ALP 1.2%
Incumbent MP
Michael Danby, member for Melbourne Ports since 1998.
Geography
Inner south of Melbourne. Macnamara covers the port of Melbourne, St Kilda and Caulfield. Other suburbs include Elwood, Balaclava, Elsternwick, Ripponlea, Middle Park, Albert Park and South Melbourne.
Redistribution
Macnamara is a new name for Melbourne Ports. The seat gained Windsor from Higgins, which reduced the Labor margin from 1.4% to 1.2%. The gap between Labor and the Greens at the key exclusion point was also reduced from 1.1% to 0.3%.
History
Melbourne Ports was an original Federation electorate. After originally being won by the Protectionist party, it has been held by the ALP consistently since 1906, although it has rarely been held by large margins.
Melbourne Ports was first won in 1901 by Protectionist candidate Samuel Mauger, who had been a state MP for one year before moving into federal politics. Mauger was re-elected in 1903 but in 1906 moved to the new seat of Maribyrnong, which he held until his defeat in 1910.
Melbourne Ports was won in 1906 by Labor candidates James Mathews. Mathews held Melbourne Ports for a quarter of a century, retiring in 1931.
Mathews was succeeded in 1931 by Jack Holloway. Holloway had won a shock victory over Prime Minister Stanley Bruce in the seat of Flinders in 1929, before moving to the much-safer Melbourne Ports in 1931. Holloway had served as a junior minister in the Scullin government, and served in the Cabinet of John Curtin and Ben Chifley throughout the 1940s. He retired at the 1951 election and was succeeded by state MP Frank Crean.
Crean quickly rose through the Labor ranks and was effectively the Shadow Treasurer from the mid-1950s until the election of the Whitlam government in 1972. Crean served as Treasurer for the first two years of the Whitlam government, but was pushed aside in late 1974 in the midst of difficult economic times, and moved to the Trade portfolio. He served as Deputy Prime Minister for the last four months of the Whitlam government, and retired in 1977.
Crean was replaced by Clyde Holding, who had served as Leader of the Victorian Labor Party from 1967 until 1976. He won preselection against Simon Crean, son of Frank. Holding served in the Hawke ministry from 1983 until the 1990 election, and served as a backbencher until his retirement in 1998.
Holding was replaced by Michael Danby in 1998, and Danby has won re-election at every subsequent election, although never with huge margins, and a margin as small as 3% in 2004 and 1.4% in 2016.
Candidates
Sitting Labor MP Michael Danby is not running for re-election.
- Ruby O’Rourke (Independent)
- Steph Hodgins-May (Greens)
- Steven Armstrong (Sustainable Australia)
- Kate Ashmor (Liberal)
- Chris Wallis (Independent)
- Craig McPherson (Animal Justice)
- Christine Kay (Rise Up Australia)
- Helen Lucy Paton (United Australia)
- Josh Burns (Labor)
Assessment
Macnamara is a very complex seat with great variations in the vote across different booths. The Liberal Party has a significant lead on the primary vote, but Greens preferences were enough to push Labor ahead in 2016. The Greens are close to overtaking Labor, at which point Labor preferences would decide the result. Any of the three parties could conceivably win. It’s not clear what impact Michael Danby’s retirement will have on the seat – there’s evidence that his presence as an incumbent helped Labor in some parts of the seat and hurt them in others.
2016 result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Owen Guest | Liberal | 35,533 | 41.9 | +0.9 | 41.9 |
| Michael Danby | Labor | 22,897 | 27.0 | -4.7 | 26.6 |
| Steph Hodgins-May | Greens | 20,179 | 23.8 | +3.6 | 24.2 |
| Robert Millen Smyth | Animal Justice | 1,685 | 2.0 | +2.0 | 2.0 |
| Henry Von Doussa | Marriage Equality | 1,349 | 1.6 | +1.6 | 1.6 |
| Levi Mckenzie-Kirkbright | Drug Law Reform | 1,348 | 1.6 | +1.6 | 1.5 |
| Peter Holland | Independent | 1,393 | 1.6 | +1.6 | 1.6 |
| John B Myers | Independent | 425 | 0.5 | +0.5 | 0.5 |
| Others | 0.2 | ||||
| Informal | 3,756 | 4.2 |
2016 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Michael Danby | Labor | 43,573 | 51.4 | -2.2 | 51.2 |
| Owen Guest | Liberal | 41,236 | 48.6 | +2.2 | 48.8 |
Booth breakdown
Booths have been divided into three areas: Port Melbourne, St Kilda and Caulfield.
Labor won a large 61.7% majority of the two-party-preferred vote in St Kilda, and half of the vote in Caulfield. The Liberal Party polled 51.2% in Port Melbourne.
On a primary vote basis, the three areas look very different. The Greens topped the primary vote in St Kilda, with Labor a distant third. In Port Melbourne and Caulfield, the Liberal Party topped the primary vote, with Labor second and the Greens in third place.
| Voter group | GRN prim % | ALP prim % | LIB prim % | ALP 2PP % | Total votes | % of votes |
| St Kilda | 35.3 | 25.9 | 31.1 | 61.7 | 17,712 | 20.0 |
| Port Melbourne | 21.6 | 27.7 | 44.7 | 48.8 | 16,764 | 18.9 |
| Caulfield | 20.1 | 29.4 | 44.7 | 50.0 | 8,550 | 9.6 |
| Other votes | 19.3 | 26.5 | 45.8 | 47.0 | 22,890 | 25.8 |
| Pre-poll | 23.8 | 25.3 | 43.5 | 49.6 | 22,806 | 25.7 |
Election results in Macnamara at the 2016 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes, Labor primary votes, Liberal primary votes and Greens primary votes, as well as a map showing which party topped the primary vote in each booth.
Become a Patron!
Yet another candidates forum I spotted on the internet. This time the three main candidates (Lab, Lib, Grn) will speak at the Southbank Residents Association forum on 16 Apr 19, 6:30 pm to 8:30 pm, at South Melbourne Primary School, 129 Ferrar St. This is a new school recently built next to City Rd light rail stop on the No 96 tram route.
Despite the small current margin, I’m not sure why this seat is still getting mentioned as a possible Victorian gain for the Liberals in some media (ie. Barry Cassidy tonight on Insiders and an article on The Age last week).
With the usual disclosure that obviously state & federal results can be quite different, I have looked at some state numbers within Macnamara.
If you combine the entire state seats of Albert Park & Caulfield which make up the bulk of Macnamara (acknowleding that a small part of Caulfield isn’t in Macnamara), these are the results including postal, absentee, provisional & pre-poll results:
Primary Vote:
Liberal – 39%
Labor – 39%
Greens – 15%
2PP:
Labor – 56%
Liberal – 44%
This doesn’t look too awful for the Liberals yet, except when you factor in that firstly the only part of these state seats NOT in Macnamara is actually friendlier for the Liberals than the above result, and more importantly that the biggest exclusion to these results are the overlapping part of Prahran.
I didn’t include Prahran in the above yet for two reasons – firstly it’s a much smaller section so the absentee/postal vote etc is harder to measure; and secondly because it was a Greens v Liberals 2PP.
However, these were the primary votes in the Prahran booths that overlap Macnamara:
Labor – 37%
Greens – 35%
Liberals – Only 19%
The Greens v Liberal 2CP in these Prahran booths was a massive 74-26 so I would expect an ALP v LIB 2PP to be similar (at least over 70% ALP).
So when you look at an ALP 2PP of 56% across Albert Park + Caulfield, remove one of the Liberals’ stronger areas, then add another 3 suburbs where the Liberals couldn’t even get a 20% primary vote, that’s a 2PP of roughly 60-40 in the overlapping state seats.
Again, don’t get me wrong, state elections are very different and I think in particular the Greens will do a lot better (at the expense of Labor) in the federal election than in the state election. But the reality is that the Liberals will need the same voters as the state election to swing about 10% in their favour compared to how they voted in November to win this seat. It’s just not going to happen.
Trent
It is a narrow margin and the demographics would be why its kind of seen as a possibility, in any election all major political parties have target seats so MacNamara is probably on the Liberals target list due to it being on a 1.3% margin with no ALP incumbent and the demographics are fairly friendly to the Liberals so they ought to be competitive against an ALP offering changes to taxation that potentially adversely impact a large segment of the electorate, however the Liberals have kicked a few own goals by dropping Tunrbull and failing to come up with a clear climate change policy so the ALP will probably hold this seat with a swing to them.
The Liberals in this seat would be Turnbull small-l liberals. If the Liberals are in any kind of trouble in Higgins or Kooyong, which they seem to be, they’re doomed here.
Kate Ashmor also seems to be tanking at candidates forums and other public appearances. Her finger pointing shouty performance at the Australian Jewish News rally may have sabotaged her chances of picking up orthodox voters that used to vote for Danby.
This seat is a Labor vs Green competition and it will come down to who’s better at picking up disgruntled Liberals.
The thing that could blow this all out of the water is Ashmor doing so badly she comes 3rd, giving the seat to Labor with her preferences.
They are good points and I don’t think it will swing as hard to Labor as the overlapping area did in the state election. It’s certainly not going to swing to the Liberals though, particularly when the loss of the ALP incumbent is probably seen as a positive for 90% of those in the electorate who were aware of him. I think it’s hard to imagine at least a 4-5% swing away from the Liberals not happening in an overwhelmingly progressive (albeit affluent) seat this like this, especially when the overlapping area swung by closer to 10% just 6 months ago.
John that would be a really interesting outcome and it’s not too far fetched either. You make great points about Kate Ashmor’s performance also.
I see the federal result of Macnamara most likely being closest to the state result of Prahran in November, where all 3 parties had pretty close primary votes (all within the 28-34% range) resulting in an easy 2PP win against the Liberals by whoever finishes higher out of Labor & the Greens, but the spanner thrown in the works for the Greens would be if the Liberals tank so much that they don’t actually finish in the top 2.
I think it’s the least likely outcome but it is definitely possible.
I’ve mentioned before I think the automatic association between affluence and voting conservative can sometimes be overdone and Macnamara to me is a good example of that. This seat was well & truly gentrified a decade ago but has stayed in Labor hands. It’s not really any more gentrified now than it was in 2016 or even 2013 so I don’t see demographic changes as a factor. And apart from Caulfield it doesn’t have the “old wealth” of seats like Higgins & Kooyong.
I just notices a poster in the window of a local shop for another candidate, Chris Wallis, Independent. Website is Wallis4macnamara.com.au
I got my first election junk mail today. It was a postal vote application form from the ALP. As I will be early voting on 29 Apr 19 and not postal voting I will mail the application form back to the ALP in the reply paid envelope provided so they can dispose of this recyclable waste correctly.
Josh Wilson and Senator Lines – another two in addition to Melissa Parke that have expressed controversial remarks about Israel/Jews.
Will it hurt them in this seat, given such a huge Jewish population? Potentially IMO, but not enough to lose the seat/dampen the swing to Labor in any meaningful way.
Having said that, clearly BS thinks the comments are a problem for Labor generally, hence his rush to quash them.
Wealthy of Sydney – Hebrews make up about 10% of my electorate and many other voters like left wingers from Elwood and sensible centre Liberal as well as other moderates, like me, oppose Israel’s oppression of the Palestinians. The Liberal and Labor candidates are both from Caulfield’s Hebrew community so the vote will be split but I think not as neurotic about Israel as the ineffective Danby was.
The Hebrews are not a cohesive community with many political and religious factions bickering constantly and with “leader” heading various small propaganda groups. The electorate is the home of the Jewish school that once protected a paedophile head mistress who decamped to Israel and is awaiting extradition back to Australia. Also the electorate is the home of Zionist You Tube fanatic Avi Yemeni.
W of S
Nah BS is worried about his wealthy benefactors. Guess which community is dominant ?? hint Pratt etc
Adrian
Sometime i’d like to hear your solution to the ME problem. I would say that i am amazed at the Israeli MODERATION of their response to constant attacks. I often like to ask ‘What do you think we would do if we had an adversary lobbing missiles at us say from Geelong, to MELBOURNE. Killing civilians constantly. How do you reckon Australians would react ??. Your’e ex military, might i suggest a fairly primal one . eg the Japs in New GUINEA. Or perhaps how terrified the GERMANS were of the Australian love of hand-to hand combat.
I seriously doubt we would be as restrained
@AJ,
Didn’t mean to imply that there was a monolithic voting bloc, only that naturally, some people WILL be turned off by the comments.
winediamond – Simple, Israel should adopt multiculturalism. The three monotheistic religions are nearly identical and worship the same one God. Better still Israelis, and other in Palestine affected in this conflict, should become atheist like me and life would be much simpler.
Even in Macnamara 30% of voters have no religion and that percent is growing with every census and others baptised never go to church as adult and this is reflected in so many religion buildings are closed, reused for another purpose or my favourite bulldozed for apartment developments.
I loved the old Soviet films in Russia in the 1930’s when many Orthodox churches and cathedrals came crashing down. “Religion is the Opium of the Masses” as Karl Marx said. I hate religion but I am not a Maxist.
Adrian
Fundamentally i agree with you. However i believe you are confused in one important way. People are god botherers because they need the simplicity of a 2 dimensional reality life etc. good bad, right wrong black white etc. These pilgrims resist the 3 dimensional world of grey.
As a Reiki Master i believe in “the great spirit” (dai ko myo), However i’ve always been a vehement opponent of religions. Something of a paradox.
i refused to have WD junior baptised. Hilariously he is never happier than when declaring (with deliberate menace ) his religion as “HEATHEN” !!!. ” perhaps “Vikings” has added some new intensity !?
My prediction of Israel is that an Arab will deliver a WMD , & then we will find out how many nuclear warheads Israel (does not !!?) have . It has been 25 years but i’m still convinced that it will happen.
Peace will never happen. Neither side is willing to give enough.
The Middle East appears to be an election issue only in Macnamara. This is the way it should stay. I think Adrian’s preoccupation with religion and especially the religion of the ALP candidate is a distraction.
Andrew
i’d say it’s an issue in Blaxsland, Watson, Fowler, & McMahon, some Melbourne seats too, But i’m not sure which ones. However the issue is yet to be exploited
Outer eastern Melbourne suburbs (Kevin Andrews etc) is the Christian bible belt.
Adrian
I would call the Christian bible belt is more the area around Lilydale in Casey then Andrews in Menzies but in saying that both seats were strongly in support of the gay marriage survey. Menzies has a large Greek population which may follow the orthodox faith.
Kevin Andrews is a religious conservative living in the 1950’s.
The bible belt in Melbourne is probably Chisholm, Menzies, Deakin, Aston, Casey and even pockets of Kooyong, as well Holt is an epicentre for evangelicals especially of migrant backgrounds.
Religion will not trump class or economic issues especially in Australia
Totally agree Mick and especially in Macnamara, despite the constant obsessing over winning the Jewish vote which in reality is only about a quarter the size of the “No religion” vote.
This seat won’t be won or lost in Caulfield, the least densely populated part of the electorate which will probably be cut out of the seat in the next redistribution anyway, and where a significant chunk of the population is probably already rusted onto the Liberals.
Even with Danby as MP, the Liberal PV ranged between 45-51% in Caulfield compared to only 28-30% for Labor. So how much of the Caulfield vote is really up for grabs with his retirement and/or the impact of Labor candidates’ views & comments about Israel? I think it’s way overstated and the reality is that most of the demographic people think could swing to the Liberals are already voting Liberal anyway, so very few votes will actually change.
Macnamara will be won or lost in the bayside suburbs between Port Melbourne and Middle Park where voters are economically conservative but otherwise very progressive, which makes them susceptible to significant swings based on how conservative or “moderate” the Liberal leader & social agenda is perceived to be.
The most important question will probably be whether Labor or the Greens pick up more of the swing in those suburbs.
I got my first party political election material in my letterbox today and it was a Liberal card title “Labor Can’t Manage Money”. What impresses me was that the tax implication were specific to Macnamara and not just generic.
It then listed many alleged ALP taxes and how constituents and other people in Macnamara may be affected, including 38,000 small businesses, 8,000 retirees, 11,000 investors and 9,000 who will pay a 2% Deficit Levy under Labor.
Adrian
Get ready for very targeted political advertising. We have a dual approach to candidate management.
Firstly a total centralisation of communication. Major parties are especially in willing to allow candidates to speak on own behalf
But this is to some extent countered by Targetted Marketing with Major Parties having data based that can identify every voters age occupation sex union, club or association affiliation resulting in you getting a unique targetted robot calls, letter brochure or flyer which deals with your pet issues. I am sure that both you and I have electronic files in both major parties. Minor parties are being offered access to similar marketing programmes. This Nineteen eighty four big brother style campaigning is here now and I can not see any government restricting its use.
Our choice is cop it or shut up. In time using false names will be as trying to send encrypted messages via radio signals.
If Turnbull wasn’t ousted I would have put this as a liberal gain. Now I’m not quite sure as the Greens have a possibility of gaining this seat.
Bob – I agree but I will be voting for all the women, regardless of party before the men this time in Macnamara as we need more women in parliament and many men are useless like outgoing MHR Michael Danby. So either the Greens and Liberal candidate will end up with my vote after preferences of the other women are distributed.
I got two more election leaflet in the letterbox today one was a glossy leaflet from independent candidate Chris Wallis with a group of useful platform items. The other was from AEU on state school funding which means they want more teachers and therefore more union membership. Macnamara has plenty of state government schools, with about 23 kids per class, as well as non government school locally or nearby.
The Age report that Kate Ashmor posted an emoji (a cartoon like funny face) of Bill Shorten as a pig a few years ago. Why do mature adults bother with that online Yankee garbage, like face book, and all the crap associated with it.
Labor supporters keeping saying how popular Turnbull is but would never vote for him.
I believe that this Turnbull Liberal is fiction, this voter is either going to vote Green or Labor anyway!
The New South Wales election showed that state issues are paramount and that the Turnbull leadership is in the distant past. Federal issues are different altogether so please less focus on the Turnbull dodo it is extinct now!
I’m still unclear about how the addition of 5000 voters from Windsor made this margin notionally closer than before. Windsor has a 2PP way less favourable to the Liberals than Macnarama as a whole, so I don’t really get how adding a suburb where the Liberal PV was about 27% (compared to 42% in Macnamara) could possibly have been a positive gain for the Liberals. The 2CP in Windsor was about 68-32 against them.
I get that the 68-32 2CP and 27% Liberal PV was only the polling place result which was only around 1000 out of the 5000 added voters.
But to account for the other 4000, postal & prepoll results in Higgins were about 5% better for the Liberals than polling place results so that would be about a 32% Liberal PV and maybe 37% 2CP in Windsor; and the next nearest polling place where a lot of Windsor residents might vote was Prahran East which had about a 34% Liberal PV and 39% 2CP.
All of that is far worse than their 42% PV and 48% 2CP in Macnamara so I’m really confused about how the margin narrowed. Am I missing something?
Stan
In a seat like MacNamara the replacing of Turnbull with a more socially conservative leader like Morrison would have dented the Liberals changes in this seat, its a seat that has along preferred its MP’s to focus on what the reactionaries like Morrison and Dutton would call trendy lefty issues whereas Turnbull was more in tune with how MacNamara type Liberals prefer things.
I expect a 3% to 5% swing towards the ALP in this seat.
Stan
The other thing that needs to be remembered about the NSW election is the impact of OPV. It isn’t used om either Victoria or the federal election.
ABC Radio Melbourne (former 3LO and former ABC Radio 774), drive program, will be broadcast on 29 Apr 19 at 4pm to 6.30pm from Acland Court, St Kilda, for the Macnamara electorate. I found this information on the Port Phillip City Council website in the Media Centre’s “What’s On” section. This is the first day of early voting too.
CORRECTION: The ABC Radio broadcast on 29 Apr 19 is at Acland Plaza, which is near Acland Court, but in the open and south of Acland St tram terminus near Barkly St.
According to Wikipedia the final two candidates not listed above are Ruby O’Rourke (Independent) and Christine Kay (RUAP).
Kate Ashmor has had a disastrous campaign so far and a lot of bad press.
I suspect Macnamara’s swing against the Liberals will be considerably higher than across Victoria and even Melbourne as a whole. My prediction is that their primary vote will dip to around 35% for the first time since the 1990 redistribution added Caulfield to the seat.
Ashmor reported as saying private schools are far superior to public schools, Chloe Shorten is a pig (emoji post) and the childless people like Julia Gillard “lack empathy” .. She is surely running the type of campaign which would ensure that she comes 3rd.
If the Liberal vote does drop off the cliff – quite plausible – it would seem the ALP would pick up those votes rather than the Greens – leaving the Greens well behind. For the Libs to get to third place they would need to drop down by about 20% – that would be a really big call. And that would be good for the ALP as the preferences in Macnamara will always go the ALP before the Greens.
The ALP had a launch in St Kilda for Josh Burns at the exclusive and upgraded Hotel Esplanade but what was actually “launched” for we constituents in Macnamara? Will it be like the dreadful non event activities of Michael Danby over the last 20 years which were about spending taxes on security of Jewish schools at the expense of other schools or was it his overseas interest in Israel, Tibet, Burma he spoke about but were not influenced by anything Danby said. In the mean time parts of Melbourne Ports continued to be enveloped in corporate and gangland crime, car stealing, pedophiles, murder, drugs, drunkenness and prostitution. Good job Mr Danby, I don’t think. This is why he remained a backbench clown for 97% of his time in parliament.
These are comments that Ashmoor made in local newspapers about 20 years ago. Not sure this is all too relevant (and there is a certain grain of truth in what she has said) but interesting to see Aussie political parties now engaging in similar levels of opposition research as their US counterparts do.
The Sherriff
Good comment. I liked you’re insight on research.
I think there is a lot more than again of truth as you put it. So i’ll take the opportunity, to expand on that, & to be more controversial !!
Peter Knopke
Obviously it is just inappropriate to reflect on whether Chloe Shorten has porcine qualities. It is inexcusable to attack the families of politicians.
However private schools ARE UNDENIABLY SUPERIOR If only for ONE reason. That is that they educate a pupil for a fraction of the cost to the TAXPAYER. Whether it is a 1/4, or a 1/2 is beside the point. This inescapable reality seems beyond the comprehension of the left. The Greens actually propose to END ALL public funding of independent schools which i would estimate as a cost of nearly $20 billion to the budget.
Childless people do lack empathy. How could they not ??. What can possibly prepare someone for parenthood ?? It is taking responsibility for another human being. Fully conscious or not that is an awesome commitment.
Trent and The Sheriff – check your spelling of Macnamara and Ashmor.
I spelt both the same way you just did?
Adrian
I don’t think too many people see The Espy has upmarket or exclusive, its a local iconic St Kilda venue.
Winediamond
However private schools ARE UNDENIABLY SUPERIOR If only for ONE reason. That is that they educate a pupil for a fraction of the cost to the TAXPAYER.
I’m not sure that is really the case, my neighbor sends his two kids to a $30k per year per kid private school, I doubt it is better value then the local public state school.
Trent – check 22 April 11.19 pm. The Sheriff – Ashmor not Ashmoor 26 April 2.19 pm.
TPTMTBP
You missed my point. It IS better value for the taxpayer. Each of those kids would cost at least 20k+ at that public state school. Additionally private schools could be leaned on (very hard) to provide special ed, scholarships & bursaries. What is needed is a minister with balls. I speak with experience from the special ed which my profoundly disabled daughter received at PLC Croydon.
Ashmor’s comments have led me to some risk taking behaviour….. i could suffer for this…..
I can’t resist a grossly sexist reflection. When/ if BS is elected Chloe Shorten will be the hottest First Lady since Sonia McMahon, no question, no contest !! In fact probably the all time hottest !! Hardly an electoral liability !! I doubt she will leave the side of BS for the duration of the entire campaign.
Though Sonia was Bad, real bad !!.
I think if Kate Ashmor puts her foot in her mouth one more time, we will see a repeat of the Albert Park state election result. Libs would be stupid to think they have any chance left here thanks to her. Easy ALP hold.
The pencil that marks the ballot paper – The Hotel Esplanade is to St Kilda as the Hotel Windsor is to Melbourne CBD. Hotel Esplanade was closed for a few years for the upgrade including to some uppers floors unused for decades. I would not be surprised if Harry and Megan stayed there next Royal visit.
If it came out years later that Kate Ashmor was deliberately sabotaging her own campaign as part of a deal with Labor to keep the Greens out, I wouldn’t be surprised.