ALP 12.9%
Incumbent MP
Nick Champion, since 2019. Previously member for Wakefield, 2007-2019.
Northern fringe of Adelaide. Wakefield covers the towns of Elizabeth, Gawler and Salisbury on the northern outskirts of Adelaide. In addition to the entirety of the Gawler and Playford council areas, it covers northern parts of the Salisbury council area and small parts of the Barossa and Light council areas (those parts immediately to the north and east of Gawler.
History
Spence was a new name created for the 2019 election, replacing the seat of Wakefield.
Wakefield was an original South Australian electorate, having been created in 1903 at the first election with single-member electorates in South Australia. The seat was almost always been held by conservative parties. Prior to the 2007 election, the ALP had only won the seat two times. The electorate was significantly redrawn prior to the 2004 and 2019 elections in ways that shifted the seat from being a conservative fringe seat to a Labor-leaning urban seat.
The seat was first won in 1903 by Frederick Holder. Holder had previously been Premier of South Australia and had won an at-large seat in the House of Representatives in 1901 and had been elected as the first Speaker of the House of Representatives. Holder served as an independent and as Speaker up until July 1909, when he died while presiding over a raucous session of the House of Representatives.
The ensuing by-election was won by the Commonwealth Liberal Party’s Richard Foster, who had previously served as a minister in state governments before losing his seat in 1906. Foster held the seat continuously until the 1928 election, when he was defeated by Country Party candidate Maurice Collins. Collins was defeated at the 1929 election, and the party has never won Wakefield since.
The seat was won in 1929 by Nationalist Charles Hawker, who went on to serve as a minister in Joseph Lyons’ first government before resigning from the ministry in protest against high ministerial salaries during the Depression. Hawker died in a plane crash in 1938.
The ALP’s Sidney McHugh won the seat in the following by-election. McHugh was a former state MP, and lost the seat to UAP candidate John Duncan-Hughes in 1940 before returning to state politics. Duncan-Hughes had previously held the seat of Boothby before losing it in 1928, and then had served as a UAP Senator from 1932 to 1938.
Duncan-Hughes lost to ALP candidate Albert Smith in 1943. Smith was defeated by Philip McBride (LIB) in 1946. McBride had previously held the seat of Grey and then served in the Senate, and had served in Menzies’ first ministry while in the Senate.
McBride served as a minister when the Liberal Party gained power in 1949, first as Minister for the Interior and then as Minister for Defence from 1950 until his retirement in 1958.
Bert Kelly won the seat in 1958, and was a prominent proponent of free trade at a time when it was a minority view. He served as a minister from 1967 until 1969 but his advancement was limited by his free trade advocacy.
The redistribution before the 1977 election abolished the seat of Angas and the sitting member for Angas, Geoffrey Giles, challenged Kelly for Liberal preselection and won Wakefield. Giles had held Angas since 1964, when he won a by-election triggered by the death of Alexander Downer Sr.
Giles retired in 1983, and was succeeded by Neil Andrew. Andrew had a largely undistinguished career until after the 1998 election, when he was elected Speaker of the House of Representatives.
A redistribution before the 2004 election made Wakefield a notional Labor seat, and Andrew retired. Despite the unfavourable redistribution the Liberal Party’s David Fawcett retained the seat. Fawcett held the seat for one term before losing it to the ALP’s Nick Champion in 2007.
Champion has been re-elected five times, winning the renamed seat of Spence in 2019.
Assessment
Spence is a safe Labor seat.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Matt Burnell | Labor | 46,596 | 43.9 | -7.1 |
| Shawn Lock | Liberal | 27,153 | 25.6 | -0.3 |
| David Deex | Greens | 12,052 | 11.3 | +4.1 |
| Linda Champion | One Nation | 11,532 | 10.9 | +10.9 |
| Alvin Eric Warren | United Australia | 7,158 | 6.7 | -0.3 |
| Matilda Bawden | Federation Party | 1,736 | 1.6 | +1.6 |
| Informal | 5,534 | 5.0 | -1.0 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Matt Burnell | Labor | 66,818 | 62.9 | -1.2 |
| Shawn Lock | Liberal | 39,409 | 37.1 | +1.2 |
Booths have been divided into three parts: central, north-east and south-west.
Labor won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all three areas, ranging from 55.3% in the north-east to 70% in the south-west.
The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 10.8% in the south-west to 13.8% in the north-east. One Nation polled slightly less than the Greens, with a primary vote ranging from 8.9% in the north-east to 12% in the centre, with a higher pre-poll vote than the Greens.
| Voter group | GRN prim | ON prim | ALP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| Central | 12.1 | 12.0 | 65.2 | 30,497 | 28.7 |
| South-West | 10.8 | 9.4 | 70.0 | 16,935 | 15.9 |
| North-East | 13.8 | 8.9 | 55.3 | 10,406 | 9.8 |
| Pre-poll | 10.4 | 11.3 | 61.2 | 26,848 | 25.3 |
| Other votes | 10.7 | 10.8 | 59.9 | 21,541 | 20.3 |
Election results in Spence at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor, the Liberal Party, the Greens and One Nation.
Nimalan
On Kingston, Amanda Rishworth seems like some sort of vote winning machine and has built up a huge personal vote and so she would be safe unless it all went terribly pear shaped. She is in a similar category to Albo and Tanya Plibersek – seats are safe until they retire and then all bets are off – with ON in Kingston and Greens in latter two. I wonder if Ballarat could come into play when Catherine King retires in a similar vein.
On Shortland, it is a seat that has been edging closer to the Libs for a while, more so than Whitlam for example. It is interesting that there are pockets of serious One Nation votes in Shortland especially in the south toward Dobell and north west toward Hunter. In one booth – San Remo they outpolled the Libs. Dobell to me would seem prime ON territory.
Another seat that could end up in play is Gilmore, it would seem to have all the right ingredients for a big ON vote, white, retirees, a bit depressed, a bit outer suburban in Kiama. Wasn’t high last time but could be a target.
@ Redistributed
RE Amanda Rishworth I totally agree i think she is the best perfoming MP IMHO
Ballarat is interesting as i am not even sure that it is Coalition proof yet. I dont think it like Corio when Libs used to win back in the Menzies-Holt era and never again. So when Catherine King retires i will be watching it closely it also had an above state average No vote for the Voice so i dont think it is like Newcastle or Cunningham.
Re Shortland. i think Shortland is now back above Pre-Adani levels for Libs. The swing to Labor in 2025 was abobe state average and i think the backlash in 2019 has been reversed. For Coalition to win that they need to go full on the Climate Wars but that risks losing votes elsewhere
Re Whitlam, i feel it is a better prospect than Shortland as it contains the entire share of the Southern Highlands which is a conservative area on the southern fringe it has a lot of housing estates which attract young white tradie families. There is also a Macedonian community which i feel is moving rightwards. Shortland geography sandwiched between Lake Macquarie and Pacific Ocean means that it does not attract population growth unlike Whitlam
I agree about Kiama however this really a seat Libs need to win as a minimum and i dont think Labor expects to hold it long term anyway
Another seat which will be interesting is Pearce this has todays Millenial Battlers they are the modern day Phil and Jenny Archtype which Libs targeted in 1996. If Pearce is doing well for ONP that means they have captured young battlers. Pearce has a lot of young White mortgage belt families often FIFO families.