwest of the seat.

Polling booths in Sandringham at the 2006 state election. North-East in blue, North-West in red, South-East in yellow, South-West in green.

 

Voter group GRN % LIB 2CP % Total votes % of votes
South-West 11.78 66.12 8,825 26.79
South-East 12.30 54.51 7,331 22.25
North-West 15.89 58.92 5,236 15.89
North-East 12.26 48.64 4,161 12.63
Other votes 12.35 59.40 7,394 22.44
Two-party-preferred votes in Sandringham at the 2006 state election.
Greens primary votes in Sandringham at the 2006 state election.

2 COMMENTS

  1. The north-east of the seat is the old Highett public housing estate, plus there’s some mixed industrial/commercial areas around Moorabbin and northern Cheltenham. And the eastern parts around Mentone are more middle class than affluent. Elsewhere it’s pretty safe Liberal bayside territory.

    The fact that the Libs’ margin was reduced to 3% in a seat like this in 2002 shows what a disaster that election was for therm.

  2. Candidates in ballot paper order are:

    Malcolm Reid – Family First
    Robbie Nyaguy – Labor
    Murray Thompson – Liberal
    Derek Wilson – Greens

Comments are closed.