Monbulk
Margin: Liberal 1.1%*
Region: Eastern Victoria
Federal: Casey (50%)/La Trobe (50%)
* Labor-held seat made notionally Liberal by redistribution
Candidates in ballot paper order
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ANA ROJAS JORDAN CROOK JAMES MERLINO MARK VERSCHUUR AMELIA MASON MICHAEL CLARKE JENNIFER McADAM CRAIG JENKIN RON PRENDERGAST |
2010 BOOTH RESULTS MAP |
PAST RESULTS |
DEMOGRAPHICS |
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RESULTS MAP: Two-party preferred booth results from 2010 state election showing Liberal majority in red and Labor in blue. New boundaries in thicker blue lines, old ones in thinner red lines. Boundary data courtesy of Ben Raue of The Tally Room.
PAST RESULTS: Break at 1999 represents effect of the subsequent redistribution.
DEMOGRAPHICS: Based on 2012 census. School Leavers is percentage of high school graduates divided by persons over 18. LOTE is number identified as speaking language other than English at home, divided by total population.
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RESULTS MAP: Two-party preferred booth results from 2010 state election showing Liberal majority in blue and Labor in red. New boundaries in thicker blue lines, old ones in thinner red lines. Boundary data courtesy of Ben Raue of The Tally Room.
PAST RESULTS: Break at 1999 represents effect of the subsequent redistribution.
DEMOGRAPHICS: Based on 2012 census. School Leavers is percentage of high school graduates divided by persons over 18. LOTE is number identified as speaking language other than English at home, divided by total population.
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Monbulk is a marginal seat at Melbourne’s eastern fringe, held by Labor’s deputy leader James Merlino. The electorate encompasses suburban territory at Lilydale, Mooroolbark, Kilsyth and Montrose in its north-west, Yarra Ranges suburbs around Upwey in the south-west, and semi-rural territory around Monbulk itself further to the east. The redistribution has made the seat notionally Liberal, which is mostly down to the addition of 9000 voters in and around strongly conservative Kilsyth at the northern end of the electorate, who are gained from the abolished electorate of that name. In marginal territory a little further to the west, 11,000 voters in Kilsyth South, The Basin and eastern Boronia have been transferred to Bayswater. At the southern end of the electorate, 5500 voters around Belgrave have been gained from Gembrook. The combined impact of the changes is a 3.0% shift to the Liberals, turning a 1.9% Labor margin into a Liberal one of 1.1%.
Since its creation in 1967, Monbulk has twice bucked the statewide election result in saying with the Liberals in 1999, and with Labor in 2010. Steve McArthur gained the seat for the Liberals with a 10.1% swing when Jeff Kennett came to power in 1992, and was eventually swept away by a 10.6% swing in 2002. It has since been held for Labor by James Merlino, who had previously been a Yarra Ranges councillor and an official with the Right faction Shop Distributive and Allied Employees Association. Merlino suffered successive swings of 1.6% in 2006 and 4.8% in 2010, retaining his seat on the latter occasion by 1.9%.
Merlino was promoted to Sport, Recreation and Youth Affairs Minister after the 2006 election, and briefly gained the substantial new responsibility of police and corrections in October 2010, after Bob Cameron relinquished his portfolios ahead of his looming retirement at the election. After the election defeat, Merlino’s shadow ministerial responsibilities were police and road safety, and in February 2012 he gained the deputy leadership upon the retirement from parliament of Rob Hulls. In this he was the beneficiary of a factional arrangement reserving the deputy position for the Right, Daniel Andrews being of the Socialist Left, and a rapprochement between Merlino’s SDA faction and the Bill Shorten-Stephen Conroy axis, which had hitherto been at opposing ends of a divide within the Right.
Despite being made notionally Liberal by the redistribution, Monbulk hasn’t been much discussed, and the Herald-Sun reported from both sides of the fence late in the campaign that Labor has it in the bag.
The Liberal candidate for the seat is Mark Verschuur, owner of Fairmont Medical Products, a company that manufactures surgical instruments. Verschuur won preselection ahead of Alister Osborn, president of the Lilydale Chamber of Commerce and Industry.