ALP 0.6%
Incumbent MP
John Kennedy, since 2018.
Geography
Eastern Melbourne. Hawthorn covers central parts of the Boroondara local government area, and specifically the suburbs of Hartwell and Hawthorn and parts of the suburbs of Burwood, Camberwell, Canterbury and Surrey Hills.
Redistribution
Hawthorn shifted to the east, taking in part of Surrey Hills from Burwood and Box Hill, and losing the remainder of Glen Iris to Ashwood. These changes slightly increased the Labor margin from 0.4% to 0.6%.
History
Hawthorn has existed as an electoral district continuously since 1889. In that time, it has been dominated by conservative MPs, and had only been won by the ALP at one election prior to the Labor win in 2018.
The seat was won in 1902 by George Swinburne. He ended up serving as a member of the Commonwealth Liberal Party before his retirement in 1913.
He was succeeded by William Murray McPherson. McPherson served as Treasurer in the Nationalist state government from 1917 to 1923, and as Premier from 1928 to 1929. McPherson resigned from Parliament in 1930.
He was succeeded by Nationalist candidate John Gray at the 1930 by-election. Gray served as Member for Hawthorn until his death in 1939.
His seat was won at the 1939 by-election by the United Australia Party’s Leslie Tyack. He lost the seat at the 1940 state election to independent candidate Leslie Hollins, who had links to the Social Credit movement.
Hollins held Hawthorn for two terms, losing in 1945 to the Liberal Party’s Frederick Edmunds. He also held the seat for two terms, until in 1950 the Liberal Party replaced him with his predecessor Leslie Tyack.
Tyack was defeated in 1952 by the ALP’s Charles Murphy, the only ALP member to ever win Hawthorn. He left the ALP in the split of 1955, and lost his seat at that year’s election to the Liberal Party’s James Manson.
After one term, Manson moved to the new seat of Ringwood in 1958, and was replaced in Hawthorn by Peter Garrisson. He was re-elected in 1961, but in 1963 he resigned from the Liberal Party, and lost his seat as an independent in 1964.
Walter Jona was elected as Liberal Member for Hawthorn in 1964. He served as a minister in the Liberal government from 1976 to 1982, and retired in 1985.
Hawthorn was won in 1985 by the Liberal Party’s Phillip Gude, who had previously held the seat of Geelong East for one term from 1976 to his defeat in 1979. He served as a minister in the Kennett government from 1992 until his retirement in 1999.
Since 1999, Hawthorn has been held by Ted Baillieu. Baillieu won re-election in 2002, 2006 and 2010.
Ted Baillieu was elected Liberal leader shortly before the 2006 election, and led the Coalition to defeat in 2006 and victory in 2010.
Baillieu served as Premier from 2010 until March 2013, when he resigned as Premier and Liberal leader under pressure from his party’s MPs. He retired at the 2014 election, and was succeeded by Liberal candidate John Pesutto.
Pesutto held Hawthorn for one term, losing the seat to Labor’s John Kennedy with a big swing in 2018.
- Faith Fuhrer (Animal Justice)
- John Kennedy (Labor)
- Ken Triantafillis (Family First)
- Richard Peppard (Liberal Democrats)
- Melissa Lowe (Independent)
- Nick Savage (Greens)
- John Pesutto (Liberal)
- Stratton Bell (Democratic Labour)
Assessment
Hawthorn has traditionally been considered a safe Liberal seat, but a cumulative swing of 17.1% to Labor since Ted Baillieu’s retirement in 2014 saw them grab the seat. It wouldn’t take much of that vote swinging back to restore the Liberal hold here, but if the Liberal Party doesn’t receive much of a bounce back Labor could hold the seat.
Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
John Pesutto | Liberal | 17,231 | 43.9 | -10.6 | 43.9 |
John Kennedy | Labor | 12,646 | 32.2 | +8.0 | 32.9 |
Nicholas Bieber | Greens | 7,167 | 18.3 | -3.1 | 17.7 |
Sophie Paterson | Sustainable Australia | 960 | 2.4 | +2.5 | 2.4 |
Catherine Wright | Animal Justice | 885 | 2.3 | +2.3 | 2.2 |
Richard Grummet | Independent | 367 | 0.9 | +0.9 | 0.8 |
Informal | 1,462 | 3.6 | -0.2 |
2018 two-party-preferred result
Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
John Kennedy | Labor | 19,793 | 50.4 | +9.0 | 50.6 |
John Pesutto | Liberal | 19,463 | 49.6 | -9.0 | 49.4 |
Booths have been divided into three areas: central, east and west.
The Labor Party won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all three areas, with just over 52% in the centre and east and 57% in the west. The Liberal Party narrowly won the pre-poll vote and won the remaining vote more convincingly.
The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 12.3% in the east to 21.5% in the west.
Voter group | GRN prim % | ALP 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
Central | 17.0 | 52.1 | 9,807 | 22.7 |
East | 12.3 | 52.2 | 6,135 | 14.2 |
West | 21.5 | 56.9 | 5,796 | 13.4 |
Pre-poll | 18.1 | 46.5 | 13,503 | 31.2 |
Other votes | 19.3 | 49.6 | 8,018 | 18.5 |
Election results in Hawthorn at the 2018 Victorian state election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, Labor and the Greens.
I would say Pesutto claim to the leadership is that he won a ballot and was elected to the role. Secondly and more importantly the Liberal party has never been or claimed to be a Christian party rather it has always been a secular party open to all faiths that was based on free markets, rewards for success, fiscal prudence and limited government open to all faiths and those of no faith. I dont see why Moira Deeming and Renee Heath cant just join the DLP or Family First which would always better align with their views. The Deputy leader of the Victorian Liberals is not even Christian and does not celebrate Christmas or go to Church. Just like the Labor party is not anti-religion party or an atheistic party people who are hostile to religion can always vote for the Reason party and the Labor party has no interest in courting Fiona Pattern to join their ranks. The Labor party is based on Social Democracy. The Labor party often does well in areas where there is a high concentration of ethnic communities where the percentage of people with no religion is low. The Difference between both major party has always been economic and it is the difference in Economic policy that should be the compelling reason to vote for either of them, run for either of them or volunteer for either of them. In NSW where there has been two socially conservative religious leaders from the Libs, Dominic Perrotet and Mike Baird there party has not been at war with themselves because those leaders were pragmatic conservatives. Chris Minns is also socially conservative and like DP is a Catholic and raising his children in that faith.
Entrepreneurial, are you endorsing Deemings Neo-Nazi anti-trans rallies?
Sounds as if you oppose the expulsion despite the fact it was justified. Moderates such as myself would never vote for a party infested by people like her who seem to be Hitler sympathisers.
Polwarth is one or 2 elections away from being won by Labor.. due largely to demographic changes
I’m quite confident that the LNP will replace John before the next state election. You think with an ageing government that they would be making some actual ground but it seems to be just as bad for them. The internal fighting doesn’t help and sky news attacking him as well.
I personally think the in-fighting will not end even if there is a change of leadership. It is the Product rather than the Salesman that is the issue. The Liberals have a dilemma that i dont think will be resolved easily be more right wing to appeal to the membership which make it less attractive for the wider community or become more moderate and the membership will attack them as “Labor Lite”. This dilemma cannot resolved easily.
Agree nimalan, I think the Victorian Liberals need a wholesale cleanout/purge similar to what state Labor went through in the 1970/1980s period prior to John Cain getting up as leader and then Premier.
Yep, they’re exactly where Victorian Labor was before 1982; being plagued by factional infighting and having no pragmatic interest in winning government.
Yoh An/Ian
Agree. In the 1970, Whitlam led an intervention into the Victorian branch. It may have taken a decade to bear fruit but it has been being paying divideneds in the years since. If someone said in the 1960s then in two decades Labor would govern for about 75% of the time and that at a federal level the Libs would only win twice the TPP (1990, 2004) they would have told that they were crazy. There does need to drastic renovation of the Victorian Libs but i think it will take sometime for the lessons to be learnt. Tony Barry said in the Liberal party you may need to kill 100 to educate 1. I think part of the problem is the contradictory results from the last state election. The Moderate wing would point out that the Libs actually recovered in wealthy areas such as Malvern, Brighton, Caulfield, Sandringham and Hawthorn whilst the Conservatives point to the swing in areas such as St Albans, Greenvale etc and say they should focus on those so both sides dig their heels in.
Good article about Whitlam intervention in Victorian Labor branch- https://www.theage.com.au/national/the-move-that-saved-labor-in-victoria-20021203-gduvcd.html
Thanks Nimalan, very nice read.
Without winning some seats in Geelong, Bendigo and Ballarat, the Libs have no way back to a majority. There are eight seats there, and except for South Barwon in 2010 and 2014, Labor have held 6 since 1999 and 7 since 2002. They cannot rely on Regional Victoria and Melbourne alone.
I agree Nimalan,
I don’t think replacing John will improve the LNP chances for 2026 intact it just make them unstable and incapable.
Johns seat is held on a knife edge if labor or a teal were to win at the next election he wouldnt be the leader anyway. though to be fair the strongest margin is only 8.4% so with enough swing there could be very few coalition members left but i imagine they will claw back some ground. and if the moira deeming thing goes to court he could be forced out too
@ John
I agree the Hawthorn is vulnerable to a Teal but i think Labor is unlikely especially if a Teal ran again. It is important to remember that even with a sitting Labor member the Teal outpolled the Labor on all booths along Glenferrie Road and Cambewell Junction eventhough this is younger and more densley populated part of the electorate. There are accusations that Labor delibrately did not bother to campaign to give a clear run for the Teal. However, Pesutto’s rivals Riordan and Battin are IMHO more in danger of Labor challenge than Pesutto is. Let me explain why
1. Polwarth has some very left-wing areas such Airnes Inlet, Lavers Hill etc. Torquay is progressive and growing and post covid there has been an acceleration of the sea-change trend with more remote working.
2. Berwick-Labor ran dead in 2022 so they can sandbag all neighbouring seats which they succesfully did. Also in Berwick it is the Southern Part of the electorate around Clyde North is rapidly growing. This area is Labor-friendly and ethnically diverse while the northern part of the electorate which is Green Wedge/Hillside more Anglo is not growing fast. So if Labor actually campaigns in Berwick they would have done better.
I think if Labor is heading for another victory they will be more interested in seats such as Croydon, Polwarth and maybe even Berwick.
This election is now winnable for the Libs after this disastrous budget.
By focusing solely on families and schools. This is not a vote winner for people struggling with mental health such as myself. And by ignoring childcare, it also doesn’t help millions struggling. They cannot tell me it is a federal issue because the feds are not doing anything about it. so the state is responsible as well. Or did Albo tell Jacinta not to do certain things to appease him?
Ratepayers and casual workers will also suffer under this budget. They will vote Liberal next time.
And many here in Melbourne are getting sick and tired of all these never-ending delayed projects. If they want to fix the debt, there are other things they could be doing.
The only positive out of this budget is renewable energy in my opinion.
Labor will lose many young voters to the Greens in the city areas. Pessutto should be safe here. I am going to be voting Liberal if he is still the leader.
Apparently the resignation of the mental health chair wasn’t enough for Labor was it?
With the increasing number of young people opting to not have children. Labor cannot take for granted anymore that they will automatically vote for them and assume the opposition is less appealing because this budget really makes the opposition run for their money here.
@Daniel T the Victorian budget is awful. And it’s a shocking confession that you, one of the most Labor-leaning users on this site, have stated that you will vote Liberal if Pesutto is still leader.
I predict that Labor will lose a bunch of seats in the regions and in the outer-suburbs of Melbourne.
Daniel, can you please explain how payers of council rates are impacted by a state budget? I thought those were two distinct levels of government. I also thought working conditions for casual workers were set at the federal level.
The swing Labor needs to get seems out of reach for Labor to be defeated plus the LNP need to stop infighting if they want to have a chance of making any ground here. Its worth mentioning that John could easily lose his electorate to a teal along with Mornington.
Wilson, just to explain in case you don’t get an answer.
The State Budget increases the Fire Services Levy which is collected via council rates and increases the Landfill Levy which will be paid by Councils and therefore passed on to rate payers.
The Vic State government through Covid was paying Casual Workers access to sick leave and this is being taken away now.
The Vic Libs are still so useless despite the bad budget. Forget that 50% 2PP poll, this is still the real deal.
https://redbridgegroup.com.au/wp-content/uploads/2024/06/RedBridge-Report-Vic-State-political-analysis.pdf
Probably biased towards Labor.
I couldn’t imagine Labor leading 52-48 in rural communities when rural communities includes Gippsland, Mallee and Nicholls.
Yeah, I agree regarding Nat held seats.
@SCart
I see where you’re coming from but rural communities may also include Polwarth, Ripon, Eureka, Macedon and Bass for example.
Also interesting to see that men prefer Labor as well as those in the highest household income bracket, quite consdierably too.
Although there’s two and a half years until the next election and many things could very well change, there isn’t much good news for the Liberals here.
I’d probably guess the real result is somewhere between the Resolve poll and the Redbridge poll. Probably between 52-53% ALP TPP. Not bad for the Libs but not that good either.
The Greens getting 17% in provincial cities is a big stretch. And the rural communities with the ALP at 52% is just rubbish – there are 16 rural seats in Victoria – the ALP hold 2 – both marginal and two marginal Coalition. Two would be fairly safe and the other 10 are safe to extremely safe. I don’t know why they let this stuff go out the door.
@Redistributed my guess is that the categorisation was done by inner-city woke lefties from the Melbourne CBD who think Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo are nothing more than country towns when in reality they are regional cities each with over 100,000 residents.
It would be much better if they defined the TPP by region not by category since no area is the same. If you look at NSW you’ll notice that a seat like Lyne is very very different to a seat like Hunter (Lyne is a very safe Nationals on the Mid North Coast with a big agricultural (farming and fishing) industry that has never been won by Labor and never will be whereas Hunter is a blue-collar, working-class seat with not just an agricultural industry but also a big coal mining industry that has only ever been held by Labor though the Nationals are making inroads there plus Hunter also includes some outer suburbs/urban sprawl of Newcastle), and in Victoria a seat like Gippsland is very different to a seat like McEwen (Gippsland is a very safe Nationals seat in the region of the same name and covers agricultural land whereas McEwen is the semi-rural suburbs and rural towns near Melbourne with urban sprawl from Melbourne and is a marginal Labor seat).
Comparing Geelong to Mildura or Shepparton is like comparing Newcastle or Wollongong to Coffs Harbour or Port Macquarie.
My view on the Redbridge
– I am skeptical that Labor would be the strongest on earners above $3000 or more a week
– Rural Communities wouldn’t even have a Labor leading on TPP
– Men being more ALP voting on TPP than women is also probably not accurate
I believe by 2026 there will be full of correction votes especially around Melbourne with:
– Labor recovering the underperforming TPP in North-West Melbourne due to Covid long gone although Palestine issues may change this and Melton will be a wildcard as 2018 and 2022 had a large amount of independents.
– Whereas Eastern Middle Ring Liberals somewhats recovers from their underperforming TPP due to more moderate State Libs, economy/state debts, land tax policy, and Chinese Australian votes (from LNP poor performance in 2022) so I presume Libs narrowly regains back Glen Waverley and Labor will hold at a reduced margin in Ashwood, Bayswater, Box Hill, and Ringwood.
Nether Portal, it was done by Kos Samaras, who isn’t so much ideological as just a bad pollster and incredibly biased towards Labor, having previously been employed by them. But don’t worry, the big bad inner-city woke lefties from the Melbourne CBD can’t get you if you sleep with your lights on.
I disagree that RedBridge and Kos Samaras are biased, ”Kos Samaras is never wrong”, how many times do I have to say this?
I do agree the state election will be close, and I predict the Liberals should have little trouble retaining Hawthorn. However at present, The coalition is struggling to improve it’s image and get a unified message across. I think things will really start to shift next year or early 2026, and then it really is game on.
2026 will be dead heat like the 2019 NSW election was expected to be. and how the 2010 Victorian election was (not knowing who won on the night)
Kos Samaras is never wrong, except for all those times he’s reported the Greens as being a powerhouse in provincial towns and underestimating their vote in the inner city. This is one of many polls he’s released with the same inaccurate trend. Any competent pollster would have explored their methodology and rectified the issue by now.
He’s a good analyst no doubt but there’s no way Labor’s winning in rural areas when they hold barely any rural seats in Victoria and the Greens aren’t a real third party in provincial cities either except for Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo (but remember provincial cities technically also includes places like Mildura, Wodonga, Shepparton, Wangaratta and Warrnambool).
Kos Samaras is incredibly biased towards Labor when it comes to his commentary/ analysis, not sure if that also extends when it comes to polling. Some of their polling has been relatively accurate but I too doubt that Vic Labor is leading in the rural communities 52-48 on tpp
Depends upon what you count as rural. Maybe country is a better description… alp doing quite well… Bendigo Ballarat Geelong are strong for Labor. Their overflow also helps Labor. Polwarth is a good example the surf coast with country areas like Colac and Camperdown… this electorate is Maybe 2 elections away from a Labor win
Agree Mick, rural areas that feature residents who have moved there because of ‘tree or sea change’ lifestyle reasons (examples like Byron Bay, Noosa, Victorian Surf Coast, NSW South Coast and Southwest WA around Margaret Bay) are the ones that will be more Labor leaning and have exhibited this behaviour in recent elections.
This is compared to other rural areas which are dominated by primary industries (namely mining, farming, fisheries and forestry) which are still seen as strongly conservative leaning.
Mick – They have a category called provincial cities – that would presumably include Geelong Ballarat and Bendigo – unclear if it would include the Latrobe Valley or Shepparton though probably not. That category supports Labor relatively comfortably – no surprise there.
Honestly, reading through most of that report most of it looks pretty accurate and makes sense, but as others have said, the only two real eyebrow raisers are:
* The 52-48 to Labor in “Rural” communities (would love to know how that is defined);
* The Greens’ vote being higher in “Provincial Cities” than “Inner Suburbs”
I don’t necessarily think the high Labor 2PP among households earning $3000+ a week is incorrect. It correlates well with the higher level of education. That’s a couple earning $1500 a week each. I think if there was a separate category for households earning $5000+ a week, perhaps that would have a lower ALP 2PP and a $3000-4999 category is where most of that ALP strength is.
If “Rural” does include seats that are a mix of semi-rural and outer-suburban (like Yan Yean) and ‘sea change’ seats along the Surf Coast, then I can see the ALP 2PP being strong there, but I do still find it hard to believe that would be enough to wipe out the huge Nat 2PPs in the genuinely rural seats.
I don’t think the 2026 election will be all that close. The Liberals will recover some ground though to make 2030 a more competitive election. But, even if the 2010 results were replicated in 2026, that would still most likely result in a Labor majority, it wouldn’t net the Liberals any more than 8-10 seats on the current electoral map. And I can’t see them matching – let alone outdoing – their 2010 result.
And a 10 seat gain for the Liberals, coupled with the assumption that the Greens win Northcote off Labor and hold their existing seats, and the Liberals not losing a single one of their marginal seats, would still result in 45 Labor, 5 Greens, 38 Coalition. And that’s really a best case scenario for them, and would still leave them 7 seats short of forming government.
I also feel like Labor have very deliberately front-loaded all their “bad news” into the first 2 years of this term: Cancellation of Games, resignation of Dan, a disastrous budget full of cuts, maximum disruption from Big Build projects.
2025 is going to be the year that two of their flagship projects are completed: Metro Tunnel and West Gate Tunnel. This will be seen a big “wins” and also remove a lot of the construction and disruption that a lot of people are seeing every day, they will see a tangible outcome, and I suspect Labor will probably use 2025 as a bit of a “reset” to coincide with this. I wouldn’t even be surprised if the awful 2024 budget was groundwork to set up a miraculous “turnaround” narrative for the 2025 & 26 budgets closer to the election (a bit like how supermarkets raise prices before a “sale” haha), and it’s already been reported that they have a “war chest” put away for election announcements too.
How ethical any of that is, is obviously questionable. But there’s no question Labor have been extremely politically savvy over the last decade, they’re not stupid when it comes to the politics, so I can’t help but think there’s a deliberate strategy here, setting up the last 18 months to focus on ribbon-cutting, achievements, announcements, etc.
My point here… If the Liberals couldn’t make up significant ground in these 2 years, I find it difficult to believe they will do any better in the next 2 years.
My projections for 2026 election unless things change
Labor might loses Bass, Glen Waverley, Hastings and Pakenham to the Libs and Footscray, Northcote,Pascoe Vale and Preston to the Greens but that’s still enough for Labor to win a majority
@Marh in my opinion the following seats will be vunerable to either the Libs or the Greens. the greens probably not so much without Liberal preferences
Northcote Kat Theophanous ALP 0.2% v GRN
Bass Jordan Crugnale ALP 0.2%
Pakenham Emma Vulin ALP 0.4%
Hastings Paul Mercurio ALP 1.4%
Pascoe Vale Anthony Cianflone ALP 2.0% v GRN
Preston Nathan Lambert ALP 2.1% v GRN
Ripon Martha Haylett ALP 3.0%
Glen Waverley John Mullahy ALP 3.3%
Bayswater Jackson Taylor ALP 4.2%
Footscray Katie Hall ALP 4.2% v GRN
Yan Yean Lauren Kathage ALP 4.3%
Melton Steve McGhie ALP 4.6%
@john, I largely agree with that list.
I think all 4 of those Greens seats might be a bit of a stretch but I can see them picking up 2-3 (Northcote almost guaranteed).
All 8 of those ALP v LIB seats are vulnerable and the Liberals, if they do well enough, could easily pick up 6-7 of them. I’d especially consider both Pakenham & Bass to be as good as gone.
The problem for the Liberals is that some of Labor’s controversial policies, like the land tax changes, are probably going to be most unpopular in the seats the Liberals already hold (Bulleen, Kew, Malvern, Hawthorn, Mornington, Brighton, Sandringham). It should help the Liberals hold those seats or boost their margins, but might not make much difference elsewhere, but Hastings is an ALP held seat where that could be a factor.
The Libs also have to not lose any seats though. I don’t think too many will be at risk, but I’m thinking about how demographic change might keep shifting some, in particular a seat like Polwarth.
That’s probably John Pesutto’s biggest threat too. I don’t think the same voters as 2022 will necessarily swing back towards Labor or away from him, but as the suburb of Hawthorn especially continues to densify and grow younger & less “old money”, I wonder if that will keep moving the needle towards Labor.
@trent i think the libs can get all of theirs but i dont think the greens can get footscray without libs preferences . i think without a major shift in the polls the best the libs can do is force labor into minority
Yeah the Liberals need 16 seats to for a 44-44 deadlock (between ALP/GRN seats and LIB/NAT seats) and 17 to actually form government. That 17 seats the Libs need to gain is in addition to any seats ALP lose to the Greens.
That takes them down to seats held on margins over 8%, in areas that have been steadily trending left. It’s just not going to happen, especially if the needle hasn’t really been moving after two pretty terrible years for VIC Labor, and knowing that some big ribbon-cutting milestones will occur next year which will help them reset the narrative.
Reducing Labor to a minority is the only realistic outcome other than a Labor majority. That might influence the Liberals to decide to preference the Greens in those key contests, and then hope that a Labor-Greens alliance is damaging enough for Labor to make 2030 winnable.
Of course, the Liberals could completely self-implode over the next 2 years themselves and hand Labor another thumping majority. That’s never out of the question considering how shallow their talent pool currently is with their depleted numbers and waning membership, and how much disunity there is in their branches.
@trent Jacinta allen is extremely weak. and that wont happen it will be a labor minority in my opinion i think the libs will boot pesutto and start galloping in 2026. also ithink the greens will take advantage and fill the void and take those 4 seats. the libs only hope of winning govt is to make a backroom deal to preference the greens in exchange for minoirty govt support.
The other pathway to government that the Liberals have to go for is Geelong, Ballarat and Bendigo. Going into 1999, They held 6 of the 8 – they lost 4 in 1999 and the remaining two in 2002. Since then they have only held South Barwon for a few terms. That was part of their issue in 2010.
South Barwon and Ringwood are potentially winnable as their members have been cast out of the party room. In Ringwood, we have been essentially deprived of an MP almost all term. Will Fowles doesn’t rock the boat as wants to get back in so is at best a pseudo independent basically doing not much. If he ran again, he would be expelled – same goes for Darren Cheeseman in South Barwon.
The Greens will never choose the Liberals over Labor to provide minority government support to in the event of a hung parliament. They would lose the majority of their supporter base – who are further left than Labor – by doing so. If the Liberals ever preference the Greens it will be purely strategic to reduce Labor to a minority government without any input from the Greens, not a “back room deal” to form a Liberal-Greens coalition.
The Liberals could only ever form a minority government (if you don’t already include the LIB-NAT governments as technically being minority governments) if they have independents to give them minority government support. Currently there are 0 MPs that were elected as independents, just some expelled party members. And it’s most likely that if any INDs win next time it would be at the expense of Coalition seats (to either Teals or rural INDs), so it wouldn’t even make a dent in how many seats they still need to win off Labor.
@redistributed. they will be a shot at bendigo east once jacinta allen retrires. but bendigo west is too lefty.
south barwon and ringwood probably stil too far off to get.
benambra and mornington might be a possible teal targets if jacqui hawkins runs again especially given bill tilley has retired. but if helen haines supports a labor minority government that dream will be dead
@redistributed, yep and the 2010 outcome isn’t even repeatable today. The redistributions in both 2013 and 2021 have drawn a map in which the identical 2010 results would likely be a small Labor majority today.
That’s before even getting into seats that were once winnable for the Liberals (Prahran is most notable) and no longer are, to an extent that goes well beyond the boundary changes. Not to mention that going from an ALP v LIB seat to a GRN v LIB seat also shields it more from swings against the sitting government.
There is a path, but it’s a very narrow one which requires everything to go perfectly.
In 2010, it was basically this – on top of their affluent inner heartland (which at the time was under no threat), they had to win the entire eastern suburbs, all 4 bellwether “Sandbelt” seats, and win either Prahran or Albert Park – the two inner city ALP marginals at the time. They achieved all of that – other than winning Albert Park (which they still reduced to under 2%) – and still only ended up with a 1 seat majority.
In the 2020s, that’s changed a lot. They still need to hold all of their affluent heartland (which I expect they will), and they still need to win the entire eastern suburbs (which is possible if everything goes right, but certainly a bigger ask than in 2010).
However, both Prahran & Albert Park are off the table, the map has at least 1 less seat in the southeast and 1 more in the northwest, and the sandbelt is no longer marginal and would take a big swing to even win 1-2 of those seats back let alone all 4. They also have less resources, but need to pump more of them into seats like Caulfield & Hawthorn than in the past.
Their future definitely does lie more in seats like: Melton, Sunbury, Yan Yean, Pakenham. Seats on the fringe of suburbia, most of which are on smaller margins than the sandbelt is now. But they need to do this in addition to winning the entire eastern suburbs back, as well as the marginal non-metro seats (like Hastings, Bass and Ripon).
Looking at the post-election pendulum, here are the “winnable” (debatable..) seats in each of the 3 key regions or types:
– 5 regional (Bellarine, Bass, Hastings, Eureka, Ripon);
– 5 fringe/outer suburban (Melton, Sunbury, Pakenham, Yan Yean, Monbulk);
– 5 eastern suburbs (Glen Waverley, Box Hill, Bayswater, Ringwood, Ashwood)
2 of those regional seats – Bellarine & Eureka – are on margins of 8.5% and 7.2% but they are the type of regional seats they need to win. Areas surrounding the major provincial cities (Geelong & Ballarat) but not actually in them.
And that list would give them the same clean sweep of the eastern suburbs they also won in 2010, but still only gives them 15 out of the 17 gains they need to win government, and that’s including winning a range of seats they didn’t win in 2010 (Melton, Sunbury which was Macedon at the time, Yan Yean, Bellarine, etc).
It’s a bleak map for the Liberals when you look at it like that.
Trent. A very succinct summary of the issue. Possibly not 2026 but by 2030 there will be a definite ‘Its Time’ factor. It will be a very old and tired government.
If they make gains in 2026 at least – reduce margins in target areas and reduce Labor’s seat count to around 50 or less – and a redistribution is due in 2029 (and some of the ‘growth’ areas are actually what are trending towards the Liberal Party), then 2030 will definitely be a competitive election. It will be a 16 year old Labor government by that point and other than the NE Link, I don’t think many of the other major projects are due to be delivered in that 2026-30 window either which will add to the “tired” narrative.
Whereas I do think the opening of both the Metro Tunnel and West Gate Tunnel next year will shift momentum back to Labor for 2026. Similar to how some areas were very sceptical or opposed to the “Skyrail” project but when it was delivered to those areas around 2017-18, just in time for the election, those same areas swung hard to Labor because on a daily basis, they saw a delivered promise that was making a tangible positive impact on their life.
Libs cannot recover in one election. given the infighting and the influence of the far right within the liberal party…. they are currently unfit to govern.. This is the inverse of the situation in the Bolte Hamer years when Labor was seen as not fit to govern.
Greater Geelong Bendigo Ballarat which represent maybe 10 seats will not elect a liberal in the near future.
Trent – the debt issue is something that will not go away quickly. That is already impacting services. There is the risk that NE Link and the SRL will just suck in more and more money at the expense of other things. Even now, Labor have no one else to blame – every buck will stop with them.