Category: State Redistributions

The final boundaries for the Western Australian state redistribution were published on Friday, and can be viewed here. Listed below are my own calculations of new margins, a detailed accounting of which can be seen on this spreadsheet. Of the tweaks made to the draft proposal, two are of consequence. In the metropolitan area, a plan to realign the boundary between Mount Lawley and Maylands has essentially been scrapped, which means two booths won by Liberal in 2013 will stay in Mount Lawley, and two won by Labor will stay in Maylands. This is slightly to the advantage of both Michael Sutherland and Lisa Baker, who respectively hold Mount Lawley and Maylands for Liberal and Labor. In the country, Collie-Preston will gain the Shire of Donnybrook-Balingup instead of part of the City of Busselton, as it was argued the latter should be left intact within Vasse (which, relatedly, will no longer gain Margaret River and the surrounding area, which instead stay in Warren-Blackwood).

The other big change is cosmetic, but no less welcome for that – a plan to rename a number of electorates after notable personages has been scrapped, with all electorates maintaining locality-based names. There are any number of reasons why the practice the commissioners were seeking to import from the federal level works a lot less well for state electorates, owing to their smaller size and lesser sense of permanency from one redistribution to the next. Particularly awkardly, both the draft state and federal redistributions proposed the creation of electorates named Burt. The state electorate in question had assumed particular political interest in being ground zero for the Perth Freight Link issue and, relatedly, the scene of a turf war between two Liberal MPs, both of whom would prefer to have the much safer seat neighbouring it to the east. Burt will now take on the more logical name of Bicton, while its neighbour will retain the name of Bateman, rather than being renamed Toohey as proposed.

Draft boundaries have been published for the Western Australian state redistribution. It proposes abolishing the electorate of Eyre in the south-eastern corner of the state, which is held for the Liberals by Graham Jacobs, who narrowly saw off a challenge from the Nationals at the March 2013 election. Its major centres of Esperance and Boulder are respectively to be absorbed by Wagin and Kalgoorlie. The seat created in its place is Baldivis, from the rapidly growing southern suburbs centre of the same name. A number of electorates have been renamed, apparently on the principle that geographic electorate names are best avoided. Antony Green might have projected new margins at some point today, and I might take a stab at it myself if I get time this afternoon.

UPDATE: Below is my own stab at a pendulum with redistributed boundaries, without making the effort to accommodate the many name changes. Antony Green doesn’t provide a margin for the new seat of Baldivis because of the complication of independent candidate Carole Adams in the Kwinana electorate in 2013, but I’ve done an elaborate bit of modelling to produce an estimate of 8.2% using Legislative Council results. Non-trivial differences between my margins and Antony’s are in Darling Range (11.9% from him, 10.6% from me), Cannington (2.3% from him, 1.5% from me), Joondalup (10.9% from him, 10.2% from me), Southern River (11.3% from him, 10.5% from me), Churchlands (20.0% from me, 20.9% from him) and Riverton (12.6% from him, 11.9% from me).

I wouldn’t normally do a post for an event as minor as the publication of suggestions for a state redistribution, but Greens operative Grahame Bowland has made it worth our while in the case of the present Western Australian redistribution by mapping out the boundaries proposed by the Liberals and the Greens. This has made it a fairly simple matter for me to calculate notional margins based on their suggestions, so we can have a better idea of what the Liberals in particular are trying to achieve. Much as I’d like to be even-handed by scrutinising a detailed Labor proposal, its submission does not provide one.

The basic thesis of the Liberal submission is that the commissioners should push the 10% tolerance to its limits to avoid abolishing any existing electorates, despite dramatic population changes which have caused outer suburban electorates to be well over average enrolment. By contrast, Labor and the Greens propose the more obvious approach of abolishing a country electorate and creating a new metropolitan one. The biggest change proposed by the Liberals is for the waning wheatbelt electorates of Central Wheatbelt and Wagin to be brought up to quota by drawing the latter into Collie, so that the Collie-Preston electorate would become merely Preston. Collie-Preston is a highly marginal seat, held for Labor by locally popular Mick Murray on the slenderest possible margin, because it balances the hugely pro-Labor coal-mining town of Collie against conservative dairy farming surrounds. Excising Collie in the manner proposed would give Preston a Liberal margin approaching 10% on the 2013 results (remembering Labor’s statewide two-party vote was only 42.7%), without making Labor competitive in Wagin.

In the metropolitan area, the Liberals would have their margins boosted from 0.9% to 2.3% in Belmont by extending it northwards to Guildford and Helena Valley; from 2.1% to 3.8% in Forrestfield by chopping Labor turf at Maddington and Kenwick at the southern end, and adding friendlier territory around Gooseberry Hill in the north-east; from 8.1% to around 11% in Jandakot (which despite the present margin was notionally Labor on its creation at the 2008 election) by trading old suburbs at the northern end (Bull Creek and South Lake) for new ones in the south (Hammond Park and Anketell); from 4.5% to 8.5% in Joondalup, by sending Labor-leaning Craigie at the southern end to safe Liberal Hillarys, and adding Liberal-voting coastal territory around Mullaloo from Ocean Reef, which would have a much reduced but still double-digit Liberal margin; and from 4.7% to 6.4% in Morley, by adding Dianella from Mirrabooka. Midland, which Labor retained by a hair’s breadth in 2013, would acquire a notional Liberal margin of 2.2% by gaining Darlington from Kalamunda.

The submission of a detailed proposal by the Greens either reflects their growing confidence about their lower house prospects generally, or the fact that the party attracts wonkish activists who do this sort of thing for fun. Whatever the explanation, the submission proposes the abolition of Eyre in the state’s south-east and the creation of a new seat of Carramar, which would take over areas of the outer northern suburbs from Wanneroo and Butler, and by my reckoning would have a notional Liberal margin of 6.3%. It is proposed that the Greens’ favoured target seat of Fremantle would extend north of the river to take in North Fremantle, offering them the indirect advantage of subduing Labor’s primary vote.