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This will likely revert to an ALP vs NAT contest. The last Nationals candidate was disendorsed and so the Nationals primary vote crashed. This allowed ONP to easily take over. Legalise Cannabis had the benefit of the prime number 1 spot on the ballot paper.
At the recent federal election, Hunter became an ALP vs ONP contest. The federal ONP brand is quite strong but the state ONP is very different with no ONP MLCs at present.
Labor has the benefit of OPV. Most ONP voters exhaust their votes rather than preference a major party. I believe most Coalition HTV cards don’t recommend preferences to other parties but it varies by seat. The ONP and NAT vote could split thus enabling ALP an easy win.
Chris Minns is clearly concerned about seats through Hunter and intends to replace coal jobs with building trains. While the buffer here is extremely large I wouldn’t be surprised if One Nation were to peal this seat off Labor given similar seats in other states with similar margins were almost lost to One Nation.
One Nation has named investment banker and former NSW trade commissioner Mike Newman as the party’s state leader for the 2027 NSW election. Newman will run in the Labor-held lower house seat of Cessnock. Cessnock is an electorate where One Nation will poll well, however the biggest hurdles will be Labor’s high primary vote and OPV. The Nationals will likely recommend their voters preference One Nation, and could even run dead to assist One Nation. Labor may run a “Just Vote 1” campaign to counter the Nationals recommending preferences to One Nation.
There is apparently quite a mood for change here, ALP nervous this far out, the required swing looks very high but Labor’s vote could easily tumble into the low 30s or high 20s and so long as ONP is in the mid 30s or so they’ll win the seat, Nats vote could fall into single digits
Cessnock is where the ‘Red One Nation’ Voter base is concentrated. I could see a correlation for this type of voter being the area (Traditionally) Votes heavily for Labor, decent support for Gay Marriage due to their live and let live attitude for LGBT Rights (Hunter and Paterson voted 64-65% Yes for Gay Marriage) but also Nationalist in being Very High No vote to the Voice (around 72-75% No Vote) and would likely also be anti-immigration and pro-assimilation for non-Anglos. It politically and demographically looks quite similar to Secret Harbour despite being seat in a different settlement pattern.
I would put this seat as vulnerable. One Nation is putting some stock into this seat not just because the state leader is running here. It contains a red One Nation voter base. There is a high number of tradies, blue collar workers and agricultural workers plus outer suburbanites on the outskirts of Newcastle.
Normally, the state Nationals and Liberals don’t recommend preferences except to each other when both are running in the same seat. I am not sure if the Nationals will recommend preferences to ONP but they probably won’t get ONP to return the favour.
I am almost certain the Liberals won’t recommend preferences to ONP at least in greater Sydney as well as Terrigal, so not to cause controversy or raise eyebrows amongst CALD and teal-ish or moderate Liberal voters.