Tweed – NSW 2015

NAT 21.7%

Incumbent MP
Geoff Provest, since 2007.

Geography
Northern NSW. Tweed covers the eastern half of the Tweed shire, covering most of the shire’s population centres including Tweed Heads and Banora Point.

Map of Tweed's 2011 and 2015 boundaries. 2011 boundaries marked as red lines, 2015 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.
Map of Tweed’s 2011 and 2015 boundaries. 2011 boundaries marked as red lines, 2015 boundaries marked as white area. Click to enlarge.

Redistribution
Most of Tweed’s boundaries remained steady, with a small area to the west of Murwillumbah transferred from Lismore into Tweed. This change had no impact on the seat’s margin.

History
The current electoral district of Tweed has existed since 1999. It was held by the ALP from 1999 to 2007 and by the Nationals since 2007.

Tweed replaced the district of Murwillumbah, which had taken up the northeastern corner of NSW from its creation in 1988 until 1999. It was held by Don Beck of the Nationals for its entire existence.

Beck had previously held the seat of Byron from 1984 to 1988. Byron had been a solid Country/National seat from 1927 until its abolition in 1988, when it was split into Ballina and Murwillumbah.

After Murwillumbah was replaced by Tweed at the 1999 election, Beck ran for the seat as the National Party candidate. He lost to the ALP candidate, Neville Newell.

A former teacher, Newell had won the federal seat of Richmond off National Party leader Charles Blunt at the 1990 election. He was re-elected in 1993 and lost his federal seat in 1996.

Newell won Tweed in 1999 with a 2.6% margin. This was increased in 2003 to 3.8%.

In 2007, Newell lost Tweed to Nationals candidate Geoff Provest. Provest was re-elected in 2011.

Candidates

Assessment
Tweed is a Nationals seat that was held by Labor until eight years ago. The seat’s margin is now quite large and probably large enough for the Nationals to hold on, but Labor would be hoping to make significant inroads into that margin.

2011 election result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Geoff Provest Nationals 25,416 62.1 +15.9
Reece Byrnes Labor 8,750 21.4 -17.2
Andrea Vickers Greens 5,748 14.0 +6.3
Corinne Pennay Christian Democrats 1,021 2.5 +2.5

2011 two-party-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Geoff Provest Nationals 26,389 71.7 +18.7
Reece Byrnes Labor 10,432 28.3 -18.7
Polling places in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election. Banora Point in blue, South in yellow, Tweed Heads in orange, West in green. Click to enlarge.
Polling places in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election. Banora Point in blue, South in yellow, Tweed Heads in orange, West in green. Click to enlarge.

Booth breakdown
Booths in Tweed have been split into four areas. The urban area in the north-eastern corner of the seat has been split between Tweed Heads in the north and Banora Point in the south. The remaining rural parts of the seat have been split into “West” and “South”.

The Nationals won a majority of the primary vote in all four areas, ranging from 57% in the south to 66% in Banora Point.

Labor came second, with a vote ranging from 18% in the west to 26% in Tweed Heads. The Greens vote ranged from 11% in Banora Point to 21% in the south. The Greens outpolled Labor in the south.

Voter group NAT % ALP % GRN % Total % of votes
South 57.1 19.6 20.9 8,867 21.7
Banora Point 66.0 20.7 10.8 8,477 20.7
Tweed Heads 58.4 25.8 12.7 7,607 18.6
West 62.6 18.1 16.8 4,503 11.0
Other votes 65.2 21.6 10.9 11,481 28.0
Two-party-preferred votes in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election.
Two-party-preferred votes in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election.
Greens primary votes in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election.
Greens primary votes in Tweed at the 2011 NSW state election.

11 COMMENTS

  1. Labor could win this. They do well here federally and in the last local government election, and I suspect the margin was inflated more by their lack of campaigning in 2011. They selected their candidate about a year ago. I think the Nats will retain it, and they certainly won’t have the same problems in this seat as they will further south, but the margin should be reduced a fiar bit, and it’s one of those seats to watch if there is a big swing on.

  2. It’s a bit of a puzzle, to me anyway, why Labor does so much better here federally than it does at state level. Any theories?

  3. NSW Labor have suffered from being perceived as Sydney-centric, particularly during the Carr/Iemma/et al years. They held Tweed and Clarence effectively by virtue of the high personal profile of the respective ex-federal MPs. The closure of the rail line in 2004 and dithering on other regional infrastructure projects helped fuel that perception – sure they spent plenty on the Pacific Highway but that largely serves people travelling through the region. Does that explain it all? The Green vote and impact of OPV certainly doesn’t explain it all. They’ve often run low profile campaigns at state elections, that hasn’t helped either.

    It is interesting,and I’ve commented before on how it’s an area that stands out nationally. For a few years there after Labor lost Tweed in 2007 Richmond, and then Page, were the only Labor-held federal seats covering areas where the Coalition held all the state seats. I think after the Queensland election that may now again be the case with Richmond???

  4. Unless greens flow stronger here then this could be national retain. Goodman was picked early and will benefit from CSG and early preselection and is good relationship with the electorates main newspaper. I would argue this could be a high hanging fruit that labor could gain

  5. inflated Np margin here………and Labor has been under performing here at the state level….. possible ALP win

  6. Geoff Proverst has done nothing for Tweed, he is useless. Labour want to let the boats in and liberal want to sell off assets, Greens want electricity to be unaffordable AND not only let the boats in but let them dock and put out the red carpet. Bring back Pauline Hanson!!!!

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