ALP 6.7%
Incumbent MP
James Merlino, since 2002.
Geography
Eastern fringe of Melbourne. Monbulk covers southwestern parts of Yarra Ranges Shire and smaller parts of the City of Knox and the City of Maroondah.
History
Monbulk was first created at the 1967 election. The seat has alternated between being held by the Liberal Party and the Labor Party.
The seat was first won in 1967 by the Liberal Party’s Bill Borthwick. He had previously held the seat of Scoresby since a 1960 by-election. He served as a minister in the Liberal state government from 1967 until 1982, serving as Deputy Premier from 1981 until his defeat in 1982.
Borthwick was defeated by the ALP’s Neil Pope in 1982. He served as a minister in the Labor state government from 1988 to 1992, when he was defeated by Steve McArthur of the Liberal Party. McArthur was re-elected in 1996 and 1999, but in 2002 he suffered a 10.8% swing against him and lost his seat to the ALP’s James Merlino, who won the seat with a 8.3% margin in 2002, which was cut to 6.7% in 2006. He has served as a junior minister in the Labor government since the 2006 election.
Candidates
- Elizabeth Coyne (Democratic Labor Party)
- Rajeeva Gunasekera (Family First)
- Lawrence Mobsby (Independent)
- James Merlino (Labor)
- Jo Tenner (Greens)
- Simon Picknell (Country Alliance)
- Matt Mills (Liberal)
Political situation
Monbulk has demonstrated the capacity to deliver large swings in recent history that could easily overwhelm the substantial Labor margin.
2006 result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| James Merlino | ALP | 13,263 | 40.61 | -2.94 |
| Clive Larkman | LIB | 12,212 | 37.39 | -0.02 |
| Robert Stephen | GRN | 5,278 | 16.16 | +0.38 |
| Carl Huybers | FF | 1,359 | 4.16 | +4.16 |
| Joanne Stride | PP | 547 | 1.67 | +1.67 |
2006 two-candidate-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| James Merlino | ALP | 18,511 | 56.68 | -1.58 |
| Clive Larkman | LIB | 14,148 | 43.32 | +1.58 |
Booth breakdown
Polling booths in Monbulk have been divided into four areas: those in the Cities of Knox and Maroondah grouped as “north west”, with the remainder divided into south west, south east and north east. The ALP won over 62% in the southwest, with margins of 54-57% in the remainder of the seat. The Greens polled over 20% in the southwest, around 16-17% in the eastern parts of the seat, and only 10% in the northwest.
| Voter group | GRN % | ALP 2CP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| South West | 20.87 | 62.77 | 7,800 | 23.86 |
| North West | 10.42 | 55.47 | 7,440 | 22.76 |
| North East | 16.52 | 54.13 | 5,624 | 17.20 |
| South East | 17.76 | 57.20 | 4,642 | 14.20 |
| Other votes | 15.66 | 52.30 | 7,187 | 21.98 |
The Knox and Maroondah bits are typical outer suburbia, more in character with Bayswater and Kilsyth, hence the relatively low Green vote.
South-west and most of north-east covers the Dandenongs themselves, with lots of tree-change and Green types. No surprise the Greens rack up 20-30% here.
Further east the seat begins to push into more rural farmland areas, hence the higher Liberal and weaker Green vote.
Hi Folks.
I’d like to meet up/hook up with motivated people who are interested in combatting the misinformation which leads to Green votes. In particular the ‘Global Warming’ scam.
jdr_mot@bigpond.com
Here is a classic example of how it is being used for socialist wealth redistrubution.
http://www.theblaze.com/stories/u-n-official-admits-we-redistribute-worlds-wealth-by-climate-policy/
AL GORE the ‘prophet’ of Global Warming has a company called “Generation Investements LLC” which is the 6th biggest shareholder in “Climate Exchange” Europe..which was recently bought out by a bigger one. The profits depend on CAP and TRADE LAWS.. Gore stands to make MEGGGGGA bucks along with his left wing cronies and connections. Just look at Kathy Zoi (do a wiki)..Gore threw 300million at her and his ‘Alliance for Climate protection’ to persuade the world that “Global warming is true”…hmmmmm she is now deputy Dept of Energy sec and has HUGE shareholdings in Landis and Gyrr the smart meter people.
She also has her fingies on the rather large ‘billions’ of stimulus money for ‘green’ projects. Her husband is a high up in an “energy efficient window” company.
Bob CARR is the CEO of ENVEX another ‘carbon TRADING’ company!
It just get’s messier and messier… and the left side of politics is in like Flynn to the money making.
Cheers all.