Werribee – Victoria 2022

ALP 9.1% vs IND

Incumbent MP
Tim Pallas, since 2014. Previously member for Tarneit, 2006-2014.

Geography
Western Victoria. Werribee covers the suburbs of Werribee, Werribee South and Wyndham Vale, and areas to the west of Werribee. The entire electorate lies in Wyndham City.

Redistribution
Werribee contracted, losing Werribee South to Point Cook and the remainder of Hoppers Crossing to Tarneit. This change increased the Labor two-party-preferred margin from 12.6% to 13.6%.

History
Werribee previously existed as an electorate from 1976 to 2002.

Werribee was won in 1976 by Liberal candidate Neville Hudson, but he lost in 1979 to the ALP’s Ken Coghill.

Coghill held Werribee from 1979 to 1996, and served as Speaker of the Legislative Assembly from 1988 to 1992.

Labor’s Mary Gillett won Werribee in 1996, and was re-elected in 1999.

In 2002, Werribee was replaced by Tarneit, and Gillett was re-elected in the newly named seat.

Tarneit was won in 2006 by Labor candidate Tim Pallas, and he was re-elected in 2010.

Werribee was restored in 2014, and Pallas shifted to the restored seat, winning re-election comfortably. Pallas was re-elected in 2018.

Candidates

Assessment
Werribee is a safe Labor seat.

2018 result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Tim Pallas Labor 17,539 45.4 -11.2 45.9
Joe Garra Independent 7,685 19.9 +19.9 19.8
Gayle Murphy Liberal 6,641 17.2 -11.6 16.7
Jay Dessi Greens 2,522 6.5 -2.0 6.5
Rachel Carling-Jenkins Independent 2,086 5.4 +5.4 5.3
Kathryn Breakwell Democratic Labour 1,175 3.0 +3.0 3.2
Pratibha Sharma Independent 628 1.6 +1.6 1.7
Thanh Nga Ly Independent 346 0.9 +0.9 0.9
Informal 2,796 6.8 +0.4

2018 two-candidate-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Tim Pallas Labor 22,701 58.8 -6.9 59.1
Joe Garra Independent 15,921 41.2 +41.2 40.9

2018 two-party-preferred result

Candidate Party Votes % Swing Redist
Tim Pallas Labor 24,209 62.6 -3.1 63.6
Gayle Murphy Liberal 14,494 37.5 +3.1 36.4

Booth breakdown

Booths in Werribee have been divided into three parts. Most of the electorate lies in a small cluster around Werribee, Wyndham Vale and Hoppers Crossing. Polling places in this area have been divided into Werribee North and Werribee South. The small number of polling places outside this area have been grouped as “Outer”.

Labor won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote in all three areas, ranging from 64.0% in Werribee South to 72.7% in Werribee North.

Voter group IND prim % ALP 2PP % Total votes % of votes
Werribee South 30.5 64.0 8,260 23.3
Werribee North 22.6 72.7 3,337 9.4
Outer 23.4 68.1 2,535 7.2
Pre-poll 29.5 59.9 17,647 49.9
Other votes 21.0 68.7 3,621 10.2

Election results in Werribee at the 2018 Victorian state election
Toggle between two-party-preferred votes and primary votes for Labor, independent candidates and the Liberal Party.

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20 COMMENTS

  1. If a strong Independent runs here Labor could be in serious trouble here, there was an article that Labor are directing resources here as they are worried about loosing here.

  2. @Bob Yes very good chance for independent. I’m not sure if there’s any local issues for this election but last election i believe there was backlash over plans to build a juvenile prison in Werribee South, i believe they moved it further down the road in the end.

  3. @Mark What in particular about that would make him lose his seat, would the policy negatively effect his seat in a certain way that it wouldn’t others. If the policy was that unpopular that it caused that large of a swing a lot more seats would go before this.

  4. Umm @Mark, if that was the case, he would lose the 2018 state where Port of Melbourne was privatized in 2016

  5. @ Marh

    He already had to rely on preferences to carry him in a year where Labor had a 6 pt swing towards them lol

    He’s going to be nervous this year as there will almost certainly be a correction. 2018 was Labor’s high water mark and the environment is nowhere near as favourable to Dan as it was back then.

  6. Garra did pretty well here last time, will he run again? Did he live in Werribee South and get redistributed out or does he work in the community that covers the seat of Point Cook, i was wondering because an ABC article i saw awhile ago it suggested Garra hadn’t decided which seat to run in, as if he had multiple options.

  7. @North East, Garra does have some similarities to Dai Le for being a strong local player in politics (although Garra is a GP), and at this moment is the only equivalent I could find in Victoria

  8. The VicRoads privatisation is a reminder of Labor’s hypocrisy – they scaremonger about the Coalition privatising assets when in opposition, but once in government Labor will desperately do anything to raise money to cover all their extravagant spending. As hypocritical as the policy is I don’t think it will cause Pallas to lose the seat. If he loses it will be due to other factors.

  9. Exactly @Entrepreneurial

    They did the same thing at the 2018 election with health. Jill Hennessy claimed that the Libs “would cut $1b from health, like they did under Napthine”, when in actual fact, Bailieu/Napthine boosted health funding by over $4b over four years.

    The lies that Labor are able to get away with in Victoria are astounding.

  10. Whats interesting is the electorate was extremely in the late 90’s, so it will be interesting to see if the Liberals could pull something like that off here again & get over the line.

  11. If Garra runs Pallas is gone, if anyone else runs I’m not sure. Liberals haven’t even preselected a candidate here, probably hoping an independent runs.

  12. Liberals have selected long-term local and ex Wyndham Mayor Mia Shaw. She has a high local profile. Local party organisation appears weak with no local content on the Werribee Liberals Facebook page. However she might get a swing to her as I don’t think she is as polarising as the showy Intaj Khan (backed by Guy but not liked by local Liberals, who I’m guessing are mostly 70 year old Anglos).

  13. With Garra announcing he is running for Point Cook, rather than Werribee, Pallas`s chances of retaining this seat look better than they did yesterday.

  14. Not implausible that the Libs gain this seat, will be close I reckon. Libs searched outside the party to find a local candidate who is a local councillor. It’s also only a 12% margin.

    Here, Point Cook and Melton are the seats in the West to watch I reckon.

  15. 12 Candidates here! (As per Votante’s comment on Point Cook)… there would be quite a high informal rate. ALP is definitely in trouble in the Western Suburbs. If one of Melton, Point Cook or Werribee doesn’t fall, I’ll be shocked. For the record, Candidates standing here are from… ALP, LIB, GRN, AJP, FPV, VS, DLP, ND, HAP, IND x3. Agree with @Ham, this corridor is definitely worth watching and I’ll add Laverton with no sitting MP. I think Melton and Point Cook are most likely to flip with strong independents… the other seats have INDs with not as high a profile or too high an ALP margin.

  16. I personally think Melton will flip to the Liberals and I’m unsure about point cook. Because the Liberals have invested a lot of money into Point Cook before Garra announced and they would obviously put Labor last on their HTV cards.

    For Werribee, I live in this electorate and do believe Mia Shaw is an EXCELLENT candidate, it’s such a Pitty she’s a liberal because if she was independent, I would bet on money that she could pull of a Dai Le and win this seat. I still believe she could come really close, I’ve never ever gotten this much election material nor seen soo many Liberal placards before, but I think she can come close.

    As for my personal predictions. Take with grain of salt I’m just sharing.

    Melton – Liberal Gain (Maybe independent)
    Point Cook – Marginal Labor hold
    Werribee – Marginal Labor Hold

    I believe Point cook will be harder for Garra to win as the reason he was able to do so well in Werribee was because of his works as a local GP who birthed most of us. Now that he’s in point cook he doesn’t have that voter base who isn’t active or aware in politics but knows him as the person who delivered their child. For example my former high school’s children were birthed by Garra. So it’ll be interesting to see, I’ve also been told by Labor internals that they are extremely worried about the western suburbs!

    Without my bias here, Anyone in Werribee!

    Vote One Mia Shaw please 🤞

  17. Nothing concrete, but probably isn’t under much threat as there’s no obvious alternative like Garra in Point Cook. The protest voter will split 8 ways and preferences will leak everywhere.

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