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| Adam Carr's Election Archive
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Australian federal election, 2025
Division of Wide Bay, Queensland
Named for: Wide Bay district (after the bay between Double Island Point and Fraser Island, named by James
Cook in 1770)
Queensland Coast: Cooroy, Gympie, Maryborough, Noosa, Tewantin
Enrolment at 2019 election: 107,516
Enrolment at 2022 election: 115,315 (+07.4)
1999 republic referendum: No 74.3
2018 same-sex marriage survey: Yes 55.6
2023 Voice referendum: No 74.8
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Sitting member: Llew O'Brien (Nationals): Elected 2016, 2019, 2022
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2007 Nationals majority over Labor: 8.5%
2010 Nationals majority over Labor: 15.6%
2013 Nationals majority over Labor: 13.2%
2016 Nationals majority over Labor: 8.1%
2019 Nationals majority over Labor: 13.1%
2022 Nationals majority over Labor: 11.3%
Status: Fairly safe Nationals
Nationals two-party vote 1983-2022
2022 results
Statistics and history
Division of Wide Bay
Wide Bay has existed since Federation, and has always been based on the city of Maryborough and surrounding
rural areas. Until 1984 it also included Bundaberg, and the strong Labor vote in these two cities meant that
Labor could expect to win the seat in good years. Indeed, Wide Bay's first member was the three-time Labor Prime
Minister
Andrew Fisher. But Labor has not won Wide Bay since 1972, and the transfer of Bundaberg to Hinkler in 1984 made
the seat much safer for the non-Labor side. In 1998, however, the impact of One Nation produced a huge swing and almost
delivered the seat to Labor.
On its 2004 boundaries Wide Bay had the lowest median family income level of any electorate in Australia,
reflecting its large population of retired people and small farmers, plus a significant Indigenous population.
The 2006 redistribution drew the seat to the south, removing the retirement centre of Hervey Bay and adding the
booming tourist towns of Noosa and Tewantin. This boosted the seat's income levels and reduced the proportion of
over-65s, but has not altered it much politically.
Warren Truss, who won the seat in 1990, was a senior
minister in the Howard Government from 2005, and succeeded
Mark Vaile as Leader after the 2007 election. He was
Deputy Prime Minister and Minister for Infrastructure and
Regional Development in the Abbott-Turnbull Government, and retired in 2016.
Llew O'Brien, Nationals MP for Wide Bay since 2016, was a police officer before entering politics.
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