ALP 6.8%
Incumbent MP
Jodie Belyea, since 2024.
Geography
South-Eastern Melbourne. Dunkley covers most of the City of Frankston and part of the City of Kingston. Main suburbs include Frankston, Sandhurst, Skye, Carrum, Langwarrin and Seaford.
Redistribution
Dunkley shifted slightly north, taking in Carrum, Bonbeach, Patterson Lakes and parts of Chelsea from Isaacs, and losing Mount Eliza to Flinders. These changes increased the Labor margin (as of the 2022 election) from 6.3% to 6.8%.
History
Dunkley was created in 1984 as part of the expansion of the House of Representatives. It has almost always been a marginal electorate, and swung back and forth regularly in the 1980s. The Liberal Party held the seat continuously from 1996 to 2019, if only by slim margins at time.
The seat was first won in 1984 by Labor’s Bob Chynoweth. Chynoweth had won Flinders at the 1983 election, defeating new MP Peter Reith, who had won a by-election for the seat four months earlier. Chynoweth moved to Dunkley following the redistribution.
He held the seat in 1987 before losing to Liberal candidate Frank Ford in 1990. Chynoweth won the seat back in 1993.
A redistribution before the 1996 election saw Dunkley become a notional Liberal seat, and Chynoweth was defeated by Liberal candidate Bruce Billson. Billson held Dunkley for twenty years until his retirement in 2016, and was succeeded by Liberal candidate Chris Crewther.
The electoral boundaries were redrawn prior to the 2019 election, and the seat became a notional Labor seat. Crewther lost his bid for re-election to Labor candidate Peta Murphy. Murphy was re-elected with a greater margin in 2022, but died of cancer in December 2023.
Labor candidate Jodie Belyea won Dunkley at the by-election despite a swing to the Liberal Party.
- Jodie Belyea (Labor)
- Nathan Conroy (Liberal)
- Jessica Davis (One Nation)
- Matt Maber (Greens)
- Peter Nicholes (Family First)
Assessment
Belyea is the favourite to win re-election but she doesn’t have the incumbency of a full term in office, and it wouldn’t require much more of a swing for the Liberal Party to win.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Peta Murphy | Labor | 38,506 | 40.2 | +1.7 | 40.5 |
| Sharn Coombes | Liberal | 31,108 | 32.5 | -7.4 | 31.7 |
| Liam O’Brien | Greens | 9,898 | 10.3 | +2.0 | 10.6 |
| Adrian Kain Irvine | United Australia | 4,846 | 5.1 | +2.5 | 5.2 |
| Darren Bergwerf | Independent | 3,698 | 3.9 | +3.9 | 3.4 |
| Scott Middlebrook | One Nation | 2,689 | 2.8 | +2.8 | 3.0 |
| Damian Willis | Liberal Democrats | 2,398 | 2.5 | +2.5 | 2.9 |
| Elizabeth Johnston | Animal Justice | 2,013 | 2.1 | -1.0 | 2.2 |
| Kathryn Woods | Federation Party | 566 | 0.6 | +0.6 | 0.5 |
| Informal | 4,750 | 4.7 | -0.4 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Peta Murphy | Labor | 53,865 | 56.3 | +3.5 | 56.8 |
| Sharn Coombes | Liberal | 41,857 | 43.7 | -3.5 | 43.2 |
2024 by-election result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Jodie Belyea | Labor | 37,418 | 41.1 | +0.8 |
| Nathan Conroy | Liberal | 35,746 | 39.2 | +6.7 |
| Alex Breskin | Greens | 5,798 | 6.4 | -4.0 |
| Darren Bergwerf | Independent | 4,315 | 4.7 | +0.9 |
| Bronwyn Currie | Animal Justice | 2,818 | 3.1 | +1.0 |
| Chrysten Abraham | Libertarian | 2,246 | 2.5 | 0.0 |
| Reem Yunis | Victorian Socialists | 1,529 | 1.7 | +1.7 |
| Heath Mckenzie | Democrats | 1,242 | 1.4 | +1.4 |
| Informal | 3,930 | 4.1 |
2024 by-election two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Jodie Belyea | Labor | 48,019 | 52.7 | -3.6 |
| Nathan Conroy | Liberal | 43,093 | 47.3 | +3.6 |
Booths have been divided into four areas: north, south, east and west. The booth breakdown is slightly different for the by-election results as they are based on the 2022 boundaries. The “south” area is bigger, while the “north” area consists entirely of areas added to Dunkley from Isaacs, so there are no by-election results there.
Labor won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all four areas at the general election, ranging from 55.4% in the south to 62.7% in the west.
Labor won a majority in all three areas at the by-election, ranging from 50.4% to 59.8%.
2022 booth breakdown
| Voter group | GRN prim | ALP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| East | 9.5 | 57.1 | 14,019 | 13.6 |
| West | 13.0 | 62.7 | 12,549 | 12.2 |
| South | 12.4 | 55.4 | 11,008 | 10.7 |
| North | 12.7 | 56.7 | 7,321 | 7.1 |
| Pre-poll | 9.8 | 56.2 | 34,886 | 33.9 |
| Other votes | 9.8 | 54.9 | 23,061 | 22.4 |
2024 by-election booth breakdown
| Voter group | ALP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| East | 53.3 | 15,747 | 17.3 |
| West | 59.8 | 14,398 | 15.8 |
| South | 50.4 | 13,977 | 15.3 |
| Pre-poll | 51.6 | 28,812 | 31.6 |
| Other votes | 50.1 | 18,178 | 20.0 |
Election results in Dunkley at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor, the Liberal Party and the Greens.
Election results at the 2024 Dunkley by-election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor and the Liberal Party.
shouldnt this margin be based off the by election result like aston?
or is it already?
Redistributions have benefited Labor here, Labor hold.
@spacefish likely hold yes. but i think conroy will give her a good run.
Depends John,
If the Liberal civil war is still raging on then it might really hurt the Liberals
@spacefish state and federal issues are totally different.
Labor retain, probably a similar margin to the by-election. Even though Pesutto is polling well in Victoria, Dutton isn’t. There’s a chance Dutton could poll worse than Scomo in Victoria since he is further to the right.
I think statewide in Victoria both major parties could potentially have decreased vote shares. This would help Labor.
What it could potentially look like (NOT A PREDICTION):
Primaries:
* Labor: 31.0% (–1.9%)
* Coalition: 30.5% (–2.6%)
* Greens: 15.0% (+1.3%)
TPP:
* Labor: 56.5% (+1.7%)
* Coalition: 43.5% (–1.7%)
In that scenario the Greens did well in seats like Wills while the Liberals did worse than last time in the Red Wall as a correction of the anti-lockdown swing. The teals would’ve also increased their margins in Goldstein and Kooyong.
@nether Scomo was the bottom of the barrel. If you look at the state breakdowns the liberals have improved their position by about 3% according to the bar setting Newspoll. Which means they should hold Deakin, Menzies and Casey and likely recover Aston according to internal polling. They are also competitive in about 5 seats which I assume would include McEwen and Chisholm. Resolve is even more generous giving them about a 5% increase. We are due for the next quarterly Newspoll shortly so we will see how much better they are off. This will likely be the last breakdown before the election.
@Darth Vader that depends on when the election is. If it’s in summer then yes, last Newspoll breakdown.
@NP all indications are it will be a march election. Albo simply wont survive the budget and the 2035 emmissions targets release
It should be noted the 6.8% is based on the 2022 not the 2024 by election result therefore that why I’m putting Dunkley on my list. Belyea will not be able replicate Peta Murphy’s margin and will not be granted to hold onto her personal/sy,pathy vote. The by election result was only 2.7% and if you include the 0.5% increase from the redistribution that means the margin is only about 3.2% at most. So Dunkley is marginal and it could flip this year.
i think this is a real potential gain and has gone under the radar
Look at the polling both map.. a sea of red also I think the boundary changed has helped Labor as well.
This is a Labor inclined marginal
The polling booth map does not take into account the fact that popular member has past away and the fact the by election win can be attributed to people voting labor out of sympathy for the member who died and that factor will now be removed and Belyea will need to stand on her own now. With the polling in victoria going the way towards the coalition Conroy having name recognition for being the mayor of Frankston and having contested the by election. Conroy can easily win.
im giving Nathna a good chance here id say hes well within range given his performance in the by election. this is classic mortgage belt area with a high anglo/european population
Libs have no chance here. The byelection was their chance if they were going to win it, it’s not likely to swing even further. Plus the Libs lost their strongest part around Mount Eliza.
@adam they were never gonna win the by election there was too much sympathy for the popular deceased member now they have to win withot that. thats where ther chace is labor will lose some or all of peta mrhys persoanl vote now and there wont be people vting labor out of sympathy for peta murphy.
Was a pretty high profile by-election, unique conditions with a sitting member dying and Labor’s position has slid a fair way since then, wouldn’t rule out a Liberal win
@maxim agreed i think the liberals might be half a chance in bruce too
The swing will likely be bigger in Bruce (than in Dunkley on by election margin), then bigger again in Holt, but can they actually win one of them? That’s the question
Maxim
I think Labor will retain all 3 seats.
Holt and Bruce are our of range for the libs
If there was a seat in Melbourne where One Nation could do well, this is it. And those votes would probably come Labor. The Libs might run this one close but just can’t see them bridging the gap. Where Labor could come unstuck is if the swing is on in Victoria – they have buiilt a margin from a fairly low primary – 40% or so. If that goes down by 5 or 6% then they are in big trouble. They also don’t have the Greens to save them as the Greens have polled poorly <10%.
I think labor will win Holt but Dunkley is rate as agood chance alongside Chisholm which i think may just hold for labor but on an incredibly low margin. Bruce is a wildcard. I do however think libs win win back Aston and win Mcewen, and shouldn’t lose any seats to labor in Vic or anywhere else in the country for that matter.
im saying Conroy will win at this stage
Local here, it’s clear Belyea is not even half the politician of Peta Murphy, but Conroy is very unpopular, he was a poor mayor and had a reputation as a bit of a bully. Not a great choice this year.
It wouldnt take a lot for an independent to swing this is one as long as they’re not obviously left or right.
im not writing off Conroy for the pure reason that at the by election that stuff was already put out there and he decreased the margin. as you said belyea is not murphy and the only reason she won that byelection was the sympathy vote for labor because of murphys passing that likely wont be in play this time around and CoL crisis has not improved since that by election. this one will be close especially with labor on the nose in victoria.
This is my division.
John you can repeat your own rhetoric time and time again, doesn’t make it any more true, In the by-election there was almost a 4% swing away from Labor. I don’t think anyone would really say that was a “sympathy vote”. If anything, it was about the limit of where the swing would go.
If Conroy had a chance to make the move from local to federal it was then. He has zero name recognition in the Carrum – Chelsea areas where Mark Dreyfus was still quite popular (Patterson Lakes being the obvious exception). He was deeply unpopular, particularly the decision to quit council, run for the by-election and then go back to council. Although his wife did win his council seat, it was only after preferences. And he was not seen or mentioned in any of her campaign material.
Belyea may not have the gravitas or charisma that Murphy had and hasn’t been nearly as visible, but she’s not put a foot wrong or done anything to make the voting public lose faith in her. She’s been quite inoffensive.
If Liberals thought they were in a good place internally, we wouldn’t be seeing so many Vote Nathan Conroy corflutes and billboards everywhere this early. They have one of those massive billboard trailers with his face on it and his name is up – with big metre long corflutes on any available fence.
Darren, but if there are lots of billboards/flyers promoting Conroy as Liberal candidate wouldn’t that suggest the party is actively campaigning and trying to win the seat? If they had ‘written off’ the contest due to a weak candidate, they wouldn’t be keen to put up so many advertisements around the place.
@darren i never said anything about him winning i think it may be a labor retain albeit on a smaller margin but saying that im not writing him off entirely. yes i did say that on marhc 4th but that was an error and was meant to say Belyea.
By-election swings are normally bigger against governments than at general elections. The seat also no longer contains Mt Eliza. If the Liberals were ever going to win it, it was at the by-election, not now. Easy Labor retain. Margin will be above 4.5%.
It is true that by-election swings are often anti-government. Peta Murphy built up a personal vote and so there was going to be a swing away from Labor. I remember some analysis at the by-election suggesting that the Liberal primary vote and 2PP went up because One Nation and UAP were absent and hence didn’t split the conservative or non-Labor vote. It was also unusual with the Greens primary vote taking a hit.
Nathan Conroy is 32 and he’s been the mayor or deputy mayor for almost 5 years, according to his webpage. Not sure how residents rate him and his style in local politics and if it’ll play out in the federal campaign.
@adam while il agree on labor retain id say around 3%
Someone mentioned that Jodie hasn’t put a foot wrong – she really hasn’t done anything at all in the last year. Other than both her and Paul Edbrooke praying to keep riding on Peta Murphy’s coattails. Im not normally a lib voter, but something has to change and im afraid the play it safe and do little wont do anymore. To be honest, Nathan isnt my first choice, but what are the other options? A cooker that is in one nation, a priest or the bloody greens ha ha.