Deakin – Australia 2025

LIB 0.02%

Incumbent MP
Michael Sukkar, since 2013.

• Geography
• Redistribution
• History
• Candidates
• Assessment
• 2022 results
• Booth breakdown
• Results maps

Geography
Eastern suburbs of Melbourne. The main suburbs are Donvale, Park Orchards, Ringwood, Croydon, Croydon Hills, Kilsyth South, Warranwood, Forest Hill and Vermont, and parts of Burwood East and Heathmont. The seat covers most of the Maroondah council area, and parts of the Whitehorse and Manningham council areas.

Redistribution
Deakin shifted north-west, gaining Donvale and Park Orchards from Menzies and a small part of Burwood East from Chisholm. Deakin then lost part of Heathmont to Aston. These changes cut the Liberal margin from 0.2% to 0.02%.

History
Deakin was first created in 1937, and has been almost always held by the United Australia Party and Liberal Party.

The seat originally covered rural areas to the east and north-east of Melbourne, until the 1968 redistribution moved the seat into the eastern suburbs of Melbourne, in the same sort of area that the seat covers today.

The seat was first won by the UAP’s William Hutchinson in 1937. Hutchinson had previously held the neighbouring seat of Indi. Hutchinson joined the Liberal Party in 1944 and retired from Parliament at the 1949 election. Frank Davis then held it until 1966, when Alan Jarman won the seat. Jarman was defeated by John Saunderson (ALP) in 1983. Saunderson moved to the new seat of Aston in 1984, when Julian Beale won the seat for the Liberals.

Beale was succeded in 1990 by Ken Aldred. Aldred had previously been elected at the 1983 Bruce by-election and held Bruce until the 1990 redistribution. Aldred was disendorsed before the 1996 election after raising conspiracy theories in Parliament, based on documents supplied by the Citizens Electoral Council. Aldred was later selected by local branches to run in the marginal seat of Holt at the 2007 election before having his preselection vetoed by the state party.

The seat was won in 1996 by Phil Barresi, who held it until his defeat in 2007 by the ALP’s Mike Symon.

Symon held Deakin for two terms, but in 2013 he lost to Liberal candidate Michael Sukkar. Sukkar has been re-elected three times.

Candidates

• Matthew Gregg (Labor)
• Amy Mills (Greens)
• Jess Ness (Independent)
• Michael Sukkar (Liberal)
• Will Vandermeer (Libertarian)

Assessment
Deakin is the Liberal Party’s most marginal seat in the country, but if there is a swing to the Liberal Party they could retain the seat.

The historical trends here are interesting – two redistributions prior to the 2013 and 2019 made the electorate more favourable to the Liberals, but the recent redistribution only had a minor effect. This means the current boundaries would have been historically more favourable than the boundaries at the time. On the current electoral boundaries, the Liberals would have retained Deakin throughout the 2007-2013 period. But these suburbs are much less strong for the Liberals than it was then. The new boundaries are about 5% better for the Liberals than the statewide 2PP, whereas these areas would’ve outperformed the state by about 7-8% a decade ago.

This clearly indicates that these areas are trending away from the Liberal Party. Deakin could well fall even if other seats go the other way.

2022 result

2022 two-party-preferred result

Booth breakdown

Polling places in Deakin have been divided into three parts: central, east and west. The “west” covers those booths in Whitehorse council area.

The Liberal Party won a slim 50.4% majority of the two-party-preferred vote in the east while Labor won 52.1% in the centre and 54.8% in the west. The Liberal Party held on narrowly thanks to winning the pre-poll and other votes.

The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 14.9% in the east to 17.7% in the centre.

Election results in Deakin at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, Labor and the Greens.

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