Seat of the week: Bowman

Covering Brisbane’s coastal outer south, Andrew Laming’s seat of Bowman came within 64 votes of falling to Labor under Kevin Rudd in 2007, before going dramatically the other way as part of the statewide backlash three years later.

Bowman covers Brisbane’s coastal outer south from Thorneside through Capalaba and Sheldon to Redland Bay, and extends across the southern part of Moreton Bay to North Stradbroke Island. It has existed in name since 1949, but did not include any of its current territory until 1969, instead being based in Brisbane’s inner south-east. The 1969 redistribution caused the redrawn electorate to extend from the mouths of the Brisbane River in the north to the Logan River in the south, the latter also marking the Bowman’s southern extremity today. The area now covered by Bowman began to acquire its suburban character at around this time. With the redistribution of 1977, the southern part of the electorate came to be accommodated by the newly created electorate of Fadden. Bowman’s present dimensions were established when its northern neighbour Bonner was created to accommodate the Wynnum-Manly area at the 2004 election, setting Thorneside as the northern extremity of Bowman.

Bowman in its various permutations has been a marginal seat for most of its history, having been held by the Liberals throughout the Menzies and Holt years outside of a win by Labor as part of its near-victory at the 1961 election. It next changed hands with the big swing to Labor under Gough Whitlam’s leadership in 1969, and would henceforth go with the government of the day until 1998. Leonard Keogh held the seat for Labor from 1969 to 1975 and again after 1983, and also contested unsuccessfully in 1977 and 1980. Keogh was defeated for preselection in 1987 by Con Sciacca, who lost the seat to Liberal candidate Andrea West in 1996 before winning it back again in 1998. The Liberal member during the Fraser years was David Jull, who re-emerged as member for Fadden in 1984.

The reorganisation caused by the creation of Bonner in 2004 boosted the Liberal margin in Bowman by 4.4%, prompting Sciacca to unsuccessfully try his hand in Bonner. Bowman meanwhile was won by Liberal candidate Andrew Laming, an ophthalmologist and World Bank health consultant who added a solid 5.9% to the notional Liberal margin of 3.0%. Laming spent much of 2007 under the shadow of the “printgate” affair, in which he was investigated for allegedly claiming $67,000 to print campaign material for state election candidates, before being cleared two months before the election. After rumblings that the affair might cost him his preselection, Laming survived an 8.9% swing to Labor at the 2007 election to hold on by 64 votes. He had a much easier time of it in 2010, his 10.4% swing being strong even by the standards of Queensland at that election. There was a correction in Labor’s favour of 1.5% at the 2013 election, going slightly against the trend of a 1.3% statewide swing to the Liberal National Party.

Laming was promoted to the position of shadow parliamentary secretary for regional health services and indigenous health after the 2010 election, but was dropped after the Abbott government came to power.

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.

1,053 comments on “Seat of the week: Bowman”

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  2. I think of Rudd as the bull, the ten guys holding the end of the rope are Caucus, and the various victims are Labor supporters.

  3. Today’s Mumble:

    [Today a conspiracy-theory-inclined group the HS Chapman Society, named after the man credited with drafting those first Victorian ballot laws in the summer of 1855–6, advocates bringing back the traceable ballot.

    On this issue they may have a point.

    It’s worth considering anyway, particularly in the context of further moves towards electronic voting.

    Vote-buying would be less an issue today than “Big Brother” concerns. The last thing we want is voting records attached to the electoral roll, and databases being what they are—able to be linked on fields—that’s what you would end up with if we didn’t put in some serious safeguards.]
    http://blogs.theaustralian.news.com.au/mumble/index.php/theaustralian/comments/time_to_trace_the_vote/

    My preference is for electoral reform that can address the Senate voting in particular, esp preferences before looking at electronic ballots etc.

    But still, an interesting post by Brent.

  4. When I check ABC News Online all they tell me is that there was a horse race today. I wonder if I should look for sly announcements from the Government?

  6. [and the various victims are Labor supporters.]

    And anyone who wants good government, which is essentially what we had with Gillard’s minority govt.

  14. [I note Campbell Newman’s Govt has still not replaced Barnaby Joyce in the Senate.]

    I thought someone was nominated, but was deemed unsuitable after ‘revelations’ surfaced about him.

  17. [I thought someone was nominated, but was deemed unsuitable after ‘revelations’ surfaced about him.]

    No O’Sullivan is still the chosen one, its just a matter of the CMC clearing him of inducing Dr Flegg to give his seat to Mr Newman.

    Maybe tricky given the audio recordings.

  19. No news from the high court hearing yesterday as to which states etc will show up at ACT/ Commonwealth hearing and which sides they will support

  20. rua:

    I guess they don’t have to worry about the Senate makeup until July, so there’s time to wait out various investigations.

  21. I guess Chris Berg gets credit for making a forceful case that the O’Farrell government’s donation reforms were a blatant attack on the ALP and that this was bad for democracy.

    However, I can’t help but feel that the IPA’s real position is that they would love to see a “Citizens United” decision in Australia opening the door to unlimited donations from corporations to campaign for and influence politicians.

    What an unjoyous thing that would be.

  22. [I guess they don’t have to worry about the Senate makeup until July, so there’s time to wait out various investigations.]

    Maybe, but I and all Qlders are not being fully represented when Parliament sits. For no reason other than LNP internal politics.

  23. I for one will be most disappointed if Labor gets all “tactical” in deciding what to vote for and what to vote against. That’s one of the things that has got us to the current position.

    What’s wrong with voting for things you agree with and against things that you don’t, with room for compromise if a middle position can be found that everyone can live with?

    Then you never have the problem in the future of being ridiculed for your abandonment of past voting records.

    The public will actually respect this. Much of the dislike of politicians is generated by the perception that they will do anything for political advantage – Labor should mark itself out as having broken with that sort of behaviour.

  24. rua:

    Reactionaries continue to demonstrate they have little regard for the public interest.

    I’ve given up waiting for the penny to drop with voters.

  25. The trouble in Queensland is three-fold:

    a) always right-wing loonies who get big support are foreigners (Joh, Newman)

    b) little men can never admit they are wrong or ever compromise (Newman)

    c) never elect a soldier (is an engineer a soldier?) to a government position

  30. The ALPs mistake after Keating was to run away from policies, The Liberal mistake after Howard was to run away from policies.

    If you don’t stand for something you stand for nothing. Both parties should know it by now.

  31. [c) never elect a soldier to a government position]

    Winston Churchill, Dwight Eisenhower, Charles de Gaulle. All three vastly superior to the current holders of their respective offices.

  32. While Churchill was an army officer, he was predominantly and author and politician. Has any other Prime Minister received the Nobel Prize in Literature?

  33. davidwh

    [Swamprat I could take offence to your generalizations. ;)]

    I have never made a generalization in my life.

    I may have done the odd generalisation, but that’s a different story.

  34. Psephos

    [All three vastly superior to the current holders of their respective offices.]

    Doubtful, but even if one could argue their marginal superiority, the bar is set so low by the incumbents, that the claim wouldn’t amount to much.

  35. Psephos

    My line was not meant to be too serious. Just a statement of the importance of keeping military officers out of government in the westminster system.

    Churchill was hardly a professional military officer.

    I am surprised you did not nominate Julias Ceasar, Genghis Kahn and Napoleon, to prove whatever rightist point you were trying to make!!

  36. I think business leaders probably make the worst kind of political leader. I think because they’re adept in one kind of leadership style, they can’t transfer to a different one (and many probably assume they’re the same.)

  38. 981

    Winston Churchill has a generally good historical review because he was correct about Hitler. He was wrong about many issues. Had he won the election in 1945, he may have caused an Indian War of Independence.

    Charles de Gaulle got into power because the parts of the Army in Algeria threatened a coup in 1958 (including an uncontested paratrooper invasion of Corsica) if they did not get him as president. Protesters calling for Algerian independence were thrown in the Seine by police to drown in 1961. To his credit he did give independence to Algeria. He made the French system of government to presidential.

  42. @Carey/986

    But apparently business leaders are models that we should inspire too!!! (Despite business leaders causing GFC’s, etc).

  46. I think I should expand on my post in 986, as it’s true that many leaders have gone from one leadership style to another and they’ve done well, even excelled (e.g. military leaders, union leaders, community leaders etc.), whereas business leaders haven’t.

    I think the fundamental difference is all of the others have to take the welfare of those they are leading into consideration, whereas a business leader only has to care about the bottom line (profits etc.) Even if you are a small government, libertarian political leader, the welfare of those you’re governing still has to be a consideration.

  48. [So, which Australian would have made the best ever prime minister, had s/he become prime minister?]

    Dr John Hewson in a narrow victory in 1993. because:

    1. he probably would have been a one termer (he would not have had the senate to introduce fightback)
    2. had he survived he would have been a decent ‘liberal’ on social and environmental issues
    3. howard would never have become PM and may have left parliament for the 1996 election.
    4. the LNP would still be a more ‘liberal’ party
    5. labor would not have drifted so far right
    6. australia would not be lurching madly to the lunar right

    I loved keating winning in 1993, but sometimes wonder if ‘the sweetest victory of all’ was not a curse for progressive australia.

  49. Boerwar:

    The sorts of people I’d prefer to see as PM would either never be in a position to do so, or would never be interested.

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