Federal election 2016: Where the fight will be won

A NEW generation of Liberal MPs in Western Sydney are facing a fight not to be wiped out after one term, as the region emerges as the key election battleground.

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A NEW generation of Liberal MPs in Western Sydney faces a fight not to be wiped out after one term, as the region emerges as the battleground which could determine who is given the keys to the Lodge.

Strategists from both parties have mapped out extensive campaigns in Western Sydney, believing the region is critical to the outcome.

The Liberal Party had penned in first-term MPs Craig Laundy (Reid, 3.4 per cent), Fiona Scott (Lindsay, 3 per cent), David Coleman (Banks, 2.6 per cent) and second-term MP Russell Matheson (Macarthur, 3.3 per cent) to control the area after Tony Abbott swept to power in 2013.

Liberal MP for the seat of Lindsay, Fiona Scott.

That vice-like grip is under intense threat from Labor, which wants to split the region with up to 10 seats in NSW in play.

Labor will try to use a class warfare scare campaign, aimed at batt­ling westerners, to win back its base.

Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull will attempt to channel the “Howard battlers”, wooing aspirational Western Sydney voters who led the Coalition to a decade in office.

Mr Turnbull believes tax cuts for small business will entice working class owner-operator tradies who live in the west to support the Liberal Party. The Central Coast seat of Robertson (3.1 per cent), which is held by Lucy Wicks, an ally of Treasurer Scott Morrison, will also be critical to the campaign. She has been under intense pressure with Opposition Leader Bill Shorten having made multiple visits this year.

The government will lose the seats of Barton and probably Dobell, which are notionally Labor after a redistribution.

The local MPs trying to hang on.

Former Howard chief-of-staff Grahame Morris said Western Sydney was under siege but did not expect the region to be won by Labor.

“I do not get the sense that there’s that massive swing on at the moment to drive the Coalition out of government,’’ he said.

High-profile election analyst Antony Green said Western Sydney, and surrounding areas, was critical.

“It was consistently the ability of the Coalition to win seats in NSW and Queensland that gave John Howard his majority in 1998 and 2001,’’ he told ABC.

“What the Coalition needs to do at this election is hang on to those mortgage belt seats, Macarthur, Robertson, around the fringes of Sydney,” Green said. The Coalition needed to hold on to Reid and Banks, he added: “There is a huge demographic change in those electorates; they are not nearly as working class as they used to be.”

Ms Scott faces pressure in her seat over flight paths at Badgerys Creek airport with constituents set to be hit by aircraft noise. Infrastructure Minister Paul Fletcher visited the region last week to explain plans for flight paths.

Southern NSW is also a key battleground. The bellwether seat of Eden-Monaro, which is held by Peter Hendy by just 2.9 per cent, has been identified by Labor as a seat it expects to win. Foreign Minister Julie Bishop was dispatched to Gilmore near Batemans Bay to boost the government’s standing in the area last month.

The northern NSW seat of Page, held by Nationals MP Kevin Hogan by 3.1 per cent, has been marked off by Labor as one it expects to win because of a changing demographic.

LOCAL MEMBERS TRYING TO HANG ON:

Karen McNamara, Liberal, Dobell.

Bob Baldwin. Liberal, Paterson.

Julie Owens, Labor, Parramatta.

Justine Elliot, Labor, Richmond.

David Coleman, Liberal, Banks.

Peter Hendy. Liberal, Eden-Monaro.

Michelle Rowland, Labor, Greenway.

Lucy Wicks, Liberal, Robertson.

Russell Matheson, Liberal, Macarthur.