ALP 1.6%
Incumbent MP
Marion Scrymgour, since 2022.
Geography
Lingiari covers the vast majority of the Northern Territory, with the exception of Darwin and Palmerston. The seat covers Katherine and Alice Springs, as well as many indigenous communities throughout the Territory.
Redistribution
Lingiari previously covered the Palmerston suburbs of Farra, Johnston, Mitchell, Yarrawonga and Zuccoli, but those areas were moved to Solomon, unifying the Darwin-Palmerston area in one seat. This change increased the Labor margin in Lingiari from 0.9% to 1.6%.
History
The Northern Territory first elected a Member of the House of Representatives in 1922, but this person was only given full voting rights in 1968.
The seat was held by the Country Party and then the Country Liberal Party from then until 1983, before Labor and then the CLP each held the seat for one term, before Warren Snowdon won the seat for the ALP in 1987. Snowdon lost the seat for one term in 1996 before being returned for one more term in 1998.
The 2000 redistribution saw the Northern Territory gain a second seat for the first time, and the seats of Solomon, covering Darwin and Palmerston, and Lingiari, covering the rest, were created.
Warren Snowdon shifted to the new seat of Lingiari in 2001, and held the seat for the next 21 years, retiring in 2022.
Snowdon was succeeded by the ALP’s Marion Scrymgour. Scrymgour had previously held the Northern Territory assembly seat of Arafura from 2001 until 2012. Scrymgour served as a minister from 2003 until 2009, including as Deputy Chief Minister from 2007. Scrymgour briefly moved to the crossbench as an independent for two months in 2009 before rejoining Labor.
Assessment
Lingiari is a very marginal seat, even if the Country Liberal Party have never held it. Labor suffered a large swing here in 2022, at least in part due to the retirement of longstanding member Snowdon. Scrymgour’s incumbency may help boost her margin, but the seat still remains very marginal.
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Marion Scrymgour | Labor | 16,747 | 36.6 | -8.2 | 37.3 |
| Damien Ryan | Country Liberal | 15,893 | 34.7 | -2.2 | 34.5 |
| Blair McFarland | Greens | 5,018 | 11.0 | +2.7 | 11.0 |
| Tim Gallard | One Nation | 2,470 | 5.4 | +5.4 | 5.3 |
| George Kasparek | Liberal Democrats | 1,948 | 4.3 | +4.3 | 4.1 |
| Allan McLeod | United Australia | 1,882 | 4.1 | +1.3 | 4.0 |
| Michael Gravener | Independent | 948 | 2.1 | +2.1 | 2.0 |
| Thong Sum Lee | Citizens Party | 497 | 1.1 | +1.1 | 1.1 |
| Imelda Agars | Independent | 409 | 0.9 | +0.9 | 0.9 |
| Informal | 3,647 | 7.4 | +2.3 |
2022 two-party-preferred result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing | Redist |
| Marion Scrymgour | Labor | 23,339 | 50.9 | -4.5 | 51.6 |
| Damien Ryan | Country Liberal | 22,473 | 49.1 | +4.5 | 48.4 |
Booths have been divided into five areas. There are clusters of booths in the Alice Springs area, in Katherine and in areas surrounding Darwin, although Darwin itself is in the neighbouring seat of Solomon.
There were no ordinary election-day booths outside of these three urban centres, but 24% of the total vote was cast through remote voting teams, with another 47.5% cast at pre-poll. These two voting groups overshadowed the number of votes cast at ordinary election-day booths in urban areas.
Labor won almost 70% of the two-party-preferred vote in the remote booths while losing every other category.
The Country Liberal Party’s two-party-preferred vote ranged from 50.6% in Alice Springs to 60.9% in the Darwin surrounds. The CLP also polled 54.3% in the pre-poll vote which made up almost half of the total turnout.
The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 5.6% in the remote vote to 18.8% in Alice Springs, with 11.9% in the pre-poll.
| Voter group | GRN prim | ALP 2PP | Total votes | % of votes |
| Alice Springs | 18.8 | 49.4 | 4,869 | 11.5 |
| Darwin Surrounds | 8.2 | 39.1 | 3,189 | 7.5 |
| Katherine | 13.3 | 46.1 | 979 | 2.3 |
| Pre-poll | 12.1 | 46.1 | 20,115 | 47.5 |
| Remote | 5.6 | 69.4 | 10,207 | 24.1 |
| Other votes | 11.5 | 46.2 | 3,015 | 7.1 |
Election results in Lingiari at the 2022 federal election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor, the Country Liberal Party and the Greens.
The CLP came close in 2022 because they had an excellent candidate, the former Mayor of Alice Springs. He was respected across the political spectrum. That is also the reason they picked up an abnormally high number of Greens preferences as his interest in recycling, solar energy and waste management were well-known from his efforts with the Alice Springs Town Council. The CLP do not have a high-profile candidate this time.
Coalition have targeted this seat for multiple elections, admittedly at poor elections for them, and it seems unlikely they get it this time unless there is a big reverse or the current polls.
Don’t suppose anyone’s on the ground and has an idea of what turnout’s gonna do in the remote communities?
Turn-out might drop as a percentage of electors on the roll due to the enrollment boost from the voice at least, trend seems to be that voters are becoming less engaged and motivated to vote and don’t see why this would change this cycle. Lineball here currently
Without those Remote Booths this would be safe CLP. Marion’s best booths are Darwin Correctional Centre and Christmas Island, both 89%.
I think the CLP’s actually quite poor regional performance at the 2024 NT election shows Labor have a decent chance of holding this. Alice Springs especially barely swung right at all despite what many commentators thought would happen; and with no signs of gains among remote Indigenous communities the CLP doesn’t have many places to get votes.
@Indricothere the CLP got about 58% TPP in both seats on territory results. Katherine swung heaps and Alice Springs did swing just in the outer suburbs because Araluen has a conservative independent incumbent and Braitling includes the Charles Sturt Uni.
The clp control 7 of the 12 state seats that occupy the federal seat of lingiari….
Possibly he means they did worse than expected? I don’t know if that’s true or not, just guessing.
Yeah, comparing the swing in Solomon to the swing in Lingiari at a state level doesn’t look good for the CLP. Alice Springs was the very centre of the NT crime panic yet ended up being the least receptive urban area in the territory to the CLP campaign on the issue. Araluen swung to Labor on the 2PP, Braitling swung by a full 8 percent less to the territory average and almost fell to the Greens. Unironically; I think Solomon is the more likely of the 2 NT seats to fall.
Possibly, I think this will really come down to the turnout in the indigenous communities. Solomon the stronger greens vote and the margin should help Labor hold on, but it is possible it could fall and this not.
But the margin in lingiari n is razor thin compared to solomon so it doesn’t need to swing as hard
Don’t be surprised if the Coalition win both the NT seats based on the Territory elections and a popular Lia Finocchiaro. Luke Gosling has a personal vote that Marion Scrymgour does not have.
Territory results here (2024):
TPP:
* CLP: 57.9%
* Labor: 42.1%
Federal results here (2025, not finalised):
TPP:
* Labor: 58.7%
* CLP: 41.3%
This would mean Lingiari on federal results has swung +7.1% to Labor from 2022 but on territory results it has swung +16.6% to Labor.
Even in the most remote electorate in the country voters see the difference.
This seat was a fizzer for the Coalition in the end it was seen in their path to government. I was reluctant to make a prediction on this seat because it is so unique demographically it is also not easy for polling to be conducted in this seat maybe the margin was deceptive since it was the first time since 1984 that Warren Snowdon was not on the ballot.
How do remote voting teams work and why don’t they have booths in larger settlements such as Wadeye or Yirrkala say? How do the parties get their message out or HTV cards? There are more teams this time so how does the AEC match a swing?
@Redistributed typically they move around multiple sites in remote areas (obviously there are so many because of how big the Territory is).
Some of them only move around one small area though. At this election there were ones that covered multiple sites in Maningrida and Wadeye as well as on Christmas Island (which is a very diverse island) and the Cocos (Keeling) Islands (I assume there they moved from Home Island to West Island; Home Island is majority Cocos Malay and Muslim while West Island is majority white).