Seats of the week: Dunkley and Macquarie

This week: one Liberal marginal in outer Melbourne, and another in outer Sydney.

Another double header in our ongoing scramble to cover potential Coalition-held seats of interest.

Dunkley (Liberal 1.1%)

Dunkley covers an area of bayside Melbourne about 40 kilometres from the city centre which has been effectively unchanged by the redistribution. It consists of two distinct electoral parts, with Labor-leaning Frankston and its northern coastal neighbour Seaford slightly outweighed by blue-ribbon Mount Eliza immediately to the south. The electorate further extends south to Liberal-leaning Mornington along the coast, and inland to marginal Langwarrin. The north-south electoral cleavage reflects a straightforward divide in incomes, the area being notably Anglo at both ends.

Dunkley was created with the enlargement of parliament in 1984 and won for Labor on its inauguration by Robert Chynoweth, who had cut short Peter Reith’s brief first stint in parliament by winning Flinders for Labor at the 1983 election. Chynoweth was re-elected with a small swing in 1987 and then gained a 3.9% boost with a redistribution that shifted the electorate further north, exchanging Mornington for Chelsea. However, even this was not sufficient to hold back a tide that costs Labor nine Victorian seats at the 1990 election, with Liberal candidate Frank Ford gaining the seat off a 6.8% swing. Chynoweth ran again in 1993 and emerged a surprise winner, securing a slender 0.6% margin after a 1.9% swing. Hope for another term was effectively dashed when a new redistribution effectively undid the last, leaving Chynoweth defending a negative margin at a losing election.

The seat has since been held for the Liberals by Bruce Billson, who by the 2004 election had built enough of a buffer to survive the reverse that has played out with 5.3% and 3.0% swings over successive elections. Billson rose to the outer ministry portfolio of veterans affairs in the last two years of the Howard government and then to the front bench in opposition, but he was demoted to the outer ministry by Malcolm Turnbull after backing other horses in leadership ballots. He would return in the small business portfolio when Tony Abbott became leader in December 2009, holding it and related portfolios ever since. His Labor opponent is Sonya Kilkenny, a commercial lawyer from Seaford.

Macquarie (Liberal 1.3%)

Located on the western fringes of Sydney, Macquarie combines the solidly Liberal-voting Hawkesbury River area around Richmond and Windsor and Labor-voting communities on the Great Western Highway through the Blue Mountains. The seat has existed in name since federation but has changed substantially voer its history, having originally been concentrated on Bathurst and Lithgow. Those areas came to be accommodated by Calare after the 1977 and 1984 redistributions, the latter effecting further change by transferring Penrith and St Marys to the new seat of Lindsay. Macquarie briefly resumed its former dimensions between 2007 and 2010, when Calare moved deep into the state’s interior to cover the abolition of Gwydir and Macquarie lost the Hawkesbury area to Greenway. This resulted in a brief interruption to a Liberal hold on the seat going back to 1996, which was resumed in 2010 when Louise Markus succeeding in transferring to the seat from unfavourably redistributed Greenway.

Macquarie’s most famous former member is Ben Chifley, who was born and raised in Bathurst and first elected to the seat in 1928. Chifley was voted out in the 1931 landslide, twice failing to recover the seat before finally breaking through in 1940. Labor thereafter held the seat without interruption until the dark days of 1975 and 1977, with Ross Free recovering the seat with Labor’s improved performance in 1980. Free jumped to the new seat of Lindsay when parliament was enlarged in 1984, which took in the strong Labor areas of Penrith and St Marys. The slender margin left to Labor in Macquarie was erased by a slight swing at the 1984 election, and the seat held for the Liberals for the next three terms by Alasdair Webster. Maggie Deahm won the seat for Labor in 1993 by 164 votes, a margin that was easily accounted for by a 6.5% swing to Liberal candidate Kerry Bartlett when the Keating government was dumped in 1996. Bartlett’s margin progressed from 4.1% at the 1998 election to 8.9% at the 2004 election, at which point the aforementioned redistribution pulled the rug from under his feet.

Macquarie now had a notional Labor margin of 0.5%, to which the locally familiar Bob Debus added another 6.6% as Kevin Rudd led Labor to office. The Hawkesbury area meanwhile came to be represented Louise Markus, a former Hillsong Church community worker who in 2004 won the seat of Greenway for the Liberals for the first time since it was created in 1984. The redistribution then inflated her margin in Greenway from 0.6% to 11.0%, of which 4.5% remained after the 2007 election. The effect of the 2010 redistribution was even more pronounced, producing a 10.2% shift to Labor in Greenway while all but eliminating Labor’s margin in Macquarie. Upon jumping ship for Macquarie, where her task was aided by Debus’s retirement, Markus picked up a relatively mild swing of 1.5% that was nonetheless sufficient to secure her a margin of 1.2%. Markus meanwhile was promoted to the outer shadow ministry portfolio of veterans affairs in September 2008, but dropped after the 2010 election.

Labor’s election for the second successive elections is Susan Templeman, principal of Templeman Consulting, who promotes herself as “one of the country’s leading media trainers and coaches”.

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.

644 comments on “Seats of the week: Dunkley and Macquarie”

Comments Page 8 of 13
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  1. [Sep 14th isn’t ruled out by Yom Kippur – it’s ruled out because it was picked by Julia…]

    Probably true but Rudd chose the religious holiday to rule it out. 😉

  3. If we’re fantasizing about what pearls of wisdom might be contained in attention-seeking tweets from PvO or Troy Bramston, why don’t people go the whole hog and start reinterpreting Nostradamus as a predictor of polling results.

  4. [dave
    Posted Saturday, July 27, 2013 at 5:11 pm | PERMALINK
    Mick77
    Posted Saturday, July 27, 2013 at 5:08 pm | Permalink

    see my track record and be very afraid!

    Like this call ?]

    For those interested, I picked how each of the 6 indies would go immediately.

    …as well as picking the 2010 election result itself
    …as well as picking the POTUS election results more accurately than Nate Silver
    …as well as picking Obama to beat Clinton in the original primary

    🙂 just saying 🙂

  7. [I dont see why Rudd would risk parliament sitting again.]

    Get Tony to vote to keep the Carbon Tax would be a hoot. 🙂

  10. Dave

    I was talking about poll predictions, and the next test is over the coming week where I’ve consistently said 53/47 to Libs from end of July.

  11. Abbott to win a 20 seat majority (although my hopes are still alive for Rudd to hang on as long as possible thereby giving Turnbull a solid chance at LOTO, in which case he will win a 50+ seat majority).

  13. @357 ruawake Coalition would logically support Terminating the Tax as precursor to scrapping ETS if they win election as promised.

  14. Mick77@360


    Dave

    I was talking about poll predictions, and the next test is over the coming week where I’ve consistently said 53/47 to Libs from end of July.

    So that example showed you wRONg!

    Then this one on betting markets –

    [ Mick77
    Posted Sunday, August 29, 2010 at 8:10 pm | Permalink

    Centrebet probably has it right this time – Abbott 1.43/Gillard 2.70.]

    I know I cannot tell the future. Predictions are for mugs – lucky guesses at best etc.

    But each to there own I guess.

  16. Mick77,

    Guess how many boatpeople Labor have sent to PNG under their new-new-new-new-new-new-new-new boat policy plan?

    Meanwhile they are moving all the boatpeople Labor put to the “back of the queue” last year that were sent to PNG, guess where they are all headed? Straight to Australia to head to the front of the queue.

    This governments resolve is so weak you could knock them over with a plucked feather. Absolutely gutless.

  18. People might be on to something with the Turnbull question. Without going back and researching, didn’t Reachtel show a 57-43 Coalition lead with Turnbull as leader?

    So perhaps a good poll for Labor but a big Liberal lead and/or ppm lead for Turnbull?

    If this actually does happen, Rudd needs to make an appointment with Quinton pronto.

  19. Dave
    The period after the 2010 elections was not a period of opinion polls but guesses on the indies and the betting markets swayed to & fro as it seemed that they’d go one way or t’other. We are now discussing opinion polls which refkects the mood of the electorate and it ain’t moving in Kev’s direction.

  20. PvO and Bramston hinting at a Galaxy poll tomorrow! DEFCON 2!

    It will be the most important poll in this term of parliament

    …

    Seriously, they’re just employees for an organisation operating in an industry on the decline who are trying to sell their product aka newspapers. It’s probably what we already know: 48/52, 49/51, 50/50 with a Rudd/Turnbull voting intention with Turnbull way ahead plus some sparklers

  23. The Libs will not dump Abbott before the election. They don’t need to and it does not make rational sense in anyway to do so.

  24. Mick77@369


    Dave
    The period after the 2010 elections was not a period of opinion polls but guesses on the indies and the betting markets swayed to & fro as it seemed that they’d go one way or t’other. We are now discussing opinion polls which refkects the mood of the electorate and it ain’t moving in Kev’s direction.

    I didn’t see any qualification in your earlier post ?

    [ Mick77
    Posted Saturday, July 27, 2013 at 5:08 pm | Permalink

    see my track record and be very afraid! ]

  25. Lets crunch the numbers.

    People arriving illegally by boat under 5 1/2 years of Labor: 50,000

    Number of people sent to East Timor as promised by Labor: 0%

    Number of people sent to Malaysia as promised by Labor: 0%

    Number of people sent to Nauru/PNG after Labor announced Pacific Solution Lite: 1%

    Number of people sent onshore/CI after announcing Pacific Solution Lite: 99%

    Number of people sent to the “back of the queue” after promising to do so: 0%

    Number of deaths at sea under Labor: 1200+ and counting

    Number of people arriving after Labor in their latest round of pretending to be tough and introducing PNG: 1200

    Number of people actually sent to PNG under Labor pretending to be tough: 0%

    Number of people actually sitting in Australia after PNG announcement: 100%

    You can’t spin this stuff… Labor has a history. The people smugglers nor the Australian people can be conned.

  27. Whatever you think of PvO and TB their pre release tweets have always been on the money while necessarily opaque.

  28. Speaking of Abbott

    @MrPinkCarpet: Marriage rally tomorrow Manly Corso 11am and drinks afterwards. Please come along & RT

  29. well 53/47 to coalition aint all that “fascinating” so it’s either a bigger blowout either way or a mal question.

  32. I am wondering if they ask the question about military intervention,, there some people out there that seem to like guns an wars

  37. [ Mick77
    Posted Saturday, July 27, 2013 at 5:26 pm | Permalink

    We are now discussing opinion polls which refkects the mood of the electorate and it ain’t moving in Kev’s direction. ]

    Actually when you made your prediction guess of ‘end of July 53/47 to Libs’ – the polls were in fact were moving in rudd’s direction, reflecting the mood of the electorate.

    I think anything can happen in coming weeks etc and again feel any ‘prediction’ either way if it turns out is just a lucky guess.

  38. GEE WILLIAM YOUR MATE PETER MUST OF BLOCKED
    ME A FEW WEEKS AGO,, CANNOT CLICK ON TO ASK WHY THE POLL ON SUNDAY IS SO GOOD

    WOULD U PLEASE TELL HIM IT S BADGE OF HONOUR

    LOLO LO OLLOLLLLLLOL

  42. I think I’ll just keep reminding people of Abbott’s lies.

    “no new tax under a Government I lead”
    Except a tax that will cost business more than the carbon price.

  43. Regardless of whose poll it is – and Galaxy doesn’t seem that flash to me – and whether it is “fascinating” or not to some, it is counter intuitive that Abbott has made up any ground at all, that Rudd is going backwards and that, at this stage, any poll could be a “game changer” for Labor.

    Labor has made all the “game changes” it is is going to make and it is win, lose or draw with Rudd.

    If there is any reference to Turnbull at all, and it does show he is much more popular than Abbott, what is new about this?

    Everyone is more popular than Abbott.

    Interesting that 6PR had Alannah McTiernan on drive yesterday afternoon with Bob Maumill.

    The Liberal’s Perth candidate, after the offer was made by 6PR, refused to turn up and debate with her and the local Liberal bunker refused to offer anyone in his place.

    Like leader, like candidate – Chicken Man.

    Not a good look at all for the Liberals – particularly as 6PR is really Red Neck central.

  46. For the ALP to decline from here, the Coalition need to be eating into the base. That’s not going to happen any time soon. Those voters are back for the ALP and they’re not going anywhere!

    The question now is who plants their flag in the middle. Rudd appears to be winning that battle, at least for now. The Coalition are falling for his frames. Should be evident when he appears on Bolt tomorrow morning

  48. The spotlight of the election campaign proper will shift focus towards genuine policy issues and costings and will change the basis for the polls.

  49. Guytaur – preferred leader polls mean nothing. It is 2PP that counts – and Abbott does not have a problem with that.

  50. Who is making the call that this expected poll is “the most important in this term of the parliament?”

    The coming poll and probably lots of other to come, is just one more straw in the wind.

    The election date and the campaign have not even got out of the starting blocks yet, which means the election is still probably two months away.

    In the countdown in the week to the election day, then the polls might have a bit more bite.

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