LIB 17.8%
Incumbent MP
Alex Hawke, since 2007.
Geography
North-Western Sydney. Mitchell mainly covers parts of the Hills, including Baulkham Hills, Castle Hill, Winston Hills and Kellyville.
History
Mitchell was created for the 1949 election. It has almost always been won by the Liberal Party, except for two elections where the ALP won the seat, and it has become a solidly Liberal seat over recent decades.
Mitchell was won by Liberal candidate Roy Wheeler in 1949. Wheeler was re-elected at every election in the 1950s, but lost Mitchell to ALP candidate John Armitage. Armitage only managed to hold on to the seat for one term, losing it to Liberal candidate Leslie Irwin in 1963, although he later held the safe Labor seat of Chifley from 1969 to 1983.
Irwin held Mitchell from 1963 until the 1972 election, when he was swept aside with the election of the Whitlam government, with Mitchell being won by Labor candidate Alfred Ashley-Brown. Ashley-Brown lost in 1974 to Liberal candidate Alan Cadman.
Cadman held Mitchell for over thirty years without rising to much prominence in the Liberal Party, and by the mid-2000s was one of only three MPs remaining from the time of the Whitlam government, along with Prime Minister John Howard and Attorney-General Philip Ruddock. Cadman served as a Parliamentary Secretary in the final years of the Fraser government and the early years of the Howard government, but didn’t rise any further.
After narrowly surviving a preselection challenge in 2004, Cadman faced a challenge in 2007 from prominent right-winger Alex Hawke, and decided to retire. Hawke easily won election in 2007, and has been re-elected three times.
Candidates
- Immanuel Selvaraj (Labor)
- Alex Hawke (Liberal)
- Roy Peter Hoppenbrouwer (United Australia)
- Craig L Hall (Christian Democratic Party)
- Lawrence Murphy (Greens)
Assessment
Mitchell is a very safe Liberal seat.
2016 result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Alex Hawke | Liberal | 55,168 | 60.5 | -4.3 |
| Andrew Punch | Labor | 22,440 | 24.6 | +3.5 |
| Michael Bellstedt | Greens | 7,287 | 8.0 | +1.6 |
| Darryl Allen | Christian Democratic Party | 6,303 | 6.9 | +3.7 |
| Informal | 4,308 | 4.5 |
2016 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Alex Hawke | Liberal | 61,847 | 67.8 | -3.6 |
| Andrew Punch | Labor | 29,351 | 32.2 | +3.6 |
Booth breakdown
Booths have been divided into three parts: central, north and south.
The Liberal Party won sizeable majorities of the two-party-preferred vote in all three areas, ranging from 63.2% in the south to 71% in the north.
| Voter group | LIB 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| South | 63.2 | 26,403 | 29.0 |
| North | 71.0 | 21,756 | 23.9 |
| Central | 68.8 | 15,897 | 17.4 |
| Other votes | 67.6 | 12,402 | 13.6 |
| Pre-poll | 70.4 | 14,740 | 16.2 |
Two-party-preferred votes in Mitchell at the 2016 federal election
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This would be the first battleground for a Liberal Party schism, and the best chance for any of the Christian Right parties.
Australian Conservatives have no chance in their current form, but expect a spirited campaign here as a fundraiser for Bernardi’s 2022 campaign.
Labor’s candidate is Immanuel Selvaraj – https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/newslocal/hills-shire-times/federal-election-2019-alp-announce-candidate-for-mitchell-immanuel-selvaraj/news-story/9e0d6c4c1cf1b099694d1bae9bb6fa8b
True, But be won’t win, 5% swing at most
John
Bernardi’s lot seem he’ll bent on not putting their head above the parapit. Is the pretence of a national party just a covert means of raising funds to back a SA Senate campaign. They have endorsed a candidate in Qld for Senate but as far as I can see no House Candidates therefore no local campaigns therefore very few How to Votes in peoples hands. Similar to Palmer. Andrew Jackson
Expecting a hefty swing against the Liberals here. Needless to say, Hawke will nonetheless retain.
For the first time the population is growing rapidly in Mitchell. Lots of new voters. On trend it looks like it will have to shed maybe 8000 voters in 2021.
I keep waiting for Alex Hawke to show me something to change my opinion of him. Still waiting !!.
Hawke is a factional warlord. He’s the reason why the moderates have so much power within the internal organisation of the Liberal Party in NSW. So-called ‘centre-right’ factionalists who jump into bed with the moderates when they’ve actually very little in common with them. Puerile politics at its worst.