LIB 6.1%
Incumbent MP
Andrew Hastie, member for Canning since 2015.
Geography
South of Perth. Burt covers parts of Armadale, Canning and Gosnells council areas, including the suburbs of Armadale, Canning Vale, Gosnells, Huntingdale, Kelmscott, Thornlie and Westfield.
Redistribution
Burt is a new seat, taking in parts of Canning, Hasluck, Tangney and a small part of Swan. The largest proportion of the seat came from Canning.
Burt took in: Armadale, Kelmscott and Westfield from Canning; Gosnells, Huntingdale and Thornlie from Hasluck; and Canning Vale from Tangney.
History – Canning
Canning was first created for the expansion of the House of Representatives in 1949. For the early part of its history it was contested between the Liberal Party and the Country Party, and since the 1980s the seat has become much more of a Labor-Liberal marginal seat, usually being held by the party winning government.
The seat was first won in 1949 by Leonard Hamilton of the Country Party, who had previously held Swan since 1946.
Hamilton retired in 1961 and the seat was won by Liberal Neil McNeill, who was defeated by the Country Party’s John Hallett in 1963. Hallett held the seat until 1974, when the Liberal Party’s Mel Bungey defeated him.
The ALP’s Wendy Fatin won the seat in 1983 at the same time as the election of the Hawke government. Fatin transferred to the new seat of Brand in 1984, and the ALP’s George Gear transferred into Canning from Tangney, which he had held after the 1983 election.
Gear was defeated in 1996 by the Liberal Party’s Ricky Johnston, who had previously ran against Gear at every election since 1984. Johnston was defeated herself by Labor’s Jane Gerick in 1998.
Gerick was defeated narrowly by Liberal candidate Don Randall in 2001. Randall had previously held Swan from 1996 to 1998. Randall was re-elected in 2004, 2007, 2010 and 2013, and held the seat until his death in early 2015.
The 2015 Canning by-election was won by Liberal candidate Andrew Hastie.
Candidates
- Matt Keogh (Labor)
- Muhammad Salman (Greens)
- Matt O’Sullivan (Liberal)
- Warnar Spyker (Australian Christians)
- Ian Blevin (Shooters, Fishers and Farmers)
Assessment
Burt is a marginal Liberal seat, but unlike many seats on smaller margins, the Liberal Party does not have a sitting MP to defend the seat. Labor’s Matt Keogh performed very strongly in the Armadale area at the 2015 Canning by-election, and if there is a large swing to Labor they could take Burt.
Polls
- 52% to Labor – Newspoll, 13-15 June 2016
2013 result – Canning results redistributed into Burt
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Don Randall | Liberal | 45,189 | 51.1 | +4.9 | 45.9 |
| Joanne Dean | Labor | 23,578 | 26.6 | -13.7 | 31.9 |
| Damon Pages-Oliver | Greens | 6,547 | 7.4 | -0.9 | 7.6 |
| Wendy Eileen Lamotte | Palmer United Party | 6,088 | 6.9 | +6.9 | 6.9 |
| Derek Bruning | Australian Christians | 2,742 | 3.1 | +3.1 | 3.5 |
| James Forsyth | Nationals | 1,707 | 1.9 | +1.9 | 0.6 |
| Alice Harper | Family First | 1,197 | 1.4 | -0.2 | 1.3 |
| Richard Eldridge | Katter’s Australian Party | 776 | 0.9 | +0.9 | 0.6 |
| Lee Rumble | Rise Up Australia | 669 | 0.8 | +0.8 | 0.5 |
| Others | 1.1 | ||||
| Informal | 5,173 | 5.9 |
2013 two-party-preferred result – Canning results redistributed into Burt
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Don Randall | Liberal | 54,700 | 61.8 | +9.6 | 56.1 |
| Joanne Dean | Labor | 33,793 | 38.2 | -9.6 | 43.9 |
Booth breakdown
Booths have been divided into three parts:
- North-East – Gosnells, Huntingdale and Thornlie
- North-West – Canning Vale and Southern River
- South – Armadale, Kelmscott and Westfield
The Liberal Party won a large 62.4% two-party-preferred majority in the north-west, and a smaller 54.7% majority in the south. Labor won a slim 51.3% majority in the north-east.
| Voter group | PUP % | GRN % | LIB 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| North-East | 7.7 | 7.2 | 48.7 | 22,499 | 28.6 |
| South | 8.9 | 8.0 | 54.7 | 17,906 | 22.7 |
| North-West | 6.3 | 7.4 | 62.4 | 15,976 | 20.3 |
| Other votes | 5.1 | 7.9 | 60.7 | 22,334 | 28.4 |
Ben
39.3% for the libs in “other votes ” stands out. What might be the cause of this ???.
The Liberals have seats on smaller margins in WA, but the lack of any sitting MP and personal vote makes Burt their most vulnerable seat. Given the swings in the Armadale area in the Canning by-election, I’d say this is very likely indeed to go Labor.
MM
100 % Agree . Matt Keogh will also benefit from his campaigning in the Canning By- election
As I pointed out in another of WA’s seat profile’s this will be a good seat to monitor the impact of incumbency on the election process. My feeling is this will very likely go to the ALP. The swing is getting larger by the week, up to 9% now!
W of S
The swing will come back, a bit. However remember my comparison of the relative influence of WA MP;s in the H of R. Especially in opposition !!!.
Whoops, that 39.3% should be 60.7%.
@Winediamond I think so too. But the size of the swing should make the Coalition worried and they do not seem to be taking the campaign very seriously here ATM. Time will tell ofc.
I don’t get why you’re treating this as the continuation of Canning. Canning still exists. Burt is a brand new seat. Calling Andrew Hastie the incumbent MP is kinda jarring.
Most voters were not previously in Canning. In fact, the redistribution report shows slightly more came from Hasluck.
Agreed, particularly as Hastie is presumably re-contesting Canning.
Hastie is not the incumbent mp……. this is a new seat
He’s the incumbent MP for about half of the electorate.
Looking like an ALP gain.
The margin here to the Libs I don’t think is truly reflective of the seat. It is likely inflated given the members of the 4 previous seats which Burt was carved out from we’re all held by Liberal incumbents. Very likely an ALP gain.
Sportsbet has Labor noticeably ahead, here, but Coalition still in the running.
Labor 1.50, Coalition 2.50
Slightly tightening,
Labor 1.60, Coalition 2.25
This is reverted, Labor’s strengthened back:
Labor 1.50, Coalition 2.50
Labor vote at state level is much better……. which has the capacity to grow post the by election result for Canning
Newspoll 2PP (rounded), Lib 48%, ALP 52%
Labor has continued to strengthen,
Labor 1.44, Coalition 2.7
Now outside the range, so I won’t update again unless it gets closer.
My prediction: Labor candidate Matt Keogh should get a decent swing, particularly in the Armadale/Kelmscott area, where Don Randall’s personal vote has sadly disappeared.
This should be a gain for Labor, as traditional voting patterns in the east of the seat return, and the swingy west moves away from the Liberals.
Burt also took in Langford from Swan.
Shaping up to be the biggest swing of the election ~ 14.5%. A very good result for Labor here.
I heard speculation that Burt was always going to be strongly Labor-aligned – it was just that its pieces were all in Liberal-aligned electorates, and so Labor hadn’t paid it that much attention. With a new seat, Labor actually put the effort in, hence the swing.
Don’t know if it’s true, but it’s certainly a plausible explanation.
Burt now sits below Brand and above Fremantle on the pendulum; Labor’s 2nd safest seat in WA.
That seems about right. The overlapping state seats of Armadale and Gosnells/Thornlie have always been Labor, and Southern River a swing seat.
The problem is that much of the speculation about this election was based upon the 2013 election, which was an abnormality. One really needs to reflect on 2010 and earlier to get a good estimate. 2010 and earlier shows Labor as the likely winner… and this is demonstrated in this election.
For me, it’s obvious from the result in Burt, and state election results, that a big chunk of the Liberal vote in Armadale was personal votes for Don Randall. The Canning Vale area, formerly in Tangney, did not swing anywhere near as much as Armadale/Kelmscott.
Hypothetical question: If Randall was still with us, would he have contested Burt, or moved to the new Canning?