Finniss – SA 2014

LIB 11.2%

Incumbent MP
Michael Pengilly, since 2006.

Geography
Regional South Australia. Finniss covers the Fleurieu Peninsula and Kangaroo Island, including the towns of Goolwa, Kingscote, Penneshaw, Port Elliot, Victor Harbor, Willunga and Yankalilla.

Redistribution
No change.

History
The electoral district of Finniss has existed since the 1993 election, and has always been held by the Liberal Party.

Finnis was first won in 1993 by Dean Brown, who led the Liberal Party to the election and became Premier following the Liberal Party’s landslide victory at the election.

Brown had previously held the seat of Davenport from 1973 until 1985, when a redistribution saw Brown compete with a fellow Liberal MP for preselection. Brown won the preselection, but lost to his rival at the general election.

Brown returned to Parliament in 1992 at the Alexandra by-election, triggered by the resignation of Ted Chapman, who had held that seat since 1973.

Brown’s rival John Olsen, who had defeated him for the Liberal leadership in 1982, also returned to Parliament at a by-election in 1992, and Brown defeated Olsen in a race for the Liberal Party leadership.

Brown served as Premier from 1993 until his deposition by Olsen in 1996. He later served as Deputy Premier from 2001 to 2002, and then as Deputy Leader of the Opposition until 2005, retiring in 2006. Brown had won three terms as Member for Finniss.

Finniss was won in 2006 by Michael Pengilly, a former mayor of Kangaroo Island. Pengilly was re-elected in 2010.

Candidates
Sitting Liberal MP Michael Pengilly is running for re-election. The Greens are running Moira Jenkins. Family First are running Bruce Hicks.

Assessment
Finniss is a safe Liberal seat.

2010 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Michael Pengilly LIB 10,450 51.5 +13.3
Mary-Louise Corcoran ALP 6,134 30.2 -0.7
Bruce Hicks FF 1,736 8.6 +2.6
Diane Atkinson GRN 1,733 8.5 +0.6
Maris Zalups IND 246 1.2 +1.2

2010 two-party-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing
Michael Pengilly LIB 12,421 61.2 +5.8
Mary-Louise Corcoran ALP 7,878 38.8 -5.8
Polling places in Finniss at the 2010 state election. Alexandrina in red, Kangaroo Island in yellow, Victor Harbor in red, Yankalilla in blue. Click to enlarge.
Polling places in Finniss at the 2010 state election. Alexandrina in red, Kangaroo Island in yellow, Victor Harbor in red, Yankalilla in blue. Click to enlarge.

Booth breakdown
Booths have been divided into four parts, along local government boundaries. Most of the population lies in the Alexandrina, Kangaroo Island, Victor Harbor and Yankalilla council areas, and booths have been divided along these lines. The single booth in the Onkaparinga council area has been grouped with Yankalilla.

The Liberal Party won a majority in all four areas, ranging from 57.8% in Alexandrina to 66.4% on Kangaroo Island.

The Greens came third across the electorate, just ahead of Family First. The Greens came third in Yankalilla and Kangaroo Island, with Family First coming third in Alexandrina and Victor Harbor.

Voter group FF % GRN % LIB 2PP % Total votes % of ordinary votes
Victor Harbor 8.11 6.20 59.71 5,533 27.26
Yankalilla 6.89 11.32 57.86 3,481 17.15
Alexandrina 13.80 9.19 57.80 2,905 14.31
Kangaroo Island 9.17 9.50 66.42 2,126 10.47
Other votes 7.21 8.43 64.15 6,254 30.81
Two-party-preferred votes in Finniss at the 2010 state election.
Two-party-preferred votes in Finniss at the 2010 state election.

14 COMMENTS

  1. So Finniss has been held by the liberals for 20 years…. As long as Finniss remains a safe seat then what chance do we have to get any resources directed down here?? Well zero it would seem if you look at the state of jobs, public transport, health, and other services in here: either non-existent, maintained solely through the generosity of amazing volunteers, or seriously underfunded.
    And if you click on the link above to Michael Pengilly’s page it shows his “latest press release” was dated a year ago. And labor haven’t yet declared a candidate… (Or are they not going to bother at all?). That’s how much notice is taken of this electorate.
    Somehow we need to make Finniss swing.

  2. The election has been called and still no labor candidate! Finniss is such a safe seat that the other major Party cannot be bothered fielding a candidate.This electorate is suffering from”safe seat syndrome”.The voters of Indi discovered a cure-they threw out Sophie Mirabella!
    Its time for the Finniss voters to do the same.

  4. Who is Mel Smart? At the time of writing this she’s not listed on the Labor State Election Candidates website (and I’ve kept on looking at that for the past month and there has been nothing at all about Finniss on there, and apart from her private facebook page, I can’t find any information at all about Ms Smart on the web…

    Great that she’s enthusiastic, but she hasn’t knocked on my door, I can’t see any posters up about her anywhere and have no idea what issues she thinks are important down here or what she would do about anything if elected. Does she even live around here?

    I don’t think a paper candidate is going to have much impact on the voting preferences of people living here…

  6. Family First got 25.8% at Mt Compass, narrowly (by 2 votes!) behind Labor – most likely their best result in the state. Are people particularly religious round there?

  7. @ Bird of paradox

    Could well be wrong, but while religion is important, I don’t think that’s what’s driving it. Mt Compass is a lovely small country town and in such places it’s not surprising that where you’re not happy with the sitting member from a major party, then you’ll vote for your neighbour. Problem is, my prediction is that a vote for FF will end up being a vote for Liberal, in which case voting FF changes nothing and Finniss will continue to be a safe Liberal seat and will continue to be ignored….

  8. Ahh, he’s from there… I didn’t think of that. That’s one hell of a “local boy” effect.

    Hicks was also the FF candidate in Mayo last year, and came second with 22% in Mt Compass, compared to 7% across Mayo.

  9. Many families in the region send their children many kilometers to be educated at Murraylands christian school. lHicks is the principal,
    Brokenshire, a State FF member and former liberal member whose lost out in a pre selection battle with the Libs . He joined FF when a casual vacancy occurred in the Upper House He is also a large dairy farmer in the region and has a strong local following, during the fed election he handed out H T V’s for most of the day at the Mt compass booth.
    These local factors obscure the ‘high’ F F vote at Mt compass, the same factors that could explain the very high Green % at Basket Range in the Mayo federal election.Hicks’ vote at this booth was low ,in the current election he is a F F candidate for Kavel

  11. So there are now some Melanie Smart posters around town. But still no information about this candidate. Is she even old enough to have a job? Does she live locally? Does she have any idea what the issues are down here?

    The only information on the Labor website as I write is an email address and a friend who tried to contact her through that got no response. She also didn’t respond to the Victor Harbor Times questions to candidates. If anybody actually knows anything about Ms Smart can they please post some information here!

  13. Moira Jenkins is a strong local candidate and a much better option than the Labor paper candidate. She lives and works in the electorate and being a psychologist sees first hand many of the problems faced by local people. She listens and people respond well to her.

    Ok it is going to be a tall order to knock off Pengilly but the first thing to achieve is to climb above Labor and I think if most voters could talk to Moira and talk to Melanie (if you can find her) then the choice based on the candidates themselves would be obvious. Have a look at Moira’s facebook page Grrens4Finniss.

  14. What is required in very safe seat is a strong local candidate that is prepared to take up the challenge to the incumbent. The Lib/Labs might be surprised on election day on voter reaction. .
    They now have a real choice and an opportunity that they will not be taken for granted by the city-centric Major parties.Jenkins has run a very strong local campaign on local issues.
    Considerably cutting the incumbents’ safe margin will bring dividends to Finniss.!

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