LIB 2.5% vs IND
Incumbent MP
Paul Fletcher, since 2009.
Geography
Northern Sydney. Bradfield covers the Ku-ring-gai council area and most of the Willoughby council area. Key suburbs include Wahroonga, St Ives, Pymble, Turramurra, Killara, Lindfield, Gordon, Roseville, Castle Cove, Chatswood, Willoughby and Artarmon.
Redistribution
Bradfield shifted south, taking in about one third of the abolished seat of North Sydney. Specifically Bradfield took in most of the Willoughby council area, including Artarmon, Castlecrag, Middle Cove, Naremburn, Northbridge and Willoughby. The suburb of Hornsby was moved from Bradfield to Berowra, so the electoral boundary now mostly follows the local government boundary between Hornsby and Ku-ring-gai. The seats of North Sydney and Bradfield both had a teal independent in the final two-candidate-preferred count, and the changes reduced the Liberal margin against those independents from 4.2% to 2.5%.
History
The seat was created for the 1949 election, and has always been held by the Liberal Party.
It was first won by former Prime Minister Billy Hughes in 1949. Hughes had been an MP since he won election to the NSW colonial parliament in 1894, and had then held the federal seats of West Sydney, Bendigo and North Sydney. He had originally served as a Labor prime minister before leaving the party over the issue of conscription and leading the new Nationalist party. He eventually ended up in Robert Menzies’ Liberal Party and was the last remaining member of the first federal Parliameent to hold a seat.
Hughes died in office in 1952, and the ensuing by-election was won by state Liberal MP Harry Turner.
Turner held the seat for the next twenty-two years, and never rose to a ministerial role during twenty years of Coalition government. He retired at the 1974 election, and was succeeded by David Connolly.
Connolly also held Bradfield for twenty-two years, and was expected to take on a ministerial role after the 1996 election, but lost preselection to Brendan Nelson, former president of the Australian Medical Association.
Nelson won Bradfield in 1996 and quickly rose through the ranks of the Liberal government, joining the cabinet following the 2001 election and serving first as Minister for Education and then Minister for Defence.
Following the defeat of the Howard government in 2007, Brendan Nelson was elected Leader of the Opposition, narrowly defeating Malcolm Turnbull in the party room. His leadership was troubled by low poll ratings and being undermined by Turnbull and his supporters, and Nelson lost a leadership spill in September 2008. Nelson resigned from Parliament in 2009, triggering a by-election in Bradfield.
The 2009 Bradfield by-election was held in December, and was a contest between the Liberal Party and the Greens, with the ALP declining to stand a candidate, along with a field of twenty other candidates, including nine candidates for the Christian Democratic Party. While the Greens substantially increased their vote, Liberal candidate Paul Fletcher comfortably retained the seat. Fletcher has been re-elected five times.
Candidates
Sitting Liberal MP Paul Fletcher is not running for re-election.
- Nicolette Boele (Independent)
- Gisele Kapterian (Liberal)
- Louise McCallum (Labor)
- Harjit Singh (Greens)
- Andy Yin (Independent)
Assessment
If the teal independents were to pick up an extra seat in 2025, Bradfield is a very clear frontrunner. The seat has taken in about a third of an abolished seat that has been represented by an independent for the last three years, and the previous form of Bradfield had a strong independent of a similar style and political ideology in 2022.
Nicolette Boele has been actively campaigning for Bradfield since her 2022 defeat. She will be a serious contender, but the particular circumstances that led to independents winning in northern Sydney in 2022 is not quite so present now.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Paul Fletcher | Liberal | 43,562 | 45.0 | -15.3 | 43.7 |
| Nicolette Boele | Independent | 20,198 | 20.9 | +20.9 | 22.9 |
| David Brigden | Labor | 16,902 | 17.5 | -3.7 | 17.7 |
| Martin Cousins | Greens | 8,960 | 9.3 | -4.4 | 8.6 |
| Janine Kitson | Independent | 3,018 | 3.1 | +3.1 | 2.4 |
| Rob Fletcher | United Australia | 2,496 | 2.6 | +0.7 | 2.3 |
| Michael Lowe | One Nation | 1,568 | 1.6 | +1.6 | 1.5 |
| Others | 1.0 | ||||
| Informal | 3,616 | 3.6 | -0.5 |
2022 two-candidate-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Paul Fletcher | Liberal | 52,447 | 54.2 | 52.5 | |
| Nicolette Boele | Independent | 44,257 | 45.8 | 47.5 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Paul Fletcher | Liberal | 54,685 | 56.5 | -10.0 | 56.2 |
| David Gordon Brigden | Labor | 42,019 | 43.5 | +10.0 | 43.8 |
Booths have been divided into three parts. Polling places in the Ku-ring-gai council area have been split in two while those in the Willoughby council area have been grouped together.
The Liberal Party won 55.8% of the two-candidate-preferred vote in North Ku-ring-gai, while independents won 50.7% in South Ku-ring-gai and 53.6% in Willoughby.
Labor came third, with a primary vote ranging from 14.4% in North Ku-ring-gai to 21.1% in Willoughby.
| Voter group | ALP prim | LIB 2CP | Total votes | % of votes |
| South Ku-ring-gai | 16.5 | 49.3 | 21,377 | 19.2 |
| North Ku-ring-gai | 14.4 | 55.8 | 19,083 | 17.1 |
| Willoughby | 21.1 | 46.4 | 16,671 | 15.0 |
| Pre-poll | 18.8 | 52.7 | 33,487 | 30.1 |
| Other votes | 17.6 | 57.2 | 20,709 | 18.6 |
Election results in Bradfield at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-candidate-preferred votes (Liberal vs Independent), two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, independent candidates and Labor.
Eg. just because some commentators might cry foul if Dutton were to do this to a male barber doesn’t mean that it’s not a nothingburger. If anything the fact that politicians can generally shrug these off illustrates the point. The argument against it *not* being a nothingburger is predicated on the notion of the teals being perceived differently to other politicians.
Isn’t this the comment Adda, from the article above- ‘That was amazing, and I didn’t even have sex with you.’
A bit more that just better than sex.
“That was amazing” – presumably, whatever treatment she received – was better than sex. “With you” is obviously where it’s mangled. But without any other context in these articles (I wonder why) that is all we are left with. I am of the opinion the electorate can excuse that as a verbal fumble. We’ll see just whether that is the case or not but so far there hasn’t been anything beyond pure opinion in these comments.
My few cents:
– If Boele were a man, this would be a lot worse. (Let me be clear that I’m not describing how I believe things ought to be. I’m describing how they are.)
– I don’t think this would be judged much differently overall had this been a (female) candidate of any other political persuasion of affiliation.
– However, certain media outlets may hold double standards along political lines. The Australian is sure to go on about this but would not do the same were the comments made by a conservative Liberal candidate. The reverse may be true for left-leaning media outlets.
– To say that this somehow undermines the Teals’ platform of integrity and doing politics differently is to claim that Boele’s remark somehow constitutes corrupt behaviour, dishonesty, or negative campaigning. That is drawing a very long bow.
No, that isn’t what it says. It says she didn’t expect something that good without having to have had sex, presumably with the hair dresser. The ‘with you’ is irrelevant, it is definitely implied.
If Boele loses narrowly, I can also see this being cited as the reason for her loss even if it’s not necessarily true. We’d have to see more substantive evidence of this story coming up on the ground, preferably from less partisan sources.
By that, I mean more substantive evidence of voters citing it as a negative, or polling evidence.
I have found some more context in a Tele article. https://www.dailytelegraph.com.au/news/nsw/independent-bradfield-candidate-nicolette-boele-apologises-after-being-banned-from-local-hairdresser-over-inappropriate-sexual-joke-at-young-staff/news-story/d367d0ee999d48349c0b87906bf1d633
“The comments were made after her hair was washed and they were directed at a 19-year-old girl.”
“She allegedly said that was amazing and I didn’t even have sex with you.”
So the context appears to be in line with what I was guessing. She had some kind of treatment and got her hair washed, to which she tries to say that it was better than sex. I don’t see how else to view that comment, unless you’re making a claim she’s propositioning the woman, which I haven’t seen any source seriously claim. It’s obviously not a good comment to make, but I still don’t see what would make this a terminal lapse.
The incident was reported to 2GB by the salon owners husband
Are you serious Adda? There is zero way you can read what you are claiming into the comment. Zero, nada, none.
At no point does she say or imply it was better than sex, she implies it was so good it could only be gotten by giving extra (i.e. having sex with the hairdresser).
https://www.news.com.au/national/federal-election/teal-banned-from-sydney-hairdresser-for-sex-joke/news-story/da706d4e3c9b647dcd1b9c8e85880e7a
“The independent candidate for the battleground seat of Bradfield has been banned from a local hairdresser for joking that getting her hair washed was better than sex.”
Would you look at that? It’s in the first line of this article.
You’re free to have your interpretation of the facts but I’m pretty sure most observers would find this to be the normal view of the situation.
And it sounds like you’re claiming she propositioned her, or at least I’m not sure how else you could insist that “could only be gotten by given extra” could mean. Which no source has claimed.
But the only way you can interpret the joke is my way – that you would only expect something that good by having sex with someone. It is not even particularly new, it is simply an after the fact variation of ‘Who do I have to have sex with to get a drink around here’. That line is as old as the hills.
Some of the younger journo’s might not have heard of it, having lived a sheltered life and all, but Boele would absolutely have been using it in that context. Otherwise you would say straight up it was better than sex, which is another comment as old as the hills.
I do find it interesting that I see her comment so obviously one way and you see it so obviously a different way.
That was Samantha Maiden who authored that piece, who I’m fairly sure would be in touch with the typical slang of a middle aged white collar woman like Boele. And it lines up to exactly what I said. So if there is any source I would be cite as a reliable interpretation, it would be hers.
A storm in a tea cup
@MLV
I’m not sure how to interpret your arguments other than that you are making an assertion about Boele’s intention behind the remark. Intention and interpretation are two different things – and fumbling is one source of discrepancy between them.
Agree Nicholas, unless we know that Ms Boele said those words in a sexually provocative manner then the most reasonable assumption is that she made a really bad and insensitive joke. As I don’t believe she has had trouble with making sexually explicit remarks in the past, one can reasonably conclude that this event is just a lapse of judgement on her behalf that is likely to have minimal impact on the campaign overall.
Yes I do – I think the intention is worse than what is being implied, but there is not a lot in it and I think some are really, really trying to downplay this incident.
To be clear, it is the double standards applied here that gets me. If this were a man or a Liberal/National woman they would be forced to step down before polling day. Because it is a Teal it is a storm in a teacup.
I am reminded of the the Liberal woman in parliament talking about having a disabled child and a Greens woman yelled out ‘you should have kept your legs shut’. If that was the other way around it would have been a story for weeks but as it was it lasted about 12 hours in the news cycle.
Oh, by the way I don’t think it was anything other than a really poorly placed joke – the sort of thing you might say to an older woman who you had a rapport with.