Queensland state election, 2009

21 March 2009 (2009-03-21)

All 89 seats in the Legislative Assembly of Queensland

	First party	Second party

Leader	Anna Bligh	Lawrence Springborg
Party	Labor	Liberal National
Leader since	13 September 2007 (2007-09-13)	21 January 2008 (2008-01-21)
Leader's seat	South Brisbane	Southern Downs
Last election	59 seats	25 seats
Seats won	51 seats	34 seats
Seat change	8	9
Percentage	50.9%	49.1%
Swing	4.1	4.1

Premier before election

Anna Bligh
Labor

Elected Premier

Anna Bligh
Labor

The Queensland state election was held to elect members to the unicameral Parliament of Queensland on 21 March 2009. The election saw the incumbent Labor government led by Premier Anna Bligh defeat the Liberal National Party of Queensland led by Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg, and gain a fifth consecutive term in office for her party. Bligh thus became the first female Premier of any Australian State elected in her own right.^[1]

The 2009 election also marked the eighth consecutive victory of the ALP in a general election since 1989 although it was out of office between 1996 and 1998 as a direct result of the 1996 Mundingburra by-election.

Key dates

Date	Event
23 February 2009	Writs were issued by the Governor to proceed with an election.^[2]
28 February 2009	Close of electoral rolls
3 March 2009	Close of nominations
21 March 2009	Polling day, between the hours of 8am and 6pm
26 March 2009	The Bligh Ministry was reconstituted^[3]
7 April 2009	The writ was returned and the results formally declared
12 April 2009	53rd Parliament convened

Results

The Gallagher Index result: 12.47

Queensland state election, 21 March 2009^[4] Legislative Assembly << 2006 — 2012 >>
Enrolled voters		2,660,940
Votes cast		2,419,559		Turnout	90.93	+0.46
Informal votes		46,908		Informal	1.94	–0.14
Summary of votes by party
Party		Primary votes	%	Swing	Seats	Change
	Labor	1,002,415	42.25	–4.67	51	–8
	Liberal National	987,018	41.60	+3.68	34	+9
	Greens	198,475	8.37	+0.38	0	±0
	DS4SEQ	22,170	0.93	+0.93	0	±0
	Family First	19,379	0.82	–1.07	0	±0
	One Nation	9,038	0.38	–0.22	0	–1
	Independent	134,156	5.65	+0.97	4	±0
Total		2,372,651			89
Two-party-preferred
	Labor		50.9	−4.1
	Liberal National		49.1	+4.1
^{* The two-party preferred summary is an estimate by Antony Green using a methodology by Malcolm Mackerras.}

Seats changing hands

Seat	Pre-2009				Swing	Post-2009
Seat	Party		Member	Margin	Swing	Margin	Member	Party
Aspley		Labor	Bonny Barry	3.0	-7.5	4.5	Tracy Davis	Liberal National
Burdekin		Labor	notional	0.9	-4.0	3.1	Rosemary Menkens	Liberal National
Clayfield		Labor	notional	0.2	-6.1	5.8	Tim Nicholls	Liberal National
Cleveland		Labor	Phil Weightman	0.5	-1.5	0.3	Mark Robinson	Liberal National
Coomera		Labor	notional	8.3	-10.2	1.9	Michael Crandon	Liberal National
Gaven		Labor	Phil Gray	3.1	-3.9	0.7	Alex Douglas	Liberal National
Hervey Bay		Labor	Andrew McNamara	2.1	-8.6	6.5	Ted Sorensen	Liberal National
Indooroopilly		Greens	Ronan Lee	N/A ^¶	-8.6	5.9	Scott Emerson	Liberal National
Mirani		Labor	notional	1.2	-1.8	0.6	Ted Malone	Liberal National
Mudgeeraba		Labor	Dianne Reilly	2.9	-6.6	3.9	Ros Bates	Liberal National
Redlands		Labor	John English	6.8	-6.9	0.1	Peter Dowling	Liberal National

^¶ Ronan Lee was elected as a member of the Labor Party in 2006, but he defected to the Greens in 2008.

One of the gains by the Liberal Nationals was the defeat of the Minister for Sustainability, Climate Change and Innovation Andrew McNamara (Hervey Bay). The Parliamentary Secretary to the Minister for Education, Training and the Arts, Bonny Barry (Aspley), was also defeated.

Date

The previous state election was held on 9 September 2006 to elect the 89 members of the Legislative Assembly. In Queensland, for the government to serve a full-term, an election will be held approximately three years following the previous election. In Queensland, Section 80 of the Electoral Act 1992 states that an election must be held on a Saturday; and that the election campaign must run for a minimum of 26 or a maximum of 56 days following the issue of the writs. Five to seven days following the issue of the writs, the electoral roll is closed, which gives voters a final opportunity to enrol or to notify the Electoral Commission of Queensland of any changes in their place of residence.^[5]

Legislative Assembly

See also: 2006 election pendulum and maps, Candidates of the Queensland state election, 2009

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Queensland state election, 2009

The Labor Party, led by Premier Anna Bligh, and the LNP, led by Opposition Leader Lawrence Springborg, were the two main parties in Queensland at the election. It was the first election contested by the LNP following its creation with the merger of the National and Liberal parties. At the previous election, Labor won 59 seats, the Nationals won 17 seats, the Liberals won eight seats, One Nation won one seat, and independents won four seats.

A redistribution saw Labor notionally pick up three seats. Therefore, the LNP notionally needed to pick up 22 seats rather than 20 seats to form a majority government, which equated to an unchanged uniform 8.3 percent two party preferred swing.^[6]

Former Premier Peter Beattie resigned in September 2007, which triggered the October 2007 Brisbane Central by-election.

Parties contesting the election

Party	Seats Contested (2009)	Seats Contested (2006)
Australian Labor Party	89	89
LNP	88	89†
The Greens	89	75
DS4SEQ	32	N/A
Family First	25	26
One Nation	2	4
Independents & Others	72	46

† Contested 2006 elections as Liberal Party (49 seats) and National Party (40) seats.

Both the Australian Labor Party and the Greens contested all 89 seats. This was the first Queensland state election in which the Greens contested every seat. The LNP contested every seat except Gladstone (held by an Independent), which they avoided for strategic reasons. A total of 397 candidates contested the election—the largest number of candidates to contest a Queensland election since 1998.

Polling

Newspoll polling was conducted via random telephone number selection in city and country areas. Sampling sizes usually consist of around 1000 electors, with the declared margin of error at around ±3 percent.

**Better Premier ratings^**
Date	Labor Bligh	Coalition/LNP Springborg
18 – 19 Mar 2009	53%	33%
27 Feb – 8 Mar 2009	48%	34%
Jan – Feb 2009	48%	31%
Oct – Dec 2008	49%	30%
Jul – Sep 2008	53%	27%
Apr – Jun 2008	60%	24%
Jan – Mar 2008	64%	18%
Oct – Dec 2007	66%	11%²
Jul – Sep 2007	54%¹	25%²
Apr – Jun 2007	54%¹	19%²
Pre 2006 election	58%¹	28%
Pre 2004 election	62%¹	22%
Polling conducted by Newspoll and published in The Australian. ^ Remainder were "uncommitted" to either leader. ¹ Peter Beattie, ² Jeff Seeney

**Legislative Assembly opinion polling**
	Political parties							Two party preferred
Dates	ALP	Lib	Nat	LNP	Grn	FFP	Oth	ALP	LNP
18 – 19 Mar 2009	42%			42%	7%	0.5%	8%	49.9%	50.1%
27 Feb – 8 Mar 2009	41%			43%	8%	<0.5%	8%	49%	51%
Jan – Feb 2009	42%			41%	7%	<0.5%	10%	53%	47%
Oct – Dec 2008	45%			37%	8%	<0.5%	10%	57%	43%
Jul – Sep 2008	38%			41%	9%	1%	11%	51%	49%
Apr – Jun 2008	43%	26%	12%	38%	10%	<0.5%	9%	55%	45%
Jan – Mar 2008	50%	22%	10%	32%	8%	<0.5%	10%	60%	40%
Oct – Dec 2007	50%	26%	9%	35%	6%	1%	8%	59%	41%
Jul – Sep 2007	50%	21%	12%	33%	5%	2%	10%	59%	41%
Apr – Jun 2007	51%	20%	11%	31%	6%	1%	11%	61%	39%
2006 Election	46.9%	20.1%	17.8%	37.9%	8.0%	1.9%	5.3%	55.0%	45.0%
6 – 7 Sep 2006	48%	21%	17%	38%	4%	1%	9%	55%	45%
2004 Election	47%	18.5%	17%	35.5%	6.7%	4.9%	5.9%	55.5%	44.5%
Polling conducted by Newspoll and published in The Australian.

References

↑ "Queensland elects female premier". BBC News Online. 21 March 2009.
↑ "Election Timetable: 2009 State General Election". Electoral Commission of Queensland. Archived from the original on March 17, 2012.
↑ Queensland, Gazette: Extraordinary Archived March 17, 2012, at the Wayback Machine., No 71, 26 March 2009, 1307
↑ ECQ. "Parliament of Queensland, Assembly election, 21 March 2009".
↑ Electoral Act 1992
↑ "2008 QLD redistribution". ABC. 2009-03-21. Retrieved 2012-01-25.

External links

Elections and referendums in Queensland

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