Welcome to the Tally Room’s guide to the next Australian federal election. This guide will include comprehensive coverage of each seat’s history, geography, political situation and results of the 2022 election, as well as maps and tables showing those results.
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Table of contents:
Local electorate profiles
Profiles have been produced for all 150 House of Representatives electorates.
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Senate profiles
Profiles have been written for the Senate races in all six states and both territories.
- New South Wales
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- Western Australia
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For the coalition to be certain of a win – they need the Nats to pick up some seats.
don’t get me wrong the Nats have done well over the last three elections holding their 16 seats.
The other area they have done well in is the caliber of their senators. It is with these senators they could win some lower house seats.
So what if: (NT) Jacinta Price stands in Lingiari
(NSW) Ross Cadell stands in Paterson and Perin Davey stands in Eden Monaro (agree she would win Farrer)
(Qld) Susan McDonald/Matt Canavan to stand in Kennedy (if the LNP were smart one of them should stand in Leichhardt – would then become a Nat seat).
(Vic) – Bridget McKenzie to stand in Indi.
how many of these 6 seats would be won?
Kennedy will stay with Bob Katter until, like a classic marriage, death do them part. Depending on the situation in the Queensland Parliament, Robbie then might run to take his dad’s place.
Canavan has no links with Leichhardt. McDonald at least grew up in Cloncurry, but would be better off staying in the Senate than losing to Katter.
@Nick the Liberals already contest all of those except Kennedy which has Nationals candidates who are under the LNP brand and Lingiari has a CLP brand candidate who sits with either party depending on the candidate.
Matt Canavan also has nothing to do with Leichhardt so him running there would be ridiculous. He lives in Yeppoon which is in Capricornia, Michelle Landry’s seat. The only rural seat in Queensland the LNP doesn’t hold is Kennedy which will stay with Bob Katter until he resigns or dies, and Robbie Katter could succeed him.
@Nether Portal and @NQ View – agree N Queensland will be hard – but Nats almost got their in 2013. My point is that these senators already have a profile.
@Nether Portal my point (for the good of the coalition) Bridget Mckenzie would have a far better chance to win Indi (formally Liberal and before that National) because of her profile than the liberal candidate.
who ever wins Lingiari sits with the Nats – my point again wouldn’t Jacinta Price with her profile have a better chance of winning? Same with those two NSW seats (Paterson for example has in the past been both liberal and National).
@Nether Portal Gladys is already off with Optus, plus I doubt her shady past would go down too well in electorates where integrity was a big issue in 2022.
Didn’t Ms Price previously run for Lingari and lose?
Still reckon within next 2 election cycles Matt Canavan will run for Capricornia!
On the future of the Teal seats – I think the situation is far more dynamic than is being made out. I wouldn’t be at all confident that they will revert back to the Liberal Party. Most Teal voters are not ex-Liberal voters and do not see themselves as political aligned with their perception of the Liberal Party. The Australian Electoral Study 2022 has an interesting section on this.
I think most of the Teals will retain their seats in the short term. Independents have historically proven hard to dislodge. The Teal seats had some of the highest Yes vote shares in the country and are the seats under the least financial stress. There isn’t the same remove-Morrison factor as 2022 but I don’t think there is a significant new remove-Albanese factor in these seats either.
Longer term, I think we will see a lot more 3 (or 4) cornered contests in the inner-regions of the capitals. Remember that Higgins went Red and Ryan went Green, not Teal. We might see the Liberals win some of them back, some of them might go Liberal to Teal to Green or Labour, or we might see the Teal movement transform into a new party.
I predict that at the next election we will see the crossbench of the HOR grow even larger. There are plenty of seats which could potentially go independent or minor party, and not just in inner city electorates.
@Scart true about Optus but she’s still very popular.
@Nick they only came close in 2013 because that was a Coalition landslide and everybody had less votes so that meant less preferences went to Bob Katter and more went to the LNP. Nobody can beat Bob Katter.
In 2013 for some reason he had a swing against him on primaries of –17.35% which is bloody enormous. He only won because of Labor preferences. If it weren’t for everybody preferencing him the LNP would’ve easily won it. If you look at the primaries it’s a bit like Higgins in 2022 when the Liberals had such a big lead but Labor won because of Greens preferences.
@NP i agree both Curtin and Kooyong are possible gains for the libs but the others are likely to hold. but with the loss of North Sydney that would only give albo 3 teals to bargain with unless Bradfield were to fall to the teals this time but coming from opposition Paul Fletcher should be able to hold on. in regards to lingiari its a nationals seat and solomon is a liberal seat. in regards to Kennedy in 2013 that was because Bob Katter was seen as too close to Kevin Rudd and a strong Liberal candidate who may well have beaten him in 2016 if she ran again but chose not to due to health reasons and pass away shortly after the election due an aggresive brain tumour
@Nick Jacinta Pirce currently has a guaranteed spot in the senate so i doubt they would risk such talent on a gamble even though they are likely to gain Lingiari anyway but it would be marginal and why risk such a talent on a marginal seat in future., Paterson and Eden-Monaro are more likely to go to the libs not the nats, Kennedy wont go to Libs or Nats while there is a Katter on the ballot. in regrds to indi yes i think bridget mckenzie should run there but not now as helen haines is more likely to retain that seat this time around but shoulnt be ruled out in 2028. as a Liberal voter I would vote for her instead thoguh.
@NQ view katter will most likely retire after this election assuming hes still alive as hes said hes only got a few more years left in him recently. so given the 2028 federal and qld election almost line up id imagine robbie would switch to federal at that time.
@nick id imagine any CLP candidate will win Lingiari in 2025 given how close they got in 2022 against the tide and the state of play in the NT atm and why risk such a talented minister in a marginal seat that could turn against them later
@mick yes but she was up against much loved Warren Snowden and did make some inroad and hes now retired and i would wager Lingiari will be one of the most likely gains in 2025
@Kim doubtful it will get any bigger it will either remain the same or shrink. the liberals could take a couple of those teals back and i wouldnt rule out retaking Ryan and/or Brisbane from the greens either given the high vote in qld and being on the back of a drubbing of qld labor and a honey moon period for the libs at a state level
both Linda Burney and Brendan O’Connor have announced their resignations
Maybe Michelle Ananda-Rajah could run in Gorton, since Higgins is going to be abolished? Wonder how that would go down?
@adam i dunno they could lose the seat over that
@Adam Gorton is far far away from Higgins, both geographically and socioeconomically. Not sure if I agree with @john that they would lose Gorton over that though.
I heard she might run in Menzies (which is notionally Labor for now).
@Adam – Michelle Ananda-Rajah running for Labor in Gorton would essentially be politicial ‘self-death’. She would be a parachute, which will basically give flashbacks to Fowler in 2022: safe Labor seat, high-profile candidate, community anger, and thus, a shock Labor loss. I think Labor would have learned their lesson from Fowler, and an independent like Jarrod Bingham or Ian Birchall could emerge and sap up a lot of voter anger.
Gorton is slowly trending Liberal: Keilor is a good Liberal area, Taylors Hill & Taylors Lakes are marginal Labor, and could easily flip. 2022 was probably due to the lockdown backlash, but in general it’s becoming a mortgage belt seat that the Liberals can capitalise upon with O’Connor’s retirement and personal vote. I predict a Labor retain but probably a marginal status. Choose Ananda-Rajah, and I think that’s where things look unpredictable, because of the amount of voter backlash of a parachute who was only chosen because her seat would be abolished.
Speaking of those booths @James, I just analysed those on the Gorton thread. It appears that one booth voted mostly for conservative candidates but still voted Labor. No spoilers.
I think the lockdown anger has turned into anger over inflation and interest rates in outer Melbourne seats like Gorton and Lalor right where the mortgage belt is. This means that the primary vote swings away from Labor in 2022 is unlikely to be reversed.
@ Votante
Agree, if better economic circumstances that those lockdown swings can be reversed. Also Gorton is less Muslim so there will not be a massive increase in the far left vote. I agree Taylors Lakes could easily flip to Blue it is a more established and middle class area. Taylors Hill is more mortgage belt as is Caroline Springs but both of those suburbs have above average incomes and quite aspiration. I dont think Gorton will flip but as James said it is likely to weaken for Labor until economic conditions improve.
*quite aspirational
@Nimalan if you look at the Gorton thread I analysed Taylors Lakes in full. There was a massive swing against Labor on primaries and TPP but it went to everybody else. A lot of it went to One Nation and the UAP, and some of it went to the Greens. But not a lot went to the Liberals. So it does seem that that particular suburb has a freedom party vote.
im liking my chances of a 2024 election $$
There is no thread on it yet, so I’ll post it here. Former WA Nationals Leader Mia Davies will seek preselection to be the Nationals candidate for the new seat of Bullwinkel at the next federal election, after being convinced by federal leader David Littleproud. This comes 18 months after quitting state politics, and saying she had no fuel left in the tank.
Mia Davies has a lot of personal popularity (though the Nationals brand does in regional areas too) around there. Given how high-profile she was in state politics I would say she can win.
I’d love for her to be in federal politics.
@James she’s 45 she’s got many terms left.
given its part urban parts of perth id say the libs will probbalywin it given theres no coalition in wa
Could there be both a Liberal and a National candidate in Bullwinkel?
@Nicholas yes in fact for some reason both parties field candidates in some of the same federal and state seats as each other in Victoria, WA and SA (though the latter branch is quite small and has no seats in any legislature).
In WA at the 2022 federal election, the Liberal MP for Durack Melissa Price was re-elected and there was also a Nationals candidate who ran (Ian Blayney, who served as the member for the state seat of Geraldton from 2008 until 2021 when Labor gained the seat in their massive historic landslide).
At the 2019 federal election, Melissa Price was re-elected in Durack as a Liberal and the Nationals candidate was Scott Bourne. Likewise, the Liberal MP for O’Connor, Rick Wilson was easily re-elected and the Nationals candidate was John Hassell.
I have no idea why the rural parts of WA are Liberal on the federal level but Nationals on the state level, and I also have no idea why the Nationals really don’t even try to win seats in rural SA on the state or federal level.
I’m personally against when Liberals and Nationals run against each other, but if a seat is a Liberal vs Nationals contest on TCP (like Port Macquarie at the 2023 NSW state election) then it just shows how conservative that seat is for two Coalition candidates to comfortably beat Labor.
@nicholas yes nationals usually run candidates but other then 2010 when tony crook got up in oconnor from labor preferences they dont usually get up given the libs usually poll better at a federal level
@nether portal they run dual candidates when there is no sitting member running because it increases the chances of them winning when its FPV. in wa there is no coalition agreement so they are in fact rivals in those seats
NP, I think the SA Nationals branch is simply too weak to field any strong candidates for either state or federal elections. There have been only two SA Nationals members elected in the past fifty years, Peter Blacker (who held the seat of Flinders 1974-1993) and Karlene Maywald (who held the seat of Chaffey 1997-2010 and also served as a Cabinet Minister under Labor Premier Mike Rann).
Prior to the 1970’s under the dominance of Premier Tom Playford, the Liberals and Nationals (then Country Party) were in a coalition under the name ‘Liberal and Country League’, abbreviated as LCL.
@Nether Portal Provided it’s under FPV there’s really no reason Liberal and National candidates shouldn’t contest the same seats given they are still separate parties with separate funding allocation and different bases to appeal to (at least geographically and demographically speaking, maybe not so much ideologically anymore.) If there is not meaningful enough policy difference between the two to warrant competing with each other then they may as well follow the lead of the NT and Queensland and unify already. Historic elections were much more interesting when it comes to this matter as on the state level you had for example the Liberals holding Dubbo and Murray in NSW and of course in Queensland the Nats made their way into the inner-city at their peak. Capricornia at the federal level was even held by a Liberal for 12 years.
@laine there is no reason for them to unify in other states they only did so in Qld because OPV at the time made the vote split and cause labor to win seats that were majority conservative. the clp was in the nT
@john I gave a reason for them to unify in that same sentence. They’ve been in a near inseparable “coalition” together for 100 years and if there isn’t enough policy difference to warrant them running against each other or meaningfully disagreeing with each other, then there’s no need to keep up the whole “two separate parties” thing. The Nationals are experiencing a painfully slow death as it is anyway, both because of the obvious geographic and demographic population shift nationwide in recent decades, but also because they decided to embrace being the lap dogs and scapegoats of the Liberal party. As a result they are unwilling and unable to do anything but line their pockets and watch as their seats are either abolished or shrink until the Libs take their place instead. Many Liberals at this point are just as conservative as the Nationals as well so I’m not sure why they’d even have a problem with unifying, but then again who would they blame for their bad environmental policies or track record without the Nats being around.
I’m basically being very picky because we don’t “need” two conservative parties, especially given they effectively function as one. It’s interesting it turned out this way here but not in Canada for example which is a similarly sized country that is largely urbanized and shares a common background with us.
The nats will cease to exist when.. Labor polls very well and the liberals decide to take them on
Look at Victoria once fair boundaries existed.. very few nats now
So recently we’ve been talking a lot about the Greens vote at universities in regional universities. I’ve analysed the Greens primary vote at the closest booth to a uni in regional cities at the 2022 federal election.
To start off, I’ve looked at NSW:
* Albury (Charles Sturt) – Thurgoona: 17.3% (+7.4%)
* Armidale (New England) – Ben Venue: 20.7% (+14.7%)
* Bathurst (Charles Sturt) – Bathurst South: 7.4% (–3.2%)
* Coffs Harbour (Southern Cross) – Coffs Harbour: 7.2% (–1.7%)
* Dubbo (Charles Sturt) – Dubbo North: 6.0% (+1.3%)
* Lismore (Southern Cross) – Lismore: 19.7% (–3.7%)
* Nowra (Wollongong) – Nowra: 9.7% (–3.7%)
* Orange (Charles Sturt) – Orange East: 4.7% (–3.5%)
* Port Macquarie (Charles Sturt) – Innes Lake North: 5.6% (–0.6%)
* Port Macquarie (Newcastle) – Port Macquarie West: 6.6% (+1.2%)
* Tamworth (New England) – Tamworth East: 13.3% (+8.1%)
* Wagga Wagga (Charles Sturt) – Charles Sturt University: 11.6% (+0.1%)
Note that in a lot of these cities the booth with the highest Greens primary vote were not the ones closest to the university, but the reason the Greens vote is high in those booths is because of the university.
So it seems that the southern cities have high Greens primaries, while the northern cities don’t, with the obvious exceptions of Armidale and Lismore.
* Northern cities: Bathurst, Coffs Harbour, Dubbo, Lismore, Orange, Port Macquarie, Tamworth
* Southern cities: Albury, Nowra, Wagga Wagga
Interestingly most of these booths are still Nationals booths, which reflects the conservative and agrarian nature of these cities.
Bathurst, Dubbo, Orange, Port Macquarie and even Coffs Harbour all had Greens primaries under 8%.
For the NT:
* Alice Springs (Charles Darwin) – Sadadeen: 25.1% (+8.6%)
* Katherine (Charles Darwin) – Katherine: 13.5% (+5.1%)
Sadadeen is a Labor booth despite traditionally being a state CLP booth (and Alice Springs is usually conservative) while Katherine is a CLP booth.
Australia doesn’t have a true university town, like in the US or UK, that is a small regional hub or city and the university is by far the largest employer and a large chunk of the population is either a student or staff member.
Armidale is the closest thing to a university town in Australia. Armidale SA2 shows that 10% work in higher education. This might explain the high Greens vote.
Another factor is how concentrated the campuses are. CSU and other regional unis have multiple campuses which spread out the student population. I think the vast majority of UNE students go to the Armidale campus. This means thousands of students/staff are concentrated in a small geographic area. If a polling booth is at or near a uni and there’s little non-uni residential or commercial nearby, then you can expect a younger population and a higher Greens vote.
I suspect that voting patterns vary by domestic university cohort. I’m interested to know the political leanings of sandstone and Go8 unis (e.g. ANU, Sydney, Melbourne, Adelaide) vs regional unis vs suburban unis (e.g WSU, Monash). The sandstone unis may be skewed by their large numbers of students in arts and humanities.
Another no-threader, but according to Preselection Updates & Daily Telegraph, former NSW MLC Shaoquett Moselmane has confirmed his intent to seek preselection for Barton, held by Indigenous Affairs Minister Linda Burney, who will be retiring next election.
Other preselection updates:
– Greens announce Merran Blair as their candidate for the seat of Casey.
– Labor confirms its Senate ticket in WA: Varun Ghosh, the senator chosen to replace Pat Dodson earlier in the year, will be in the winnable second spot, behind Ellie Whiteaker, State Secretary of the WA Labor Party, and wife of state MP David Scaife.
@Votante of course they vary. The divide between northern and southern NSW is already a difference. And yes the closest thing to Oxford in Australia is Armidale.
Once upon a time it was only classified as a city when uni students moved in, so in uni season it’s the highest city by elevation in Australia, other than that it was just a town. Now it’s a city but still the uni is a big thing. It’s weird because Armidale has one big uni campus and it’s the main thing in town but Port Macquarie is bigger than Armidale and has three unis (University of Newcastle, Charles Sturt University and a small UNSW medicine school at the Port Base Hospital) and it’s never been known for its universities. Newcastle Uni in Port is the oldest one and nobody really knows the UNSW campus is there because it’s easy to not notice it while CSU in Lake Innes (a suburb of Port) is newer but it’s now the bigger university in Port.
A uni student isn’t always a leftist. Someone who takes gender identity studies at an inner-city woke uni likely would be but someone who takes ag (agriculture) at CSU likely wouldn’t be.
Something interesting I found though was that the northern city booths actually had a decent One Nation vote. Though that could just be a geographical factor.
I can look at cities too if you want though.
@James Casey should be a Liberal hold. I have no idea why the margin is so low there.
@NP – Casey is a tenuous seat which usually is Liberal heartland but gradually shifting away. I think the margin is low because of Tony Smith’s personal vote and popularity, plus being Speaker for 6 years. Aaron Violi has done a lot of work, so he should get a sophomore surge, plus a rebound to the Liberals in Victoria, mainly as there was a lot of anti-Morrison sentiment and a teal running. The Greens do good in the Yarra Ranges, mainly due to a noticeable hippie population and environmental concerns, especially in Belgrave (an outer-suburban part of Melbourne) and Warburton. But they would need a really big increase on PV to even make noise.
@James true. Interestingly Belgrave went Labor, Greens, independent, Liberal on primaries while Warburton went Labor, Greens, Liberal, independent in 2022.
Thank you to those who have posted fictionalised histories of the National Party. I found the stories rather amusing.
If anyone is interested in reading about the history of the National Party of Australia, I recommend a book called “From Country to National” editied by Brian Costar and published by Allen & Unwin in 1985 (ISBN: 9780868617169). It has individual chapters on the history of the party in each state.
I threw out my copy a couple of decades ago.
@ James/Nether Portal
With Respect to Casey, it is actually quite a mixed shift and i am not sure it is gradually shifting away from the Libs. The boundaries now are more Pro-Labor than in the past. A lot of labor friendly areas have moved from La Trobe and McEwen. This has made La Trobe much safer for the Libs. The area in the Dandenongs such as Belgrave, Selby, Kallista are shifting left-ward with more tree changers. However, it contains some good Liberal rural areas around Yarra Glen, Coldstream. Gruyere. the Wine growing areas are strong Liberal. Also the suburban area around Mooralbark, Montrose, Mount Everlyn etc are very much self-employed tradies, middle Australia and an area that has improved for the Liberals as it got more established its a bit like Hughes. I have often called Casey the Macquarie of Victoria, the Dandenongs are like the Blue Mountains while Yarra Valley is more like the Hawkesbury.
@ Votante/Nether Portal
Regarding College Towns i agree we dont really have them in Australia. There is not really a culture of university students especially those from the Capital cities moving to a new location and living in a Dorm like there is in the US with Frat houses so i dont think it really impacts electorates. For example, the suburb of Bundoora has two universities but is the most Liberal friendly part of Cooper and Scullin given that is a middle class suburban area. I also agree that University students are not always left-wing someone who attended a Private school, did Commerce or Law and then wants to work at Goldman Sachs or a law firm such as Freehils will more likely to be economically right wing and may vote for the Teals or liberals. They may also be a person of Faith.
@Nimalan agree about uni students and Casey.
Does anyone have an explanation why cities in southern NSW with unis have high Greens primaries (especially around the uni itself) but those in northern NSW don’t usually?
@Nimalan and NP, I think having a uni will have a lower affect of the polling booths in major cities as it tends to be international Students or students living in regional areas who would register as their hometown address but ironically having a big university in some Regional areas actually do affect the polling booth margins as I think a lot of the students from major cities who are lured for very specific degree/field (research, a specific program,etc) so many are semi-permanent hence they register their addresses in the University.
@NP, a correction here is that Armidale is in Northern NSW and has a sizable Green Vote and regarding why some towns with unis not having a sizable Green Vote, many unis smaller regionals cities are small and only really caters to students in nearby regions.
@ Marh
Agree the presence of international students mean that the student vote has a lower impact. As i mentioned Bundoora is an example of a suburb that is not really left-wing despite the two universities. A lot of people point that university education leads to people having more left-wing views. Maybe on a few issues such as climate or some issues such as refugees but views on abortion, euthansia, LGBT or foreign policy will not be driven by level of education. For example, a Jewish Law graduate of Sydney Uni who grew up in Dover Heights will not obviously like the Greens view on the Middle East conflict while factory worker who is Muslim and lives in Meadow Heights will be grateful to the Greens. I went to university and i dont know anyone who started of with religious afflintion and became an atheist upon graduation.
There seems to be a tendency in discourse around the psephology of universities to assume that everyone who goes to university studies arts or humanities. I studied STEM, and I encountered the full spectrum of political views. Having spent five years studying full-time, the narratives in the media about students and graduates feels a world apart from what I observed.