Seat of the week: Canberra

The Liberals once won the seat covering the southern half of the national capital at a by-election during the terminal phase of the Keating government, but they wouldn’t be holding their breath waiting for it to happen again.

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

The electorate of Canberra covers the southern half of the national capital together with the bulk of the Australian Capital Territory’s undeveloped remainder, with northern Canberra accommodated by the seat of Fraser. Both seats were created when the territory was first divided into two electorates in 1974. The Australian Capital Territory had been a single electorate since the expansion of parliament in 1949, but its member only obtained full voting rights in 1968. A third electorate of Namadgi was created for the 1996 election, accommodating Tuggeranong and its surrounds in Canberra’s far south, which pushed the Canberra electorate north of Lake Burley Griffin to include the city’s centre and inner north. However, the previous order was reinstated when the seat entitlement slipped back to two at the 1998 election, in large part due to Howard government cutbacks to the federal public service. The two ACT electorates presently have enrolments of around 140,000 voters each, compared with a national average of around 105,000.

The Australian Capital Territory electorate was won by an independent at its first election in 1949, but was held by Labor after 1951. Kep Enderby came to the seat at a 1970 by-election and carried over to Canberra in 1974, succeeding Lionel Murphy as Attorney-General upon his appointment to the High Court in early 1975. Enderby was then dumped by a 10.4% swing to the Liberals at the December 1975 election, and for the next two terms the seat was held for the Liberals by John Haslem. The seat’s natural Labor inclination finally reasserted itself in 1980 with the election of Ros Kelly, who served in the Hawke-Keating ministries from 1987 until she fell victim to the still notorious “sports rorts” affair in 1994. Kelly’s indulgent departure from parliament a year later was followed by a disastrous by-election result for Labor, with Liberal candidate Brendan Smyth gaining the seat off a 16.2% swing.

Smyth unsuccessfully contested the new seat of Namadgi at the 1996 election, and Canberra was easily won for Labor by Bob McMullan, who had served the ACT as a Senator since 1988. The reassertion of the old boundaries in 1998 prompted McMullan to move to Fraser, the Labor margin in the redrawn Canberra being 5.1% lower than the one he had secured on the short-lived boundaries in 1996. Canberra went to Annette Ellis, who had entered parliament as the member for Namadgi in 1996, while Fraser MP Steve Darvagel agreed to go quietly after a brief parliamentary career that began when he succeeded John Langmore at a by-election in February 1997. Ellis added 7.2% to an existing 2.3% margin at the 1998 election, since which time the seat has returned fairly consistent results with Labor margins ranging from a low of 7.0% in 2013 to a high of 11.8% in 2007.

Both Ellis and McMullan announced they would not seek another term six months out from the August 2010 election. Large fields of preselection contestants emerged for the two seats, with the front-runner in Canberra initially thought to be Michael Cooney, chief-of-staff to ACT Education Minister Andrew Barr and a former adviser to opposition leaders Mark Latham and Kim Beazley. However, Cooney shortly withdrew amid suggestions Kevin Rudd was ready to use national executive intervention to block him. The eventual winner was Gai Brodtmann, a former DFAT public servant who had established a local communications consultancy with her husband, senior ABC reporter Chris Uhlmann. Together with Andrew Leigh’s win in Fraser, Brodtmann’s preselection was seen as a rebuff to local factional powerbrokers who had pursued a deal in which the Left was to support Mary Wood, adviser to Housing Minister Tanya Plibersek and member of the Centre Coalition (Right), which the Right was to reciprocate in Fraser by backing Nick Martin, the party’s assistant national secretary and a member of the Left. However, Brodtmann was able to build a cross-factional support base of sufficient breadth to prevail over Wood by 123 votes to 109. Following the 2013 election defeat she was promoted to shadow parliamentary secretary in the defence portfolio.

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.

1,955 comments on “Seat of the week: Canberra”

Comments Page 37 of 40
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  1. In case not posted here previously, turns out the “merit” of Whitehouse Design Chairman’s Scholarship has been one of genetics.

    It was revealed by New Maltida reporter, Mr. Graham, on Channel 10 this morning, the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner.

  3. Labor needs to emphasise that the nasty budget is due to ridiculous policies such as

    direct action ie taxpayers money to pay polluters.
    PPL that will cost. 5 billion per annum

  5. Atticus

    Wasn’t there something on twitter, an application form for a scholarship at whitehouse?

    There was only one question: what is your father’s name?

  6. briefly

    It is good. I am sensing that Labor really need to draw a line in the sand on this budget. The coalition is no doubt expecting them to back down in several areas.
    I feel that Labor must not give them any quarter. As you have said, this whole budget is a complete dud

  8. Will be interesting to see the outcome of Rogerson talking to the police, and what they’ve got on him.

    Is it only that his house is so close to the murder scene, or is there other forensics or info that’s been given to police.

    Or was the victim a police informant and they were onto the whole deal, but it went belly up.

  9. psyclaw

    Dont know if the reporting is accurate, but it appears the student was a police informer in light of the substantial CCTV footage taken of the movements of this person

  10. Victoria,
    Program was Studio 10 whose regular panel includes Ita Buttrose and Jessica Rowe. All panelists asked questions which were actually statements attempting to whitewash the PM’s actions, but Graham (Editor of New Maltida) was masterful in quietly demolishing every bogus justification/excuse/spin and then bringing out all the salient points of the matter.

  11. Zoomster

    [right. So what I’m trying to determine (and I’m not going for the gotcha here, although obviously my musings have been sparked by the Greens opposition to the deficit levy) is at what level a higher income tax rate should kick in, in a well designed system?]

    From my perspective the total net burden of contribution (not merely just “tax”) should be scaled incrementally more significantly from AFTWE up. I also believe we should have some way of evaluating “wealth” derived from lifestyle — so as to ensure that people who were substantially advantaged in practice contributed aptly, regardless of what their notional wealth/income on paper suggested. The wealthy have proved very adept at hiding their advantage for tax purposes.

    That said, there are some constraints. Contributions should not be arbitrarily decided (since they should be capable of being reviewed by courts) and compliance that does not have reasonable ROIs is not desirable.

    That’s why I am somewhat in favour of greater reliance on indirect taxes and duties, bank and equity transaction taxes,a wider and more aggressive capital gains tax, resources rent taxes and so forth. The system should allow those who can show that they are in the bottom half of the income distribution to obtain means-tested access to subsidised services and/or cash rebates/tax refunds do that these measures do not have a regressive effect.

    Equally, negative gearing would have to be abolished, and we’d simply remove the favourable tax treatment of super above a certain multiple of income.

    I’d also like a system which set a cap of 25 as the maximum difference between the remuneration package of any one full-time employee of a company and any other full-time employee beyond which the company would be progressively denied the scope to treat this as a business expense for tax purposes. At a multiple of 50, surcharges would kick in.

    Under my system, people like me on nearly $90k pa would be amongst those paying more in net terms, though obviously the higher up the scale we went, the more that net burden would increase.

  13. [It was revealed by New Maltida reporter, Mr. Graham, on Channel 10 this morning, the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner.]

    ROTFLOL

    It’s not what you know but who you know.

  14. Mr. Graham was one of the most effective interviewees I’ve seen in many moons, in terms of minimal emotive rhetoric, sound reasoning and a low-key manner of speaking.

  15. Diog

    tsk. I’m sure she submitted a folio, ‘averaged’ Distinction grades, and was such an outstanding student she was offered a Masters position and given further employment by the College…

  16. [Although I suspect Abbott is confident that this matter will quietly go away very soon].

    My impression was that the chief reason Mr. Graham was given this opportunity to keep the matter in front of the public was that the panelists (or program producer) reckoned they’d be seen as the avenging angels who kicked this man’s unfair “muckraking” to the kerb. If that indeed was the cunning plan, it backfired monumentally.

  17. [SO

    $20!! I was thinking they’d be more like $80.

    Scalpers will make a killing.]
    Nah, it is ICC policy that the early games of the world cup be at cheap prices.

    But my ticket to the Australia V Whoever final at Adelaide cost $90

  18. I hold no brief for Rogerson, but the ‘journo’ who repeatedly asked the leading questions was 2GB.

    Is there something about the NSW cops’ way of using the media that smells a little off?

  20. fran

    thanks for that – for the most part, I agree with you.

    I do find it concerning, still, that the Greens have an income tax policy which is only aimed at the super rich, and thus – as the other post above on tax minimisation makes clear – targets those most able to avoid it.

    Obviously more work needs to be done in this area to make the policy meaningful (and I’m not saying the Greens are Robinson Crusoe here, just that I find it surprising that they seem to have wimped it).

  21. [Did not last.”Prime Minister Tony Abbott rules out taxpayer-funded budget ad blitz” Do they ever talk to one another.]

    What was the description Abbott used for Labor – something about a disorganised rabble???

  24. [Karen Middleton ‏@KarenMMiddleton 1m
    Wow, crazy day in SA. Former SA Liberal leader Martin Hamilton-Smith defects to Labor to become a minister in State Govt. #notsincecheryl ]

  25. [1801
    Atticus

    …the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner.]

    Anybody surprised?

  30. briefly @ 1787

    [Michaelia Cash is a ranter. She should be renamed Tantrum.]

    The egregious Cash is definitively a harradin who is in need of a jolly good rabbit chop to the neck when she starts screaming. I saw her on Sky last night and I actually felt sorry for the brow-beaten interviewer having to put up with her high-decibel screeching substituting for any coherent content in her rage filled ravings.

    She reminds me of ‘The Parrot’ in the way her volume and pitch increases as she is confronted with her ever more illogical and disjointed responses drawing incredulous looks from her interlocutors.

    Someone install an attenuation switch to tweak her down a few notches.

  33. For some months I have suspected that Michaela has (or would like to have) a very special relationship with Tone. The screeching in his defence is quite over the top. The smiles when aked to comment, very smug.

  34. Just me,
    Worst aspect is that in the Whithouse Design’s first press release to explain their “merit” scholarship system, they appear to have attempted to imply the award of the same scholarship to another recipient was evidence that it was fair-dinkum. They were probably correct that the hundreds of crack journos in the MSM would not bother to find out the identity. Thank goodness for online media such as Crikey.com.au and New Matilda (which almost folded recently!) and even the Oz Guardian.

  35. [breaking: former S.A. Lib Leader, Hamilton-Smith, has defected
    to Labor.]
    Wow! What a coup.
    Steven Marshall must have political incontinence.

  36. Shellbell:

    [This is just errant nonsense.]

    This is not incorrect. It makes perfect sense, but I suspect you intended “arrant” rather than “errant”. Apologies if I’m wrong.

  41. Interestingly, the words errant and arrant have a common root in the Latin for “to go” (ire and subsubsequently iterare).

    To err derives from the idea of wandering away, presumably from rectitude.

  43. [ It was revealed by New Maltida reporter, Mr. Graham, on Channel 10 this morning, the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner. ]

    Oh Dear. 🙁

    I feel a bit sorry for his daughter, but not that much. She accepted the perk of having people trying to suck up to daddy and any fallout is part of the price of that.

    Now Abbott can get all indignant about having his family targeted, but that’s the price of using them as props during the election. Suck it up Princess.

  45. [Atticus

    It was revealed by New Maltida reporter, Mr. Graham, on Channel 10 this morning, the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner.]

    The awarding of the two scholarships would have to be a significant ‘own goal’ by Whitehouse and its owner/directors.

    The reputation of the company has been significantly tarnished and students facing $60,000 in fees would be seriously tempted to go to a rival institution. Doubtless these rival institutions (hopefully including TAFE) would not be backward in promoting their courses to potential students.

  46. [Fran Barlow
    Posted Tuesday, May 27, 2014 at 11:29 am | Permalink

    BW

    Use of dissmissive, emotive and incorrect terms such as ‘meh’, ‘abducted’ and ‘held without charge’ is more of the same.

    Actually, these are all, in context, aptly used.]

    Putting asylum seekers into detention facilities is not ‘abduction’. They are not ‘held without charge’. They are detained pending a refugee determination.

    [BTW, I have yet to hear a Greens congratulate Morrison for stopping the drownings which had reached the cumulative total of around 1600 and climbing.

    ‘I hope none of us ever does anything similar, and if someone does, I will work to have them removed from our ranks. No such person ought to be abided in our party.]

    I am still wondering why the Greens are not congratulating Morrison for putting an end to the drownings. He stopped the boats and he stopped the drownings.

    [Or wasn’t it about stopping the mass drownings of men, women and children after all?

    ‘As you well know, that was mere eyewash…’]

    1600 deaths is ‘mere eyewash’? To the Greens maybe. Your attitude may explain why you guys were content to use your BOP to maintain the drownings regime.

  47. [ In case not posted here previously, turns out the “merit” of Whitehouse Design Chairman’s Scholarship has been one of genetics.

    It was revealed by New Maltida reporter, Mr. Graham, on Channel 10 this morning, the identity of the only other scholarship recipient beside Ms. Abbott was Billy Whitehouse, daughter of the owner. ]

    Absolutely disgraceful, isn’t it?

    If I was a fee-paying attendee of Whitehouse, I’d be up in arms.

    And if I was a member of the LNP, I’d be asking Abbott to at least show the same level of ethical conduct as Barry O’Farrell has shown.

  48. [ breaking: former S.A. Lib Leader, Hamilton-Smith, has defected to Labor. ]

    Cue Pyne on “illegitimate govt” ?? 🙂

    Would have loved to be a fly on the wall in the PM’s office when that news came through.

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