11:43 – That’s it for today. All done within an hour. It’s worth noting that if the federal parliament is expanded, this redistribution process will be abandoned and will need to start over. So hopefully the federal government will make a final decision on that matter soon.
11:42 – We already know that 3.95% of voters are to be moved to new seats, but I thought I would drill down to the seat level to see which seats are changing the most.
Seven of the ten seats have retained all of their existing population. The only exceptions are Mayo, Spence and Kingston. They have respectively lost 15.7%, 12.6% and 9.5% of their pre-redistribution enrolment.
Adelaide, Hindmarsh and Sturt are entirely untouched.
10.2% of Makin’s voters are new to the seat, as are 9.5% in Kingston and 9.4% in Mayo. Boothby has 4.6% new voters, while O’Donoghue has 2.7% and Barker 2.6%. Spence has not gained voters, but did lose voters, which reflects it’s fast-growing outer suburban status.
11:37 – And here is my map showing the changes. You can toggle each layer on and off.
11:31 – This video is quite useful in explaining the changes:
11:23 – Here are my estimates of two-candidate-preferred margins. Most changes are very minor or non-existent. Labor has very large margins in six of their seven seats and they are all held intact. Barker gets slightly safer for the Liberal Party while Grey/O’Donoghue becomes more marginal for the Liberal Party.
Mayo was the only complex calculation, since it is the only non-classic seat in the state. I found a reasonably high correlation between Labor 2PP and Labor 2CP, so I have calculated the difference and applied it to the new areas. The areas that Mayo has lost to Boothby and Kingston are relatively weaker for Rebekha Sharkie, but they have also been replaced by areas with a higher Labor 2PP. Overall I think this slightly increases her margin but it is not particularly meaningful.
| Electorate | Old margin | New margin |
| Adelaide | ALP 19.1% | ALP 19.1% |
| Barker | LIB 13.0% | LIB 12.7% |
| Boothby | ALP 11.1% | ALP 11.1% |
| Hindmarsh | ALP 16.3% | ALP 16.3% |
| Kingston | ALP 20.7% | ALP 20.1% |
| Makin | ALP 14.7% | ALP 14.9% |
| Mayo | CA 14.9% | CA vs ALP 15.3% |
| O’Donoghue (Grey) | LIB 4.6% | LIB 4.2% |
| Spence | ALP 15.3% | ALP 15.2% |
| Sturt | ALP 6.6% | ALP 6.6% |
11:06 – This table shows my estimated primary vote and 2PP for each new seat. I’ve included Rebekah Sharkie in the Independent vote, and I’ve also added in One Nation.
| Electorate | ALP 2PP | LIB 2PP | ALP prim | LIB prim | GRN prim | ON prim | IND prim |
| Adelaide | 69.1 | 30.9 | 46.5 | 24.2 | 19.0 | 4.0 | 0.0 |
| Barker | 37.3 | 62.7 | 22.3 | 47.6 | 8.2 | 8.2 | 6.7 |
| Boothby | 61.1 | 38.9 | 42.0 | 32.0 | 17.1 | 3.1 | 1.0 |
| Hindmarsh | 66.3 | 33.7 | 48.1 | 23.1 | 13.6 | 5.0 | 1.6 |
| Kingston | 70.1 | 29.9 | 51.0 | 18.6 | 13.8 | 6.5 | 1.6 |
| Makin | 64.9 | 35.1 | 47.7 | 22.0 | 12.6 | 6.9 | 0.2 |
| Mayo | 55.5 | 44.5 | 23.2 | 23.7 | 13.2 | 5.8 | 28.5 |
| O’Donoghue (Grey) | 45.8 | 54.2 | 23.0 | 34.6 | 6.1 | 10.0 | 17.2 |
| Spence | 65.2 | 34.8 | 44.1 | 18.8 | 14.5 | 9.7 | 2.5 |
| Sturt | 56.6 | 43.4 | 35.3 | 34.3 | 15.6 | 3.4 | 7.2 |
10:56 – 3.95% of voters have been moved to a new seat, which is much less dramatic than the changes in Tasmania, for example.
10:55 – The brief summary of changes based on the report are:
- The proposed electorate of Barker gains part of the Alexandrina Council Local Government Area (LGA) and the localities of Callington and Kanmantoo from the electorate of Mayo.
- The entirety of the City of Mitcham LGA is united in the proposed electorate of Boothby, moving parts of the LGA out of the electorate of Mayo.
- The proposed electorate of Kingston gains the localities of Aldinga, Aldinga Beach, Port Willunga and Sellicks Beach from the electorate of Mayo.
- The proposed electorate of Makin gains part of the City of Salisbury LGA south of the Little Para River from the electorate of Spence.
- The proposed electorate of Mayo gains the localities of Aberfoyle Park, Chandlers Hill and part of Happy Valley from the electorate of Kingston.
- The proposed electorate of O’Donoghue gains part of the City of Playford LGA from the electorate of Spence.
Generally this sounds like rural seats like Barker and Grey/O’Donoghue are expanding closer to Adelaide, with Mayo also moving further into the Adelaide area.
10:53 – The redistribution committee has recommended renaming the large rural seat of Grey to O’Donoghue, after Lowitja O’Donoghue.
10:50 – The Australian Electoral Commission has just published the draft federal redistribution for South Australia.
I had been briefed that this was due out but there hasn’t been much chance to think about it. I understand that the AEC deliberately waited until after the SA election to avoid voter confusion.
I’ll be back shortly with my thoughts on the changes, and I will publish margin estimates soon.
I will be trying to post updates with South Australian time.
Given how far south into the northern outskirts of metro Adelaide the huge/ginormous Grey/O’Donoghue is now pushing (and how far west Barker is now pushing), a Bill to increase the size of Parliament (if only to 14 senators per state, with the House therefore of around 173-175 MPs) cannot come soon enough! That would likely increase SA’s numbers on a redetermination from 10 federal MPs to 12.