IND 3.5% vs LIB
Incumbent MP
Monique Ryan, since 2022.
Geography
Eastern suburbs of Melbourne. Kooyong covers a majority of the Boroondara council area and part of the Stonnington council area, including the suburbs of Armadale, Hawthorn, Kew, Kooyong, Malvern, Canterbury, Surrey Hills, Balwyn, Toorak and parts of Camberwell.
Redistribution
Kooyong expanded south, taking in the suburbs of Kooyong, Toorak, Armadale and Malvern from the abolished seat of Higgins. Kooyong lost Mont Albert and Mont Albert North to Menzies, and lost part of Camberwell and the remainder of Glen Iris to Chisholm. These changes increased the estimated margin for Ryan from 2.9% to 3.5%.
History
Kooyong is an original federation electorate, and has always been held by conservative parties, by the Free Trade Party for the first eight years and by the Liberal Party and its predecessors since 1909. It was held from 1922 to 1994 by only three men, all of whom led the major conservative force in federal politics.
The seat was first won in 1901 by Free Trader William Knox. He was re-elected in 1903 and 1906 and became a part of the unified Liberal Party in 1909. He won re-election in 1910 but retired later that year after suffering a stroke.
The 1910 by-election was won by Liberal candidate Robert Best. Best had previously served as a colonial minister and a Protectionist Senator from 1901 to the 1910 election, when he lost his seat in the ALP’s majority victory, and had served as a minister in Alfred Deakin’s second and third governments. Best returned to Parliament, but didn’t serve in Joseph Cook’s Liberal government or Billy Hughes’ Nationalist government.
At the 1922 election, Best was challenged by lawyer John Latham, who stood for the breakaway Liberal Union, a conservative party running to personally oppose Billy Hughes’ leadership of the Nationalist Party. Despite winning the most primary votes by a large margin, Best lost to Latham on Labor preferences.
John Latham was elected as one of five MPs for the breakaway Liberal Party (two of whom had previously been Nationalist MPs and retained their seats as Liberals in 1922). The Nationalists lost their majority due to gains for the Liberal Party and Country Party, and were forced to go into coalition, and the Country Party demanded Billy Hughes’ resignation as Prime Minister. With Stanley Bruce taking over as Prime Minister, the five Liberals, including Latham, effectively rejoined the Nationalist Party, and Latham won re-election in 1925 as a Nationalist.
Latham served as Attorney-General in the Bruce government from 1925 to 1929, when the Nationalists lost power, and Bruce himself lost his seat. Latham became Leader of the Opposition, but yielded the leadership to former Labor minister Joseph Lyons when they formed the new United Australia Party out of the Nationalists and Labor rebels. Latham served as the unofficial Deputy Prime Minister in the first term of the Lyons government (when they governed without the need for support from the Country Party), before retiring at the 1934 election. Latham went on to serve as Chief Justice of the High Court from 1935 to 1952.
Kooyong was won in 1934 by Robert Menzies. Menzies had been elected to the Victorian state parliament in 1928 and had served as Deputy Premier in the United Australia Party government from 1932 to 1934. He was immediately appointed Attorney-General in the Lyons government. He served in the Lyons government until 1939, when he resigned from the Cabinet in protest over what he saw as the government’s inaction. This was shortly before the death of Joseph Lyons in April 1939, which was followed by the UAP electing Robert Menzies as leader, making him Prime Minister.
Menzies’ first term was rocky, with the Second World War being declared in September 1939. He managed to retain power with the support of independents at the 1940 election, but after spending months in Europe on war strategy in 1941 he returned home to opposition within the government, and was forced to resign as Prime Minister and UAP leader. He was replaced as leader by Country Party leader Arthur Fadden, who was followed soon after by Labor leader John Curtin.
Menzies worked in opposition to reform the conservative forces, who suffered a massive defeat at the 1943 election. In 1944 and 1945 he put together the new Liberal Party, which took over from the moribund United Australia Party and a number of splinter groups. He led the party to the 1946 election and won power in 1949.
Menzies held power for the next sixteen years, retaining power at elections in 1951, 1954, 1955, 1958, 1961 and 1963, and retiring in January 1966.
The 1966 Kooyong by-election was won by Andrew Peacock, then President of the Victorian Liberal Party. Peacock rose to the ministry in 1969 and served in the ministry until the election of the Whitlam government in 1972. He served as a senior frontbencher during the Whitlam government and became Minister for Foreign Affairs in the Fraser government in 1975. He moved to the Industrial Relations portfolio in 1980, but resigned from Cabinet in 1981 due to supposed meddling in his portfolio by the Prime Minister. He launched a failed challenge to Fraser’s leadership and moved to the backbench, although he returned to Cabinet in late 1982, a few months before Malcolm Fraser lost power.
After the 1983 election, Peacock was elected leader, defeating John Howard, who had served as Deputy Leader of the Liberal Party for the last few months of the Fraser government. Peacock led the party into the 1984 election, reducing the Hawke government’s majority. With rising speculation of a leadership challenge from Howard (still deputy leader) in 1985, he attempted to replace Howard as deputy leader, but the party room re-elected Howard. This caused Peacock to resign as leader and Howard was elected Leader of the Opposition. Howard led the Liberal Party to a bigger defeat in 1987. Howard was challenged by Peacock in 1989, and Peacock led the Liberal Party to the 1990 election. Despite winning a majority of the two-party preferred vote, Peacock didn’t win enough seats, and he resigned as leader immediately after the election.
Peacock remained on the frontbench under the leadership of John Hewson and Alexander Downer, and retired in 1994. Peacock was appointed Ambassador to the United States upon the election of the Howard government in 1996, and served in the role until 1999.
Kooyong was won at the 1994 by-election by Petro Georgiou, the State Director of the Victorian Liberal Party. Georgiou was a former advisor to Malcolm Fraser and a key proponent of multicultural government policies. Georgiou’s main opposition came from Greens candidate Peter Singer, due to the absence of a Labor candidate. Singer managed 28% of the primary vote, which remained a Greens record until the 2009 Higgins by-election, but it wasn’t enough to seriously challenge the Liberal hold on Kooyong.
Georgiou positioned himself strongly as a moderate within the Liberal Party and despite his impeccable credentials in the Liberal Party and as a policy advisor, he never held a frontbench role in the Howard government. He was openly critical of the Howard government’s refugee policies in the final term of the Howard government. He faced a strong preselection challenge in 2006, but managed to win more than two thirds of votes in the preselection. He managed to win re-election in 2007 with practically no swing against him, despite the Liberals suffering large swings across Australia.
In 2010, Georgiou retired, and he was succeeded by fellow Liberal Josh Frydenberg. Frydenberg was re-elected three times, and in 2018 was elected deputy leader of the Liberal Party. Frydenberg served in a number of ministerial portfolios, including as Treasurer from 2018 until 2022.
Frydenberg was defeated in 2022 by independent candidate Monique Ryan.
Assessment
The 2022 political environment was more favourable to independents than it is now, but Monique Ryan should benefit from a personal vote that will help her win a second term.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Josh Frydenberg | Liberal | 43,736 | 42.7 | -6.5 | 43.4 |
| Monique Ryan | Independent | 41,303 | 40.3 | +40.3 | 30.8 |
| Peter Lynch | Labor | 7,091 | 6.9 | -10.6 | 11.3 |
| Piers Mitchem | Greens | 6,461 | 6.3 | -14.8 | 9.8 |
| Alexandra Thom | Liberal Democrats | 1,080 | 1.1 | +1.1 | 1.4 |
| Scott Hardiman | United Australia | 1,011 | 1.0 | -0.2 | 1.2 |
| Rachael Nehmer | Animal Justice | 500 | 0.5 | -0.7 | 0.7 |
| Josh Coyne | One Nation | 741 | 0.7 | +0.7 | 0.5 |
| Others | 0.4 | ||||
| Will Anderson | Independent | 265 | 0.3 | +0.3 | 0.2 |
| Michele Dale | Hinch’s Justice Party | 177 | 0.2 | +0.1 | 0.1 |
| David Connolly | Australian Values Party | 152 | 0.1 | +0.2 | 0.1 |
| Informal | 3,046 | 2.9 | -0.1 |
2022 two-candidate-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Monique Ryan | Independent | 54,276 | 52.9 | 53.5 | |
| Josh Frydenberg | Liberal | 48,241 | 47.1 | 46.5 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Josh Frydenberg | Liberal | 55,542 | 54.2 | -2.2 | 53.7 |
| Peter Lynch | Labor | 46,975 | 45.8 | +2.2 | 46.3 |
Booths have been divided into five areas: central, east, north-east, north-west and south. The “South” covers all of the areas added to Kooyong from Higgins, and thus no cover votes were cast there for Monique Ryan.
Ryan won a majority of the two-candidate-preferred vote in three of the other four areas, ranging from 53.7% in the north-west to 60.4% in the centre. The Liberal Party won 51.1% in the north-east.
The two-party-preferred vote (between Liberal and Labor) was recorded everywhere. Generally the Liberal Party did 7-9% better on the 2PP than on the 2CP. Labor won in Central but the Liberal Party won everywhere else.
| Voter group | LIB 2PP | IND 2CP | Total votes | % of votes |
| North-West | 53.9 | 53.7 | 10,921 | 9.9 |
| East | 54.9 | 54.0 | 10,894 | 9.9 |
| Central | 48.5 | 60.4 | 9,218 | 8.4 |
| South | 51.7 | 0.0 | 8,962 | 8.1 |
| North-East | 58.7 | 48.9 | 7,828 | 7.1 |
| Pre-poll | 52.5 | 38.3 | 37,574 | 34.1 |
| Other votes | 56.1 | 35.8 | 24,835 | 22.5 |
Election results in Kooyong at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-candidate-preferred votes (Independent and Labor vs Liberal), two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, independent candidates, Labor and the Greens.
Hamer v Baillieu would be the ultimate electoral contest of white privilege.
@Trent Monique Ryan might be out of a job come the next state election
Who is suggesting that Hamer runs for Hawthorn? Are they giving up on Kooyong? It would’ve been best to remain tight lipped until after the election because this makes Hamer look a bit like a seat-shopper.
@Sheriff. It’s more like class privilege.
@The Sheriff Yep! Lol.
Kooyong forever. ✊ Independent retain
hamer should win here
14 days of campaigning left! I think this will be a brutally tight contest, but I suspect Hamer just squeaks through. The problem for me is that in a contest that might come out 51/49 either way, the ‘dirt’ on either candidate can seem to cause outrage and scandal to a large percentage of people without dinting the world-view of the other side. Yes, Ryan’s husband stole a sign – but many people who oppose the big parties know that much dodgier electoral things happen with the major parties every time (the Libs’ Chinese-language ‘AEC’-style signage from 2019 in Chisholm still resonates). Yes, Ryan is seen to be more reliably left than someone like Allegra Spender or Kate Chaney, but in a seat like Kooyong, where the combined cooker forces could barely muster 3%, that’s less harmful to a lot of people than it seems. Is there really much about Albanese’s fairly milquetoast centrist government that Josh Frydenberg would morally disagree with? Yes, Hamer turned out to have not only an investment portfolio but a healthy annual income from a multimillion dollar family trust, but do the 42.7% of people who voted for Frydenberg in 2022 care about that? They were never angry at Morrison (or Dutton) for being too wealthy. Indeed, if anything this outrage confirms their sentiment that the media will whip up hatred against anyone ambitious or achieving and so it was right (they think) for Hamer to be discreet about it in the first place.
I think Hamer picks up more than 42.7%, although not getting back to Frydenberg’s personal popularity, and just salvages it on preferences. It seems like an own-goal to me. I live in Curtin, and given an Albanese minority government is the likely outcome, I would much rather my MP be an independent at the negotiating table than a first-term opposition backbencher. I think a lot of Kooyongites will feel that way too, but not quite enough.
both Nicolle Boele and Monique have been the most controversial. all the teals are quite vunerable except Spender and Stegall who are a shoe in. I imagine Scamps might squeak through. an albanese minor government could be beneficial for the libs in both those seats if they support labor. same with the rest of the teals. i cant see the libs winning it from but the easter break is a good time to reset and at least minimise the damage and claw back enough votes to push labor far enough into minority that it will hurt them.
I was speaking to a relative tonight who has a business dealing with lots of clients in Kooyong and Goldstein. Her feedback was that the Kooyong people were not happy with Monique Ryan – been underwhelming and not achieved. Some voted for her in 2022 but not this time. Reaction in Goldstein was very favourable to Zoe Daniel and if anything has gained support. View was Monique Ryan is in big trouble but Zoe Daniel is safe.
The polling in both seats suggest both are in trouble
I’m personally surprised even despite the controversy that Amelia Hamer is shaping up to be the favourite.
It will be close. I’m saying a Liberal gain thanks to the redistribution and a slight correction in some of the more inland areas of the electorate. But Ryan can definitely retain still.
Agreed my only regret is the counting is gonna start at 8am where I gonna be on may 3rd and il be busy so can’t watch the livestream… damn u albo
Goldstein will be Independent hold because Tim Wilson’s just completely unlikeable.
Kooyong, I think is lineball. Both Ryan and Hamer have baggage on them. Ryan’s husband did something that’s quite distasteful and of pretty bad sports but Hamer hasn’t helped her own integrity with the whole ‘empathise with renters but still own two investment properties anyway’ saga, which reeks of elitist entitlement.
How Kooyong votes will probably be determined by the balance of how many student renters/younger voters have moved into the electorate vs how many boomers were distributed in from Higgins. Also something a lot of people have forgotten is the fact that half of Prahran was also distributed into the electorate, and that part skews left big time. Anyone can take it but the conditions still favour Ryan by a smidge.
I’m not seeing the case for Liberal optimism here. I don’t think Ryan is going to be a big exception among the teals – if they are doing well, so will she. There seems to be some perception that the electorate will punish her for being more left leaning but that appears to reflect Kooyong’s younger demographics fairly well, in comparison to most of the other teal seats. For the same reason, the Liberals have tried to use Hamer as the younger alternative and have her pass herself as a renter.