Seats of the week: Swan and Dawson

Two seats which Labor might hope to gain if they can recover from historically poor results in their respective states in 2010.

As talk firms of a September 7 election, we review another two seats which might form part of a hypothetical Labor majority, being conservative marginals in the relatively promising states of Western Australia and Queensland.

Swan (Liberal 2.5%)

The perennially tight marginal seat of Swan covers areas of inner Perth bounded to the north by the Swan River and the west and south by the Canning River. It extends from South Perth and Como north-eastwards through Victoria Park to Belmont, and south-eastwards through Bentley to Cannington. There is a division in the electorate between the affluent and Liberal-voting west and lower-income Labor-voting east, reflected in the corresponding state seats of South Perth and Victoria Park which are respectively safe for Liberal and Labor. The combination of the two areas has left the federal electorate finely poised, being decided by margins of 164 votes in 2007, 104 votes in 2004 and 294 votes in 1993.

Swan in its present form is unrecognisable as the seat that was created at federation, which covered the state’s non-metropolitan south-west. The seat’s inaugural member was John Forrest, explorer, colonial Premier, federation founding father and senior minister in early non-Labor governnments. The electorate was drawn into the metropolitan area when parliament was enlarged in 1949, at which point it continued to cover the eastern suburbs as far north as Midland. Labor only intermittently held the seat until 1969 when it was won by Adrian Bennett, who retained it until his defeat in 1975 by John Martyr.

Swan returned to the Labor fold in 1980 with the election of 32-year-old Kim Beazley Jr, future party leader and son of the Whitlam government Education Minister and long-serving Fremantle MP Kim Beazley Sr. Beazley strengthened his hold on the seat with consecutive swings of 8.1% and 8.6% in 1980 and 1983, but the expansion of parliament in 1984 cut his margin by 4.1% by transferring inner eastern suburbs around Bassendean to Perth. A sharp swing at the 1990 election further pared back Beazley’s margin, and he began to cast around for a safer seat after surviving the 1993 election by 294 votes. A safety hatch opened when Wendy Fatin retired in the somewhat safer seat of Brand along Perth’s coastal southern suburbs at the 1996 election, which Beazley was nonetheless able to retain by just 387 votes.

Swan meanwhile fell to Liberal candidate Don Randall, who was tipped out by a 6.4% swing in 1998 before returning at the 2001 election in his present capacity as member for Canning. The new Labor member for Swan was former farmer and prison officer Kim Wilkie, who barely survived a poor performance by Labor in Perth at the 2004 election despite a disastrous campaign for his Liberal opponent Andrew Murfin. A correction after the Liberals’ under-performance in 2004 presumably explains the seat bucking the trend of the 2007 election, at which the seat was one of only two in the country to fall to the Liberals, the other being the northern Perth seat of Cowan.

The seat has since been held for the Liberals by Steve Irons, a former WA league footballer and proprietor of an air-conditioning business. Irons’ tiny margin was erased by a 0.4% redistribution shift ahead of the 2010 election, but he retained the seat with a 2.8% swing that was closely in line with the statewide result. Labor’s candidate is John Bissett, deputy mayor of the Town of Victoria Park.

Dawson (Liberal National 2.4%)

Extending along the central Queensland coast from Mackay northwards through the Whitsunday Islands, Bowen and Ayr to southern Townsville, Dawson has had a wild ride after the past two elections, firstly falling to Labor with an epic swing of 13.2% in 2007 before returning to the conservative fold in 2010. The swing on the latter occasion was 5.0%, approximately in line with the statewide result, which rose to double figures in the Whitsunday region booths around Airlie Beach and Proserpine. The seat was created with the expansion of parliament in 1949, and has consistently been centred on the sugar capital of Mackay. While Mackay has consistently been an area of strength for Labor, the surrounding rural territory has tended to keep the seat in the conservative fold. The only Labor member prior to 2007 was Whitlam government minister Rex Patterson, who won the seat at a by-election in February 1967 and kept a tenuous hold until his defeat in 1975.

The Nationals retained the seat throughout the Hawke-Keating years, despite close calls in 1983 (1.2%) and 1990 (0.1%, or 181 votes). De-Anne Kelly succeeded Ray Braithwaite as the party’s member in 1996, become the first woman ever to represent the party in the House of Representatives. The swing that unseated Kelly in 2007 was one of three double-digit swings to Labor in Queensland at that election, and the only one to strike a sitting member. Labor’s unxpected victor was James Bidgood, a former Mackay councillor noted for linking the global financial crisis to biblical prophecy. Bidgood bowed out after a single term citing health problems, and was succeeded as Labor’s candidate by Whitsunday mayor Mike Brunker. Brunker however proved unable to hold back a statewide tide at the 2010 election which almost entirely undid the party’s gains of 2007.

Dawson has since been held by George Christensen, a former Mackay councillor and local newspaper publisher who sits in parliament with the Nationals. Christensen suffered an embarrassment during the 2010 campaign with the emergence of newsletters he had written as a university student containing what Tony Abbott conceded were “colourful” views on Jews, gays and women. He has more recently been noted for his hostility to Islamic radicalism, having been the only federal MP to attend rallies held in Australia by controversial Dutch politician Geert Wilders. His Labor opponent for the coming election is Bronwyn Taha, a former Proserpine restaurant owner and electorate officer to state Whitsunday MP Jan Jarratt.

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.

2,259 comments on “Seats of the week: Swan and Dawson”

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  3. [His newspaper division is declining and he himself is 82 and reportedly losing influence within the company.]

    not going that good back at the hacienda either

  7. izzie
    Posted Sunday, August 4, 2013 at 5:14 pm | PERMALINK
    OK

    Rudd – beaming, confident, good actor.
    Milne – I’m sorry, Christine, dry, schoolmarm delivery.
    Abbott – slow, careful, negative, too obviously scripted (and he looks worried).

    As the producer of the play, I’ll give the gig to Mr Rudd.

    ———–

    i disagree wiht you about milne

    I knwo she was boring , but she is not boring as abbott

  9. [Bernard Keane ‏@BernardKeane 1m
    Not sure the Abbott of the “ditch the witch” placard can talk too much about stopping divisiveness, but anyway.]

  12. Sean Tisme

    Posted Sunday, August 4, 2013 at 5:07 pm | Permalink

    Melbourne Poll was paid for by the Greens…

    I’m calling bullshit on it
    —————————————————-

    Well that’s convinced me!!!

    I believe it now

  15. [Bernard Keane ‏@BernardKeane 33s
    “Do you really think Australia needs another three years like the six years we’ve just had?” Good line from Abbott]

    No surprises he’s playing the unity, stability line.

  16. Bad timing for Piers. He’s having a quadruple bypass operation and will be out of action for a month. What will his ferals do?

    Good news for Piers though. If they can’t get enough vein from his legs they can try his fat head.Not nice I know but who cares about this shit?

  18. MB

    I wasn’t judging “how boring”. Abbott wins by a mile because it started negatively and went down from there.
    Best actor/presenter? Rudd.

  19. Bernand Keane beautifully illustrates how superficial the press pack are. Love the lines and slogans, easy to package for reports

  22. guytaur
    Posted Sunday, August 4, 2013 at 5:17 pm | PERMALINK
    Slow Autocue?

    —————

    Fear of debating Rudd ?

  24. lizzie
    Posted Sunday, August 4, 2013 at 5:20 pm | PERMALINK
    MB

    I wasn’t judging “how boring”. Abbott wins by a mile because it started negatively and went down from there.
    Best actor/presenter? Rudd.

    ————–

    Fair enough

    cant argue wiht your points then 🙂

  25. Ooo just in from the LNP

    [Dear ru

    The election has now been called for September 7.

    The election is the clearest choice in a generation – it’s a choice between a truly united Coalition with our Real Solutions Plan or Labor and its chaos, division, dysfunction.

    Only the Coalition has a Plan to build a strong, prosperous economy and a safe, secure Australia.

    The Coalition offers real change and will deliver a genuinely united government and a better future – for all Australians.

    Labor hasn’t changed at all over the last six years – it’s still the same Kevin Rudd and same old Labor.

    In the last week Labor announced two more taxes that will hit the pockets of Australians. All the while the boats keep coming and the debt will keep increasing.

    You can start the 34-day election campaign by donating $34 to help us get the message out. Please visit http://www.lnp.org.au/change to make a contribution.

    Without your support we will be outspent by Labor’s cashed up union movement.

    One thing’s for sure – Australians simply can’t afford three more years of Labor’s reckless spending, debt, deficits and new taxes.

    Yours faithfully

    Bruce McIver
    LNP President]

  26. That commission of audit ought to be a millstone for Abbott after Newman. It’s a mistake that Labor should go hard on.

  31. Abbott stating in advance that he knows he could never negotiate a hung parliament. Trying to make a virtue of necessity 🙂

  41. you would all remember how abbott told pm JG to pick up
    the phone to Nauru

    now this, not starting off too good already
    ==============================================================

    theABC News ‏@abcnews 6m
    Abbott: We’ll work with our friends and neighbours but we’ll never rely on another country to do the [border protection] job. #ausvotes

    Collapse Reply
    Retweet

    =======================================================

    day in day out he told the gov and JG to pick up the phone to Nauru and now he says the above

    o dear

  44. Abbott wimping the debate questions, uses the Loughlane has written a letter excuse -whats in the friggin letter Tony?

  45. Abbott is going to propose community forums for his debates and won’t show up to more than one formal debate. And he might get away with it. He’ll argue that debates should be with the people, not the press.

  46. While Milne is certainly not an engaging public performer, she shares this attribute with Gillard, Julie Bishop, Tony Abbott, Joe Hockey and indeed, most politicians.

    She’s certainly no worse than most politicians. Bernie Fraser (technically not a pollie) was a good deal worse.

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