Proposed new state electoral boundaries for Queensland have just been published. As the report summary puts it, “new electorates are proposed to be created – namely, Caboolture (formerly Glass House) and Springfield (formerly Jordan)”, which are balanced by the effective abolition of Hill (held by Shane Knuth of Katter’s Australian Party) and the Labor-held metropolitan seat of Stretton. Fully 19 seats are being renamed, including a reversion to geographical names of seats like McConnel (which goes back to being Brisbane Central) and Oodgeroo (Cleveland). UPDATE: Ben Raue at The Tally Room has interactive maps of the old and new boundaries.
Below the fold are my estimates of two-candidate preferred and primary vote shares for the new boundaries, and how they have changed from the 2024 election results. Note in the former case that where more than two numbers appear in a row, it is because the proposal combines seats that had different parties in the final count in the election. When the aberrant number is large — Mulgrave, for instance, is an LNP-versus-Labor seat that stands to absorb a large chunk if Hill, where the two-candidate count was Katters-versus-LNP — it means the numbers are of limited use. The remainder of the post will consist of commentary that will be added bit-by-bit as I wrap my head around what’s been done.
There was an unusual degree of consensus in the party submissions that a new seat of Caboolture should be created, and so it has proved. An earlier incarnation was one of the 11 seats One Nation won at the 1998 election, but I only get their primary vote at 11.0% based on the 2024 results. Its voters are drawn from Morayfield (39.5%), Glass House (32.8%) and Pumicestone (27.8%).
Covering the eastern end of the City of Ipswich, Springfield is being treated as a new seat, but this can be better understood as an arrangement that accommodates local population growth by creating Springfield, Redbank and Greenbank (together with the commonality of “bank” in the latter two cases, there are now three seats that begin with “red” and two with “spring”) where formerly there was Bundamba and Jordan. All are notional Labor, in varying degrees of safety.
Fresh from losing Hinchinbrook at a by-election in November, Katter’s Australian Party now loses one of its two remaining seats in Hill, held by Shane Knuth, of which 24.5% goes to Flinders, the successor to his party colleague Rob Katter’s seat of Treager. Around half goes to Hinchinbrook and the rest to the Mulgrave, which becomes less urban after losing about a fifth of its enrolment to Cairns.
Around two-thirds of the abolished southern Brisbane seat of Stretton, which Labor won in 2024 by 9.5%, goes to Eight Mile Plains, the new name for Toohey, with the rest going to Algester. This is not the only bad turn for Labor: their remaining toehold on the Gold Coast, held by mooted future leader Meaghan Scanlon, gains unhelpful territory north of Nerang State Forest from Theodore, turning a 0.6% Labor margin into a notional LNP margin of 5.4%. Not far to the north, Beenleigh has an LNP margin of 0.4%, where the seat of Macalister that is supersedes has a Labor margin of 1.9%. The regional seats of Thuringowa and Mackay, which Labor lost badly in 2024, have both gained conservative semi-rural territory. Conversely, the loss of its southern end to Caboolture makes Labor more competitive in Glass House, which moves into the Sunshine Coast hinterland, cutting the LNP margin from 10.2% to 5.7%.
The inner-city seats where the Greens are competitive are little changed: the changes to their primary vote share in Maiwar, Cooper and South Brisbane, the first two of which resume their former names of Indooroopilly and Ashgrove, are all inside half a percentage point.
Estimated two-candidate preferred
Estimated primary vote
I notice right away that they appear to be renaming a lot of the districts back to their pre-2017 names (McConnel back to Brisbane Central, Oodgeroo back to Cleveland, Cooper back to Ashgrove, Maiwar back to Indooroopilly, etc).
Perhaps they were just too “woke” for the LNP to tolerate?
Kirsdarke:
Perhaps, though I must admit I do tend to prefer it when electorates are named after the places in which they are based rather than notable people. It gives them a bit more of a local identity.
@Asha
Yeah, fair point. Letting most of the Federal divisions be named after people and the state districts be named after localities seems reasonable.
I just remember the LNP being pretty uppity about the 2017 redistribution name changes, Cleveland to Oodgeroo in particular.
@Asha
A case of the LNP pursuing the right outcome for the wrong reason, perhaps.
I do agree that State seats being geographically named and Federal seats not also helps avoid confusion.
I think QLD Labor will be upset – very upset, by the change to Labor-held Gaven based on the Gold Coast hinterland, given that the state ALP member for Gaven, Meaghan Scanlan, is seen as leadership material – perhaps sooner rather than later.
This is a pro LNP redistribution and the court must overrule it. They deliberately made it where labour loses his seat seats around the Logan River (Gaven and Beenleigh) and reducing LNP margins in other seats so the LNP vote appears more efficient. This is effectively a gerrymander.
I like the idea of renaming seat seats the geographical locations however. But I will submit an objection to Bancroft being renamed to D-Bay simply because North-Lakes is more populated and is the main population hub. As a former local of North-Lakes when I lived in Queensland. It should be named that.
It’s now called Pimpama.
Yes Daniel T at 5.31pm.
Good electoral divisions produced by the 3 sensible Commissioners appointed by Mr Chrisafulli.
Nth Qld only loses one seat.
The big four regional electorates are pretty much exempt from the 10% variation rule if they cover more than 100,000 sq kilometres.
Bit of a shuffle in Brisbane’s northern suburbs, but if they decide to tack the Bribie booths onto “Caboolture”, then that new seat won’t be automatically Labor.
Bit of a stich up in Gaven for Labor too. Ha ha.
Sir Joh would be happy with these new boundaries.
So would Gavin Newsom.
Ha ha.
Thanks for the analysis. Just a correction if I may: the new seat (formerly Jordan) in the Brisbane-Ipswich corridor is Springfield, not Springwood. Springwood is further east!
Thanks – an error made while pointing out the potential for the new names to cause confusion, thereby proving my point (right?).
Either Springfield or Springwood would be excellent seats for The Bounce Party.
(reference from The Goodies)
This is a corrupt Operation Get Meaghan.
Do your best.
A few comments being made here about the commissioners.
From the report they seem to be highly qualified. A lot of time spent on courts and the NTT.
Here is the relevant page from the website.
https://redistribution.ecq.qld.gov.au/about-the-qrc/the-commissioners
There has been a bit of a stink about John Sosso, whose director-general roles were under Rob Borbidge and Campbell Newman. Tony Fitzgerald said in response to the appointment that he was “concerned that Queensland might be reverting to the bad old days of biased electoral boundaries”.
I’m certainly not accusing anyone of corruption or even bias, but I may note that what the LNP asked for in its submission was the abolition of Hill (check) and Toohey (more-or-less check — Eight Mile Plains can be seen as a merger of it and Stretton), and the creation of Caboolture (check) and Greenbank (check). So I suspect we haven’t heard the last of this.
I’m usually not one to criticize our various electoral commisions – all of whom generally do great work that makes us the envy of democratic nations across the world – but I have to say that this particular redistribution does feel a wee bit Gerrymandery to me.
So essentially regional queensland gets less representation in parliament.
This is where is a system of government like Queensland has the “one vote one value” system fails. A huge populated but tiny small area that is totally removed from the rest of the state dictating to the rest of the state how it must operate.
It is the reason why Tasmania elect the same number of senators as New South Wales.
Tyranny of the masses is a thing and you need to counter that somehow. I am not saying I have a solution, but something has to be done.
Funny how it’s always the right who feel the need to “fix” democratic systems by introducing horrendously biased malapportionment, and as we’ve seen in the past and now once again, blatantly partisan gerrymandering.
Some perspective. If Labor gets a uniform swing of 3.8%, which is what they would need for a 50-50 TPP, they would win a majority on these figures – 45 seats out of 93, not including the one held by the Greens.
WB, and that would be without Gaven ironically.
But a 1 or 2% swing to the LNP with see them get towards 60 seats so there are dangers both ways
I expect the member for Hill will run to reclaim Hinchinbrook from the LNP if this holds
Just curious, while the boundaries can be challenged in the highest Queensland court. Can they in theory be challenged to the High Court nationally if the Queensland court sides with the commission?
Labor needs to act fast and challenge. And not because of Gaven. But rather because the commission took the LNP’s submissions which clearly shows bias. And the slice and dicing of some seats clearly do not reflect the geography of some of these seats.
Also that 3.8% swing assumes that Labor regain seats like Rockampton (possible), Townsville (won’t happen), and Maryborough (won’t happen now with Saunders not being there), and Cook would be lineball (possible)
Perhaps a referendum on whether there should be an upper house should seriously be considered to prevent abuse from gerrymandering (so if an LNP government is more likely on these boundaries it will make it where they would have to compromise to get legislation through) same with Labor if they won.
If we’re doing this many name changes. We might as well change Gaven to Nerang (formerly abolished) too. Gaven is a smaller lesser known locality. Whereas Nerang is one of the principal communities of interest in the area – servicing many of the Hinterland localities.
Geographically, Nerang also alludes to the river cutting through the division, and the Nerang state forest which now sits within this division with its reacquired Hinterland localities.
Odd choice to stretch Gaven out across the Pacific Motorway that far into Carrara and Merrimac btw. Highland Park and parts of Carrara are more natural fits.
Looking at it, I would say 8 Mile Plains is actually old Stretton not Toohey. Stretton makes up close to 60% of the 8 Miles Plains seat. So therefore Stretton becomes 8 Miles Plains.
Besides Hill being abolished, I’m surprised that Bundaberg was left mostly unchanged.
I read a number of comments mentioning effective ‘gerrymandering’, but having submitted a QLD proposal myself I can say that any and all changes were going to favour the LNP no matter how you went about it. I think the same will be the case federally, as a number of the ALP seats are under allotted, where as seats along the Sunshine Coast in particular are over allotted.
In my proposal Gaven had minimal change but there was a big swing the Liberals way in Logan.
I was unaware of Fitzgerald’s concern about Sosso.
BUT, Challenging the redistribution can only be made once the actual redistribution is gazetted.
The redistribution at this stage is a mere proposal.
An appeal must be made 21 days after gazettal.
The decision of the Court of Appeal on the challenge cannot be appealed.
Oz, what if Labor was to sue for it or would they not be allowed to do that? I think it shows the mess of this country if you cannot appeal clearly unfair boundaries and a court of appeals who are not always independent (correct me if wrong but doesn’t the gov appoint them too?)
This is comparable to the Texas gerrymander and I hope Labor starts to gerrymander other states to fight back against this like the patriotic US Democrats are currently doing.
The conservatives believe they are “entitled” to more seats
Daniel T
Please NO gerrymandering in other states – it doesn’t help in our context.
Any elector can appeal the redistribution.
But you are appealing that the redistribution has been carried out according to the factors in the law and there is an expectation that the Commissioners get to decide how these factors are considered.
Some perspective. If Labor gets a uniform swing of 3.8%, which is what they would need for a 50-50 TPP, they would win a majority on these figures – 45 seats out of 93, not including the one held by the Greens.
William, do they win 45 seats at 50-50, leaving them two short of a majority, or do they win a majority?