Oxley – NSW 2023

NAT 15.4%

Incumbent MP
Melinda Pavey, since 2015. Previously member of the Legislative Council 2002-2015.

• Geography
• Redistribution
• History
• Candidate summary
• Assessment
• 2019 results
• Booth breakdown
• Results maps

Geography
Mid-North Coast of NSW. Oxley covers all of Bellingen, Kempsey and Nambucca councils and parts of the Port Macquarie-Hastings council area. The main towns in the seat are Kempsey, Nambucca Heads, Wauchope and Bellingen.

Redistribution
Oxley expanded slightly, taking in some more land close to Port Macquarie. This change increased the Nationals margin from 14.9% to 15.4%.

History
The electoral district of Oxley has existed since 1920, with the exception of the 1988 election. It was a three-member district from 1920 to 1927, and since then has been a single-member district. It has been held by the Country/National Party continuously since 1965.

Independent candidate George Mitchell won the seat of Oxley in 1941, defeating the sitting United Australia Party MP in an election where the conservative government was swept aside, to be replaced by 24 years of Labor rule.

Mitchell spent much of the next term on active military service in the Second World War. At the 1944 election, the major parties did not stand official candidates against him, but an independent Country Party candidate, Les Jordan, defeated Mitchell, and then joined the Country Party caucus.

Jordan was re-elected five times for the Country Party, but after the 1959 election he switched from the Country Party to the Liberal Party. He was re-elected as a Liberal in 1962 and 1965, and died in office later in 1965.

The 1965 by-election was won by Bruce Cowan, also of the Country Party. He served as a minister from 1975 to 1976. In 1980 he resigned to run for the federal seat of Lyne, which he won in a three-cornered contest. He held the federal seat until his retirement in 1993.

Peter King won the 1981 Oxley by-election for the National Country Party. Later in the year, however, the redistribution abolished the neighbouring seat of Raleigh, and that seat’s MP, Jim Brown, challenged King for preselection in Oxley, and King retired.

Brown had held the seat of Raleigh since 1959. He held Oxley for one term, retiring in 1984.

Bruce Jeffery won Oxley for the National Party in 1984. The 1988 redistribution abolished the seat of Oxley, and created the seat of Port Macquarie. Jeffery contested and won the new seat. In 1991, Oxley was again restored, and Jeffery returned to his original seat, with the sitting Member for Manning moving to Port Macquarie.

Jeffery retired in 1999, when he was succeeded by Andrew Stoner. Stoner was elected National Party leader following the 2003 election.

Stoner became Deputy Premier after the Liberal-National Coalition won power in 2011, and served in a variety of ministerial portfolios in the new government. Stoner resigned as Deputy Premier and Nationals leader in October 2014.

Stoner retired in 2015, and he was succeeded by Melinda Pavey, who had been a Nationals upper house MP since 2002. Pavey joined the ministry in 2017, and was re-elected in 2019.

Candidates
Sitting Nationals MP Melinda Pavey is not running for re-election.

Assessment
Oxley is a safe Nationals seat.

2019 result

2019 two-party-preferred result

Booth breakdown

Booths in Oxley have been split into four parts, along local government boundaries.

The Nationals won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all four areas, ranging from 53.8% in Bellingen to 74.7% in Port Macquarie-Hastings.

The Greens came third, with a primary vote ranging from 7.6% in Port Macquarie-Hastings to 24.4% in Bellingen.

The Shooters, Fishers and Farmers came fourth, with a primary vote ranigng from 7.6% in Bellingen to 13.3% in Kempsey.

Election results in Oxley at the 2019 NSW state election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for the Nationals, Labor, the Greens and the Shooters, Fishers and Farmers.

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