Seat of the week: La Trobe

This week’s better-late-than-never installment of Seat of the Week brings us to La Trobe, one of two crucial gains for Labor in Victoria at the 2010 election which helped redressed losses in New South Wales and especially Queensland. The defeated Liberal member, Jason Wood, will attempt to recover the seat from Labor’s Laura Smyth at the next election after winning a preselection ballot earlier this week.

La Trobe has covered Melbourne’s eastern fringe since its creation with the enlargement of parliament in 1949, drifting south-eastwards over time from its starting point of Dandenong and Croydon. It now consists of two rapidly growing outer Melbourne areas separated by the Dandenong Ranges – Boronia and Ferntree Gully in the north, and the Berwick area in the south – and extends eastwards through Belgrave to Emerald, Cockatoo and Gembrook. Labor’s strength around Belgrave is countered by Liberal dominance around Berwick. The redistribution that will take effect at the next election has effected a swap of about 16,000 voters around Bayswater, who have been transferred to Aston, for a similar number in Narre Warren, who were previously in Holt. Another 3000 voters around Pakenham have been transferred to McMillan. Antony Green calculates that the changes have boosted Labor’s margin from 0.9% to 1.7%.

Along with other seats in Melbourne’s outer suburban “sandbelt”, La Trobe played a decisive role in the election of the Whitlam government in 1972, falling to Labor for the first time with a 10.2% swing. It swung almost as heavily the other way when the Liberals recovered it in 1975, but returned to the Labor fold in 1980 when Peter Milton defeated Liberal member Marshall Baillieu (part of the clan that includes the current Premier). An unfavourable redistribution in 1990 combined with the statewide anti-Labor tsunami at that year’s election to deliver a 1.4% victory to Liberal candidate Bob Charles. The seat had a remarkably stable time of it on Charles’s watch, staying with the Liberals by 2.4% in 1993, 1.4% in 1996, 1.0% in 1998 and 3.7% in 2001.

With Charles’s retirement at the 2004 election, La Trobe emerged as a contest between Liberal candidate Jason Wood, a police officer who had worked in counter-terrorism and organised crime units, and Labor’s Susan Davies, who held the since-abolished state seat of Gippsland West as an independent from 1997 to 2002. The result was an easy win for Wood, who overcame the loss of Charles’s personal vote to pick up a 2.1% swing that was concentrated in the heavily mortgaged suburbs nearer the city. Wood had won preselection with the backing of the Kennett faction after cutting his teeth as candidate for Holt in 2001. It was noted at the time he had “been a member of Greenpeace for longer than he has been a member of the Liberal Party”, and he went on to embarrass his party ahead of the 2007 election by issuing a brochure that failed to sing from its song sheet on nuclear power.

Wood went into the 2007 election with a 5.8% margin, of which only 0.5% was left after a swing that was most conspicuous in the areas that had moved to the Liberals in 2004. He was promoted to parliamentary secretary for justice and public security when Malcolm Turnbull assumed the Liberal leadership in September 2008, despite the embarrassment he had recently suffered after stammering his way through a parliamentary speech on genetically modified organisms (which repeatedly came out as “orgasms”). The 1.4% swing that unseated him at the 2010 election was fairly typical for Victoria, which collectively swung to Labor by 1.0%. The successful Labor candidate was Laura Smyth, a lawyer for Holding Redlich whom VexNews linked to the “Andrew Giles/Alan Griffin sub-faction of the Socialist Left”.

VexNews reports that Jason Wood’s victory in this week’s preselection ballot was achieved with 61 votes in the first round out of 140, against 38 for Mark Verschuur, managing director of Fairmont Medical Products (and, apparently, a former ALP member); 17 for “IT uber-nerd” and “chick magnet” Martin Spratt; 14 for local councillor and former mayor Sue McMillan; and 12 for Michael Keane, an anaesthetist and former member of the Liberal Democratic Party.

Author: William Bowe

William Bowe is a Perth-based election analyst and occasional teacher of political science. His blog, The Poll Bludger, has existed in one form or another since 2004, and is one of the most heavily trafficked websites on Australian politics.

2,980 comments on “Seat of the week: La Trobe”

Comments Page 59 of 60
1 … 58 59 60

  1. A ‘Steady as She Goes’ Newspoll. As the wiser heads here were speculating would be the best option. Maintain and consolidate recent gains.

    Can’t understand why the Preferred PM figure for TA has gone up by one. Maybe there are people out there who liked his running style in this Olympic year? 😀

    Goodnight all!

  2. gusface

    [matches perfectly internal polling of 50/50]

    ooooh magical internal polling, just what the nervous back bench sheep need to follow the dear leader.

  3. Ha! I nailed it.

    That’s a good result. It confirms the trend back to the ALP. I expect the other pollsters to follow suit and for 54-46/53-47 to be the new standard for a while. 52-48 by about September.

    I did a rough calculation on the raw figures. It must be very close to 53-47 anyway.

  10. Crikey Whitey
    It does seem to me that a lot of indigenous communities are finding out it can be good for them to get involved with mining companies.

    I hate to spruik them, as I am a Greenie, but they have improved a lot in that regard. They do a lot of training of the local aborigines as ‘field asssistants’, not an ignoble job, and one thatpays very well.

    I haven’t seen them training the local communities to be truck drivers though… But it may exist

  11. kezza there are plenty of Latinos in Australia, tho not enough for anyone to realise that the person who spoke on Q&A tonight would probably be called a Latina. Languages descended from Latin are gendered.

    Where I grew up in Melbourne I knew plenty of people from Latin America, many who came here to escape fascism.

  12. 8 points

    Centre why is that dreadful

    We add on moe what ever lag time

    May only be 4 points

    Some months ago wasnt it 17 or something like that’
    I can remember a few dyed in the wool labor saying

    We will never get back from here

    17 behind may be has close as february

  13. [William Bowe
    Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 10:44 pm | Permalink
    Kezza, please desist from frivolous accusations of racism.]
    They weren’t frivolous. They were topical and they were based on politics.

    bemused has been trying to say the EMA legislation, based on 457 visas, is allowing overseas guest workers in – and the only way that can be construed is as racism.

    I was just calling him out on it – although I used Mr Squiggle’s latino comment to do so.

    If you think that’s frivolous, delete my comment, as you did my defence of confessions – even though those comments, too, were based on politics – from 18 months ago.

  14. Gus, just for me, my power is likely to go off at any time.

    What the hell are you on about? I want to believe you, but you aren’t helping!

    Please explain.

  15. [What do you do Squiggle? You need things like a ‘White Card’, Senior First Aid etc.]

    I work in financial services. Several other manual labor careers during Keating’s recession.

    The truck spraying thing pays more than I get with post graduate qualifications and more than a decade experience. (just)

  17. [Swan knew almost zero about anything at that time.

    Can you provide proof of that or should your claim be added to the very large pile of bullshit you have left here in the last 18 months?]

    Before he entered politics, Swan was a lecturer in QUT’s Dept of Management (Business Faculty), mainly in Public Administration (meaning he’d have studied economics). Like Wayne Goss, Kev Rudd and Peter Beattie, he was a speaker at UniQ’s & QUT’s School of Management’s Friday public lectures/ seminars etc.

  18. RUMMELL
    I have been thinking if you want to experience a small bit of great liberallisim

    Why not move to qld , newmans qld , could find work for you,
    Dont wait for an election go now

  20. Victoria—that is what I have been saying. I that case weird the Greens go up. I reckon Greens more like 10-12, labor higher by 2-4 points

  22. [2897

    William Bowe

    Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 11:01 pm | Permalink

    New thread up for Newspoll. Working off an iPad so can’t be arsed with a link. Thank you for your understanding.
    ]

    Try an android tablet, much easier for productivity purposes such as that.

  24. Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 11:08 pm | Permalink

    My Say

    Do you have this guide I have in my favourites and safarai on iPad ?

    Thank you in my favs, now

    Your such a considerate person

  25. [jules
    Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 11:04 pm | Permalink
    kezza there are plenty of Latinos in Australia, tho not enough for anyone to realise that the person who spoke on Q&A tonight would probably be called a Latina. Languages descended from Latin are gendered.

    Where I grew up in Melbourne I knew plenty of people from Latin America, many who came here to escape fascism.]
    Yes, I know.

    However, the latino population here is minuscule.

    And the reference to it is because of the how the latino population now affects US politics.

    Nothing to do with Aus politics or how latinos are taking Aussie jobs.

  28. [Aguirre
    Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 11:02 pm | Permalink
    Ha! I nailed it.

    That’s a good result. It confirms the trend back to the ALP. I expect the other pollsters to follow suit and for 54-46/53-47 to be the new standard for a while. 52-48 by about September.

    I did a rough calculation on the raw figures. It must be very close to 53-47 anyway.]

    I am guessing things will stay in the 54-57 range for some time, and then get worse for the ALP later in the year.

    Lets see eh?

  30. OO headline (no paywall): Prime Minister Julia Gillard, Labor mired in Newspoll trough

    [According to the latest Newspoll survey, conducted on the weekend exclusively for The Australian, Labor’s primary was 31 per cent, down from 32 per cent two weeks ago, and the Coalition’s primary support went from 46 per cent to 44 per cent.

    Support for the Greens went to 14 per cent, meaning the split on a two-party preferred basis, based on preference flows at the last election, was unchanged, with the Coalition on 54 per cent and Labor on 46 per cent.

    Ms Gillard also kept a narrow lead over Tony Abbott as preferred prime minister, 42 per cent to 38 per cent, her biggest lead since December….

    Full details and analysis of the Newspoll will be published in The Australian newspaper and online on Tuesday.]

  31. [GhostWhoVotes @GhostWhoVotes 4m
    #Newspoll Abbott: Approve 32 (+1) Disapprove 59 (-1) #auspol]
    View details ·
    [GhostWhoVotes @GhostWhoVotes 4m
    #Newspoll Gillard: Approve 32 (+2) Disapprove 58 (-2) #auspol]
    View details ·

  37. Squiggle

    Chevron might be the go for you! You probably wouldn’t need to work away! Check them out, they pay heaps and I am sure they’d need financial people.

    I don’t envy the water truck drivers job, They earn more than me and I have two degree… I wouldn’t want to do it.

    It’s surprising too, as most people on the last site I was on were much older than me. Would have been in their 50s mostly.

  42. Gus tbere was a time when will
    Thought there would be no solice in polls for labor

    Sorry william but i ha e not forgotten

  46. My Say

    I can’t see Labor getting worse again… Once the Carbon Price is in people will see it’s not going to seriously affect them.

  48. [gusface
    Posted Monday, June 11, 2012 at 11:14 pm | Permalink
    my say

    I JUST WISH WILLIAM AND SHOWS WOULD DEFAME ME—-=- AGAIN]

    Am I missing something here, Gus?

  49. [Julia Gillard @JuliaGillard 7m
    Thanks for having me tonight, @QandA, and thanks to everyone for their #qanda questions. Glad I could be part of it. JG]

Comments are closed.

Comments Page 59 of 60
1 … 58 59 60