Reid – Australia 2028

After Robertson, this seat has the longest streak of voting for the party that forms government. It has done so since 2007, back when Reid was known as Lowe.

Given it is a small-l Liberal seat, which covers some affluent areas on Parramatta River, as well as containing a notable Asian population, this is the sort of seat the Liberals would need to be competitive in if they want to ever form government again. With a margin of 12%, there is a lot of work to do.

Reid still existed before 2007, it just had very pro-Labor which largely cover the seat of Blaxland these days.

And I don’t think this is a seat the Liberals need to form government again, there are literally 44 Labor seats (with varying demographics) on lower margins + 9 crossbench seats too.

Agree scart, this is probably a second tier target for the Liberals as they would want to prioritise their efforts in the outer suburban seats first to try and force Labor into minority or at least reduce them back under 80 seats like the 2022 result.

I would use Lowe rather than the Pre2010 version of Reid as a comparision. Lowe was a marginal seat but not always a bellwether.
John Howard won an election 3 times without Lowe all in a majority
Bob Hawke won an election twice without Lowe all in a majority.
If Coalition can win a seat they did not win in 2016 like Lyons, Eden-Monaro or Solomon instead then even in a narrow election like 2016 then can afford to loose Reid. Alternatively, if they can win a seat like McEwen,Blair which they did not win in 2013 then they can afford to loose Reid as well. I dont think Liberals will win Moreton, Lilley or Kingston in lieu of Reid however, i think they are stronger seats these days

@Nimalan that’s what I mean when I say “Reid, when it was known as Lowe”. The 2010 redistribution effectively abolished Reid, but the name Lowe was retired.

I basically refer to this seat as Reid/Lowe

@ CJ
You are correct Scart mentioned Reid before 1997 so i was responding to him and just adding a bit of context of Lowe how while it was a marginal seat not often a bellwether. When Lowe was created in 1949 it was a notional Labor seat based on 1946 results but technically was a Liberal pick up in 1949.

*Reid before 2007 i mean

Given the consistent under quota of central and inner west of Sydney as well as demographics I don’t see how this seat is going back to the liberals.

@Darth Vader Reid was one of only 8 or 9 seats not touched at the most recent redistribution (as well as the only one in Sydney not touched), and with the Metro West being built within Reid’s boundaries, the development around these stations should keep the seat within quota for the foreseeable future.

Inner West and the Sydney CBD has been under quota a lot of times at recent redistributions. I’m expecting when NSW loses its next seat (likely before the 2031 election), it’ll be removed from the electorally crowded area between the Georges and Parramatta Rivers. I expect either Blaxland, Grayndler, or Sydney to be abolished at such a time, unless parliament is expanded.

Interestingly, this was a seat where Tony Abbott overperformed John Howard. I note the current Reid is not the same as Pre 2010 Reid as i have already accepted above so i am comparing it to Lowe. In 1996 John Howard won Lowe by only 2.5% the 2013 version of Reid was actually 3.4% more Pro Labor than Lowe so i am pretty convinced that Howard would not have ever won under those boundaries. In any case Howard only won Lowe once once the last Coalition government held Reid for their entire duration. There were 3 seats why i said Tony Abbott overperfomed Howard (Reid/Lowe, Banks and Barton). All 3 deats are multicultural. I think Tony Abbott could have won Chisholm in 2013 if Anna Burke had retired, i feel Tony abbott was actually more popular among ethnic communities than Howard especially after Hanson. Tony Abbott once described himself as convert to multiculturalism. He now feels strongly otherwise. He sais we need to keep our Anglo-Celtic Core and Diversity is not a strength https://www.youtube.com/watch?v=kjovkDMQI6M&t=1s

@Nimalan, agree Abbott probably did better for ethnic communities than Howard did but I would caution that many of these were less diverse back in 1996 and has a sizable Southern/Eastern European population which moved Right. Although I think it was Scott Morrison in 2019 that had the highest support of ethnic communities supporting Liberals.

@ Marh
I am thinking that Abbott did better than Howard among Chinese. There was a lot of critcism from the Chinese community that Howard did not stand up forcefully to Hanson in the late 90s and changes to Family reunion visas. I think by 2010s that hurt had faded and more were willing to vote for Abbott. You are also correct Reid/Lowe, Barton, Banks and even Chisholm have strong Southern/Eastern Europeans which moved right between 1996-2013. I concur in 2019 Scomo did very well among ethnic communities and if the pandemic never happened i think Libs would have targeted Parramatta and Greenway which are diverse.

@Marh, Nimalan,
NSW on the whole voted more strongly for the Abbott-led Coalition in 2013 than the Howard-led Coalition in 1996. Howard was known for having policies to reduce Asian immigration and abolishing multiculturalism in the 1980s. Since Abbott, as opposition leader, was less known for his race-based immigration, he was probably better able to connect with ethnic communities.

Howard, as PM, pivoted to more skilled migration and family reunions. More educated or entrepeunerial migrants were more economically conservative. During the Howard era, seats like Reid, Banks and Barton were quite working-class but were de-industrialising and gentrifying. All three have appealing waterfront properties and large residential properties saw their values go up. I also agree that descendants of working-class Southern/Eastern European migrants became more conservative as they were more upwardly mobile.

@ Votante
Agree with all your points. Just to add Abbott did better in NSW statewide than Howard did in 1996 he also did better in Tasmania and picked up Lyons which Howard never managed to do so. Abbott did better overall statewide in WA but Labor managed to retain Perth, Brand and Fremantle like they also did in 1996. However, Abbott underperfomed Howard-1996 in Queensland and South Australia.

In an alternate history if Paul Keating won the 1996 Election, I wonder if One Nation would had performed much higher both in the peak of the polls (I think it was 22% in the peak) and the elections results (8% in the 1998 Elections)?

@ Marh
In the alternative history if Keating had been re-elected in 1996, Hanson would not have been elected in Oxley as it was the safest Labor seat in QLD and had the biggest swing in the nation. While i think if every thing else had played she was preselected for Oxley and disendorsed after noniminations had closed she would have picked up a bigger swing than average so for this scenario to play out she would have had to be either preselected for a Coalition held seat or a marginal Labor held seat like Petrie and she would have defeated Gary Johns. The Alternative is that someone like Graeme Campbell MP from Kalgoorlie would start a right wing nationalist party but as he had been the MP since 1980 he would not have had a maiden speech which shook the nation.

Re Oxley 1996 – whether Paul Keating or John Howard win the election is to ny mind immaterial – the key point was Pauline Hanson being disendorsed after nominations closed. There was no Liberal and Labor voters could votw for her when they would never vote for the Libs. The other issue is that Labor were vulnerable as they were on a downward trajectory. If the Labor had not been so unpopular or Hanson had been disendorsed before nominations closed, she would only exist now as an old newspaper clipping.

@ Redistributed and Nimalan if Labor had done 4.31% better in TPP and was universally evenly distributed in every seat, Labor could had a narrow majority but have Hanson still winning Oxley very narrowly. In this alternate scenario however, the Labor Government after 1996 would likely become unpopular so I feel One Nation might had gotten peak poll support in the mid to high 30s.

Fair point Marh, looking at post 1996 pendulum such a path may have involved picking up seats elsewhere to ofset some of the swings in QLD