LIB 2.9%
Incumbent MP
Russell Broadbent (Independent), since 2019. Previously member for Corinella 1990-1993, member for McMillan 1996-1998, 2004-2019.
Geography
South-eastern Victoria. Monash covers parts of Victoria stretching from the south-eastern fringe of Melbourne to the Latrobe Valley. The seat stretches from Western Port in the west to Moe in the east, and stretches down to the coast. McMillan covers the entirety of Bass Coast and South Gippsland council areas, most of Baw Baw council area and parts of the Latrobe council area. The seat covers the towns of Warragul, Moe, Wonthaggi, Leongatha and Foster.
History
The electorate name “Monash” was introduced in 2019 as a new name for the seat of McMillan, which had been first created in 1949. The seat has mostly been held by conservative parties, although since the 1980s the ALP has won the seat on a number of occasions.
The seat was first won by Geoffrey Brown of the Liberal Party in 1949. Brown won a three-cornered contest on Country Party preferences. The Country Party occasionally would contest the seat throughout the 1950s and 1960s, but never managed to overtake the Liberal Party. Brown was reelected in 1951 and 1954 but died in 1955 before the election.
The seat was won at the 1955 election by Alexander Buchanan, also a Liberal. Buchanan held the seat for seventeen years without taking ministerial office before losing the Liberal Party’s endorsement in 1972.
Buchanan stood as an independent in 1972, and preferences from the DLP and Buchanan allowed Country Party candidate Arthur Hewson to leapfrog the official Liberal candidate and defeat the ALP candidate on Liberal preferences.
Hewson was reelected in a fierce contest in 1974, when the Liberals stood Ronald Dent against him despite a coalition agreement, and Hewson narrowly defeated Dent on primary votes before overtaking the ALP on preferences.
Hewson was defeated by Liberal candidate Barry Simon in 1975, and the Nationals never came close to winning McMillan again. Simon held the seat until 1980, when the ALP’s Barry Cunningham won it.
Cunningham held the seat throughout the 1980s, losing to John Riggall (LIB) in 1990. Riggall was defeated by Cunningham in 1993, and Cunningham was defeated by Russell Broadbent in 1996.
Broadbent had previously held the neighbouring seat of Corinella for one term from 1990 to 1993, and Corinella had been abolished at the 1996 election.
Broadbent was again defeated in 1998 by Christian Zahra, a 25-year-old ALP candidate. Zahra was made a shadow Parliamentary Secretary after the 2001 election, and was considered to have a promising career, before losing to Broadbent in 2004.
Broadbent managed to win re-election in 2007 after developing a reputation for rebelling against the Howard government’s immigration policies, and has been re-elected five more times since.
Broadbent lost preselection for Monash in November 2023, and he went on to resign from the Liberal Party to serve out his term as an independent.
Assessment
Monash is quite a marginal seat, and the loss of the sitting MP’s personal vote may make things harder for the Liberal Party. The presence of both Deb Leonard as a well-funded teal independent and Broadbent as an ex-Coalition independent make this race quite complicated.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Russell Broadbent | Liberal | 36,546 | 37.8 | -8.2 |
| Jessica O’Donnell | Labor | 24,759 | 25.6 | -4.3 |
| Deb Leonard | Independent | 10,372 | 10.7 | +10.7 |
| Mat Morgan | Greens | 9,533 | 9.9 | +2.7 |
| Allan Hicken | One Nation | 7,289 | 7.5 | +0.2 |
| Christine Ann McShane | United Australia | 3,991 | 4.1 | +0.2 |
| Meg Edwards | Liberal Democrats | 3,548 | 3.7 | +3.7 |
| David Matthew Welsh | Federation Party | 674 | 0.7 | +0.7 |
| Informal | 4,752 | 4.7 | +0.3 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Russell Broadbent | Liberal | 51,156 | 52.9 | -4.0 |
| Jessica O’Donnell | Labor | 45,556 | 47.1 | +4.0 |
Booths have been divided into four areas, which reflect local government boundaries.
The Liberal Party won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in two areas, with 55.2% in Baw Baw and 56.6% in South Gippsland. Labor polled 53.8% in Bass Coast and 58.2% in Latrobe.
Independent candidate Deb Leonard came third, with a primary vote ranging from 8.7% in Latrobe to 14.3% in Bass Coast.
| Voter group | IND prim | LIB 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| Baw Baw | 8.8 | 55.2 | 15,233 | 15.8 |
| South Gippsland | 10.8 | 56.6 | 13,443 | 13.9 |
| Bass Coast | 14.3 | 46.2 | 8,454 | 8.7 |
| Latrobe | 8.7 | 41.8 | 3,586 | 3.7 |
| Pre-poll | 9.1 | 51.9 | 39,442 | 40.8 |
| Other votes | 9.8 | 55.9 | 16,554 | 17.1 |
Election results in Monash at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal Party, Labor, independent candidate Deb Leonard and the Greens.
Nimalan, I think I agree about Broadbent. I don’t think he can crack 20% first preference, maybe not even 15%. I think he hurt Leonard too, but as I mentioned above it is a bit of a wildcard and everyone will preference against the Liberals here.
Why would Broadbent preference against the Liberals – though he may leave an open ticket. Based om conversations that he has had with a family member, he loathes the Teals and it would be highly surprising if he preferenced Labor. For what its worth, family members are planning to vote for Russell Broadbent this time – they are not usually right wing voters and will probably preference Labor after that. They are not convinced Deb Leonard won’t sell out and have power lines everywhere in South Gippsland.
@ LNP insider
Agree i think Broadbent should have been given a friendly nudge to retire maybe in 2019. I dont think Labor will win it again unless they win a huge landslide and maybe over 58% TPP statewide. In the past McMillan was a swing seat between 1980-2004 but i think since Labor can win Corangamite now they dont need the seat anymore.
Preferences will be confusing… no party or candidate will.get over 30% of the vote.
Also people voting will realise the libs are most likely to win. So a put liberals last strategy will maximise the chances of a non liberal candidate to win.
Greens recommended preferences to Labor over Deb Leonard last time. I haven’t seen their HTV (or much from them at all) yet this time.
I ran into the Labor candidate at the train station on day one, he seemed particularly keen to convince me that I should not vote for Deb Leonard, and not even preference her ahead of him.
The Warragul Gazette reported that Broadbent proposed a preference swap to Leonard, but has withdrawn the offer.
Of course he’d say that no candidate would ever tell you to vote for someone else ahead of them
@darth
True (although there was that time Sylvie Francois ran for the old City of Berwick).
Regarding the corflute game – in Warragul it’s mostly Mary Aldred dominating, Leonard second, some (but not much) visibility from Broadbent and One Nation, next to no visibility for Labor despite Tully showing up at the train station on day one, zero from the Greens. (Probably very different in the south of the electorate.) The Gazette letters page is dominated by people denouncing Leonard, and anti-teal leaflets are appearing in letterboxes regularly, so it seems the local Libs are worried about her. She’s just opened a hub in Victoria St and seems to be in town a lot.
I got contacted for a seat-specific uComms poll last night, so maybe there’ll be some figures out soon.
(I haven’t lived in a competitive seat for over a decade, I’d forgotten what it was like.)
It’s climate 200 testing their support I got one in indi 2 weeks ago
In South Gippsland there are more Deb Leonard than Mary Aldred corflutes with quite a few for Labor. Seen only one Broadbent and one One Nation BUT on private property only seen Mary Aldred ones. All the rest on trees etc.
Broadbent’s ticket is now public. Preferencing minor right wing parties then Libs. Greens apparently running an open ticket as payback to Labor for doing the same in the seat of McNamara. Deb Leonard announced today that she is also running an open ticket – very hard to see how she wins from that position unless she keeps going up the ladder off the back of Greens and even Labor preferences. And Aldred has Broadbent at number 4.
All in all it’s shaping up to be a dog’s breakfast and unless one candidate gets close to 30% or more of the primary vote, it’s going to be quite a while before we know the winner of this one. Gotta love the electorate of Monash.
Where are you finding the cards?
One Nation are going Broadbent 2 then Nutties and then Aldred 5 with Labor 7 Leonard 8 and Greens 9
Family First going 2 Aldred 3 Broadbent and similar to One Nation down the back.
In Victoria FF seem to be going Liberal 2 but in other states go around ON and Trumpets before getting to the Libs
I guess the Libs can breathe a bit easier with Broadbent’s HTV.
@Darcy, the Lib’s and Broadbent’s HTV cards are on their FB pages.
One would assume that neither Family First nor One Nation will be able to staff many of the booths, although major parties do sometimes find ways to make sure that minor-party HTV vote cards favourable to them get into the hands of voters anyway 🙂
I point out the obvious voters decide preferences not the parties they vote for .
Preferences will be all over the place