Seat of the week: Holt

A once marginal seat now safe for Labor, Holt in Melbourne’s south-east has provided a home for Gareth Evans, and more recently Anthony Byrne.

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

Holt covers a Labor-voting area of Melbourne’s outer south-east, extending from Endeavour Hills and Narre Warren south through Hampton Park to Cranbourne. This area was accommodated by Flinders before urban expansion caught up with it after the war, then by Bruce from 1955 until the creation of Holt in 1969. The electorate was considerably larger at that time owing to the area’s lighter development, extending westwards through Dandenong to Springvale and eastwards to Emerald. Progressive redistributions reduced its area thereafter, but it continued to encompass Dandenong up to the redistribution that took effect at the 2004 election. It then assumed roughly its current dimensions, with Dandenong divided between Bruce and Isaacs, and Holt gaining Cranbourne from Isaacs.

As the balance of semi-rural areas and low-income outer suburbs tilted increasingly towards the latter, Holt transformed from highly marginal to safe for Labor. It was won for the Liberals on its creation in 1969 by Leonard Reid, then held for Labor during the Whitlam years by Max Oldmeadow, with William Yates winning it back for the Liberals in 1975. The watershed came when Michael Duffy won the seat for Labor with an 8.7% swing in 1980, and the margin was in double figures by the time Gareth Evans transferred to the seat from the Senate in 1996. Evans announced his intention to resign on the night of the 1998 election defeat, and while this ruffled feathers at the time, it did not cause trouble at the ensuing by-election for new candidate Anthony Byrne, who won easily in the absence of a Liberal candidate.

The loss of Dandenong in the 2004 redistribution cut Labor’s margin from 13.3% to 7.9%, which was followed by a further swing to the Liberals of 6.4% at the ensuing election, typifying Labor’s poor performance across Victoria. Reflecting the sensitivity of interest rates in a heavily mortgaged electorate, it then recorded a particularly forceful swing to Labor of 10.1% in 2007, joining Calwell in Melbourne’s outer north as one of two Victorian seats to record double-digit swings to Labor. The Labor margin was further boosted by 1.6% amid a generally strong result in Victoria in 2010, before a 4.9% swing in 2013 pared it back to 9.1%. A redistribution in the interim increased the margin by 0.8% through a transfer of over 14,000 voters in Narre Warren, Narre Warren South and Berwick to La Trobe in the east, a result of rapid growth in the outer suburbs generally, and around Cranbourne in particular.

The member throughout this period has been Anthony Byrne, a member of the Right faction who was widely noted as a supporter of Kevin Rudd throughout the previous government’s long-running leadership saga. Byrne won promotion to shadow parliamentary secretary for foreign affairs when Kevin Rudd became leader in December 2006, then became parliamentary secretary to the Prime Minister after the 2007 election, with the trade portfolio further added in February 2009. He reportedly switched support from Rudd to Julia Gillard for the June 2010 coup only when it became apparent that Rudd was headed for a heavy defeat, and was demoted to the back bench after the 2010 election, where he has since remained. In April 2014 he made headlines after accusing Bob Carr of “narcissism, self indulgence and immaturity” on the occasion of the latter’s book being published.

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.

607 thoughts on “Seat of the week: Holt”

Comments Page 11 of 13
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  3. Reader poll
    Has your opinion of Tony Abbott changed in the last year?
    Top of Form

    Yes, for the worse

    Yes, for the better

    No, it hasn’t changed

    Current Results
    Yes, for the worse – 71%
    Yes, for the better – 13%
    No, it hasn’t changed – 15%

  5. Re Lizzie @486: The lies kept coming with British-born, economic migrant Abbott’s Flag Day assertion that he was proud to be born under the Australian flag, clearly displaying his total disregard for the truth.

    There was also a choir of angels and three kings bearing suppositiries of wisdom.

  8. The Last Straw? Venezuela Runs Out Of Fake Breasts

    Venezuelan women are complaining. While the citizens of the socialist utopia can withstand shortages of food, toilet paper, and now even news paper, in a nation thought to have one of the world’s highest plastic surgery rates.

    AP reports beauty-obsessed Venezuelans face a scarcity of brand-name breast implants, and women are so desperate that they and their doctors are turning to devices that are the wrong size or made in China, with less rigorous quality standards. No one is giving the frustrated women much sympathy.

    …late President Hugo Chavez called the country’s plastic surgery fixation “monstrous,” and railed against the practice of giving implants to girls on their 15th birthdays.

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-15/last-straw-venezuela-runs-out-fake-breasts

  9. Venezuela: a country that the west can finally claim has gone tits up.

    Couldn’t resist … 😉

    Mind you, while food and toilet paper shortages are a problem, peak fake breast doesn’t seem to be an obvious blow to human well-being.

  10. An ageless formula –

    A Simple Primer On “War Propaganda” From An Unexpected Source

    Stop when this becomes familiar:

    The receptivity of the great masses is very limited, their intelligence is small, but their power of forgetting is enormous.

    In consequence of these facts, all effective propaganda must be limited to a very few points and must harp on these in slogans until the last member of the public understands what you want him to understand by your slogan.

    As soon as you sacrifice this slogan and try to be many-sided, the effect will piddle away, for the crowd can neither digest nor retain the material offered.

    In this way the result is weakened and in the end entirely cancelled out.

    Source: Chapter 6, “War Propaganda” of Adolf Hilter’s 1926 “Mein Kampf”

    http://www.zerohedge.com/news/2014-09-15/simple-primer-war-propaganda-unexpected-source

  12. Nick Ross ‏@NickRossTech 1m

    Australian Home Entertainment Distributors Association: Aus has the cheapest Video On Demand prices globally. #DontAskAboutSubscriptions

  13. CFMEU Vic Bill Oliver, scheduled 2b in #turc box 2day, famously had union PR who complained the job was : ‘Like putting lipstick on a pig’

  16. Abbott’s priorities on display:

    The European Union’s climate chief says it is a pity Prime Minister Tony Abbott will not attend a major UN climate meeting in New York next week.

    World leaders including US president Barack Obama and UK prime minister David Cameron will attend the UN secretary-general’s Climate Summit.

    Mr Abbott will not be attending, despite the fact that he is due to attend a UN Security Council meeting in New York the next day.

    http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-09-16/eu-climate-chief-surprised-by-australia27s-un-summit-snub/5745908

  18. 517
    Boerwar

    citizen
    Abbott is a paid-up member of the Climate Death Cult.

    He has come to power by embracing the cult. It’s not too much to say he must exult in it.

  20. briefly

    Posted Tuesday, September 16, 2014 at 2:40 am | Permalink

    I also watched the Lateline discussion on the Scottish vote. If the best the unionists can do is to roll out arrogant goons like the bloke from The Telegraph the Yes campaign should win easily.

    Never underestimate the fear factor which the right wing nutters are good at selling.

  21. Josh Taylor ‏@joshgnosis Sep 12

    Turnbull says people talk about the need for FttP for e-health but forget about the wireless and satellite being capped at 25Mbps #NBN

    Nick Ross ‏@NickRossTech 1m

    @joshgnosis @dobes @TurnbullMalcolm This sounds like another swipe against me, yet I’ve mentioned that from the start with my #NBN coverage

  22. The accusations against the NZ govt are very serious, but I do wonder if Greenwald & co haven’t gone about this in exactly the wrong way. When the Intercept broke the news my first reaction was “its too late.” This isn’t a hip pocket issue, or one easily understood in the short time before an election. They should have revealed their info ages ago. Like the “Dirty Politics” scandal, it may have come late enough that people have already made up their minds, the issues just aren’t personal enough, and there isn’t enough time left for the topic to develop its own life. This article captures some of what’s wrong with the latest approach.

    http://pando.com/2014/09/15/greenwald-in-new-zealand-grandstanding-doesnt-get-more-condescending-or-counter-productive/

    Greenwald in New Zealand: Grandstanding doesn’t get more condescending or counter-productive
    By James Robinson
    On September 15, 2014

    ………….

    As a New Zealander I felt sad and a little furious watching it happen. The biggest sadness here is that Snowden’s allegations are gravely serious. But by Greenwald and Snowden casting themselves as the white knights, trying to deliver New Zealand its own version of the American November surprise they’ve painted the prime minister’s own defense for him.

    Imagine an American equivalent. A sitting Republican president the week of an election rocked by potentially cataclysmic information unearthed by two French journalists in a high and mighty manner. The context and reality of the information wouldn’t have a chance to sink in, drowned out by the furious claims of outsiders stirring the pot on cable news.

    “I would have a modicum of respect for the guy if he had the guts to turn up here six months before the election, or six months after,” Prime Minister Key retorted in a radio interview before the event. “If this loser is going to come to town and try and tell me, five days before an election, staying at the Dotcom mansion with all the Dotcom people and being paid by Dotcom, that he’s doing anything other than Dotcom’s bidding – please don’t insult me with that.”

    Responding to the coverage online, many New Zealanders have taken a similarly skeptical and dismissive tone, writing it off as conspiratorial meddling. The Moment of Truth got a lot of headlines, but it won’t come close to even slightly influencing an election.

    The most recent Intercept article
    https://firstlook.org/theintercept/2014/09/15/questions-new-zealand-mass-surveillance/

  26. I didn’t know Abbott had actually lied about his birth. I suppose he gets carried away by his muse when writing his speeches.

    The lies kept coming with British-born, economic migrant Abbott’s Flag Day assertion that he was proud to be born under the Australian flag, clearly displaying his total disregard for the truth.

    http://www.news-mail.com.au/news/letter-tony-abbott-disaster/2386862/

    Great lizzie, we have a born again Australian for PM then??

  27. Zoid…along with many others who come and go over the years – essentially for a needle – treat with ignore.

    The contributions are clearly not based on any sense of continuity and my fleeting observations as I scroll by is to also note just boring repetition.

  28. 524 – Zoid, ever heard of the scroll wheel and the word ignore. Such people are after attention. Deny them this long enough and they will leave. It just requires everyone to opt into this strategy.

  29. I find EDJ taking continuous swipes at every PB, makes PB less welcoming place.

    I find ESJ one of the most pointlessly nasty trolls to appear here. Still, its presence serves as a salutatory reminder of the exactly kind of icky moron that cheer-leads for this Govt and does give the scroll wheel some exercise.

  31. @Gary/528

    Unless someone is actually going to pay me for a new Logitech mouse, to replace my current old one, there is only so much scrolling you can do.

  36. imacca

    I find ESJ one of the most pointlessly nasty trolls to appear here.

    Certainly, his/her intent is malign, but mostly he/she is just vapid and banal.

    Ocassionally, when at the checkout, I see racks of magazines that appear, from the jackets, to be an insult to human accomplishment and the product ultimately of the dysfunction attending insistent social inequality. There are images of someone’s cellulite, snapped by people who apparently earn a living taking such images, and stories about which celebrity is going out with or breaking up with other celebrity (neither of whom I’ve ever heard of, more often than not). In the trolleys there are leftover promotional bumpf and in the car park those ibisies pick at dicarded KFC boxes for morsels.

    I do feel a certain weariness at the work that remains to be done by those of us who want a better world, but I’ve learned to accept that until that happens, there will be banality and waste about. ESJ is just another pathetic example of the failure of society to configure itself along rational and equitable lines.

  38. ESJ is just another pathetic example of the failure of society to configure itself along rational and equitable lines.

    A good way of looking at it. On this site Centre is not too far behind in the pathetic stakes.

  39. Josh Taylor ‏@joshgnosis 5m

    Meanwhile, Quickflix referring to Netflix access as “unauthorised back door access” has ruined all headline ideas.

  40. This is a good move by both parties in NSW

    Labor says it will support a bill to legalise the use of cannabis for medicinal purposes in NSW.

    Nationals MP Kevin Anderson will soon introduce a private member’s bill to allow terminally ill patients and their carers to legally possess up to 15 grams of cannabis.

  41. http://www.businessinsider.com.au/australian-consumer-confidence-falls-again-anz-says-weakness-surprising-2014-9

    “The ANZ reports that “consumer confidence fell 1.8% to 111.3 in the week ending 14 September.” That’s the lowest level in five weeks, and while far from the post-budget depth the ANZ says it is, “surprising given the strong August employment report last week, as well as the continuing house prices gains and buoyant auction clearance rates.””

  42. don

    To use the Crikey Clear Comment Preview script, install in order:

    It seems the userscripts website is no longer available. Does anyone know if there is an alternative source for cccp and stfu? Musrum wrote them I think so if he is around he may be able to help…….

  43. Dio

    Re your query last night:

    (1) I do not support Shorten’s approach to going to war. If Abbott is a Dog of War, Shorten is a Neocon Lapdog.

    (2) On the whole I prefer the Greens’ approach to war making. The fundamental problem I have with the latter, though, is that the Greens think that Australia getting rid of subs, ships, fighter planes, tanks and artillary will somehow fix everything. Not that is what you will get Greens to say. They are far too rat cunning for that.

  45. BW

    that the Greens think that Australia getting rid of subs, ships, fighter planes, tanks and artillery will somehow fix everything. Not that is what you will get Greens to say. They are far too rat cunning for that.

    Either that or we don’t think it, and you are uttering a strawman.

  46. From the Absurdistan Files:

    Al-Sadr has been a considerable killer of Coalition troops.
    It must have been a death cult thing, right?

    Al-Sadr has been a key supporter of Al-Maliki who ensured:

    (a) that the Iraqi Army was a corruption-riddled, incompetent crock, and
    (b) that the Sunni side of the street was ripe for the ISIS picking.

    Anyhoo, he is now on our side. Go figure.

    http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Muqtada_al-Sadr

  47. Fran Barlow
    Posted Tuesday, September 16, 2014 at 12:17 pm | Permalink

    BW

    that the Greens think that Australia getting rid of subs, ships, fighter planes, tanks and artillery will somehow fix everything. Not that is what you will get Greens to say. They are far too rat cunning for that.

    Either that or we don’t think it, and you are uttering a strawman.

    Feel free to say exactly what the Greens would do with Australia’s military equipment.

    Not that you will.

  48. Zoid:

    Unless someone is actually going to pay me for a new Logitech mouse, to replace my current old one, there is only so much scrolling you can do.

    Assuming you read all of people’s comments wouldn’t you eventually scroll about the same distance?

    Ok, maybe the presence of the trolls adds pages that you wouldn’t be on in the case of most of them (and atm there are few here) most contribute fairly concise remarks — ESJ rarely goes past about 3 lines IIRC — that probably isn’t going to add many pages.

    I also suspect your mouse will become unuseable for other reasons before the scroll-wheel wears out. You can get cheap mice from ‘wiretek’ for about $8 each. You could use these exclusively for scrolling if you wanted to as you can have more than one mouse on a machine.

    FTR, I do a lot of scrolling on my machine here at work, and still have the wiretek mouse I bought in June of 2010.

  49. BW

    Feel free to say exactly what the Greens would do with Australia’s military equipment.

    That’s not the question you posed. You suggested that “getting rid of subs, ships, fighter planes, tanks and artillery will somehow fix everything.” We don’t think that, obviously.

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