Stretton – Queensland 2024

ALP 14.8%

Incumbent MP
James Martin, since 2021.

Geography
Southern Brisbane. Stretton covers the suburbs of Kuraby, Calamvale, Drewvale, Stretton and parts of Runcorn and Sunnybank Hills, at the southern end of the City of Brisbane.

History

Stretton was created in 2001, replacing the seat of Sunnybank which had existed since 1992.

Labor’s Stephen Robertson held the seat of Sunnybank and then Stretton continuously from 1992 to 2012. He served as a minister in the Beattie/Bligh government from 1998 to 2012.

In 2012, Robertson retired, and Stretton was won by LNP candidate Freya Ostapovitch with a 19% swing.

Ostapovitch lost to Labor’s Duncan Pegg in 2015. Pegg was re-elected in 2017 and 2020, but died in 2021.

The subsequent by-election was won by Labor’s James Wilson.

Candidates

  • Ahmed Abdulhamed (Greens)
  • Stephen Strong (One Nation)
  • James Martin (Labor)
  • Merle Totenhofer (Family First)
  • Freya Ostapovitch (Liberal National)
  • Assessment
    Stretton is a safe Labor seat.

    2020 result

    Candidate Party Votes % Swing
    Duncan Pegg Labor 16,128 56.6 +6.0
    Peter Zhuang Liberal National 8,609 30.2 +1.8
    Andrea Wildin Greens 2,483 8.7 +1.3
    Alexey Chekhunov One Nation 1,280 4.5 -7.4
    Informal 1,010 3.4

    2020 two-party-preferred result

    Candidate Party Votes % Swing
    Duncan Pegg Labor 18,473 64.8 -4.9
    Peter Zhuang Liberal National 10,027 35.2 +4.9

    2021 by-election result

    Candidate Party Votes % Swing
    James Martin Labor 14,314 56.4 -0.2
    Jim Bellos Liberal National 8,322 32.8 +2.6
    Andrea Wildin Greens 1,654 6.5 -2.2
    Jasmine Melhop Informed Medical Options 616 2.4 +2.4
    Suzanne Clarke Animal Justice 478 1.9 +1.9
    Informal 891 3.4

    2021 by-election two-party-preferred result

    Candidate Party Votes % Swing
    James Martin Labor 16,224 63.9 +0.9
    Jim Bellos Liberal National 9,160 36.1 -0.9

    Booth breakdown

    Booths in Stretton have been divided into three areas: central, north and south.

    Labor won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all three areas at both the 2020 general election and the 2021 by-election. At the general election, the vote ranged from 65.9% in the north to 69.4% in the centre. At the by-election, the vote ranged from 65.6% in the north to 67.3% in the centre.

    2020 booth breakdown

    Voter group ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
    North 65.9 2,754 9.7
    Central 69.4 2,681 9.4
    South 67.5 1,898 6.7
    Other votes 64.0 11,470 40.2
    Pre-poll 63.7 9,697 34.0

    2021 by-election booth breakdown

    Voter group ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
    Central 67.3 3,976 15.7
    North 65.6 3,635 14.3
    South 66.2 2,705 10.7
    Pre-poll 63.6 7,909 31.2
    Other votes 60.7 7,159 28.2

    Election results in Stretton at the 2020 Queensland state election
    Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor and the Liberal National Party.

    Election results at the 2021 Stretton by-election
    Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor and the Liberal National Party.

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    37 COMMENTS

    1. Safe ALP retain. James Martin has been very active since replacing former MP Duncan Pegg after the last election. I can see this margin halving but still being comfortably retained.

    2. @nolnp The LNP haven’t yet announced who they’re running in the following seven safe Labor seats: Stretton, Jordan, Bulimba, Bundamba, Gladstone, Ipswich and Woodridge. They’re probably going to run dead here.

    3. Seems an odd choice for the LNP to run dead in, if that really is what’s going on. They won it in 2012 and were at least somewhat competitive in a few other elections.

      A seat like Woodridge or Bundamba I can understand, but would be a bit weird if they did it here.

    4. *The LNP also don’t have a candidate in Cooper, forgot that last night.

      @Mark Mulcair Stretton along with Bulimba and Cooper should theoretically be winnable or close to it for the LNP if the 57-43 TPP polls are to believed, so it is strange they still don’t have candidates. My guess in another thread was that they’ve written Cooper off for the Greens but I’m not sure about the other two.

    5. My thoughts exactly mark. The lnp won this seat in 2012 after the failings of Anna bligh and the rud Gilliard rud disaster train. Christifulli is way ahead in the polls he’s done a solid campaign so far in my opinion and the lnp are fools not to be running candidates in Stretton and those other 7 seats someone else mentioned. Also RE: Bundamba what makes you think the lnp won’t perform there or even win the seat? We saw a 25ish % swing against Labor in Ipswich west at the bi election in March Bundamba is just next door similar demographic.

      This is the first year in a decade the lnp stands a chance of forming govt and they aren’t running in all electorates? They’re abandoning cooper? Seriously?!?!?!?

      Reminds me of the NSW council elections fancy not running candidates in many of them because someone forgot to file the paperwork!

      What numpty is making these decisions in the lnp backroom?

      Time to sack some ppl in marketing lnp!

      What my concern is now where is the conservative vote for Stretton going to go? They had a 2% swing at the 2021 bi election which suggests conservatism is on the rise here. Alot of ppl in this area are angry at Labor over cost of living, covid, crime and electricity. I don’t think right wingers will go green which is the only other option. Will we see a record high in donkey / invalid votes?

      Thanks for reading sorry it’s long.

    6. @nolnp they still have time to announce candidates for those 8 seats, and they will very soon. The two major parties both run in every federal and state/territory electorate no matter how unwinnable. Only exception is Mulka in the NT.

    7. @laine yes they do but why is the lnp leaving it to the last minute? Especially if they need to win 12 seats to win govt. If I was christifulli and serious about becoming premier id have all seats filled and made public months in advance.

    8. @nolnp There are a good thirty seats the LNP is likely to win from Labor before they win Stretton. They’ve most likely left those eight til the last minute because they’re unlikely to win them and no one serious in the community has put their hand up.

    9. horray! The lnp have FINALLY announced their candidate for Stretton Freya Ostravich who was the member during the Newman years. Hopefully we get a repeat performance in a months time.

    10. Labor retain following a single digit swing to the LNP. I am sensing much bigger swings in Logan and Ipswich-based seats (partly due to the retreat in One Nation’s vote) as well as Inala (compared to four years ago) and Mount Ommaney.

      Freya Ostravich’s page on Wikipedia is interesting to read.

    11. @Trump 24 Not sure Labor is struggling to find candidates, but rather do not care if they leave it to the last minute in places they would never win even in a landslide. It’s not like they’re missing people in seats like Coomera, it’s electorates like Warrego and Callide.

      And yeah I agree @Votante, Labor retain. It’s become apparent that this isn’t going to morph into a 2012-style victory at the last minute.

    12. @Caleb something we finally agree on.

      Labor retain but with a swing to the LNP, likely smaller than average because of the shit candidate.

    13. @Mick Quinlivan – Freya Ostapovitch is known very well as a hardline conservative, especially when she ran for federal Rankin in 2016. She once claimed that abortions can lead to breast cancer. Furthermore, while she was state MP for Stretton (2012-2015), in 2014, she was filmed throwing objects at media recording her.

      Even as a Coalition supporter, she should not have been chosen whatsoever, so I don’t know why Crisafulli would endorse her as candidate. She’ll lose easily here.

    14. And as @Votante said, her Wikipedia page is incredibly short and of the three paragraphs in it, two of them relate to her previous controversies. It’s sad to think that her actions is basically what she is known for. What a dud.

    15. @James I would say he chose her out of haste, knowing that a 14.8% margin in a heavily Labor-voting part of Brisbane was too much. If such a candidate was chosen for a key seat then it would be worse.

      Oh and just to be clear, voted Coalition all my life. Abortions don’t cause breast cancer. Chances are we’ve all met a woman with breast cancer at some time in our lives or may even personally know one, and I’ve never personally heard anyone publicly declare that abortions cause cancer (I’ve seen people say it online but I’ve never spoken to anyone who’s said that).

    16. @Daniel T only a few candidates were there when Campbell Newman was Premier. One example I can think of is the candidate for Cook, who was preselected in favour of other candidates.

    17. Labor margin seems to be inflated in Stretton as well as neighboring Toohey given a middle class to upper middle class Chinese heavy areas are normally competitive in Sydney and Melbourne but probably QLD Labor made decent inroads to the Chinese Community (similar to Libs for the Arab Community in Werriwa) as well as LNP not traditionally having the same inroads for CALD Communities compared to Liberals in other states.

    18. @Marh well they do well with CALD communities on the Gold Coast and in Cairns as well as in at least some parts of Brisbane, just not this part.

    19. Freya is certainly someone with the capability to be in the headlines, unfortunately for all the wrong reasons like fellow LNP member Ros Bates. For a more progressive electorate (compared to the, well you know, the regions) she’s a completely unfitting candidate.

      I’d like to think this seat will be a Labor hold but given that we said the same about the likes of Nightcliff, Wanguri and Sanderson in NT and they all fell it wouldn’t surprise me if they lost this on election night.

    20. Announcing Newman-era Ostapovitch as the candidate, who is know for her hardline conservative and anti-abortion views, shows the LNP doesn’t want to win Stretton, didn’t bother to find a good candidate and would probably run dead here. A 14.8% Labor margin in a Labor heartland area in Brisbane (half of Stretton is within the federal seat of Rankin, the only Queensland federal seat that Labor has never lost, and another half overlaps Moreton, which Labor has held since 2007) is probably too large for the LNP to conquer even with a decent candidate when the statewide 2PP swing against Labor is only going to be around 10%. I agree with @Daniel T that Labor should retain this seat comfortably.

      I don’t think the LNP should be running anti-abortion or otherwise hard right conservative candidates anywhere, even in completely unwinnable seats. It reflects very badly on them and could deter small-l Liberal voters in inner Brisbane seats from voting for the LNP, even if such controversial candidates are not running in their electorates.

    21. I have deleted all of the comments by that vile user and the whole conversation, and they’ve been permanently blocked.

      I am having trouble keeping up with the vast volume of comments so if you see something like that, don’t argue about it, contact me directly. This is why I have been considering shutting down many of the comments threads.

    22. Is Labor at the level of ThoughtCrime yet?
      This woman was giving her honest opinion to someone she thought was acting in good faith, they recorded the conversation without telling her.

    23. Gympie, ridiculous comment. Nobody is prosecuting Ostapovitch for her beliefs so it is not a thought crime. But the public deserve to know what the LNP agenda is given how many of their MPs want to revisit the legality of abortion and Crisafulli’s failure to provide a convincing answer on whether his government will look at it.

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