Seat of the week: Barker

A conservative rural seat since the dawn of federation, Barker is under new management after Tony Pasin defeated incumbent Patrick Secker for Liberal preselection ahead of the 2013 election.

Blue and red numbers respectively indicate booths with two-party majorities for Liberal and Labor. Click for larger image. Map boundaries courtesy of Ben Raue at The Tally Room.

Barker encompasses South Australia along the Victorian border from Mount Gambier north to the Riverland and its population centres of Renmark, Loxton, Berri and Waikerie, extending westwards to the mouth of the Murray River and the towns of Angaston and Murray Bridge 75 kilometres to the east of Adelaide. It has existed since South Australia was first divided into single-member electorates in 1903, at all times encompassing the state’s south-eastern corner including Mount Gambier, Bordertown and Keith. From there it has generally extended either westwards to the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island or, as at present, northwards to the Riverland. The former territories were lost when Mayo was created with the expansion of parliament in 1984, but recovered from 1993 to 2004 as Mayo was drawn into Adelaide’s outskirts. The Riverland was accommodated by Angas prior to its abolition in 1977, and by Wakefield from 1993 to 2004. Barker’s present dimensions were established when South Australia’s representation was cut from twelve seats to eleven at the 2004 election, causing Barker to take back the Riverland from a radically redrawn Wakefield, while Mayo recovered the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island.

The areas covered by Barker presently and in the past have long been safe for the conservatives, the Riverland last having had Labor representation when Albert Smith held Wakefield for a term after the 1943 landslide. Barker has never been in Labor hands, nor come close to doing so since territory in southern Adelaide was ceded to the new seat of Kingston in 1949. Archie Cameron held the seat for the Country Party from 1934 to 1940, having been effectively granted it after helping facilitate a merger of the state’s conservative forces as the Liberal Country League while serving as the Country Party’s state parliamentary leader. Cameron succeeded Earle Page as federal parliamentary leader in 1939 but was deposed after the election the following year, causing him to quit the party and align himself with the United Australia Party and then the Liberal Party, which has held Barker ever since. He was succeeded in Barker on his retirement in 1956 by Jim Forbes, who was in turn succeeded in 1975 by James Porter.

Porter was defeated for preselection in 1990 by Ian McLachlan, a former high-profile National Farmers Federation president whom some were touting as a future prime minister. He would instead serve only a single term as a cabinet minister, holding the defence portfolio in the first term of the Howard government, before retiring at the 1998 election. McLachlan’s successor was Patrick Secker, who led a generally low-profile parliamentary career before being unseated for preselection before the 2013 election. Despite endorsement from Tony Abbott and moderate factional powerbroker Christopher Pyne, Secker reportedly lost a local ballot to Mount Gambier lawyer Tony Pasin by 164 votes to 78, with a further 40 recorded for Millicent real estate agent and Wattle Range councillor Ben Treloar. Pasin picked up a 3.5% swing at the election and holds the seat with a margin of 16.5%.

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.

3,554 comments on “Seat of the week: Barker”

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  2. ‘fess

    [Consequently I chose law for my elective in Year 12.]

    As part-time student my boss ‘suggested’ Law at very nearby Kings College, London. I made it just.

    Last year at a dinner event he said in a grumpy way “If I’d known you’d still be around I would have recommended Economics”.

    FMD!

  3. Zoomster

    Australia made a commitment for 5 years or so, but without the strong and enthusiastic involvement of the Malaysian government these sort of agreements rapidly lose their status.

    That is why legislative committment or some sort of binding agreement was needed. Something that made it clear that after 5 years or so the people would not be abamdoned anmd lost. The sort of scenario that i feared are these:
    1. Australia honors its part of the bargain and makes sure that say a girl of 11 is educated until she is 16. Perhaps her family dies or has no employment so she is falls victim to the sex trade.
    2. A boy at 16 may get into minor trouble, spend some time in jail and is then deported.
    3.An adult may start to take an interest in political affairs and is deported home and even executed.

    The point is that under the “agreement” Australia lost any control or involvement with adults at all and just with children until 16. They may have had some commitment to medical care I am not sure, but certainly no commitment to provide shelter, food or employment. The reality is that after 5 years in Malaysia with no work many will have died, turned to crime or for girls to sex work.

    There was no long term Australian involvement in providing consular or emergency support for these people or even for keeping details on the whereabouts after being deposited in Malaysia. Now MALAYSIAN commitment to ensure that the refugees had food, shelter medical care and non refoulment, would have allowed Australia to hand over responsibility with a clear conscience. Without this commitment frankly the deal was a no goer.

  4. [The Piping Shrike ‏@Piping_Shrike 3h
    Chris Pyne is right. Our kids spend too much time spouting off Hindu and Muslim values, and not enough time on Judeo-Christian ones.]

    I’m assuming we are still in the dark about just what judeo-christian values are.

  5. @rossmcg

    When undertaking a long, arduous expedition into unexplored and unhospital lands, make sure you remember to bring all the essentials… like a gigantic chinese gong, antique furniture, and three wagons worth of salted meat. And if someone you don’t get along with offers to help you out by shipping much of your equipment up the Murray Darling for you, its prudent to refuse their offer – having to take it all yourself is a worthwhile cost for the opportunity to slight a rival.

    I mean, what’s the worst that could happen?

  7. Re Jackol @3470 – I don’t think that Politifact will be getting its funding back any time soon. The last thing a Mendocracy wants or needs is facts, other than those it makes up.

  8. CTar1

    [“If I’d known you’d still be around I would have recommended Economics”.]
    If only we could hear the chap’s accent 😆

  10. dtt

    most of your scenarios could apply to people who ended up settled in Australia, too, particularly if they had not taken out Australian citizenship.

    Arguing about what might have happened to refugees settled in Malaysia under the deal is a bit pointless, since it’s all hypothetical. I could equally put up scenarios where every single refugee ended up living in bliss. We simply don’t know what problems/benefits would have unfolded over time.

    I have no doubt that some of the arrangements were less than ideal. However, neither is the present situation. The Malaysian solution – or something similar to it – still seems to me to be the best way forward.

  11. [Just look at some Tories for advice on how to cultivate combover. Maurice Newman is a good starting point]

    I rather favour the shave it all off approach, myself (with a bushy beard to compensate). I’ve seen twenty-something guys with combovers… its, er, not a great look.

    There was a poor guy I used to work with who had obviously had long-ish hair for some time and was clearly in denial of his receding hairline. Over several years he went from a reasonably normal looking guy to that creepy old guy from the Rocky Horror Picture Show… expect he still had some hair at the front, which meant there was a gigantic lock of hair hanging from his forehead that he tried to comb back with the rest of his hair.

    There was also a former boss of mine who favoured the Donald Trump do. An interesting look on someone in their early thirties!

  12. Asha

    didn’t they drag a couple of truly ridiculous items with them? – I have memories of something like a piano.

    Another set of explorers took a boat with them for the entire trip. As they were heading into the desert, they never used it.

  13. ruawake@3499

    Asha Leu

    Male pattern baldness is a sign of testosterone, embrace it.

    “>ruawake@3499

    Asha Leu

    Male pattern baldness is a sign of testosterone, embrace it.

    ruawake@3499

    Asha Leu

    Male pattern baldness is a sign of testosterone, embrace it.

    That is a furphy. Baldness has nothing to do with high levels of testosterone, except that it is mostly a male thing.

    There was a study done very recently on this.

  16. @zoomster 3512

    It wouldn’t surprise me.

    Then there was Kennedy, name-sake of Katter’s electorate, who ventured throuh the Queensland rainforests with many wagons full of the most fashionable and expensive garments of the time, which he and his team must have been very thankful during an agonisingly slow journey consisting of cutting their way through thick jungle (so their huge convoy could get through, you see…) interspersed with brief interludes of getting killed by local indigenous tribes.

    At least I think it was Kennedy. I know it was one of the explorers my high school sports teams were named after, the others being Leichardt and Jardine.

  17. poroti@3515

    don

    Male pattern baldness actually creates a solar panel for a sex machine. Or so they say

    ‘they’ being those who have gone bald!

    Women rarely go really bald, but a significant percentage get noticeable thinning of the hair.

  21. [That is a furphy. Baldness has nothing to do with high levels of testosterone, except that it is mostly a male thing.]

    Don as usual you are wrong. I have recently started to take testosterone supplements. One of the side effects is hair growth, I have noticed this, except in the male pattern baldness areas.

    I mentioned this to my GP and he said that testosterone levels are the cause of male pattern baldness but supplementation will not reverse the change. This is because the “damage” is done too early.

    [ Below normal values of Sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG), Follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), testosterone and epitestosterone are present in men with premature androgenic alopecia compared to normal controls.]

    Facts. 😛

  22. Too add to the myth.

    [The role of testosterone in premature balding has led to the myth that going bald is a sign of virility. However, men with male pattern baldness aren’t any more well-endowed with testosterone than other guys. Their hair follicles are simply more sensitive to the hormones.]

  23. [Palmer knows his place when parking – mentally disabled???

    Or does being a big fat right wing politician rate as disabled?

    ]
    AA
    What a shithead!!

  24. ruawake@3521

    That is a furphy. Baldness has nothing to do with high levels of testosterone, except that it is mostly a male thing.


    Don as usual you are wrong. I have recently started to take testosterone supplements. One of the side effects is hair growth, I have noticed this, except in the male pattern baldness areas.

    I mentioned this to my GP and he said that testosterone levels are the cause of male pattern baldness but supplementation will not reverse the change. This is because the “damage” is done too early.

    Below normal values of Sex hormone-binding globulin (SHBG), Follicle-stimulating hormone (FSH), testosterone and epitestosterone are present in men with premature androgenic alopecia compared to normal controls.


    Facts.

    Nope. You and your doctor are wrong. It’s much more complicated than that.

    Men who are castrated early (eunuchs) don’t get male pattern baldness, that is true.

    But it is a derivative of testosterone, called dihydrotestosterone or DHT which causes male pattern baldness.

    [ The genetic influence in pattern baldness, on the other hand, causes hair follicles on the front, top and crown of the head to end up different from those on the sides. What makes them different is that they carry receptors susceptible to DHT, the chemical made by the body from testosterone from around puberty.

    DHT alters the growing cycle of hair. Silken tresses normally result from a long growing phase – two years or more – followed by a short resting phase. But DHT gradually reverses this cycle until eventually the resting period is so long that there’s no new hair coming through to replace the 100 to 150 hairs we lose daily as part of natural shedding.

    The same genetic pattern occurs in women, but because they have smaller amounts of testosterone, which for much of their lives is buffered by female hormones, pattern balding only starts to occur after the menopause. And, since DHT works by persistent attrition over time, this late start means women generally only experience thinning hair as they grow older and rarely get bald spots. Taking HRT with its boost of female hormones can postpone it even further.

    Only scalp hair can be affected by DHT; body hair is controlled by testosterone itself. And the hair follicles on the sides and back of the head never acquire the DHT receptor, hence the success of surgery which transplants hair follicles from these areas to bare spots on the crown. ]

    http://www.independent.co.uk/arts-entertainment/science-why-eunuchs-dont-wear-toupees-1151862.html

    Few people would say that it is an excess of testosterone that causes baldness in women.

  25. Looks like the whole of the south of WA is on a total fire ban for tomorrow, with much of the Wheatbelt on catastrophic fire warnings.

  26. Aaha rua et al
    I dont know about testosterone but most of the males in my family on my fathers side are bald … My father grandfather and brother, my uncle and his sons …. My maternal grandfather died in his 70s with a full head of hair and I am looking good, grey but it’s all there. I dunno whether it’s testosterone or genes and having or not having hair doesn’t make you a better or worse person.

  27. Here’s another myth buster:

    http://www.bernsteinmedical.com/hair-loss/faq-myths-more/hair-loss-myths/

    [ Myth #2
    Men who are bald have high levels of testosterone.

    Fact: This myth falls into the same category as the “size of a man’s hands or feet…” Hair loss is caused by a greater sensitivity of hair follicles in some parts of the scalp to DHT (dihydrotestosterone), rather than to increased levels of testosterone per se. DHT causes the hair follicles to shrink (miniaturize) and eventually disappear. If elevated levels of testosterone were the problem, then “all” of ones body hair should be expected to fall out as well.
    ]

  28. poroti

    The same.

    They all become ‘Lord’ if they can make it to the top..

    Even Gus who went from being Gus O’Donell to Sir (GoD) to Lord O’Donnell (LoD).

    LoD works well with me,

  29. don

    If you care to read what I stated about testosterone, I purposely did not mention a level. Plus where the fuck does DHT (androstanolone) come from outer space.

    I was making a lighthearted comment and you try and prove you know jack shit.

    Stick to rocks.

  31. rossmcg@3526

    Aaha rua et al
    I dont know about testosterone but most of the males in my family on my fathers side are bald … My father grandfather and brother, my uncle and his sons …. My maternal grandfather died in his 70s with a full head of hair and I am looking good, grey but it’s all there. I dunno whether it’s testosterone or genes and having or not having hair doesn’t make you a better or worse person.

    As with most hereditary traits, it is a matter of choosing your parents wisely. 😛

  32. Speaking of testosterone:

    [A WA study has found older men with high levels of testosterone may be just as vulnerable to health problems as those with a deficiency.

    Researchers from the University of WA measured the testosterone in almost four thousand men aged between 70 and 89.

    They monitored men’s health over a long period, finding those with mid-range levels of testosterone had the best survival rate.]
    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-01-11/men-study/5195526?section=wa

  33. Being gen x and never having much interest in Aus history I must say I have learned a lot about it today from PB. No need for curriculum changes just direct the young-uns to PB. But seriously who cares, there r a million ways to get information about history if u r interested. If u r not then it will b in one ear out the other, if engaged then will do ur own research. Currently I would settle for people on this country understanding what is happening in the present.

  34. vk
    [Currently I would settle for people on this country understanding what is happening in the present.]
    That may require knowing some history ;).

  35. School curriculum is just the latest culture war pinata for Australian reactionaries which they’ll keep on beating until it gives them the results they want. Screw the national interest. It’s always been up to Labor govts to govern in the national interest.

  37. virtualkat@3533

    Being gen x and never having much interest in Aus history I must say I have learned a lot about it today from PB. No need for curriculum changes just direct the young-uns to PB. But seriously who cares, there r a million ways to get information about history if u r interested. If u r not then it will b in one ear out the other, if engaged then will do ur own research. Currently I would settle for people on this country understanding what is happening in the present.

    My late Primary School textbook in the 1950s (as I remember it anyway) was a treasure trove of wondrous (to me) stories about European and Australian history.

    It had stories about Vasco da Gama, Columbsu, Magellan, Dirk Hartog, and other Dutch and Portugese navigators.
    We covered North American history, Canada and the US, War of Independence, British taking Canada from the French, Civil war, emancipation of slaves etc.

    We went all over the Australian explorers. WWI and touched on WWII which was not really far enough in the past to seem like history. Kokoda is about all I remember.

    I was entranced by it.

    Later in my first couple of years of High School we studied ancient history, Mesopotamia, Egypt, Greece, Alexander the Great and Rome.

    My impression is that history, as taught these days just does not cover such a broad sweep, although it may have other virtues.

    I truly enjoyed history at school.

  38. We did lots on Egypt, Romans and Greece. I guess that’s the sexy history stuff! Compared to all of that failed expeditions in a desert didn’t really compare. I don’t remember much on ww1 or 2 or much in Asia or the US (this was Vic in the 90’s). Anyway I was obsessed with the reneisance so did most of my own exploring in that period.

  45. AussieAchmed at 3456 said correctly that……
    The curriculum is a guide for teachers …………… The teachers on the ground will choose the political and other people to study, depending on the topic.

    And the teachers are the next ones in Pyne’s sights. He wants to take that power to choose away from teachers and give it to “parents and Principals”. He said “we have to end the system where teachers control everything and give that power to Principals”.

    Then he wants to change the qualifications required to be a teacher by “creating flexible pathways into teaching”. To get new and different people into teaching.
    While he is doing that he will also have “a relentless focus on the quality of new graduates” so the Libs can “control what our kids are taught and how they are taught”.

    I don’t know anything about teaching and recents posts on PB suggest that some reform is needed but this ideological stuff from the Libs is a worry. It sounds like old fashioned union busting to me as they transform schools into little businesses they can sell off.

  49. Sharon Dead

    Good Riddance
    _______________
    Sharon was a long time dying…but at leastin the end he escaped trial for the war criminal he was

    He was the prime mover in the terrible massacres of Palestinians in Beirut during the civil war…by fascist Lebanese Phalangists christian militias

    The two refugee camps at Sabra and Shatilla were under Israeli supervision after their invasion of Lebanon,,,but they allowed the Fascist Lebanese to enter and murder Palestinians in great numbers Though much criticised even at home he survived as such Israeli leaders always seem to do

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