Queensland election 2015

Maryborough

Margin: Liberal National 0.3% versus Independent
Region: Southern Brisbane
Federal: Bonner/Bowman/Griffith

Candidates in ballot paper order

maryborough-lnp

maryborough-ind

DAMIAN HUXHAM
One Nation

ANNE MADDERN
Liberal National (top)

KATHERINE WEBB
Greens

STEPHEN ANDERSON
Palmer United Party

CHRISTOPHER FOLEY
Independent (bottom)

RUSSELL WATTIE
Independent

BRUCE SAUNDERS
Labor

ELECTORATE MAP

2012 ELECTION RESULTS

DEMOGRAPHICS

Electorate boundary outline courtesy of
Ben Raue of The Tally Room.

One of two seats gained by the Liberal National Party in the 2012 landslide from a source other than the ALP, Maryborough looms at the coming election as a rematch between LNP member Anne Maddern and Chris Foley, the former independent member she narrowly succeeded in unseating. The electorate takes its name from its dominant population centre, located on the Bruce Highway 300 kilometres north of Brisbane, from which it extends north-eastwards to the outskirts of Hervey Bay at Urraween, 40 kilometres southwards down the Bruce Highway to Glenwood and Curra, and 30 kilometres northwards to Cherwell. Its distinguishing demographic features include the state’s lowest proportion of non-English speakers, the smallest share of adults who finished high school, the second lowest median income, and the sixth highest median age.

Maryborough has existed as an electorate without interruption since 1865, and was in Labor hands for all but one term from 1915 until it fell to the Liberals in 1971. Labor recovered it in 1977, lost it to the Nationals in 1983, and won it back again in 1989. Ray Dollin then held the seat for Labor until he was unseated in 1998 by John Kingston, who emerged as one of 11 successful One Nation candidates after polling 42.6% of the primary vote, the party’s second best result in the state. Generally reckoned to be one of the sharper tools in the One Nation shed, Kingston left the party eight months after his election and was re-elected as an independent in 2001 with a 0.5% margin over Labor. This made him one of only two members of One Nation’s class of 1998 to be re-elected, the other being Dorothy Pratt in Nanango, who was also returned as an independent.

Kingston’s retirement due to ill health led to a by-election in April 2003, at which Wesleyan Methodist pastor Chris Foley kept the seat in independent hands after being knocked back for Nationals preselection. Labor led the primary vote with 37.0%, but Foley emerged 3.5% ahead after preferences from a primary vote of 33.3%. Foley was re-elected with over 60% of the primary vote in 2004 and 2006, but this was pared back to 47.7% by a much stronger performance from the Liberal National Party. The party’s candidate, property valuation business owner Anne Maddern, ran again in 2012 and enjoyed a further 10.0% increase in the primary vote, reducing Foley to 30.2%. With Katter’s Australian Party on 19.6%, Labor was relegated to fourth place with 11.8%. Foley was narrowly unable to close the gap on preferences, with Maddern emerging 152 votes clear at the final count for a winning margin of 0.3%.

Corrections, complaints and feedback to William Bowe at pollbludger-at-bigpond-dot-com. Read William’s blog, The Poll Bludger.

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