LNP 11.3%
Incumbent MP
Llew O’Brien, since 2016.
Geography
Wide Bay covers parts of the Queensland coast, including the towns of Noosa, Gympie and Maryborough, at the southern end of central Queensland as well as the northern end of the Sunshine Coast.
Wide Bay is an original federation electorate. It has been held for most of its history by the Nationals and its predecessors, although there have been two periods where it was held by the ALP for over a decade.
The seat was first won in 1901 by Gympie colonial MP Andrew Fisher, a prominent Labor member. Fisher had served as a minister in Anderson Dawson’s brief government in 1899, the first socialist government in the world.
Fisher served as a minister in Chris Watson’s federal Labor government in 1904, and became deputy leader of the ALP in 1905. He became the ALP’s leader in 1907. In 1908, Alfred Deakin’s minority government fell, and Fisher became Prime Minister at the head of a Labor minority government. This lasted until 1909, when Deakin returned to power at the head of a new unified Liberal party.
Fisher returned to office after the 1910 election, when the ALP won an unprecedented majority in the House of Representatives. This was the first time a party won a majority in a federal election. He governed until 1913, when he lost office to the Liberal Party, but he returned to power after Joseph Cook called a double dissolution in 1914. Fisher resigned from Parliament in 1915.
The ensuing Wide Bay by-election was won by Liberal candidate Edward Corser by only 86 votes. Corser was re-elected as a Nationalist in 1917, 1919, 1922 and 1925, dying in July 1928.
The 1928 Wide Bay by-election was won by Corser’s son, Bernard Corser, who stood for the Country Party. He held the seat until his retirement in 1954.
The seat was won in 1954 by the Country Party’s William Brand, who had previously served as a senior member of the party in the Queensland state parliament. He was re-elected in 1955 before retiring in 1958.
Wide Bay was won in 1958 by Country candidate Henry Bandidt, but lost in 1961 to the ALP’s Brendan Hansen. Hansen held Wide Bay until his retirement in 1974, and was elected to the Queensland state parliament for the seat of Maryborough from 1977 until 1983.
Upon Hansen’s retirement in 1974, the Country Party’s Clarrie Millar won back Wide Bay, and he held it until his retirement in 1990.
Wide Bay was won in 1990 by the National Party’s Warren Truss. Truss was made a junior minister in the Howard government in 1997 and joined the cabinet in 1999. He was elected Deputy Leader of the Nationals in 2005, and became party leader after the defeat of the Howard government.
Truss served as Nationals leader from 2008 until 2016, including as Deputy Prime Minister from 2013 to 2016.
Truss retired in 2016, and was succeeded by LNP candidate Llew O’Brien. O’Brien has been re-elected twice.
Assessment
Wide Bay is a safe LNP seat.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Llew O’Brien | Liberal National | 41,601 | 43.5 | -3.6 |
| Geoff Williams | Labor | 20,345 | 21.3 | -0.5 |
| Nathan Buckley | One Nation | 9,765 | 10.2 | -0.6 |
| Craig Armstrong | Greens | 9,088 | 9.5 | -0.4 |
| Tracy Bennett | United Australia | 4,406 | 4.6 | +1.0 |
| Kelli Jacobi | Independent | 4,106 | 4.3 | +4.3 |
| Tim Jerome | Independent | 2,737 | 2.9 | -1.6 |
| Andrea Newland | Informed Medical Options | 2,097 | 2.2 | +2.2 |
| Daniel Williams | Values Party | 1,057 | 1.1 | +1.1 |
| John Woodward | Federation Party | 501 | 0.5 | +0.5 |
| Informal | 6,569 | 6.4 | +1.7 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
| Llew O’Brien | Liberal National | 58,708 | 61.3 | -1.8 |
| Geoff Williams | Labor | 36,995 | 38.7 | +1.8 |
Booths have been divided into four areas. Polling places in Fraser Coast council area have been grouped as ‘Maryborough’ and those in the Sunshine Coast and Noosa council areas have been grouped as ‘Noosa’. Those booths in the town of Gympie have been grouped together as Gympie Urban. The remainder of the Gympie council area have been grouped together with the small number of booths in the South Burnett and Cherbourg council areas as ‘Gympie Rural’.
The LNP won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all four areas, ranging from 54.6% in Noosa to 64.8% in rural parts of Gympie.
One Nation came third, with a vote ranging from 8.4% in Noosa to 15.3% in Maryborough.
The Greens polled slightly less than One Nation, with their vote very concentrated in Noosa, where they polled 17.3%, and as low as 5.5% in rural Gympie.
| Voter group | GRN prim | ON prim | LNP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| Noosa | 17.3 | 8.4 | 54.6 | 13,127 | 13.7 |
| Gympie Rural | 5.5 | 12.8 | 64.8 | 9,863 | 10.3 |
| Maryborough | 7.1 | 15.3 | 58.2 | 7,715 | 8.1 |
| Gympie Urban | 9.2 | 13.3 | 62.1 | 6,692 | 7.0 |
| Pre-poll | 8.4 | 9.0 | 62.0 | 40,309 | 42.1 |
| Other votes | 9.5 | 9.4 | 64.1 | 17,997 | 18.8 |
Election results in Wide Bay at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Liberal National Party, Labor, One Nation and the Greens.
The Only Possible way for the LNP to lose this seat is if Independent Noosa MP Sandy Bolton decides to contest.
The issue is Noosa is very demographically different from the rest of the seat. A lot of the rest of the seat is White working class/One Nation voters etc so Sandy Bolton probably will not appeal in Maryborough.
Sandy Bolton wouldn’t win this. Never.
This is way more than just Noosa. It’s also got towns like Cherbourg, Kikilvan, Poona, Rainbow Beach, Tiaro, Tinnanbar and Tin Can Bay. It’s also got the cities of Gympie and Maryborough. It’s also got Fraser Island (K’gari).
@Nether Portal i never said Sandy Bolton would win, at best she’d poll 3rd with 14-15% of first preferences, nearly half of which would come from the LNP putting them well below 40%
Noosa should not be in this seat.
Wonder What would happen if previous mp for Maryborough contested?
Gympie is a problem though
This seat contains
1.100% of Gympie
2. 100% of Noosa
3. 14% of Nicklin
4. 68% of Maryborough
will post the booths later tonight
@Nimalan thanks, will do.
Booths
1. Anamoor
2. Baddow
3. Bauple
4. Belltop
5. Bonooroo
5. Boreen Point
6. Coooloola Cove
7. Coolum Beach PPVC
8. Cooran
9. Cooray
10 Cooray South
11. Cootharabba Road
12. Curra
13. Federal
14. Glenwood
15. Goomboorian
16. Goomeri
17. Granville
19. Gunalda
20. Gympie Central
22. Gympie East
23. Gympie North
25. Horseshoe Bend (Gympie)
25. Imbil
26. Kandanga
27. Kikivian
28. Kin Kora
29. Lower Wonga
30. Maryborough
31. Maryborough West
32. Monland
33. Mothar Mountain
34. Mungar
35. Murgon
36. Noosa Heads
37. Noosa Heads PPVC
38. Noosa Ville
39. Peregian Beach
40. Pomona
41. Rainbow Beach
42. Southside
42. Tewantin
43. Tiaro
44. Tin Can Bay
45. Tinana
46. Tinbeerwah
47. Veteran
48. Weyba
49. Widgee
50. Wolvi
@ Nether Portal
My plan is to do Fairfax next work my way South along the Coast and then move inland into Wright and Kennedy will be the last seat. I plan to start Fairfax on Thursday complete the Coastal seats by this time next week and then the following week do the inland seats outstanding from Wright to Kennedy. It will give you a much needed break from all the maths 🙂
State level TPP/TCP here:
* LNP: 53.9%
* Labor/Independent: 46.1%
Note that the Labor TPP is combined with Sandy Bolton’s TCP in Noosa since the ECQ doesn’t calculate the notional TPP for non-classic contests.
Overall, while Labor technically did 7.4% better here on the state level in 2024 than on the federal level in 2022, that figure is kinda misleading since it’s combined with teal independent Sandy Bolton’s TCP in Noosa.
Without any votes from Noosa, the LNP’s TPP against Labor would be 63.3%, which is actually 2.0% better than on the federal level for the LNP.
@Nimalan sounds like a good idea.
Thanks Nether Portal, when you get a chance over the next few days if you could do the table by % who speaking English at home that will be great.
@Nimalan will do.
Np
See Wikipedia
Appears 2pp is later available
This may help with wide bay
@Mick Quinlivan thanks, I will look at that.
Tomorrow though I’ve already calculated a record three seats today.
No comments on this seat in a while, but…
Latest YouGov MRP has:
– LNP: 33.1%
– ALP: 17.8%
– IND: 16.9%
– ONP: 13.1%
– GRN: 8.9%
– OTHER: 10.3% (Trumpet, FFP)
Is there any chance of a Casey Iddon win on these numbers? Can someone locally advise if this is plausible or just crazy thinking ?
I’m not local to the electorate, but just wanted to say this: if Wide Bay is swinging 10% away from the LNP, its game over.
I think trumpets one nation and family first preferences probably flow enough to the LNP here. Especially if that seat poll is overstating the independent vote.
I would say the greens vote would surprise me if at 8.9%, but it includes Noosa and my on ground contacts in Gladstone, Gympie, Bundaberg are saying young people are voting Greens more than ever and it’s noticeable. Considering those are probably among the least friendly Greens towns, maybe that makes near 10% realistic in these seats.
Possibly Casey is too progressive to harvest right wing preferences here…
Gympie has been in decline 25 years, Maryborough 50. Both places have a growing underclass that get to interact with Greens activists through Community Service Orders.
Then there’s the sleeper issue of nominally protestant Gympie conservatives
being motivated to return sommeone surnamed O’Brien for a 4th term.
So, it’s plausible that Labor and Greens voters could leverage an independent into the 2CP and if enough voters place him at 1 to the LNP’s 2, he’ll win.
I wonder what happened to the old Fraser Island PPVC. Only ever existed in 2010 and was a solid LNP booth.
The polling here that suggested that Casey Iddon would poll nearly 17% and probably would have won the seat was a joke. He finished nearly last here and the LNP easily retained here.
I will also add at the upcoming redistribution in QLD, I expect this seat will lose the remainder of Sunshine Coast Regional Council. It’s a weird boundary.
@James
Regarding the redistribution, how do you propose that will happen given the enrolment deficiencies further north?
Nicholas – Last time I did the numbers a few months back the over quota of Longman, Fisher, Fairfax and Wide Bay equalled the combined under quota of every electorate to the north. Basically, Dawson , Capricornia, Flynn,Hinkler and Maranoa need to all move south. Kennedy, Leichardt and Herbert are sort of at quota so the others and the Sunny Coast seats all need to shuffle south. It would be nice to tidy up boundaries Townsville is across two seats rather than three , and Mackay, Cairns and Rocky in one each but not sure if that is practically possible.
Yup, my understanding is that everything would have to push south, hence my question to James.
It makes me wonder if there’s any possibility of Flynn extending back out to Longreach, with Maranoa moving closer to SEQ. It would likely decrease the size (in area) of Maranoa, a matter which some people seem concerned about. And it might save Wide Bay from pushing further into the Sunshine Coast.
It doesn’t seem there’s much appetite for changes that would unite Cairns. From what I’ve heard, there is too much objection both to transferring Cape York into Kennedy, and to transferring Mount Isa into Maranoa.
Both The Australian and the Fairfax websites are reporting that Llew O’Brien could be the next Nat to jump ship. Reports are that One Nation are also wooing (not sure how actively) Canavan, Price and Colin Boyce.
Why does One Nation think a Reform/Trump-style party will work here? We have a different political system, a smaller parliament and are a different country.
Furthermore, those governments don’t last. Look at Giorgia Meloni and FdI in Italy. They’ve lost more than 10% of their vote from 2022.
One Nation won Gympie [Qld Parliament] in 2001, held in 2004, only lost it in 2006 because the member was perceived locally to be voting with Labor in many of the divisions.
O’Brien may have been told his time is up, like Barnaby Joyce.
Both Colin Boyce and Llew O’Brien were enthusiastic about hosting Nuclear plants in their Electorates.
@Nether Portal
To me, it looks more like pols with no future past the next election, Joyce and Price are 2 of those, Canavan another, are seeking to stay on the gravy train.
Hanson is unable to articulate a position, let alone adhere to it for any length of time, so she couldn’t sustain a campaign as a major party leader.
It’s possible that there’s been a plan hatched before the last election to move Joyce’s supporters in the National Party on during this term and the results are playing out with One Nation merely a Non Playing Character.
The more that members of the coalition shuffle seats amongst themselves, the more they prove they are not a credible alternate government. This is to Australia’s detriment.
Matt Canavan has affirmed his intention to stay in the Nats.
If Llew O’Brien does jump ship, there could be a possibility that independent Noosa MP Sandy Bolton could contest the federal seat in 2028
Two “coulds” and an “if”.
You seem to be hedging your bets there Caleb.
There is always a lot of speculation on this site of this MP or candidate going from from state to federal or vise versa. Except in Tasmania, it doesn’t happen that much … not sure why there is so much speculation of it.
I don’t think as many LNP MPs will defect as speculated. The ones who defect will be ones who are seeking retirement or willing to accept defeat and won’t go out quietly.
The prized #1 spot on the One Nation senate ticket in QLD is reserved for Hanson or her successor. It will likely be James Ashby, otherwise there’ll be a fight for it.
Lower House LNP MPs who defect and then run for One Nation would struggle to win. To win, they would need to lead in the 3CP and lead the LNP by a huge margin. It will have to come from a high primary vote and possibly with preferences from right-wing minor parties. The issue for them is that Labor and Greens direct preferences to LNP over One Nation and their voters mostly preference this way.
I agree with Votante. I actually even think Llew O’brien wouldn’t even make the final two party preferred count if he defected. And One Nation would elect the LNP candidate on preferences. If you notice Barnaby Joyce is not recontesting New England, a sign he’s alot of more hopeful of his chances standing in the Senate.
If obrien ran as a on candidate he would get hammered wide bay is probably gonna get gutted and his personal vote would plummet he would probly run 3rd. If not 4th
I don’t know about that, Gympie and Maryborough is pretty good One Nation country, plus Llew O’Brien is pretty high profile locally. Sure the issue is Noosa, but there is a base there.
If Noosa went back into a Sunshine Coast seat and Wide Bay started to take any of the Goomeri, Kingaroy, Biggenden and Gayndah area that would improve One Nation chances as well.
Even if they went with ditching Noosa for Hervey Bay would make it a little better.
Maryborough and gympie will probably be removed so that argument is void
@Caleb – respectfully I disagree about Sandy Bolton’s prospects in Wide Bay. Yes she is a formidable MP and was re-elected quite easily against a strong LNP candidate in Mayor of Noosa Shire, Clare Stewart. But the tealish appeal of Noosa is different compared to the more conservative cities of Maryborough and Gympie. Unless she ran a hard campaign especially in those two aforementioned cities and shifted to the right a bit, her vote at best would be 15%, assuming she maintains her vote around Noosa.
Noosa is very demographically different from the West of Wide Bay. Maryborough is quite working class and not tealish.
Agree Nimalan and James, Noosa is considered to be an alternative lifestyle hotspot similar to Byron Bay where the left vote (Greens) is strong. In contrast Maryborough and Gympie would be like places such as the Latrobe Valley in Victoria being an industrial area filled with blue collar workers who are strongly supportive of the conservative LNP.
As a result, the two areas have totally different demographics.
Noosa definitely isn’t as socially progressive as Byron Bay, I’d say more akin to Corangamite (sea-changers, but not really a “hippy” area)
One thing not considered above is voters in places like Gympie and Maryborough that park their votes with Labor, would never LNP but consider voting for ON. They might jump to ON in Wide Bay if they seem like a winner and push Labor’s vote down. The key to an ON win is the LNP in third place and that would seem unlikely. Are there any examples of an ON vs LNP final two so we could see how many Labor votes leak to ON?
Labor ran 2nd to Elisa Roberts i[ON] n Gympie in 2001 & 2004, Roberts vote crashed by 7,000 in 2006 and Dave Gibson [NP] took the seat.
Labor vote was split between the official ALP candidate and the former candidate from ’01 & ’04, combined it was unchanged.
Christian Rowan [now LNP Moggill and Leader of The House] was the NP pick in ’04, ran third.
Blow ins will never win Gympie, neither will Labor, but their vote is solidly in the high 20s, while incumbents on the Right are keenly judged on performance.
A Teal type female candidate could do well in Maryborough, it’s industrial heyday is long past, but they’d struggle to make an impression amongst the desendants of Ulstermen and German farmers in Gympie.
Gympie. Maranoa 2025. Southern Downs 2020. Lockyer 2017. Dalrymple 2009. Blair 1998.
Redistributed. Maranoa 2025. Southern Downs 2020. Lockyer 2017. Dalrymple 2009. Blair 1998.
@Redistributed have a look at the 2017 QLD election. ONP ran 2nd in Gympie then, as well as a bunch of other seats – from memory, Callide, Gregory, Southern Downs, Scenic Rim, Lockyer, Nanango and probably more.
@Gympie respectfully, I don’t think a teal candidate will do well in Maryborough. Despite the industrial heyday being long over, there’s still a strong local manufacturing sector, especially around the rail industry. It’s still a solidly working-class area. The census shows that people are much more likely to work in blue-collar industries. Unemployment is also very high, and incomes are lower than average. Kinda reminds me of Ipswich in the ’90s, or in a way, the Wynnum/Manly area in the early 2000s before it was gentrified.