Pakenham – Victoria 2026

Labor performed well at the federal level here however, it does not mean it will translate to a Labor victory here especially how this seat will be an open race.

Population growth is helping Labor here but only a small swing is required to flip.

Is it confirmed that the Labor MP will retire? I was being told by an insider for all of last year they were bracing for a by-election but then heard more recent talk that she may re-contest!

Regardless it’s probably a little presumptuous to assume Labor’s outer suburban success Federally will be replicated at the state ballot like for like. Having said that the margin from 2022 might be a little artificially close due to covid issues? If the Liberals continue to struggle with internal crap they are not guaranteed to flip here

Unsurprisingly, Emma Vulin has announced that she isn’t recontesting, but intends to complete her term.

This was an open seat last time with no sitting MP. Whilist i expect a LIB win due to small margin i think swing will be very small and much less than state average. Outside chance of a status quo result due to Population growth/ethnic diversification

eithout a sitting mp this will be easy pickings for the libs. despite the swing against the libs last time they manage to pickup votes here. the libs should comfortably win this with at least a 4% swing

One would expect this to go to the Liberals, but it is worth reminding ourselves that we all wrote this off as a Liberal notional gain in 2022, and we were wrong.

We all wrote this off in 2022. Important to remember that State Labor is more popular here s they have delivered a lot and it is demographically trending Labor as it urbanises. There was a huge swing to Federal Labor in La Trobe unlike Hawke, Gorton. I think maybe 2% swing here max for Libs.

Everyone said last time it was pick up number 1 for Libs and that Labor wrote of this seat.

https://www.tallyroom.com.au/archive/vic2022/pakenham2022/comment-page-1#comments

how could it be a liberal notional gain? it was a notional labr seat meaning the liberals would have to win it? as someone who was unimpressed with the liberal campaign they did better here then they did elsewhere in the state where they went backwards verall. this is the 3rd marginal labor seat with a retring member and labors second most marginal against the libs (3rd overall) if they arent winning here they probably have been wiped out. the fact that brad battins seat is just next door means they should probably bank this one

The Libs got a TPP swing to them statewide of 3% last time. They went backwards in seat count but not in terms of TPP. Swing was lower than statewide last time so on Cook PVI this seat trended Labor last time.

correction the coalition had a swing of 2.3% the nats did most of the heavy lifting. the fact the libs seat count went backwards. means they went backwards. it just means they got swings in seats they already hold.

yes typo sorry it was 2.3% Nats gained 3 seat which meant overall Coalition went forwards. The libs got swing in seats they already held, very safe Labor seats in the NW Melbourne such as Greenvale, St Albans. They also picked up Hawthorn, Nepean

but lost bass notionally and lost hastings despite having a sitting mp. although i did see that coming due to the star candidate. labor have 8 marginal seats vs liberals. the libs have to win at least 6 of them this election. ive excluded ripon due to its historically low swings and yan yean because it a historically labor seat that they probably cant hold long term or even short term due to redistribution upcoming. if they dont get those 6 marginals (3 of which have no sitting members) then this election is a failure. also ive updatedmy prediction for yan yean based on recent news of a housing estate in beveridge and the fact my oven shouldnt need that much of a fixer that yan yean will indeed lose Nimbulk but will probably shed parts of Mernda as well. i think it should be renamed Whittlesea also. this would also leave it still competitive for the libs. in regards to Kalkallo in addtiion to shedding mitchell it could probly lose parts of Yuroke or even cragieburn as well depending on where the numbers fall.

C0ok pvi over counts
Counts 55 /45 as 11
Not the 5% need to win

umm what?

@Nimalan: I calculated Pakenham’s 2025 federal results. In the 2025 federal election, booths within Pakenham recorded a Liberal 2PP of 51.27%. If you take into account declaration votes, my estimated Liberal 2PP for Pakenham at the 2025 federal election would be 52.11%. Polls considently show that Labor support at the VIC state level is much weaker than at the federal level in Victoria. For VIC Labor to hold Pakenkam Labor needs to do significantly better than their federal counterparts, which is not possible without a popular sitting Labor MP.

@Nicholas and @Nimalan: Labor 2PP in Pakenham going into the 2022 VIC state election was 2.2%, therefore Labor could withstand a small swing against it and still hold the seat. The last Newspoll before the 2022 VIC election recorded a Labor 2PP of 54.5% or 2.8% swing against Labor. 2.8% was slightly higher than Pakenham’s margin, which means a below statewide-average swing could see Labor narrowly holding the seat and it did. Labor’s margin in Pakenham is now only 0.4%, which means even a below-statewide average swing against Labor will see Labor lose Pakenham. Without a popular sitting Labor MP, demographic changes alone won’t help Labor defy a minimum 2-3% statewide swing against it.

Joseph the npstatewide swung ended up being 2.3% just over the target here in Pakenham however they only achieved a 1.8% swing. However 1.8% was probably the avg liberal swing stateside. The nats lifted the average a bit over the libs and they got a swing in Pakenham and the member has now retired just after one term so maybe the writing is on the wall and she wants to go out with her dignity. The only way the libs don’t win here is if brad battin runs over a nun on his way to parliament. The redistribution will likely be favourable in Pakenham meaning they would be able to hold it

The MP for Pakenham was diagnosed with a pretty serious medical condition. There is a non-zero chance she might not be able to serve out the term since it is over a year away, but that is a discussion for another day. She was diagnosed after winning the seat, so presumably would have stood again had that situation not occurred.

Whether Battin ran the nun over or someone else, you can bet he would set up a mic and give commentary whilst the event was still taking place. I see 12 marginal seats with 3-4 of them being Lab v Grn contests plus Prahran. Liberals have a couple of seats under teal threat, including Mornington. We shall see if they are contested again.

Is David Farrelly contesting again? In the last campaign, the Pakenham Hospital delay was a key focus of the campaign.

Dpthanks didn’t know that. Any idea what condition. Curious. The libs will lose prahran either to Labor or the greens the left vote is simply too much for the libs to overcome when they preference wpeach other barring some miracle. I can see Labor losing at least 6 of those marginals to the libs. Ripon would need a higher then usual variance. Though the bays being in Te contest and the recent bush summit I think it will flip. Yan yean I think the libs can get too. The greens will be a good shot at footscray given their may result in Fraser. Thye could easily lose those other 3 too. It will depend on lib preferences. Also guns might lose Richmond.