Division of Hindmarsh

The Division of Hindmarsh is an Australian Electoral Division in South Australia covering the western suburbs of Adelaide. The division was one of the seven established when the former Division of South Australia was split on 2 October 1903, and was first contested at the 1903 election on vastly different boundaries. The Division is named after Sir John Hindmarsh, who was Governor of South Australia 1836-38. The 78 km² seat includes the suburbs of Ascot Park, Brooklyn Park, Edwardstown, Fulham, Glenelg, Grange, Henley Beach, Kidman Park, Kurralta Park, Morphettville, Plympton, Richmond, Semaphore Park, Torrensville, West Beach and West Lakes. The international Adelaide Airport is centrally located in the electorate making noise pollution a prominent local issue, besides the aged care needs of the relatively elderly population − the seat has one of the highest proportions of citizens over the age of 65 in Australia. It has long been dominated by working-class families and aged pensioners, though redistributions have moved it south over time to include wealthy seaside suburbs in and around Holdfast Bay.

Though now a marginal seat, for many years on very different boundaries it had been one of the safest Labor seats in the country, and was in Labor hands for all but three years from the 1903 election to the 1993 election. Hindmarsh originated further north and roughly covered what is now the safe Labor seat of Port Adelaide, while the safe Liberal rural seat of Barker at times first covered most of what is now Hindmarsh. After 1949 some of the area had variously been covered by Boothby, Kingston and abolished Hawker. The present Hindmarsh has changed little since neighbouring Hawker was abolished in 1993, though the north-western coastal strip was added from 2004.

Prominent members for the electorate have included Norman Makin, who was Speaker in the Scullin government, and a cabinet minister in the Curtin and Chifley governments, and Clyde Cameron, who was a cabinet minister in the Whitlam Government. The seat became far less safe for Labor from 1984 onward, and gradually developed a voting pattern similar to mortgage belt seats, which tend to be fairly marginal. Labor's hold on the seat became even more tenuous in 1993 when it absorbed most of the area around Holdfast Bay that had previously been in Hawker. This reduced Labor's two-party margin from an already marginal 5.3 percent to a paper-thin one percent. Combined with anger at the state Labor government, this was enough for Liberal Christine Gallus, previously the member for Hawker, to take the seat on a two-party swing of two percent and a one percent two-party margin, becoming only the second non-Labor MP ever to win it. She seemingly consolidated her hold on the seat in 1996 amid her party's massive victory that year, increasing her margin to 8.1 percent--easily the strongest result for a non-Labor candidate in the seat's history.

Gallus fended off spirited challenges from Labor's Steve Georganas in 1998 and 2001, winning each time with a margin of less than two percent. Gallus retired at the 2004 election, and Georganas won the seat on a razor-thin 0.06 percent margin from a one percent two-party swing. Georganas substantially increased his two-party margin above five percent at both the 2007 election and the 2010 election. Though Georganas was thought to have built up a base with the substantial Greek community in Hindmarsh (he is himself of Greek descent), he was defeated at the 2013 election when Liberal Matt Williams won the seat with a 1.89 percent margin from a 7.97 percent two-party-preferred swing. He became its third non-Labor member, and the first to oust a sitting Labor MP in the seat. The only South Australian seat to change hands in 2013, Hindmarsh became the most marginal seat in South Australia, and the only marginal Liberal seat in the state.

South Australian Senator Nick Xenophon confirmed in December 2014 that by mid-2015 the Nick Xenophon Team (NXT) party would announce candidates in the South Australian Liberal seats of Hindmarsh, Sturt and Mayo, along with seats in all states and territories at the 2016 federal election, with Xenophon citing the government's ambiguity on the Collins-class submarine replacement project as motivation.^[1] ABC psephologist Antony Green's 2016 federal election guide for South Australia states NXT has a "strong chance of winning lower house seats and three or four Senate seats".^[2] The NXT candidate in Hindmarsh is Daniel Kirk.^[3]

Going into the 2016 election with a slender 1.9 percent two-party Liberal margin, Hindmarsh was the most marginal seat in South Australia, the government's only marginal seat in South Australia, the Coalition's only gain at the 2013 election in South Australia, and was the sixth most marginal Coalition-held seat in the nation. Georganas sought to retake his seat from Williams.^[4] A Galaxy seat-level opinion poll of over 500 voters in Hindmarsh conducted a week out from the Saturday 2 July election indicated a knife-edge 50–50 two-party vote.^[5] Ultimately, Georganas reclaimed Hindmarsh for Labor with a two-party margin of just 0.6 percent, representing a two-party swing of 2.5 percent.^[6] Though slender, Georganas was first elected to Hindmarsh at the 2004 election with a two-party margin of just 0.06 percent.^[7]

Members

Election results

See also

• Australian federal election, 2016
• Results of the Australian federal election, 2016 (South Australia)

References

• ABC profile for Hindmarsh: 2016
• Poll Bludger profile for Hindmarsh: 2016
• AEC profile for Hindmarsh: 2016
• The Australian Political Almanac, 1st edition, Peter Wilson, 2002, Hardie Grant Books

Notes

External links

• SA boundary map, 2001: AEC
• SA boundary map, 1984: Atlas SA

Coordinates: 34°56′10″S 138°31′41″E / 34.936°S 138.528°E / -34.936; 138.528