Macarthur – Australia 2016

LIB 3.3%

Incumbent MP
Russell Matheson, since 2010.

Geography
Macarthur covers most of the City of Campbelltown (except for Macquarie Fields and Glenfield) and a small part of Camden council area. The key suburbs are Campbelltown, Minto, Leumeah, Ingleburn, St Andrews, Raby, Bradbury, Ambarvale and Rosemeadow.

Map of Macarthur's 2013 and 2016 boundaries. 2013 boundaries marked as red lines, 2016 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.
Map of Macarthur’s 2013 and 2016 boundaries. 2013 boundaries marked as red lines, 2016 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.

Redistribution
Macarthur shifted further into the Sydney area. The seat previously covered parts of Wollondilly, including Douglas Park and Appin, along with Camden, Narellan and surrounding suburbs. All of these areas were shifted into Hume, while some western parts of Liverpool council were shifted into Werriwa. In exchange, Macarthur shifted deeper into Campbelltown, gaining Ingleburn, Minto, St Andrews and Raby from Werriwa. These changes cut the Liberal margin from 11.4% to 3.3%.

History
Macarthur was first created at the 1949 election, and has moved around southwestern Sydney, the southern highlands and the Illawarra over the last sixty years. The seat was a bellwether seat from 1949 until 2007, when the Liberals managed to hold on to the seat.

The seat was held from 1949 until 1972 by Jeff Bate of the Liberal Party, who became an independent in 1972 after losing preselection, before losing to the ALP’s John Kerin. Kerin held the seat until 1975. He later won the neighbouring seat of Werriwa in a 1978 by-election following the retirement of Gough Whitlam and served as a minister in the Hawke government, including a brief term as Treasurer following Paul Keating’s move to the backbench.

Michael Baume won the seat for the Liberal Party in 1975 and held the seat until the 1983 election, when he too was defeated. Baume returned to politics as a Senator following the 1984 election. He was defeated in 1983 by the ALP’s Colin Hollis, who transferred to the Illawarra seat of Throsby in 1984 following the expansion of the House of Representatives.

Hollis was succeeded in 1984 by Stephen Martin, who transferred to the seat of Cunningham in 1993 following a redistribution which presumably shifted Macarthur out of the Illawarra, which is now covered by Cunningham and Throsby. Martin went on to serve as Speaker during the final term of the Keating government and his 2002 retirement triggered the Cunningham by-election, which was won by the Greens. Chris Haviland held the seat for one term before he was defeated for Labor preselection in 1996 and retirement.

The new Labor candidate was defeated by former Liberal premier John Fahey, who had previously been the state member for Southern Highlands before his government was defeated in 1995. Fahey served as Finance Minister in the first two terms of the Howard government.

A 2001 redistribution saw Macarthur move out of the Southern Highlands and take in parts of southern Campbelltown, which had previously been included in Werriwa. This gave the ALP a notional majority in the seat, and the party nominated recurrent Mayor of Campbelltown Meg Oates. Fahey originally planned to transfer to the seat of Hume, which now covered his heartland territory around Bowral and Moss Vale, although he eventually retired at the 2001 election due to health problems.

The Liberal Party eventually preselected ultramarathon runner and charity fundraiser Pat Farmer, a personal favourite of John Howard, and he managed to win the seat with a swing to the Liberal Party. The 2004 election saw Farmer solidify his hold on the seat, holding the seat with a 9.5% margin.

Despite his margin increasing to over 11% thanks to a favourable redistribution, Pat Farmer barely held on in 2007.

The redistribution prior to the 2010 election made Macarthur a notional Labor seat. Farmer was defeated for Liberal preselection by former Campbelltown mayor Russell Matheson, who went on to retain the seat for the Liberal Party with a 3.5% swing. Matheson solidified his hold in 2013, thanks to a further 8.3% swing.

Candidates

Assessment
Macarthur should be a key marginal at this election – while the Liberal Party has held Macarthur continuously since 1996, the seat has now shifted to be almost entirely based in Labor-friendly Campbelltown, and while Matheson is a former mayor of the area he will have a fight to win a third term with a much smaller margin.

Polls

  • 51% to Labor – Galaxy commissioned by Daily Telegraph, 11 May 2016
  • 51% to Labor – Reachtel commissioned by 7 News, 19 May 2016
  • 50-50 – Newspoll, 13-15 June 2016

2013 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Russell Matheson Liberal 46,185 54.3 +6.9 45.9
Ian Fulton Labor 26,039 30.6 -7.9 38.0
Goetz Robert Uwe Grosche Palmer United Party 4,916 5.8 +5.8 5.5
Patrick Darley-Jones Greens 3,929 4.6 -0.9 4.1
Sarah Ramsay Christian Democratic Party 2,189 2.6 +0.8 3.2
Mick Williams Katter’s Australian Party 1,751 2.1 +2.1 1.7
Others 1.6
Informal 7,225 8.5

2013 two-party-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Russell Matheson Liberal 52,161 61.4 +8.3 53.3
Ian Fulton Labor 32,848 38.6 -8.3 46.7
Polling places in Macarthur at the 2013 federal election. Central in green, North in yellow, South in red, West in blue. Click to enlarge.
Polling places in Macarthur at the 2013 federal election. Central in green, North in yellow, South in red, West in blue. Click to enlarge.

Booth breakdown
Booths in Macarthur have been split into four parts. Most of the seat’s population is in the city of Campbelltown and this area has been split into north (including Minto, Ingleburn and St Andrews), central (including Airds, Campbelltown and Leumeah) and south (including Ambarvale, Bradbury and Rosemeadow). Those booths in the Camden council area, including Harrington Park and Leppington, have been grouped as west.

The Liberal Party won 68.5% in the west, but only small majorities in the centre and south. In the north, previously contained in Werriwa, Labor won 54% of the two-party-preferred vote.

Voter group LIB 2PP % Total votes % of votes
North 46.1 9,407 21.9
South 52.8 8,101 18.8
Central 50.4 7,454 17.3
West 68.5 5,741 13.3
Other votes 57.8 12,340 28.7
Two-party-preferred votes in Macarthur at the 2013 federal election.
Two-party-preferred votes in Macarthur at the 2013 federal election.

84 COMMENTS

  1. As a point of order, it’s not even called the M5 there – the M5 doesn’t start until closer to the M7 intersection. Near Raby and Claymore etc it’s the M31.

  2. While you are technically correct, kme, I grew up a short walk from the freeway around there and it was generally referred to as the M5 (even though I don’t think it ever actually was called that).

  4. Run the figures for 2007 or 1998 elections on this seat and you will see a 10% alp margin I suspect

  5. Yesterday good ole Doc Freelander demonstrated, & revealed, why he is entirely the wrong candidate for this electorate. Just another soft headed lefty doctor, not prepared to deal with some of the harsher realities of life, & this country.

    Personally i have more than 1/2 a dozen doc friends who are similarly afflicted.

    Yesterday Freelander gained national attention, & further exposed Labors vulnerability, & division, on border security. This was incredibly self indulgent, & DUMB.

    In declaring that there were “children being tortured” he forgot to check if there were in fact any children left in detention !!!!!. There are NOT .

    Historically to compare our DETENTION camps with ANY concentration camps in completely false.
    The British invented the concentration camp, & 3/4/ of million Boers died
    The Italians refined it in Libya in the rebellion of the 30s & hundreds of thousands of Arabs died.
    The Nazis perfected this “art ” in WW 2. We all know the result.

    For this TWIT to engage in such hyperbole , & gross deception is an insult to our country, the millions of dead, & all the rest of us.

    i am disgusted obviously,

    However i am appalled more, at the complete ignorance displayed.
    Now someone TRY, just TRY to defend this idiot.

  8. I note you argue like a five year old. No one cares mate. Stick to the psephology, not the mudslinging.

  9. I wouldn’t put it in quite the same language as WD, but Freelander’s comments are probably not helpful at all in a seat like Macarthur. If he was running for Grayndler or Griffith or Batman, sure. But an outer western Sydney seat? Hmm…..

    (I’m not making any comment on the merit or otherwise of his comments, just the politics….)

  10. PJ
    Projection, Projection, & more projection. 5 year olds don’t provide FACTS. They also tend not to have the capacity to form a view through a process of reason.

  11. MM
    Your point about Freelander’s lack of judgement is very well made.

    If this idiot is incapable of representing his party effectively, not to mention supporting his leader How then does he legitimately present himself as worthy, & capable candidate ,in the first place????

  12. ‘If this idiot is incapable of representing his party effectively, not to mention supporting his leader How then does he legitimately present himself as worthy, & capable candidate ,in the first place????’

    So I guess your hopping MPs like George Christensen, most of the Tasmanians, Andrew Hastie, Bernardi and Abbott lose given they have undermined the leader

  13. Dan
    If you are saying that Freelander is as extreme , or even as mad as some you have mentioned, then that illustrates the point perfectly.!!!!!. This of course apart from your entirely personal, & visceral hatreds, of say Abbott, & Hastie. BTW that’s not to say i’m a fan of either.

    You also fail to account for the different needs, expectations, & demands the parties place on their candidates. The so called” broad church” of accommodation, & supposed tolerance, as opposed to the absolute lack of such aspirations.

  15. kme
    If this is a true indication the ALP ought to be disappointed. They need to do better than this to win more than a couple of seats, & particularly this one.
    Perhaps this seat becomes a litmus test, or fulcrum of the refugee, border security issue ??. If so it will take on a much larger significance, perhaps like the infamous “Lindsay test ” ??.

  16. I count this off as a Labor gain. However, I can see this seat remaining marginal for some time but potentially trending back to the Liberal Party as Leppington and areas in the western side of the seat continue to grow.

  17. Apart from the redistributed LNP seats that are now notionally Labor, this should be the first to fall. It’s the only one in NSW that I’d be reasonably confident of as an ALP gain -they appear to have some chance in up to another half-dozen – but not favorites in any of them yet.

  18. Sportsbet has this one quite close, with Labor in the lead to take the seat from Liberals.

    Labor 1.75, Coalition 2.00

  19. This will probably be one of the few ALP gains in metropolitan Sydney outside the redistributed Barton. That Sportsbet predicition sounds spot-on

  22. The fact that the Coalition are even in contention here is a great result for them. While I do not think that they will win it, the closeness of the result here is perhaps indicative of much more solid support for the Coalition in marginal seats than what the national 2PP suggests.

  23. Race is tightening a little

    Labor 1.6, Coalition 2.25

    Incidentally, NXT are in a distant third at 16.00

  24. Labor firming again,

    Labor 1.45, Coalition 2.60

    Now outside of the range, will update again if it gets closer.

  28. My prediction: Russell Matheson’s margin has been slashed in the redistribution, and will have to work hard to hold Macarthur. This will be a hot contest on the new boundaries, will Matheson be able to do what his predecessors John Fahey and Pat Farmer did, and win after an unfavourable redistribution?

    This will be competitive, but ultimately, I think Labor will squeak in here.

  32. @Dubopov Are the Libs using it for political gain? Yes. Is it true though? Also yes. From what I’ve been told by colleagues, the man was quite badly hurt.

  33. This will be my last updating of Sportsbet numbers, and Macarthur has seen a small further shift towards Labor

    Labor 1.60, Coalition 2.20

  34. Massive swing for Labor here. Both sides were shocked with the magnitude of the result.

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