Keysborough

Margin: Labor 9.5%
Region: South Eastern Metropolitan
Federal: Hotham (52%)/Isaacs (48%)

Candidates in ballot paper order

	MARTIN PAKULA Labor (top) ANDREW CUNNINGHAM Rise Up Australia ADRIANNE FLEMING Liberal (bottom) SUSAN FYFIELD Greens HUNG VO Independent MICHAEL CARTY Independent

Located roughly 27 kilometres south-east of central Melbourne, Keysborough replaces the abolished electorate of Lyndhurst, absorbing 72% of its voters. The electorate consists of two markedly different halves, separated by the Dandenong Bypass: Keysborough in the east, together with parts of Springvale and Noble Park immediately to the north, which are dominated by the Vietnamese and Chinese communities; and Dingley Village in the west, where 82.6% of residents reports as speaking only English at home, compared with 32.7% in the remainder of the electorate.

Dingley Village and its 9300 voters have been gained in the redistribution, and are the main cause of a 4.4% cut in the Labor margin. However, the Springvale end of the electorate carries far the larger population, so the seat remains safe for Labor. The redistribution also adds parts of Noble Park and Keysborough at the eastern end, transferring 2000 voters from Dandenong. The corresponding losses account for the southern half of the old Lyndhurst electorate, much of which is non-residential. The name change reflects the loss of Lyndhurst and adjoining Lynbrook, home to 5300 voters, to Cranbourne. Industrial Dandenong South and a small area of residential Dandenong are transferred to the Dandenong electorate, accounting for 1300 voters.

Lyndhurst was created at the 2002 election in place of abolished Springvale, which was won by the Liberals on its creation in 1976 before passing permanently into Labor’s hands in 1979. Eddie Micallef held the seat for Labor from 1983 until his preselection defeat in 1999 at the hands of Tim Holding, a 27-year-old Waverley councillor and electorate officer to state MP Jan Wilson. Holding served in Steve Bracks’ cabinet after the 2002 election, and made national headlines in August 2009 when he went missing for two nights while on a solo hiking expedition in Alpine National Park. He retired from politics in 2013 and was succeeded at the ensuing by-election on April 27 by Martin Pakula, who finished 7.0% ahead of a Family First candidate after preferences in the absence of a Liberal candidate.

Pakula had previously been a member of the upper house, having held a seat in Western Metropolitan since 2006, and was well established as a rising figure within the party. Prior to entering parliament he had been state secretary of the Right faction National Union of Workers, which had also been Tim Holding’s factional base. His first entry to the political stage was determined but ultimately unsuccessful challenge to the federal preselection of Simon Crean in Hotham in 2005. He was immediately made a parliamentary secretary after entering parliament, and won further promotion first to Industry, Trade and Industrial Relations Minister in December 2008, and then to the troublesome public transport portfolio in January 2010. In opposition he has held the shadow portfolios of Attorney-General, gaming and racing, to which corrections was added in December 2013.