Division of Mackellar

Mackellar Australian House of Representatives Division
Division of Mackellar in New South Wales, as of the 2016 federal election.
Created	1949
MP	Jason Falinski
Party	Liberal
Namesake	Sir Charles Mackellar Dorothea Mackellar
Electors	110,899 (2019)
Area	233 km2 (90.0 sq mi)
Demographic	Outer Metropolitan

The Division of Mackellar is an Australian electoral division in the state of New South Wales.

History[]

Sir Charles and

Dorothea Mackellar, the division's namesakes

The division is named after Sir Charles Mackellar, a social reformer and surgeon who served in the Senate from October to November 1903, and his daughter Dorothea Mackellar, a 20th-century Australian poet. The division was proclaimed at the redistribution of 11 May 1949, and was first contested at the 1949 federal election.

Like most seats in northern Sydney, Mackellar is a safe seat for the Liberal Party of Australia. It was first held by Bill Wentworth, the first Minister for Aboriginal Affairs, and the great-grandson of politician and explorer William Wentworth, one of the first three Europeans to cross the Blue Mountains. The seat has been in Liberal hands for all but two months of its existence; Wentworth briefly sat as an independent for the last two months of his term. The Liberals' hold on the seat has been only remotely threatened once, when Wentworth only tallied 55.2 percent of the two-party vote in 1972. That election is also the only time to date that the Liberals have come up short of winning enough votes on the first count to win the seat outright.

Most of this area has been represented by centre-right MPs since Federation; it was part of North Sydney before 1922, and then part of Warringah from 1922 to 1949.

Former Speaker of the House of Representatives Bronwyn Bishop held the seat from 1994 until 2016, when she lost a preselection contest for the Liberal Party candidacy following an expenses scandal. The Liberal Party preselected Jason Falinski to contest the seat.^[1][2]

Boundaries[]

The division is located in the Northern Beaches region of Sydney, adjacent to the Tasman Sea, south of Broken Bay and the Hawkesbury River. The division includes the suburbs of Akuna Bay, Avalon Beach, Bayview, Belrose, Bilgola Beach, Bilgola Plateau, Careel Bay, Church Point, Clareville, Coasters Retreat, Collaroy, Collaroy Plateau, Cottage Point, Cromer, Davidson, Duffys Forest, Elanora Heights, Elvina Bay, Great Mackerel Beach, Ingleside, Lovett Bay, McCarrs Creek, Mona Vale, Morning Bay, Narrabeen, Newport, North Narrabeen, Oxford Falls, Palm Beach, Scotland Island, Terrey Hills, Towlers Bay, Warriewood, Whale Beach, and Wheeler Heights; as well as parts of Beacon Hill, Dee Why, Forestville, Frenchs Forest, and Narraweena.

Members[]

	Image	Member	Party	Term	Notes
		Bill Wentworth (1907–2003)	Liberal	10 December 1949 – 11 October 1977	Served as minister under Gorton and McMahon. Did not contest in 1977. Failed to win a Senate seat
			Independent	11 October 1977 – 10 December 1977
		Jim Carlton (1935–2015)	Liberal	10 December 1977 – 14 January 1994	Served as minister under Fraser. Resigned in order to retire from politics
		Bronwyn Bishop (1942–)	Liberal	26 March 1994 – 9 May 2016	Previously a member of the Senate. Served as minister under Howard. Served as Speaker during the Abbott Government. Lost preselection and retired
		Jason Falinski (1970–)	Liberal	2 July 2016 – present	Incumbent

Election results[]

References[]

External links[]

• Division of Mackellar - Australian Electoral Commission

Coordinates: 33°40′08″S 151°15′11″E / 33.669°S 151.253°E / -33.669; 151.253