Nepean – Victoria 2022

Former pro tennis player Sam Groth is running here for the Liberals.

Again another seat that the Liberals should be able to pick up, however Labor has incumbency on their side so it might be difficult for the LNP to pick this seat up.

Bob I thought this seat has a Liberal MP Neale Burgess, although others have indicated he is retiring at the upcoming election. Unless some other incumbent Labor MP is intending to transfer and run in this district.

Interesting that Sam Groth is the Liberal candidate here when he lives over 80km away in Mont Albert North.

@Yoh An, Neale Burgess has the neighbouring seat of Hastings, which is now notionally Labor.

@echt, Sam Groth moved to Blairgowrie last year

Yoh An,
Labor won Nepean in 2018 state election. Neale Burgess who is retiring is the member for Hastings which is next door & has been made notionally Labor.

Apologies, think I got confused between the two Mornington peninsula seats. Yes it is Hastings which is Liberal held but now considered notionally Labor after the redistribution.

also in terms of celebrities running, Paul Mercurio is running in Hastings

I think this is probably the Liberals’ best chance for a gain.

From what I understand, the Mornington Peninsula was particularly unhappy with the Andrews government during the pandemic because they didn’t like being considered part of metropolitan Melbourne (when it didn’t suit them anyway).

Easy Liberal pickup. Severe anti-Dan sentiment due to being classed as metro, and a member who really hasn’t done much. This and Hastings I would put into the safe Lib pickup category for the election.

Based on federal results this would be the most vulnerable Labor seat in the state. The Liberals did better here than in Hawthorn on federal numbers!

This is a likely Liberal gain. As previously discussed, some dissatisfaction with the way the Peninsula was classified as metro Melbourne during lockdowns.

Seems a foregone conclusion by most that Libs will pick this up. Don’t know if Chris Brayne is well liked by the community, although losing your license 1 year into office after going 30km/h probably doesn’t help.

Labor seem to think they will hold here which personally would not surprise me.

Bob, Source that they think/said this?

I think this along with Pakenham will be Labor losses but I suspect Hastings is still 50/50

It seems the Teals did not do well in the Flinders electorate. Is it because the rich people there tend to be older and more conservative than in areas like Hawthorn?

Daniel,
It was either on The Guardian or The Age also worth noting Labor has incumbency here.

Good point about Teals. Portsea-Blairgowrie is very affluent and i would assume good for Teals. There was some controversy about Mornington Peninsula being include in Metro Melbourne Lockdown. However, it has a much older population with very few young families in sharp contrast to Pakenham where part of the backlash would be due to home schooling etc.

It seems that the Anglosphere has parallel leaders (governing or not) even if leaders have some differences
1980s
– Ronald Reagan
– Margaret Thatcher
– Roger Douglas (despite being Labour, it shares some similarities with the first two)
1990s
– Bill Clinton
– Paul Keating
– Tony Blair
2000s
– George W Bush
– John Howard
– Tony Blair (despite being Labour)
– Stephen Harper
late 2010s
– Donald Trump
– Scott Morrison
– Boris Johnson
2020s (aka covid period)
– Ron Desantis
– Pierre Poilievre
– Matthew Guy
– Greg Abbott
– Donald Trump

There may be more parallels and correct me if there are more

Median age in Portsea is 68. In Blairgowrie, it’s 58.

The most likely “teal” prospect in Flinders ran into Section 44 problems (a good example of a generic interest in voting independent still requiring a viable independent candidate to vote for).

Flinders lacked the local member factor.

@Marh I think Flinders, especially in the richer areas is older, unlike the young professionals you see in Kooyong. Also in Kooyong Labor and Greens voters voted for Ryan to get her into the second spot and were probably happy to do so as they probably agreed a lot with her social views. Apart from the smaller towns like Somers, Balnarring, Shoreham, Red Hill and St Andrews Beach most of the Labor vote tends to come form Rosebud and Hastings, which is more a working class older population. Not the teal demographic.

Also the candidate ran into issues and never really got momentum.

Likely Liberal gain.

The median age in Nepean is 52. Much older in Portsea and Sorrento. Speaking of pandemic politics, based on polling abroad, older people are more likely to be vaccinated and are more supportive of lockdowns. In Australia, older workers and retirees suffered less financially than say, 18 to 30 year olds. At the same time, there was local despair about locking down Mornington Peninsula and also the effect on the local leisure, tourism and hospitality industries.

Near certain Liberal gain, this is a seat that Labor was never expecting to win in 2018. I think the retirement of the incumbent in 2018 also helped Labor’s chances here but no chance this’ll stay with Labor after November.

I wound’t write this seat off for Labor, The LNP seem to be very unpopular in the South & Eastern suburbs their traditional base. I would personally has have this as tossup only due to its slender margin, however I would say the neighbouring seat of Hastings will go to the LNP.

@Bob If this particular area was mad at the Liberals they probably would’ve swung away from them at last federal election. The comment rings true for the rest of the east and south though.

@Marh, that sounds like a very good sign for Keir Starmer given the other national leaders in the Anglosphere are Biden, Albanese and Ardern. I’d also add the late 2000s period where Obama, Gordon Brown and Rudd were all in power simultaneously.

This and Pakenham will be the only Liberal gains, and I still expect them to be under 3% so there’s a good chance they won’t be called until the next day or week after the election.

I am basing this entirely on Flinders and LaTrobe bucking the trend in May. Labor will win a landslide by picking up 6-8 seats from the Liberals plus a couple of others seats that the Liberals will lose to independents.

@Daniel T If both seats vote how they did federally the margins might be around 5% for Libs for both seats, this may be wrong though as it’s an estimate from memory when i last looked at the seats. Why don’t you think the Libs can pick up Hawthorn or Hastings.
Also what seats do you think the Libs will lose to Labor.

Been doing look-a-like audience clustering of all of Victorian State divisions using data from the 2021 Census.

This division comes up in mostly Coalition clusters, rarely in Labor clusters, which given its former status and its current margin isn’t unusual. More specifically, it comes up in close proximity to Nationals seats and ex-Nationals recently Independent seats like Morwell. I see this seat as a vulnerable pick up by an Independent if there is a strong candidate. It was clear in 2018 that there was a swing in this division from disaffected Coalition supporters.

From a Queensland context, this division is very similar in demographics and profile to Noosa – retirees, sea-changers, low-density and close to the ocean. Astute political observers would note that Noosa is currently held by Independent Sandy Bolton, a kind of pseudo-Teal independent.

It is also a potential Coalition gain if there is any broad softening in the Labor vote across the vote.

I will be sharing more of my findings across other divisions soon.

What’s the explanation for Labor winning this seat in 2018? It doesn’t seem like any of the other seats Labor gained.

Because the incumbent retired. I heard the previous MP was popular here. It also seems to follow the state TPP reasonably well and was on a knives edge as well in 2002 when the statewide TPP was around the same.

Nicholas, some of the bayside parts of this seat have traditionally been where the less-affluent go to retire. Areas like Rosebud, Tootgarook and Rye are sometimes viewed as the sort of ‘poor cousins’ of the peninsula; generally these areas are flatter and with smaller older housing and caravan parks, as opposed to the clifftop mansion type demographic around Portsea.

The relative disadvantage of these areas keeps the seat Labor-friendly enough that it can fall in landslides.

Just because the teal movement couldn’t get its shit together in Flinders doesn’t mean that comments about sea and tree changers, or affluent small-l Liberal voters don’t apply here.

I think Labor will retain here on a sophomore surge and Kate Lardner (teal) is a real chance in Mornington.

I respectively disagree @John. This seat is almost certainly swinging back to the Liberals because of the area being included in the lockdowns causing anti-Dan sentiment and long-term demographics including a constant influx of old money retirees. If Brayne retains then it will be seen as another upset in a very unfavorable seat for Labor.

However, I do agree with you on the Mornington electorate.

Ultra marginal.
Labor in front.. these seats in
Plus minus 2% range are the real battlefield. Labor could retain.. cannot assume a swing
Back to the liberals.. the result
Will depend on candidates and
The local campaign

This is probably the only real positive story for the Libs in an otherwise disappointing result for them seat-wise.

Well, failing to win Nepean would have been like failing to win Hastings or Pakenham. Oh wait.

This is the Libs’ only bright spark. Ironically, Labor has flipped more seats than the Liberals have.

Yes the Libs wasted their swings on unwinnable seats while in the seats that mattered they either stayed stagnant or went backwards. The massive swings in the north and west aren’t still enough to make those seats competitive since it simply turned at 20+% margin seat into a 10% margin seat. In most of those seats, much of the swing would be caused by anger towards the lockdowns since those areas would be the most negatively affected by them so the Labor vote should be able to recover in 2026 or at least maintain the same margins in a worst case scenario. The Libs still haven’t managed to make any seats marginal in the north and west not even Point Cook. Meanwhile in the southeast, they failed to make much ground in both the established working class areas and the growth areas.

Interestingly, Werribee had a two-party preferred swing towards Labor while swings were limited in Melton and Point Cook despite bigger swings in other parts of the north and west. That leads me to believe that Labor can reverse or neutralise potential swings in 2026 by paying attention to campaigning and promising services or infrastructure in those places.

@Adda

That’s a short-term fix, seeing as the Andrews Government consistently drops the ball when it comes to delivery of promises for the north and west.

If we get to 2026 and very little of what was promised has been done (which is very high likelihood), the swings against Labor will continue.

This was a seat I completely misread, it seems the Liberals were able to tap into the lockdown anger. I am also surprised that Labor at this stage when I wrote this comment look to hold onto Bass, Hastings & Pakenham.

@Adda, I agree. While some may read this result as promising for the Liberals to make gains in the west next time, I don’t think that’s the case at all and I think this election result actually sets Labor up even better for 2026. Here’s why.

* The massive swings in the west came in the least competitive seats (St Albans, Sydenham, etc) whereas the seats that were competitive – Melton, Point Cook & Werribee – didn’t swing at all, so the Liberals are no closer than they were prior to this election;

* As you say, the “scare” this time plus all the extra promises made by Labor will result in some increased delivery for the west over the next 4 years which will neutralise some of the “we’re forgotten” protest vote;

* The two main driving factors for the biggest swings in the safe seats were lockdowns/Covid and Dan Andrews. In 2026, it’s unlikely Dan will be leader, and the last Covid lockdown will have been 5 years ago, so a “correction” back to Labor – perhaps not to 2018 levels but certainly back to safe double-digit margins – is most likely to occur;

* Likewise in the outer southeast (Cranbourne, Narre Warrens), there were practically no swings against Labor at all so again, the Liberals will be in the same position that they were this year, they didn’t manage to set up a closer contest for next time, and again with a new leader and no Covid factor, the environment will actually be more favourable to Labor than it was this year;

* Meanwhile Labor have actually increased their margins to more than 5% in most of the eastern suburbs seats that were traditionally Liberal (Box Hill, Ashwood, Ringwood, etc), while also holding onto most of their sandbelt margins, making that region also even more difficult for the Liberals to claw back than it was this year;

The only bright spot for the Liberals is that they probably don’t need to fight as hard to hold onto seats like Brighton & Sandringham next time, so can focus more on the suburbs.

But they’re still faced with a dilemma – focus on clawing back the middle-ring east & the sandbelt, which has smaller margins but doesn’t deliver enough seats for government; or keep focusing on the outer suburbs and north-west (which some in the party truly believe they should do) which will likely be completely fruitless again because they haven’t made any real dent in the competitive seats.

Tim Smith said on Sky News last night he thinks the Liberals are in opposition for another 8 years, and barring a completely unexpected catastrophe, I can’t see any path for them not to be.

I agree with Adda and Trent,
Also want to add by the 2026 election Metro Tunnel and Westgate Tunnel will open and this will benefit commuters in both North and West Melbourne. However, in growth areas like Melton/Yan Yean it will always be a challenge with service delivery for example Melton electrification will not be done by 2026 but that is not an issue in established working class areas such as Broadmeadows, St Albans and Thomastown (In Dandenong Labor did quite well). I do think Labor should focus more on Service delivery in North and West Melbourne going forward.

Good post by Trent.. Mornington
Was the only safe seat in this area. And that seat is still undetetermined

It should be noted that having less safe territory leaves Labor forced to spread resources more thinly. So it’s not by any means a simple matter to do the necessary campaigning and service delivery to address perceived “neglect”. But the fact that Melton, Point Cook and Werribee got so much attention and yet did not turn on Labor shows their strategy for those places this election is useable for the rest of the outer north and west.

@ Trent,
Makes me think the fact that competitive Western suburbs seats like Melton didnt swing much shows that while there is discontent with ALP when they realised that their vote in Point Cook and Melton could result in Liberal MPs and even a Liberal Government they decide not to take up the opportunity and decided to give Labor another chance. While in seats like Thomastown, Broadmeadows and St Albans they knew no chance their vote will help elect Libs so decide to make a protest and give a kick to Labor that was not fatal. It maybe the same reason why Elite areas swang back to the Libs this election like Brighton, Sandringham, Caulfield and parts of Nepean. Last time protest votes made this very marginal and potentially elect Labor MPs