Seat of the week: Melbourne Ports

Labor’s century-long hold on this inner southern Melbourne seat has never really looked threatened, despite being transformed by gentrification over the past few decades.

NOTE: Poll Bludger will be closed for comments for two weeks from December 25 to January 7 inclusive.

Melbourne Ports covers Bayside inner Melbourne from the mouth of the Yarra through Port Melbourne and Albert Park to St Kilda, further jutting inland in the south to take in Elsternwick. The redistribution to take effect at the next election will transfer 9000 voters in Elsternick and Caulfield South south of Glen Huntly Road to Goldstein, increasing the Labor margin from 7.6% to 7.9%. Melbourne Ports has the largest Jewish community of any electorate in Australia, accounting for 12.8% of the local population, and ranks at or near the top for numbers of Poles, Russians and Hungarians. It also has the second lowest proportion of Christians after its northern neighbour, Melbourne.

Labor’s greatest source of strength in the electorate is around St Kilda, where booths results in 2010 typically had Labor in the high thirties, the Greens on or around 30%, and the Liberals in third place in the mid-twenties. At the city end of the electorate, encompassing Port Melbourne, South Melbourne and Albert Park, green-left inner-city tendencies are counterbalanced by wealthy Liberal-voting elements. The strongest areas for the Liberals are in the east of the electorate, both around South Yarra in the north and Caulfield in the south, where the suburbs begin to take on the character of the electorate’s safe Liberal neighbour, Higgins.

Melbourne Ports was once noted for its preponderance of waterfront workers and generally working class voter base, and was accordingly very safe for Labor for most of its history. It has since transformed into the tenth wealthiest electorate in the country, a process which has considerably worn down Labor’s margin. The seat has nonetheless been extremely stable over the past two decades, recording essentially no swing at all at the consecutive elections of 1996, 1998 and 2001, a 2.0% swing to the Liberals in 2004, and swings to Labor of 3.4% in 2007 and 0.4% in 2010. The 2004 election proved Labor’s low water mark to date, the margin falling to 3.7%.

Labor has held the seat without interruption since 1906, with only five members serving over that time: James Matthews until 1931; Ted Holloway, a Curtin-Chifley government minister who moved to Melbourne Ports after unseating Prime Minister Stanley Bruce in Flinders two years earlier, until 1951; Frank Crean, Whitlam government Treasurer and father of Simon, until 1977; Clyde Holding, who came to the seat after a long and unproductive spell as state Opposition Leader, until 1998; and the incumbent, Michael Danby.

A member of the Right sub-faction associated with Stephen Conroy and Bill Shorten, Michael Danby’s pre-parliamentary career included stints as editor of the Australia-Israel Review, staffer to Hawke government minister Barry Cohen and industrial officer for the Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association. He is frequently in the news as a supportive voice for Israel, most recently after the Prime Minister was prevailed upon to have Australia support observer status for the Palestinian territories at the United Nations. Although occasionally mentioned as a candidate for promotion, he is yet to achieve a position more senior than Opposition Whip, which he held between 2001 and 2007.

The preselected Liberal candidate for the second electorate running is Kevin Ekendahl, a manager at non-profit social enterprises organisation Try Australia.

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.

2,987 comments on “Seat of the week: Melbourne Ports”

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  5. [You people aren’t trying to get your posts counts up just before it shuts down are you?]
    Did you know that Mod Lib has made EXACTLY 2.5% of the posts this year?

  6. C@tmomma@2798


    Maybe the blog turns into a pumpkin at midnight?

    Back to wrapping presents(my least favourite parenting chore).

    No, Tone turns back from a coach/truckdriver to a brown rat.

  10. [Did you know that Mod Lib has made EXACTLY 2.5% of the posts this year?]

    Unlike most of your posts, that one has at least a CHANCE of being right!

    Hehe 😉

  11. All the best to you William. Thanks for your efforts this year. If I weren’t opposed in principle to dynastic rule and patriarchy, I’d commend you as a prince among men. (Gosh, even now I’m doing puns!).

    Anyhoo, I will settle for calling you a man of worthy intentions and better deeds.

    We’ve made up the food for the family get together — well our part of it anyway. Frittata and lasagne. The older boy is doing Japanese rolls. I hope it’s not too hot out at Cranebrook tomorrow.

    Best to all. Keep safe.

  13. fiona:

    The men of PB seem a tad grumpy tonight.

    Seems an opportune moment to wish them all a merry xmas and happy festive season.

    😀

  14. [Rossmore
    Posted Monday, December 24, 2012 at 11:43 pm | PERMALINK
    Mod Lib 2797 Possibly, its in the news …]

    Sacking people for farting is sexist….don’t you agree Confessions?

    …anyhow, it wasn’t that story, it was about the new fart absorbing underwear from Japan.

  19. Mod Lib@2814


    Rossmore
    Posted Monday, December 24, 2012 at 11:43 pm | PERMALINK
    Mod Lib 2797 Possibly, its in the news …


    Sacking people for farting is sexist….don’t you agree Confessions?

    …anyhow, it wasn’t that story, it was about the new fart absorbing underwear from Japan.

    This will bring down the wrath of the sisterhood, but here goes anyway.

    Why do men fart more than women?

  20. Fib – All posters know, already, that I’m totally aware of, and fully in control of, absolutely all your ‘kinks, bends and perverted warps’ and other neat little pink bits.

    Take it as truth, you’ve been ‘outed’.

  24. …and appears to make gender based comments when gender was not relevant.

    Consistency needs to be commended though….. 🙂

    Just kidding Confessions, don’t get angry please, its Xmas after all!

  26. bemused,
    Maybe it just seems as though men fart more than women because women are the masters(?mistresses?) of the discrete fart? 😉

  27. Rossmore,

    [Fiona, And yours too. But change that bloody moniker. It’s so utterly out of character for you …]

    I would – now – love to do so, but I promised Bemused.

    Pax?

  29. Mod Lib,
    I might write to Aunty asking for my 8c back for today.

    Typical Liberal. You know you’ll make 2c on the deal due to the lack of 1c & 2c pieces! 🙂

  31. C@tmomma@2826


    bemused,
    Maybe it just seems as though men fart more than women because women are the masters(?mistresses?) of the discrete fart?

    A gallant try.

    The correct answer is…

    Because women can’t keep their mouths shut long enough to build up sufficient pressure.

  32. [But change that bloody moniker. It’s so utterly out of character for you…]

    It’s a total pisstake on bemused’s hysterical and ridiculous remarks that PB is like North Korea. In that context I think it’s entirely appropriate, and hilarious.

    Besides, if PB really was North Korean and alienating, the sensible approach would be to ignore it, and simply comment elsewhere. Like Piers’ blog, where one’s anti Gillard, anti Labor comments would draw round applause and agreement. Kind of like that North Korean atmosphere bemused seems to want a little bit of for himself…

    😆

  33. modlib – your tactics tonight on here are exactly what I’d expect of a fucken Lib.

    Disgusting, Nealy Nazi, and feral.

    You will hear, no more from me.

    Goodbye, BITCH.

  36. Well, Bludgers, the witching hour nears …

    [Stand still, you ever-moving spheres of heaven,
    That time may cease, and midnight never come …]

    God rest ye merry gentle/ women, and, on waking, a very merry Christmas to ye all!

    [O lente, lente currite, noctis equi!
    The stars move still, time runs, the clock will strike …]

    And a Happy New Year!

    [O, it strikes, it strikes! Now, body, turn to air …
    O soul, be chang’d into little water-drops,
    And fall into the ocean, ne’er be found!…

    I’ll burn my books!]

    (Marlowe: Doctor Faustus)

    Thank you for another year of links, laughs, argument, agreement, music of all kinds, The Yartz, wonderful garden paths happily explored, new Bludgers welcomed, trolls exiled … and the sound and fury of democracy and free speech in action.

    Thanks, William. Have a great break. Enjoy the peace.

    See youse all in 2013 – Federal Election Year. BRING IT ON!

    Goodnight and goodbye.

    Stay safe, well and happy until William returns, PB wakes from a fortnight’s sleep, and we are all back again!

  37. fiona@2827


    Rossmore,

    Fiona, And yours too. But change that bloody moniker. It’s so utterly out of character for you …


    I would – now – love to do so, but I promised Bemused.

    Pax?

    I get the impression that some people do not know what moniker means.

  43. One minute to go! Then it’s really Christmas somewhere! Like here in Sydney. Because everyone thinks we believe we are the centre of the universe! So may as well go with the flow! 🙂

  45. [what is this ‘fart’ theme?]

    Some idiocy bemused dreamed up.

    But really, who cares. There are far more interesting things to talk about than bodily functions. 🙂

  47. Fiona 2827 I can live with it I suppose. A guy at work I knew, very bright, had a poster of Mao prominently displayed for all to see. , I think he thought it was witty. Pissed me off no end, knowing what that megalomaniac did to his people.

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