Cairns – Queensland 2024

Historically a solid Labor seat, save for one term during the Newman LNP landslide. ALP retain.

pretty sure this will rule out the LNP’s as well
https://www.abc.net.au/news/2024-04-04/warren-yolonde-entsch-federal-mp-leichardt-queensland/103657670?utm_campaign=abc_news_web&utm_content=link&utm_medium=content_shared&utm_source=abc_news_web

@caleb doubtful its not a scandal

Geena Court, former ONP candidate for Leichhardt, seems to be the ONP candidate for Cairns. –>

https://www.facebook.com/GeenaCourt.PHON/posts/pfbid02UCjsMnZquxGaiiUWXgENDbK69pK4PUn369MZzonSWp9uzVRHM5uSvmW4swfCg2nl

https://www.facebook.com/photo?fbid=122142780266202237&set=pcb.122142780284202237

LNP gain but I think it’ll be one they’ll struggle to sandbag in 2028. Much more of a traditional Labor seat than Barron River.

Healy might even try and win the seat back if he loses it in October.

LNP pickup, but not by a big margin. I doubt Cairns would swing as much as most other regional seats. To be fair, Cairns LGA itself has a pretty big urban centre and is more dependent on tourism and social and healthcare services than farming or mining.

It’s historically Labor held, save for the 2012 landslide, but I wouldn’t call it a stronghold or red wall seat. I’d say KAP would do better than One Nation if they’re running.

Transposing federal and state results is never ideal but it can be interesting. Based on the 2022 federal results, all of the seats in Rockhampton, Mackay and Townsville would be won by the LNP – fairly comfortably. Same goes for Bundaberg, Maryborough and Hervey Bay. However, the seats in Cairns would be line ball and could go either way – local and state factors could come into it but the ALP might hold onto one or some. Possibly Barron River could end up a more likely Labor hold than Cairns.

The betting markets currently have this seat as a truly even contest between the majors. Healy and Entsch both paying $1.83.

@Wilson the LNP will gain it. Sportsbet notably has low odds for some key seats.

@Redistributed Barron River is a write-off for Labor. They will not hold it. It’s a marginal seat covering northern Cairns which is the more conservative part of Cairns and the election is very bad for Labor.

the only seat labor will hold north of brisbane is gladstone. though i rate cook as a tossup

@John I almost agree but only because Curtis Pitt retired. He wasn’t losing Mulgrave. Now I have Mulgrave as a toss up. I can’t see Saunders losing Maryborough, too strong of a local candidate. Otherwise it’s a wipe out for Labor north of Brisbane, even Mackay. I think Strelow wins Rocky.

I think people underestimate how multicultural the Gold Coast and Cairns are. Cairns has one of the most multicultural CBDs in Australia.

Percentage of people in CBD suburbs that speak English at home:
* Adelaide: 49.1%
* Brisbane City: 51.2%
* Cairns City: 45.5%
* City (Canberra): 50.8%
* Darwin City: 52.1%
* Hobart: 57.3%
* Melbourne: 35.9%
* Newcastle: 83.2%
* Perth: 53.0%
* Southport (Gold Coast): 67.4%
* Sydney: 31.6%
* Townsville City: 77.0%

Percentage of people in CBD suburbs born in Australia:
* Adelaide: 41.0%
* Brisbane City: 39.3%
* Cairns City: 35.9%
* City (Canberra): 44.6%
* Darwin City: 42.8%
* Hobart: 50.6%
* Melbourne: 17.5%
* Newcastle: 75.4%
* Perth: 38.5%
* Southport (Gold Coast): 54.1%
* Sydney: 22.3%
* Townsville City: 63.1%

I’m not sure why, perhaps direct flights to Japan there helps, but there are a LOT of Japanese people on the Gold Coast and in Cairns. I personally know three people on the Gold Coast from Japan, which may not seem like a lot but it’s more than I know from most other countries.

@feel I think that the anti Labor swing is still gonna overwhelm that personal vote outside Brisbane.

@Nether Portal

Great analysis. I would expect the CBDs of Brisbane, Perth and even Adelaide to become more multicultural as they grow and increased density. I think Haymarket (NSW) has the highest overseas born %

Poll Blunger Profile shows 5 candidates on the Ballot
as well as some information on Yolonde Entsch’s unhelpful publicity in June 2023
https://www.pollbludger.net/qld2024/LA.htm?s=Cairns

@Nimalan for CBDs or suburbs in general? I’m not sure about suburbs in general but definitely for CBDs. In Haymarket (which is where Chinatown, Koreatown and Thai Town are located), just 13.0% of residents were born in Australia according to the 2021 census. 21.4% were born in Mainland China, 17.5% in Thailand, 11.2% in Indonesia (the Sydney CBD also has lots of Indonesians and Thais), 3.0% in Malaysia and 2.8% in South Korea.

40.9% have Chinese ancestry, 16.2% Thai, 8.7% English, 7.2% Indonesian and 3.8% Australian. 82.7% speak a language other than English at home (24.3% Mandarin, 16.3% Thai, Indonesian 8.6%, Cantonese 5.7% and Korean 2.5%). Just 18.0% speak English at home.

As for religion, obviously because most people there are Chinese the main religion is no religion (40.1%), and because there are lots of Thais too Buddhism is second (27.7%). 10.5% didn’t state their religion, 8.2% are Catholic and 2.9% are “Christian, nfd”.

Other random stats:

* The unemployment rate there is 9.8% (I’m considering doing a map for the unemployment rate in each electorate).
* 58.5% of people don’t own any motor vehicles and the average number of motor vehicles per person is 0.5.
* The weekly household income is $1,931.

@Caleb my predicted order of candidates (i.e most to least first preferences):

1. LNP (↑)
2. Labor (↓)
3. Greens (↑)
4. One Nation (↓)
5. Independent (—)

TPP:
1. LNP (↑)
2. Labor (↓)

LNP GAIN from Labor.

@Nether Portal, yeah that’s what i have on first preferences too, TPP for me is a Tossup.

@ Nether Portal
Haymarket is considered a separate suburb from the CBD by the ABS. It seems to have a lot of international students. I am trying to find out the suburb which has the lowest english speaking percentage. We dont have any suburbs in 2021 census where a single suburb had majority with one particular ancestry. At the 2016 Census Both Burwood and Hurstville had a majority of people who nominated Chinese ancestory. However, by 2021 census that percentage dropped and the Nepalese community grew.

@Nimalan not sure about that one, but I’m linking a good tool for finding out how multicultural suburbs are on the general Australia 2025 page.

The Katter’s ended up not running a candidate here after all. They’ve scaled their campaign back even further from 2020 when they still ran in seats like Warrego, Burnett and Rockhampton. No candidate in Mackay or Whitsunday either, a last-minute pick in Barron River.

Cairns…. do voters like family dynasties? May be won by party other than lnp

Can’t be worse than the alleged stories of Townsville voters not able to tell Troy Thompson apart from Phillip Thompson.

This seat voted 59.7% No to the Voice. Labor got 51.5% of the TPP in 2022 here.

However, I should note that that does not include the many Cairns voters who prepolled. Around 10,000 people in this electorate voted on election day, while the rest voted early or by postals. Therefore, it is probable that the LNP would’ve won this in 2022 by winning the prepoll vote.

It was reported in the Courier Mail by Hayden Johnson State political editor both Labor and LNP think Michael Healy will holds Cairns.

I’ve got $100 saying he loses

It looks like Townsville will be a wipe out.
Cairns seats not so
Different dynamics Cairns
Mulgrave and cook (near cairns) all possible alp hold

I also got $50 on a lnp win in mulgrave

Interesting Labor held here with a smaller margin but lost Rockhampton with a larger margin. I’m not a Queensland local whats the demographic differences?

@SpaceFish this part of Cairns is more CALD and less conservative. Under 50% of people living in the Cairns CBD were born in Australia.

I think in Cairns CBD, like in many capital city CBDs and Surfers Paradise, a high percentage of residents are CALD but are not citizens. They don’t vote.

In the Bundaberg thread, someone said Yolonde Entsch is scandalous. Maybe that was a factor in Labor retaining.

Yeah, that was me. A clean LNP candidate would’ve won Cairns.

Overall, this was a big miss for the LNP.

At the start, it seemed like Entsch was the perfect pick: changing demography coupled with being the wife of a popular local federal MP, and a big tidal wave against Labor. It felt like she was almost guaranteed to wins Cairns.

But then all the screw-ups happened, and soon, Entsch seemed to be a victim of her own almost guaranteed success.

Honestly part of me thinks she should have been honourably disendorsed, but then she could’ve ran as an independent and potentially make it harder for the LNP to gain Cairns.

Unless the tide is against the LNP in 2028, I see an LNP gain if the candidate has no controversies and potentially if the Labor MP makes a serious gaffe.

How was yolonde scandalous?

She seems like a good candidate but im not a local

@Up the dragons I have a link up top the comment page that’s explains it better.

Not only is Cairns CALD and urban, but one of its understated aspects is that it is an internationally-facing city. Its airport is international with connections to places like Japan. Its economy is driven more by tourism and hospitality and is complemented by non-market sectors.

This is in contrast to the other urban Queensland regions which are more internally facing (no direct international connections) and have economies centred around industries like mining, energy and agriculture.

@SEQ Observer the Gold Coast has direct international flights, but it’s too big to be considered regional.

@Nether Portal, yep I wasn’t alluding to the Gold Coast or Sunshine Coast when mentioning the other urban regional cities. To your point though the Gold and Sunshine Coast’s are quite similar to Cairns in their large tourism and hospitality industries. However, Cairns is more indigenous and younger. Gold Coast and Sunshine Coast have significant populations of retirees.

@ SEQ Observer
Do you feel Townsville is more Conservative as well due to the military vote which is not the case in Cairns. Leichardt has not really moved as far right as Herbert has in fact in 2019 it barely had a swing. Townsville also has tourism such as Magnetic Island.

Yes, at both the federal and state level we don’t see the same trend to the LNP happening in Cairns as compared to Mackay, Rockhampton, Townsville etc. It would be a mistake to evaluate Cairns based on other QLD regional cities, probably for the exact reasons SEQ Observer points out.

Northern Cairns (Barron River) is more conservative than the inner-city (Cairns itself). The coastal parts also tend to lean LNP as they are more affluent (e.g Clifton Beach).

Reading about Yolonde Entsch’s federally funded work in Gulf aboriginal communities, the worst I could say is
‘No good deed goes unpunished’.