LNP 11.3%
Incumbent MP
Llew O’Brien, since 2016.
Geography
Wide Bay covers parts of the Queensland coast, including the towns of Noosa, Gympie and Maryborough, at the southern end of central Queensland as well as the northern end of the Sunshine Coast.
Wide Bay is an original federation electorate. It has been held for most of its history by the Nationals and its predecessors, although there have been two periods where it was held by the ALP for over a decade.
The seat was first won in 1901 by Gympie colonial MP Andrew Fisher, a prominent Labor member. Fisher had served as a minister in Anderson Dawson’s brief government in 1899, the first socialist government in the world.
Fisher served as a minister in Chris Watson’s federal Labor government in 1904, and became deputy leader of the ALP in 1905. He became the ALP’s leader in 1907. In 1908, Alfred Deakin’s minority government fell, and Fisher became Prime Minister at the head of a Labor minority government. This lasted until 1909, when Deakin returned to power at the head of a new unified Liberal party.
Fisher returned to office after the 1910 election, when the ALP won an unprecedented majority in the House of Representatives. This was the first time a party won a majority in a federal election. He governed until 1913, when he lost office to the Liberal Party, but he returned to power after Joseph Cook called a double dissolution in 1914. Fisher resigned from Parliament in 1915.
The ensuing Wide Bay by-election was won by Liberal candidate Edward Corser by only 86 votes. Corser was re-elected as a Nationalist in 1917, 1919, 1922 and 1925, dying in July 1928.
The 1928 Wide Bay by-election was won by Corser’s son, Bernard Corser, who stood for the Country Party. He held the seat until his retirement in 1954.
The seat was won in 1954 by the Country Party’s William Brand, who had previously served as a senior member of the party in the Queensland state parliament. He was re-elected in 1955 before retiring in 1958.
Wide Bay was won in 1958 by Country candidate Henry Bandidt, but lost in 1961 to the ALP’s Brendan Hansen. Hansen held Wide Bay until his retirement in 1974, and was elected to the Queensland state parliament for the seat of Maryborough from 1977 until 1983.
Upon Hansen’s retirement in 1974, the Country Party’s Clarrie Millar won back Wide Bay, and he held it until his retirement in 1990.
Wide Bay was won in 1990 by the National Party’s Warren Truss. Truss was made a junior minister in the Howard government in 1997 and joined the cabinet in 1999. He was elected Deputy Leader of the Nationals in 2005, and became party leader after the defeat of the Howard government.
Truss served as Nationals leader from 2008 until 2016, including as Deputy Prime Minister from 2013 to 2016.
Truss retired in 2016, and was succeeded by LNP candidate Llew O’Brien. O’Brien has been re-elected twice.
- Emma Buhse (Greens)
- Chad Burgess (One Nation)
- Kirsti Kenningale (Family First)
- Llew O’Brien (Liberal National)
- Gabrial Pennicott (Trumpet of Patriots)
Assessment
Wide Bay is a safe LNP seat.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Llew O’Brien | Liberal National | 41,601 | 43.5 | -3.6 |
| Geoff Williams | Labor | 20,345 | 21.3 | -0.5 |
| Nathan Buckley | One Nation | 9,765 | 10.2 | -0.6 |
| Craig Armstrong | Greens | 9,088 | 9.5 | -0.4 |
| Tracy Bennett | United Australia | 4,406 | 4.6 | +1.0 |
| Kelli Jacobi | Independent | 4,106 | 4.3 | +4.3 |
| Tim Jerome | Independent | 2,737 | 2.9 | -1.6 |
| Andrea Newland | Informed Medical Options | 2,097 | 2.2 | +2.2 |
| Daniel Williams | Values Party | 1,057 | 1.1 | +1.1 |
| John Woodward | Federation Party | 501 | 0.5 | +0.5 |
| Informal | 6,569 | 6.4 | +1.7 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Llew O’Brien | Liberal National | 58,708 | 61.3 | -1.8 |
| Geoff Williams | Labor | 36,995 | 38.7 | +1.8 |
Booths have been divided into four areas. Polling places in Fraser Coast council area have been grouped as ‘Maryborough’ and those in the Sunshine Coast and Noosa council areas have been grouped as ‘Noosa’. Those booths in the town of Gympie have been grouped together as Gympie Urban. The remainder of the Gympie council area have been grouped together with the small number of booths in the South Burnett and Cherbourg council areas as ‘Gympie Rural’.
The LNP won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all four areas, ranging from 54.6% in Noosa to 64.8% in rural parts of Gympie.
One Nation came third, with a vote ranging from 8.4% in Noosa to 15.3% in Maryborough.
The Greens polled slightly less than One Nation, with their vote very concentrated in Noosa, where they polled 17.3%, and as low as 5.5% in rural Gympie.
| Voter group | GRN prim | ON prim | LNP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| Noosa | 17.3 | 8.4 | 54.6 | 13,127 | 13.7 |
| Gympie Rural | 5.5 | 12.8 | 64.8 | 9,863 | 10.3 |
| Maryborough | 7.1 | 15.3 | 58.2 | 7,715 | 8.1 |
| Gympie Urban | 9.2 | 13.3 | 62.1 | 6,692 | 7.0 |
| Pre-poll | 8.4 | 9.0 | 62.0 | 40,309 | 42.1 |
| Other votes | 9.5 | 9.4 | 64.1 | 17,997 | 18.8 |
Election results in Wide Bay at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal National Party, Labor, One Nation and the Greens.
The Only Possible way for the LNP to lose this seat is if Independent Noosa MP Sandy Bolton decides to contest.
The issue is Noosa is very demographically different from the rest of the seat. A lot of the rest of the seat is White working class/One Nation voters etc so Sandy Bolton probably will not appeal in Maryborough.
Sandy Bolton wouldn’t win this. Never.
This is way more than just Noosa. It’s also got towns like Cherbourg, Kikilvan, Poona, Rainbow Beach, Tiaro, Tinnanbar and Tin Can Bay. It’s also got the cities of Gympie and Maryborough. It’s also got Fraser Island (K’gari).
@Nether Portal i never said Sandy Bolton would win, at best she’d poll 3rd with 14-15% of first preferences, nearly half of which would come from the LNP putting them well below 40%
Noosa should not be in this seat.
Wonder What would happen if previous mp for Maryborough contested?
Gympie is a problem though
This seat contains
1.100% of Gympie
2. 100% of Noosa
3. 14% of Nicklin
4. 68% of Maryborough
will post the booths later tonight
@Nimalan thanks, will do.
Booths
1. Anamoor
2. Baddow
3. Bauple
4. Belltop
5. Bonooroo
5. Boreen Point
6. Coooloola Cove
7. Coolum Beach PPVC
8. Cooran
9. Cooray
10 Cooray South
11. Cootharabba Road
12. Curra
13. Federal
14. Glenwood
15. Goomboorian
16. Goomeri
17. Granville
19. Gunalda
20. Gympie Central
22. Gympie East
23. Gympie North
25. Horseshoe Bend (Gympie)
25. Imbil
26. Kandanga
27. Kikivian
28. Kin Kora
29. Lower Wonga
30. Maryborough
31. Maryborough West
32. Monland
33. Mothar Mountain
34. Mungar
35. Murgon
36. Noosa Heads
37. Noosa Heads PPVC
38. Noosa Ville
39. Peregian Beach
40. Pomona
41. Rainbow Beach
42. Southside
42. Tewantin
43. Tiaro
44. Tin Can Bay
45. Tinana
46. Tinbeerwah
47. Veteran
48. Weyba
49. Widgee
50. Wolvi
@ Nether Portal
My plan is to do Fairfax next work my way South along the Coast and then move inland into Wright and Kennedy will be the last seat. I plan to start Fairfax on Thursday complete the Coastal seats by this time next week and then the following week do the inland seats outstanding from Wright to Kennedy. It will give you a much needed break from all the maths 🙂
State level TPP/TCP here:
* LNP: 53.9%
* Labor/Independent: 46.1%
Note that the Labor TPP is combined with Sandy Bolton’s TCP in Noosa since the ECQ doesn’t calculate the notional TPP for non-classic contests.
Overall, while Labor technically did 7.4% better here on the state level in 2024 than on the federal level in 2022, that figure is kinda misleading since it’s combined with teal independent Sandy Bolton’s TCP in Noosa.
Without any votes from Noosa, the LNP’s TPP against Labor would be 63.3%, which is actually 2.0% better than on the federal level for the LNP.
@Nimalan sounds like a good idea.
Thanks Nether Portal, when you get a chance over the next few days if you could do the table by % who speaking English at home that will be great.
@Nimalan will do.
Np
See Wikipedia
Appears 2pp is later available
This may help with wide bay
@Mick Quinlivan thanks, I will look at that.
Tomorrow though I’ve already calculated a record three seats today.