LIB 3.8%
Incumbent MP
Ryan Smith, since 2006.
Geography
Eastern Melbourne. Warrandyte covers the suburbs of Parkwood, Warrandyte, North Warrandyte, Warrandyte South, Warranwood, Wonga Park and parts of Donvale and Doncaster East. The electorate mostly covers eastern parts of the City of Manningham, as well as the suburb of North Warrandyte on the northern side of the Yarra River in Nillumbik Shire, and small parts of Maroondah and Yarra Ranges council areas.
Redistribution
Warrandyte shifted east, gaining Chirnside Park from Evelyn and Ringwood North from Croydon and Ringwood. Warrandyte also lost Deep Creek and part of Doncaster East to Bulleen. These changes made little difference to the margin.
History
Warrandyte was created for the 1976 election. It has been won by the Liberal Party at all elections except for two elections in the 1980s when the seat was won by the Labor Party.
Warrandyte was first won in 1976 by the Liberal Party’s Norman Lacy, who had previously won the seat of Ringwood in 1973. He held the seat for two terms, losing in 1982.
The ALP’s Lou Hill won Warrandyte in 1982, and was re-elected in 1985. In 1988 he was defeated by the Liberal Party’s Phil Honeywood.
Honeywood became a Parliamentary Secretary when the Kennett government was elected in 1992, and became a minister when the government was re-elected in 1996. He served as an Opposition frontbencher from 1999 until his retirement in 2006.
Warrandyte was won in 2006 by the Liberal Party’s Ryan Smith.
Smith has been re-elected three times.
- Naomi Oakley (Labor)
- Nicola Rae (Animal Justice)
- Deepak Joshi (Greens)
- Richard Vernay (Family First)
- Cynthia Pilli (Independent)
- Ryan Smith (Liberal)
Assessment
Warrandyte has a long history of being held by the Liberal Party. It is now marginal but would likely only fall if Labor did extremely well.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Ryan Smith | Liberal | 18,852 | 49.8 | -7.1 | 50.0 |
| Elizabeth McGrath | Labor | 13,395 | 35.4 | +6.1 | 35.8 |
| Ben Ramcharan | Greens | 3,927 | 10.4 | -0.1 | 10.5 |
| Lachlan Mcgill | Animal Justice | 1,710 | 4.5 | +4.5 | 3.7 |
| Informal | 1,909 | 4.8 | +0.1 |
2018 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Ryan Smith | Liberal | 20,402 | 53.9 | -7.7 | 53.8 |
| Elizabeth McGrath | Labor | 17,464 | 46.1 | +7.7 | 46.2 |
Booths have been divided into four areas: east, north, south-west and west.
The Liberal Party won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in three out of four areas, ranging from 50.3% in the north to 55.1% in the east. Labor polled 50.8% in the south-west.
The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 8.6% in the south-west to 13.2% in the north.
| Voter group | GRN prim % | LIB 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| East | 10.1 | 55.1 | 9,675 | 21.7 |
| South-West | 8.6 | 49.2 | 6,852 | 15.4 |
| North | 13.2 | 50.3 | 6,130 | 13.7 |
| West | 8.9 | 52.4 | 2,655 | 5.9 |
| Pre-poll | 10.4 | 57.1 | 13,205 | 29.6 |
| Other votes | 11.8 | 54.6 | 6,105 | 13.7 |
Election results in Warrandyte at the 2018 Victorian state election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, Labor and the Greens.
It does not seem to make sense to put Doncaster East and Chirnside Park together. One is in a middle ring suburb with a large Chinese and Southern European population and another is an outer fringe with a semi-rural feel with nearly everyone being Anglo and their transport alignments are different as well.
I believe Doncaster East/Donvale should be in a seat that is within Urban Manningham and/or Nothern Whitehorse (just like the federal seat of Menzies) for a better community of interest.
Matthew, i grew up in Manningham (still call it home) and i concur with your comments regarding Doncaster East and the ethnic composition although i would also add the large Persian community as well which is the largest in Victoria. It is possible to argue that Chirnside Park shares a community of interest with Wonga Park and the semi-rural part of Manningham is very Anglo unlike the suburban western half. Even parts of Donvale East of Springvale Road are much less diverse than suburbs to the West. The issue is that the East/North East of Melbourne has little population growth relative to the state so it a future redistribution will likely have to expand further same at a federal level. I would not be surprised if goes further East i the future.
Possible Labor gain if the Liberals are serious about abandoning these small-l seats. The arrogance in some of the conservative ”liberal” politicians is absolutely outstanding and the comments from him will be the exact reason they will be thrashed this November. This would be very close on federal figures.
Labor will get swings against them in the west and possible could lose Melton, But other than that they could get swings against them in western Melbourne but it doesn’t translate to any losses much like the Brisbane council elections for the LNP and in 2020 and the federal election for Labor.
Labor has a shot of winning between 60-65 seats this November as a result of the infighting and the shift to the right which will only cause them to lose in a landslide. No seat is safe in eastern Melbourne in my opinion with the exception of Rowville and Malvern. (Unless you include Berwick as eastern Melbourne)
Daniel, this my neck of the woods and my old primary school, Doncaster Gardens PS is here although i live in Bulleen electorate. I would not really describe this as small l liberal area (except Warrandyte North which has a very large green vote and is very socially progressive). It is Nouveau Riche rather than old money. Most of this would be similar to the Hills District I agree it could be vulnerable as it is not a populist area. Matthew’s comments above explain the ethnic demographics.
Agree mostly with @Nimalan here. The north/north east of the seat definitely has a sizeable portion of small l Liberals but you could say it’s not just North Warrandyte but the whole Warrandyte area and is a lot more Anglo than the rest of the seat but it’s drowned out by the more populated and ethnically diverse Doncaster East.
This could be one seat (alongside the demographically similar Glen Waverley) that Labor should target to attack Ryan Smith’s sympathetic views to the anti-vax movement
Evidence: https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=IfuaEC2Bi-4
Being within 50km of a CBD doesn’t make a seat small-l liberal.
@Marh been against restrictions doesn’t necessarily make someone anti-vax.
@North East There are a lot of extremist Dan supporters that seem to comment on this site
I’m pretty sure the Labor candidate here is Naomi Oakley. She was Labor’s candidate in Menzies for the 2022 Federal Election. She is generally considered a poor candidate within the party.
She really isn’t the best candidate and listening to her interviews, she hasn’t even grasped the main reason why Menzies was so close, instead treating the seat like a Teal one. If Labor chose a better candidate then like Jennifer Yang, the former mayor for Manningham, they could’ve won it. To be fair, it’s not like they have a lot of options in an area like this.
Labor’s candidate selection for Victoria (in both the federal election and the upcoming state election) are generally pretty horrible to say the least with most of them being less than ideal candidates for their seats, a by-product of the national executive having 100% say in the preselections without any local input. If they had better locally selected candidates, they could have taken a bunch of seats they’ve just missed out on (Menzies, Deakin, Aston and Casey).
@Dan M It’s probably because Oakley lives in a bubble and doesn’t understand the divide in this seat and Menzies on social issues. Socio-economically this seat is mostly similar all around but the Warrandyte area is more socially progressive tree tory/changer type that would be susceptible to a teal candidate. I believe Oakley is from the Warrandyte area so she’s only basing her thoughts on her suburb and not the whole seat. If she was elected i can see her not been appealing to the southern part of the seat in Doncaster East and rubbing people there the wrong way.
Also on her Facebook i think she had something about the Yarra river in Warrandyte and overcrowding along he river hurting it and her plan to prevent overuse. I don’t know how they would be able to manage that but i have a feeling the idea wouldn’t be popular with local businesses.
Another seat where the LNP should just hold onto.
In my mailbox today, I found the first campaign material of the election campaign – an leaflet from the Labor candidate Naomi Oakley.
What realistic chances does she have of winning the seat from Ryan Smith?
@Oscar B
It’s unlikely but there was a decent swing to Labor within the seat there at the Federal level, you assume some of this people are people who voted Labor in 2018 however where there was a significant swing to Labor in this seat.
If Liberals lose this then it will have been a bloodbath.
Fairly likely this will stay Liberal, like said above if this falls then the election will be a landslide. Not sure whether this will swing to or against the Libs though, the swings in the Eastern suburbs of Melbourne were all over the place in May.
@Ham This seat swung to Labor in essentially all the booths though the swing was much stronger in Doncaster East than it is in the rest of the seat. Still that doesn’t necessarily mean the state results will swing as much as the federal ones to Labor.
Print this or not, it’s up to you of course. Naomi Oakley the Labor Party candidate for Warrandyte is in fact an excellent choice for the electorate. She very narrowly missed out on the federal seat of Menzies, and is incredibly down to earth and genuinely passionate about community, domestic violence and actually listens to people. She is an ex police officer and now runs her own business as well as being a single mum. She is not your usual political staffer, lawyer or other person governed by personal ambition. I admit it, she is a personal friend but I would just keep my head down and my mouth shut if I felt she was a poor choice for the area. If you doubt me, get in touch with her and decide for yourself.
Well said Alice, a very hard working candidate, a true local candidate wanting to represent her electorate not part of the usual party machine.
Correction on an earlier comment made. Oakley makes reference to living in Doncaster. As far as i’m aware no part of Doncaster falls into the seat of Warrandyte, only a large part of Doncaster East.
Ryan Smith has pulled the plug so there will be a by election in late August or early September
This outcomes is probably good for Pesutto as Ryan Smith was hard right and was an opponent of him. This is less ethnically diverse than Bulleen except for the Doncaster East part, if Labor does not run it is possible a Teal could win if Labor supporters vote Teal and the Teals could make some inroads into the ethnically diverse communities.
If Liberals lose this, it’s curtains for Pessuto, they must retain this. If Labor can win this then it actually helps them in 2026 because Battin will make no inroads whatsoever and continue to shift the party to the right and into irrelevance.
A big win would probably make Pessuto safe for at least another year or 2.
Would be an absolute joke if Tim Smith does get preselected. I believe the Warrandyte branches are hard right (the legacy of Kevin Andrews) so there is a pretty strong possibility.
I know it’s really early but I think the results in the byelection will be very patchy because this electorate itself has lots of different parts. The west around Doncaster East is among the most ethnically diverse suburbs in Melbourne with notable for having a large Chinese population, and to an extent Iranian population (though it only accounts for around 3% of the suburb). Keith Wolahan’s advocacy on Iran has basically got the Iranian community locked in for the Liberals but again its only a tiny proprtion of Doncaster East, let alone the entire seat. With more than 1 in 5 people in this seat being of Chinese heritage, the vote of the Chinese community will determine the success of the Liberals. The Liberals failing miserably with this demographic cost them Aston and many other seats at the last federal election. In the south, there are the parts that overlap with Deakin. This is where the Libs should theoretically more likely to better in this time with it being the area relatively the most receptive to right wing populism in the seat (at least by Melbourne standards) but it’s also pretty similar to Aston and we all know how that turned out. The rest of this seat east of Springvale Road is very Anglo and semi-rural with an increasingly larger tree change demographic that is favourable to the teals.
What November showed is that it is hard to be Teal at state level. The Libs will probably be fine if they pick a good candidate. If not, then who knows…
Tim Smith is seriously damaged goods – he is not a plausible candidate. His only hope is the Upper House.
Move on over to the by-election guide.