Blog CemeteryA Shock Win?
November 26th 2007 11:18
I thought I'd look at some of the key seats that helped decide Saturday's election. And of course the biggest one to fall was that of the Prime Minister, where a swing of 5.8% has seen Maxine McKew become the first Labor member for Bennelong.
MAXINE'S VICTORY - A SHOCK WIN?
Once the result is officially called in Bennelong, we're going to hear a lot about Labor's triumph there - about how it was an epoch-making event defining new support for Labor after their time in the wilderness. Make no mistake, the result was a historic one in the fact that the PM was beaten, and a great performance by McKew in defeating an incumbent PM. But this was largely the end-game in a long-standing drift across Bennelong to Labor.
What was interesting in Bennelong is just how even the voting was across the electorate. Only a handful of booths gave either party over 60% of the TPP vote, although McKew won Labor a majority of booths for the first time. Overall the seat is largely divded, with Labor winning most booths in the West of the seat around Eastwood, Ermington and Epping, and the Coalition maintaining their majority in most of Ryde and south to Tennyson and Gladesville.
In total, Labor carried 13 more booths than won in 2004. As the map below shows, there is a significant tract of booths in the North of the seat which all gave Labor majorities for the first time in 2007.
All in all it was these booths around Epping which were the vanguard of Labor's victory, with big swings across the North, as well as down towards West Ryde. Only one booth swung to Howard, but the majority of booths in the seat's South and East moved by far less than the seat's average.
As has been mentioned countless times, Labor's win in Bennelong was just the second time an incumbent prime minister has been unseated since federation. But really it shouldn't have been a surprise. The victory of Labor was merely the continuation of a long-standing movement in the polls in the seat of Bennelong, which had seen the North-Western corner of the seat move dramatically to Labor, and all but the south-east areas around Putney move against the tide to stay with the ex-PM.
While the Coalition was performing well across the state this merely meant that Howard was gaining less than many of his colleagues. However the large swing to Rudd across the state was always going to combine with the overall movement to Labor in Bennelong and make it extremely hard for Labor to lose.
Historic? Yes. Impressive? Yes. Shocking? No.
MAXINE'S VICTORY - A SHOCK WIN?
Once the result is officially called in Bennelong, we're going to hear a lot about Labor's triumph there - about how it was an epoch-making event defining new support for Labor after their time in the wilderness. Make no mistake, the result was a historic one in the fact that the PM was beaten, and a great performance by McKew in defeating an incumbent PM. But this was largely the end-game in a long-standing drift across Bennelong to Labor.
What was interesting in Bennelong is just how even the voting was across the electorate. Only a handful of booths gave either party over 60% of the TPP vote, although McKew won Labor a majority of booths for the first time. Overall the seat is largely divded, with Labor winning most booths in the West of the seat around Eastwood, Ermington and Epping, and the Coalition maintaining their majority in most of Ryde and south to Tennyson and Gladesville.
In total, Labor carried 13 more booths than won in 2004. As the map below shows, there is a significant tract of booths in the North of the seat which all gave Labor majorities for the first time in 2007.
All in all it was these booths around Epping which were the vanguard of Labor's victory, with big swings across the North, as well as down towards West Ryde. Only one booth swung to Howard, but the majority of booths in the seat's South and East moved by far less than the seat's average.
As has been mentioned countless times, Labor's win in Bennelong was just the second time an incumbent prime minister has been unseated since federation. But really it shouldn't have been a surprise. The victory of Labor was merely the continuation of a long-standing movement in the polls in the seat of Bennelong, which had seen the North-Western corner of the seat move dramatically to Labor, and all but the south-east areas around Putney move against the tide to stay with the ex-PM.
While the Coalition was performing well across the state this merely meant that Howard was gaining less than many of his colleagues. However the large swing to Rudd across the state was always going to combine with the overall movement to Labor in Bennelong and make it extremely hard for Labor to lose.
Historic? Yes. Impressive? Yes. Shocking? No.
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