Eastern Victoria

Eastern Victoria extends from the lower house districts on Melbourne’s eastern fringe through Gippsland to the state's eastern extremity, the former area accounting for Evelyn, Monbulk and Gembrook in the outer east, together with bayside Mornington and Nepean. Its only Labor-held seat is Monbulk, and even that was made notionally Liberal by the redistribution before the 2014 election, requiring a favourable swing for Labor to retain it. Labor has nonetheless retained a constant two seats, with the Coalition parties dropping from three to two in 2014 after Shooters and Fishers emerged the beneficiaries of an elaborate preference network.

The count at the 2014 election unfolded as separate contests between Shooters and Fishers and the Coalition for the third seat on the right, and Labor and the Greens for the second seat on the left. The former was a clear win for Shooters and Fishers, who soared to just shy of a quota with preferences from the Liberal Democrats, Palmer United and Family First, Australian Christians, the DLP, Rise Up Australia and even the Sex Party. With Shooters and Fishers elected to the fourth seat, a surplus consisting of Liberal and micro-party party preferences decided the fifth seat by flowing en bloc to Labor ahead the Greens.

Labor candidates

The top position on Labor's Eastern Victoria ticket has emerged as the final destination for Jane Garrett after her odyssey in search of a more secure berth than her existing lower house seat of Brunswick, where she was increasingly under pressure from the Greens. Garrett came to Brunswick in 2010 with the support of Socialist Left powerbroker Senator Kim Carr, having earlier been a Slater and Gordon lawyer and an adviser to Steve Bracks. Her hold on Brunswick appeared to be further weakened by the circumstances of her resignation as Emergency Services Minister in June 2016, after she sided with the Country Fire Authority in its dispute with the United Firefighters Union over the terms of an enterprise bargaining agreement. This placed her on the wrong side of the decision reached by the Premier, and caused the UFU to campaign against her locally.

Garrett's first move was to seek upper house preselection in Western Metropolitan, where she reportedly won the local branch vote by a two-to-one margin over Ingrid Stitt, state secretary of the Australian Services Union. However, Stitt then defeated her in the ballot to determine which candidate would have Socialist Left support on the party's public office selection committee, which ultimately stood to decide the result. It was next suggested Garrett might take the new safe Labor federal seat of Fraser in Melbourne's outer west, but an alternative deal was reached in which the position went to Eastern Victoria MLC Daniel Mulino, which has in turn made his vacancy available to Garrett, despite her apparent lack of connection with the area. The UFU was not done yet, launching a legal challenge against the preselection process, but this was thrown out in the Supreme Court on October 25.

Harriet Shing, a former lawyer with the Left faction Australian Services Union, has retained the second position on the Labor ticket, from which she won election in 2014 following Daniel Mulino.

Coalition candidates

The Coalition ticket grants the second position to the Nationals, leaving both partners all but assured of one seat each, with the Liberals potentially gaining a second, as they did in 2006 and 2010 but not 2014. Leading the ticket is Edward O’Donohue, who was elected from second position in 2006 and 2010, then promoted to first place in 2014 after the retirement of Philip Davis. O'Donohue is a former lawyer and real estate company manager who served in cabinet in the liquor and gaming regulation and corrections portfolios from April 2013 to the November 2014 election defeat. Since then he has held the shadow ministry portfolios of police, community safety and corrections.

The Nationals incumbent in second place is Melina Bath, who filled the casual vacancy created in April 2015 when the member elected at the 2014 election, Danny O'Brien, successfully contested the by-election for the lower house seat of Gippsland South, where he replaced former Nationals leader Peter Ryan. Bath was formerly a maths teacher at Mirboo North Secondary College, and won the party's preselection vote ahead of Kate Lancaster, a community relations worker from Traralgon; Tim Shelton, a pharmacist from Bairnsdale; and Nicole Griffin, general manager at Gippsland Water. She was promoted to parliamentary secretary status in December 2016, and has served since September 2017 as Shadow Assistant Minister for Education.

The third candidate on ticket, a non-incumbent Liberal, is Meg Edwards, who was on South Gippsland Shire Councillor until early October, when she was one of two members to resign over dissatisfaction with the handling of bullying complaints.

Other candidates

The candidate elected for Shooters, Fishers and Farmers in 2014 was Jeff Bourman (left), a former police officer who later worked as an IT contractor.

The Greens' lead candidate is Tom Cummings, an information technology professional who works in the banking industry.