Pyne the pea to lift his majority in SA seat

Christopher Pyne is on track to easily retain his Adelaide seat of Sturt, with internal polling finding him 18 points ahead of Labor.

Christopher Pyne has held his South Australian seat of Sturt since 1993.

Christopher Pyne is on track to easily retain his suburban Adelaide seat of Sturt, with internal polling finding the Defence Minister 18 points ahead of Labor on a two-party basis.

The poll, conducted during heated debate on Kerryn Phelps’s bill to medically evacuate asylum-seekers in offshore detention, also found 49 per cent of respondents viewed Bill Shorten unfavourably, while 15 per cent had a favourable view of the Labor leader.

The remainder were neutral.

Just over 30 per cent viewed Scott Morrison favourably, marginally above the 29 per cent who viewed him unfavourably.

The release of the poll, published in South Australian daily newspaper The Advertiser, came as Mr Pyne launched a robocall ­offensive in Sturt.

The calls warn voters about Labor’s proposed crackdown on franking credits and urged those affected to attend a parliamentary inquiry in Sturt next week.

Mr Pyne, elected the member for Sturt in 1993, holds the seat by a notional 5.4 per cent following a boundary redraw reducing South Australian seats from 11 to 10.

Mr Pyne received 43 per cent of first preferences in the poll, well clear of Labor’s 25 per cent and the Greens’ 7 per cent.

Centre Alliance had 1.6 per cent of the primary vote, a spectacular decline from the 2016 federal election when the then Nick Xenophon Team received 21.2 per cent.

Seventeen per cent of respondents were undecided.

On a two-party basis, Mr Pyne had an 18-point lead over Labor, 59 to 41 per cent.

Labor has not preselected a candidate for Sturt, although it is understood dispute mediator Cressida O’Hanlon is the frontrunner. Centre Alliance is coy on whether it will stand a candidate, despite senator Rex Patrick earlier flagging the leafy eastern suburb seat as a potential target.