Prahran – Victoria 2010

ALP 3.6%

Incumbent MP
Tony Lupton, since 2002.

Geography
Inner southern Melbourne. Prahran covers parts of Stonnington, Melbourne, Port Phillip council areas, and specifically the suburbs of Prahran, South Yarra and Windsor and parts of St Kilda and Toorak.

History
Prahran has been a state electorate since 1889. It has alternated between the ALP and conservative parties, but in recent decades has been dominated by the Liberal Party.

The ALP first won the seat in 1894, holding it until 1900. Liberal MP Donald Mackinnon held the seat from 1900 to 1920. The ALP and conservative parties alternated in control until the 1930s, with the Liberal Party holding the seat until 1945.

In 1945, the ALP’s William Quirk won the seat, holding it until his death in November 1948. The ensuing by-election in 1949 was won by Frank Crean, who had previously held the seat of Albert Park. He left the seat in 1951 when he moved to the federal seat of Melbourne Ports. He served as a federal MP until 1977, playing a senior role in the Whitlam Labor government.

The 1951 Prahran by-election was won by the ALP’s Robert Pettiona, who held the seat until his defeat in 1955.

Since 1955, Prahran has been won by the ALP only four times. In 1955, the seat was won by Sam Loxton, a Liberal candidate. Loxton was a former test cricketer who had been part of Don Bradman’s Invincibles team and played VFL football for St Kilda.

Loxton held the seat until 1979, when the ALP’s Bob Miller won the seat. He held the seat for two terms, and in 1985 unsuccessfully contested the Legislative Council province of Monash.

The Liberal Party’s Don Hayward won the seat in 1985. He had previously held the upper house seat of Monash from 1979 to 1985. He served as Member for Prahran until the 1996 election.

In 1996, the Liberal Party’s Leonie Burke won Prahran. Burke was defeated in 2002 by the ALP’s Tony Lupton, who currently serves as Cabinet Secretary in the Brumby Government.

Candidates

Political situation
Prahran is the closest to a three-cornered contest between the ALP, Liberal Party and the Greens in Victoria. In a straight ALP-Liberal contest, the seat is certainly winnable for the Liberal Party, with only a 3.6% margin. It is also possible that, with a strong Greens vote and a weakened ALP vote, the 12% margin between the ALP and the Greens could potentially be overturned, producing a Liberal-Greens contest that would be impossible to predict.

2006 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Clem Newton-Brown LIB 13,136 41.87 -0.86
Tony Lupton ALP 11,518 36.72 -1.26
Justin Walker GRN 6,315 20.13 +2.09
Gary Pinto FF 402 1.28 +1.28

2006 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Tony Lupton ALP 16,800 53.55 -0.87
Clem Newton-Brown LIB 14,571 46.45 +0.87

Booth breakdown
Booths in Prahran have been divided into two areas: Prahran in the north and St Kilda in the south. Over two thirds of ordinary votes were cast in the Prahran area, which includes Toorak and South Yarra.

While the Liberal Party won a slim majority of the vote in the Prahran area and amongst other votes, the ALP won the seat off the back of almost 68% in the St Kilda area. In the Prahran area, the ALP were outpolled by the Liberals by six votes. The Greens also polled much more strongly in the St Kilda area, where the Greens outpolled the Liberals.

 

Polling booths in Prahran at the 2006 state election. Prahran in blue, St Kilda in yellow.
Voter group GRN % ALP 2CP % Total votes % of votes
Prahran 16.07 49.98 16,332 52.10
St Kilda 26.75 67.94 6,294 20.08
Other votes 20.24 49.79 8,722 27.82
Two-party preferred votes in Prahran at the 2006 state election.
Greens primary votes in Prahran at the 2006 state election.

11 COMMENTS

  1. Probably the most diverse seat in Melbourne; includes both blue-rinse Toorak and “trendy” St Kilda and Chapel St precinct. There wouldn’t be too many other seats where you see 70%+ margins for different parties in different booths.

    I don’t see any realistic chance for the Greens at the moment, since the vote for both major parties is too high. But long term, the growth in inner suburban apartment living and the transformation of areas like Prahran and Windsor will probably continue to favour both Greens and Liberals at the expense of Labor.

    If the next redistribution moves the seat further into St Kilda/Elwood (which i think it will, given Albert Park is well over quota), the Greens would be a genuine chance to win.

  2. 1985 redistribution pushed this seat to the east and made it Lib (and made Monash Labor) hence the swap of MPs however Libs won both. I think the 1992 redistribution pushed it back to the west as a consequence of abolition of St Kilda and made it notionally Labor. East St Kilda was the last ALP booth in the east until Morwell.

  3. Considering that the ALP won Clayton and Dandenong, Dandenong North, and Springvale as well as non-massive defeats in other places and the existence of Moe I find it impossible to believe that the ALP could not have won a single both between St Kilda and Morwell.

  4. In the Age on Saturday the 9th of October there was a table with the 2010 Commonwealth primaries for several inner city seats and the Commonwealth ALP`s 2PP`s margin of 2.25% for Prahran. The Prahran Primaries were Greens 24.9%, ALP 32.6% and Liberal 42.5%

  5. Candidates in ballot paper order are:

    Clem Newton-Brown – Liberal
    Meni Christofakis – Greens
    Katherine Anderson –
    Simon Ronchi – Family First
    Christian Vega – Sex Party
    Tony Lupton – Labor

  6. Interesting seeing how the Green primary is mapped. The lack of a hotspot for them at the Northwest corner (South Yarra) where there is a mobile population with high rental turnovers and greatest same sex domestic arrangements leads me to question their traction. Their strength in tradional ALP stronghold areas might explain why their preferences so strongly flow back to the ALP.

  10. The Sex Party are directing preferences to the ALP and Liberals ahead of the Greens?! You’ve got to be kidding. Their how-to-vote cards state – ‘want to see a truly modern Victoria’ and then list things that are supported by the Greens but opposed by the Labor and Liberal parties. With this preferencing, which is similar in other seats, they can’t be taken seriously…

  11. LIB GAIN, simply because the urban swing is going to get them to 47% of the vote, so even if GRN get in front of the ALP, this will instead be a LIB-GRN marginal, not a potential gain. Having said that with Albert Park overquota, a redistubuted Prahran could very well be a place for a GRN member in 2014

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