Federal Election 2022: The key seats where it will be won or lost

The pathway to victory will not be easy for the Coalition or the Labor Party as “both have a murky path ahead of them”. Here’s why. See the list.

The election will be fought through hand-to-hand combat, with the Coalition and Labor fighting for single seats across the country and a host of previously safe seats coming into play due to the retirement of well-known local members of parliament.

The Coalition must stem its losses in Western Australia, cling on to at-risk electorates in Queensland and try to pick up a couple of marginals in New South Wales in order to win a fourth term in office when Australians go to the polls on May 21.

Kosmos Samaras — RedBridge Group.

Labor needs to pick up marginal seats in Victoria and Tasmania, capitalise on its popularity in Western Australia and defend its coalmining seats in regional NSW if it is to win majority Government for the first time since 2007.

“The pathway to victory is wider for the Labor Party than it is for the Liberal Party but both have a murky path ahead of them,’’ pollster Kosmos Samaras, from RedBridge Group, said.

To maintain its one-seat majority the Liberals would have to at least regain the south Sydney seat of Hughes, which they lost when sitting MP Craig Kelly defected to Clive Palmer’s United Australia Party (UAP). This would help offset the loss of the abolished Liberal seat of Stirling in WA, and the creation of the new seat of Hawke in Victoria, which is on a notional margin of 10 per cent for Labor.

Clive Palmer with Craig Kelly in Parliament House in Canberra. Picture: NCA NewsWire

The Coalition would then have to hold all of its seats, or pick up something in NSW to offset potential losses in Tasmania and Victoria.

Taking into account Stirling and Hawke, Labor needs to win another seven seats to claim majority victory.

The most obvious of these likely gains are in WA, where two and possibly three seats are up for grabs, while the Liberals are vulnerable in the NSW marginal seat of Reid, Victorian ultra-marginal Chisholm, and the Tasmanian seat of Bass.

Both major parties are bleeding votes to minor parties, but the Liberals are copping it from several directions, losing conservative voters to the anti-vax, anti-lockdown appeal of the UAP, as well as progressive inner-city votes to the well-organised and funded “Voices of’’ independents.

With the retirement of a number of well-known and established MPs, seats which were previously safe are now potentially in play. These include Lingiari in the Northern Territory, where Labor’s Warren Snowden is retiring, Casey in Victoria, vacated by Liberal Tony Smith, and even Flinders, where Liberal Greg Hunt is retiring. In South Australia, the resignation of Liberal Nicolle Flint has made Boothby vulnerable.

Election analyst, psephologist Kevin Bonham, said a uniform national swing would see Labor taking out seats across the country.

However, the situation was different in each state and sometimes in each seat.

In Tasmania, Labor had lost Bass and Braddon last time due to policy errors, announcing money for the MONA museum and an AFL team in Hobart. “This was seen as southern-centric and used against them,’’ Dr Bonham said.

Labor was unlikely to make the same mistake again but will have to ensure it holds Lyons, with the seat’s 5.2 per cent margin inflated last time by the Liberal candidate being disendorsed.

kevin bonham

Dr Bonham said the seats of Swan and Pearce, where the Liberal incumbents (Steve Irons and Christian Porter) were retiring, were both likely to fall to Labor.

In Queensland, prominent Liberal Peter Dutton’s marginal seat of Dickson remains a Labor target.

“Dickson is always hoped for, but it’s more hope than expectation I think,’’ Dr Bonham said.

“If there’s a swing on he could go because it’s a modest margin, but let’s see.’’

Still in Queensland, Dr Bonham said the Liberal seat of Longman was at risk due to its low margin. And while Brisbane was a target seat for Labor, the ALP had done well in the inner-city seats last time and he believed it would be harder for them to improve enough to take Brisbane.

Labor will also target Flynn in central Queensland — where long-serving Nationals MP Ken O’Dowd is retiring — and Leichhardt to the north.

In NSW, both parties have significant ground to defend, and opportunities to pick up.

Labor will have to work hard to retain the ultra-marginal seat of Macquarie in Sydney’s West, Eden-Monaro and Gilmore in southern NSW, as well as the three electorates in the Hunter.

The Liberals plan to heavily target these seats, but will also have to defend strongly in Reid and Robertson, where Labor is running effective local campaigns, as well as in Wentworth and North Sydney where “Voices of” candidates are mounting high-profile challenges.

The Nationals are hopeful they can end Labor’s century-long reign in the seat of Hunter off the back of the retirement of Joel Fitzgibbon, who had been the local member for more than 25 years.

Dr Bonham said the Coalition was in a much worse position that it had been at the start of the campaign in 2019.

“In the current polling Labor is absolutely miles ahead and would win things everywhere,’’ he said, but cautioned: “historically, that will be expected to tighten up’’.

Mr Samaras said he believed Labor would pick up two seats in WA, was a chance in Boothby in South Australia and would likely pick up Chisholm, the ultra-marginal suburban Liberal seat held by Gladys Liu.

“Tassie is an absolute shemozzle to try to predict.’’

In NSW, Mr Samaras said while there was a drop in the Liberal vote in Lindsay, Banks and Macquarie, most went to Palmer and would come back on preferences.

“There is a big drop in the Liberal primary but Labor is not benefiting from the decline.’’

“The Coalition needs to pick up seats in the Hunter Region – the electorate of Hunter, Paterson, Shortland, Greenway, that’s where they will go hunting.’’

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