Seat of the week: McEwen

The Melbourne fringe seat of McEwen has long been one of Victoria’s most keenly contested marginal seats, but the addition of the Labor stronghold of Sunbury in the latest redistribution may have put an end to that.

The most electorally significant change to result from the redistribution in Victoria relates to the electorate of McEwen, a traditionally marginal seat in Melbourne’s northern hinterland which has now been rendered fairly safe for Labor. This results from the transfusion of around 35,000 voters from rapidly growing Labor-voting suburbs around Sunbury, which are counterbalanced by the loss of outer urban areas further east (20,000 voters to Casey, 13,000 to Scullin and 4500 to Jagajaga), together with 10,000 to Indi and 7,000 to Bendigo in rural Victoria. The electorate maintains a stretch of the Hume Highway including Kilmore and Seymour, together with the urban fringe centres of Gisborne, Wallan and Whittlesea. Among the areas transferred to Indi are Kinglake and Maryville, which were devastated in the bushfires of February 2009.

McEwen was created with the expansion of parliament in 1984 and held for Labor in its first two terms by Peter Cleeland, who was unseated in 1990 by Fran Bailey as part of a statewide swing which cost Labor nine seats. Cleeland recovered the seat with a 0.7% margin in 1993, but was again defeated by Bailey in 1996. In 1998 it was one of a number of marginal seats which registered a below-par swing to Labor, a circumstance that allowed the Howard government to win re-election from a minority of the national two-party vote.

Consecutive swings to Bailey in 2001 and 2004 combined with a 1.0% redistribution to put the seat outside the marginal zone, but such was the swing to Labor in 2007 that Bailey needed every bit of her 6.4% margin to hold on. At first blush the result was the closest in any federal election since Ian Viner’s 12-vote victory in the Perth seat of Stirling in 1974: Labor challenger Rob Mitchell won by seven votes on the first count, but a recount turned that to a 12-vote margin in favour of Bailey. Labor challenged the outcome in the Federal Court, but the determinations the court made regarding individual ballot papers actually increased Bailey’s margin to 27.

Fran Bailey retired at the 2010 election, disappointing Liberals who hoped the esteem she gained during the bushfire crisis would stand her in good stead in a difficult seat. The party appeared to do well in preselecting Cameron Caine, a Kinglake police officer credited with saving several lives during the emergency, but he was swamped by a 5.3% swing. This made it second time lucky for Labor’s Rob Mitchell, who won preselection with the support of the Bill Shorten-Stephen Conroy sub-faction of the Victorian Right. Mitchell had earlier won a seat in the state upper house province of Central Highlands at the 2002 election, before being frozen out by the electoral reforms that took effect in 2006.

The preselected Liberal candidate for the next election is Ben Collier, managing director of Sunbury-based information technology consultancy Collier Pereira Services.

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.

1,337 comments on “Seat of the week: McEwen”

Comments Page 18 of 27
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  2. [There’s been a bit of a pattern.]

    Which some are amazingly still in denial about.

    Personally I think he’s over-reached with it all, and is now just regarded as a bit of a joke.

  3. The ‘love the children more than they hate us’ proposition is rubbish from a clever politician.

    Here are some more crap propositions along the same lines:

    Peace will come when Israeli jews love their children more than they hate arabs.

    Peace will come when Israeli jews love their children more than they love illegal settlements.

    Peace will come when arabs love their children more than they hate their dispossession.

    I could go on and on with this sort of rubbish.

  4. confessions@803,

    One thing her CV on the website doesn’t mention is the name of the Adelaide law firm where she(Julie Bishop), was made partner at 26. Yet all the Perth ones are listed.

    When in doubt, check Wikipedia out:

    She graduated from the University of Adelaide with a Bachelor of Laws in 1978, and subsequently practised as a barrister and solicitor at the Adelaide law firm Mangan, Ey & Bishop, where she was a partner.

    🙂

  5. I don’t really see the point of predicting election results based on polls. It’s saying “Here’s my guess at what the electorate thinks–based on asking them what they think.”

    Yes there is a bit of work to do to untangle the results from the statistical noise, to work out what to do with the minor parties, and to turn a national poll into 150 seats, but that’s just simple number crunching. The interesting questions are things like: why is there a trend back to Labor? Who is being convinced to change their vote on the current situation? How long will the trend continue and what level does it stop at (I assume it won’t get all the way to 100-0)?

  6. What will be interesting , lets say the public continue to ignore news ltd smear campaigns on Gillard and labor

    the public continues to put Abbott and the coalition into the decline

    what would newsltd do

  8. You would think that some enterprising journo would, by now, have asked Julie Bishop for her thoughts on the Gaza/Israel situation or about the opposition policy for that part of the world. But no, not a peep out of any of them.

  10. Laocoon@836,
    First things first. 20-14

    That will learn thems pomgolians to field a rugby team decked out in fuschia!

    Lao, do you know why they were decked out in that strip? No one on Outsiders had a clue.

  13. As an experiment, in future, when I make any sort of electoral prediction, I will also do a coin flip on the winner. I will keep a track record of how the two compare.

    I will try to figure out a way to get a random margin prediction that won’t make any predictions that are too wild, and use that too.

    (I will exclude things with obvious results like one-sided by-elections.)

  14. C@t:

    I just thought it was odd that her website doesn’t mention the name of the firm she was made partner of at such a young age.

  15. [zoidlord
    Posted Sunday, November 18, 2012 at 1:41 pm | PERMALINK
    @Mod Lib – your guessing like most pollsters are.]

    As long as I keep “guessing” right I don’t mind.

    Now, off to enjoy the day….Au revoir! 🙂

  17. [Carey Moore
    Posted Sunday, November 18, 2012 at 1:44 pm | PERMALINK
    As an experiment, in future, when I make any sort of electoral prediction, I will also do a coin flip on the winner. I will keep a track record of how the two compare.

    I will try to figure out a way to get a random margin prediction that won’t make any predictions that are too wild, and use that too.]

    Carey: There were 24 predictions which were a toss-up in the recent US elections and I got 23 right…..plug in a 50:50 guess 23 times out of 24 and see what the odds are, I suspect the chances are pretty slim!!!!!

  21. And of course the REALLY valuable thing to do with the polls is to make them go in the direction you want.

    But will the stunts still work by the time thr election comes next year?

  24. C@tmomma

    The fuschia

    There are a few explanations:
    1. Take attention away from possibly the worst national anthem renditions of this century

    2. Psychological warfare (backfired)

    3. From the RFU new release (no kidding!)
    [The tradition of the presentation jacket informs the eye-catching new change kit, which is styled in regal purple with gold detailing, reinforcing England’s position as a member of rugby royalty.]
    http://www.rfu.com/news/2012/september/newsarticles/190912_kit_launch_presentation_jacket

    Now the issue I have with this is that I thought purple [sic] was an imperial designation, whereas royal was red. In any event, the strip was not purple!

    4. The explanation by the FoxSports commentary – to make money
    [The new England Home kit from Canterbury is available to buy now.]
    From the same release above. I suspect this is most likely the real reason.

    Apparently (I heard during a Super Rugby match commentary, so take the evidence as you will), the SA Bulls pink strip is their best seller. But at least it is pink. Not fuschia.

  26. [Carey: There were 24 predictions which were a toss-up in the recent US elections and I got 23 right…..plug in a 50:50 guess 23 times out of 24 and see what the odds are, I suspect the chances are pretty slim!!!!!]

    The US pundits call 52-48 a “toss-up” because of the margin of error. It just shows they don’t understand statistics; the candidate on 52% is still well ahead.

  27. [Gary
    Posted Sunday, November 18, 2012 at 1:50 pm | PERMALINK
    As long as I keep “guessing” right I don’t mind.

    Joke of the day given your “guess” re Gillard being gone last year.]

    I don’t predict ALP MP’s thinking well, which is not such a great surprise, but I can predict voters well.

    [868
    Gary
    Posted Sunday, November 18, 2012 at 1:54 pm | PERMALINK
    You cannot read polls of the past and predict future polls. It really doesn’t work like that.]

    You have been well and truly proven wrong in the last US elections (not to mention the ones before that) where the poll aggregators hit the nail on the head and most of the so-called-experts got it completely wrong.

  28. mimhoff

    [But will the stunts still work by the time thr election comes next year?]
    Nah. Any of the attention gaining novelty attached to seeing Tone’s antics in HiVis gear kissing fish declaring the carbon tax will wipeout the economy has long gone. It is wallpaper now.

  30. [The US pundits call 52-48 a “toss-up” because of the margin of error. It just shows they don’t understand statistics; the candidate on 52% is still well ahead.]

    I am afraid all this shows is that you do not understand statistics.

    52-48 to the ALP is exactly the same as 49-51 to the LNP if the poll has a margin of error of 3%.

    Exactly the same.

    The difference is when you use a poll aggregation model and take into consideration the likely areas of error in the polls (like adjusting for “likely voters” or using “swings” or “trends” rather than actual numbers, you get close to the truth than a single poll with its inherent errors (of which margin of error is just one example).

  32. Mod Lib,

    If you’re so smart, please provide next weeks Lotto numbers. That is the only test of your predicitive intelligence. The rest is boastful fluff.

  33. GG:

    If there was some objective way to determine the Lotto numbers I would have done it and would currently be sunning myself in Majorca. There isn’t.

    There is an objective way to determine the likely outcomes of elections, which has been comprehensively proven in the recent US and Australian elections.

  34. The purple pomgolian kit was no doubt meant to be the “royal” purple as seen at Wimbledon (see below). However I reckon the shade was lightened so as to show out more on television.

  35. Okay, the coin being completely unbiased, I decided to apply it to 5 recent elections where, prior to polling day, predictions were divided:

    1. US President: The coin chose Romney, I had predicted Obama

    2. 2010 Federal election (never mind the margin): the coin chose Labor, I had predicted Labor.

    3. Melbourne (state) by-election: The coin chose Labor, I had predicted the Greens

    4. Victoria state election: The coin chose Labor, I had predicted the Coalition

    5. Port Adelaide (state) by-election: The coin chose Labor, I had predicted Labor. (vs. Independent)

    So, the coin got three of those races right, I got four. (Means nothing btw, just doing it for fun)

  36. Mod Lib@875


    The US pundits call 52-48 a “toss-up” because of the margin of error. It just shows they don’t understand statistics; the candidate on 52% is still well ahead.


    I am afraid all this shows is that you do not understand statistics.

    52-48 to the ALP is exactly the same as 49-51 to the LNP if the poll has a margin of error of 3%.

    Exactly the same.

    I really don’t think they are the same.

    the 52 – 48 with a margin of error of 3% could surely give a possible result such as 53 – 47, which 49 – 51 the other way could not.

  37. [I am afraid all this shows is that you do not understand statistics.

    52-48 to the ALP is exactly the same as 49-51 to the LNP if the poll has a margin of error of 3%.]

    You could not be more wrong there.

    The margin of error means that the pollster is 95% confident that the result is within 3% of the true level of support. It does not mean that every possible outcome within that 3% range is quallty likely!

  38. I take back @879 . Just switched over to watch the Aus v Eng thugby replay and the colour looks very close to the Wimbledon purple.

  39. Mod Lib

    You are forgetting to take into account mobile phone bias.
    US research has concluded that not including mobiles gives the GOP a 1.5 point bias.
    We know nothing about what such a bias may be here and how it changes from election to election. So MOE should actually be larger.

  46. Leroy@811


    This argument is hopeless. There is nothing wrong in principle with using polls to predict an outcome. That’s what this blog is about. Some of the people here who are arguing with Mod Lib are kind of missing the point and almost conceeding the argument by failing to discuss how & why polls change, and talking about his failed or non-failed predictions. After all, only months ago the ALP was ‘stuck” at 55-45.

    Late 2013 we will have a good idea of where the election is likely to go. The future is unwritten, and I’m not calling it for anyone. I think the ALP has a good chance though, I think the only real barrier is the NSW branch of the party.

    An eminently sensible post.

  47. OK….too many things to respond to there and have been trying to get away for some time so will draw the line there and we can resume later. The idea that you can take an individual point estimate and then make comments about relative likelihoods of results around that estimate fascinates me and I would love to discuss further…..next time!!!

  48. 735 ML
    es, it is a good time for the ALP when it is a 4% margin rather than double digit margins, but 4% still ends up with a very big loss. If Gillard stays on as leader that is what I think is going to happen still!

    Judging by the reliability of your earlier prediction, that augurs pretty well for Gillard and Labor.

    And you ought to give the voters some credit for being able to differentiate between federal and state/territory issues. Most evidence suggests that they can, albeit current polling does hint that Newman has been very helpful for ALP polling recovery (federal and state) in Queensland.

  49. guytaur

    [@strom_m: Jump the shark, much? “@rupertmurdoch: Why Is Jewish owned press so consistently anti- Israel in every crisis? ]
    Ah, that explains it. He is bitching about “jewish ” owned press not being Israel uber alle enough. I thought he’d been accused of saying an anti semite fave. The press is controlled by jews.

  50. I must give credit to Rupert there. He has somehow managed to simultaneously be blindly pro-Israel and anti-Semitic in the same tweet.

    That takes an awful lot of skill! This, folks, is why he gets to decide our opinions! 😉

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