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| Adam Carr's Election Archive
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Victorian state election, 28 November 2026
Ripon District
Location: Ararat, Maryborough, Napoleons
Legislative Council:
Western Victoria Region
Enrolment 2022 election: 50,813
Enrolment June 2026: 53,943 (up 6.2%)
Relevant demographics (2021 census)
High income: 10.1% (Aust average 22.6%)
Renting: 18.3% (Aust average 30.6%)
Paying a mortgage: 32.0% (Aust average 35.0%)
Couples with children: 50.0% (Aust average 43.7%)
Born overseas: 10.0% (Aust average 27.7%)
No religion: 44.9% (Aust average 38.9%)
University graduate: 13.0% (Aust average 26.3%)
Professional / managerial: 30.7% (Aust average 37.7%)
Works in Agriculture: 10.9% (Aust average 1.0%)
Sitting member: Martha Haylett (Labor): Elected 2022
2018 Liberal majority over Labor: 00.0%
2021 redistricting: Labor majority over Liberal: 02.7%
2022 Labor majority over Liberal: 03.0%
Status: Very marginal Labor
Ripon was created in 1945, abolished in 1955, and recreated in 1976, when the old seats of Hampden (Henry Bolte's seat) and Kara Kara were merged. It has always been based on the central Victorian goldfields towns of Ararat, Stawall and Maryborough. These towns, after a decades-long decline in population and prosperity, are growing again as a result of increasing tourism and colonisation by ex-urbanites. Like all country seats, it is a low-income and monocultural seat, with few graduates or renters.
Labor's strength is in the larger towns, particularly Maryborough, which has always been a Labor stroghold. The smaller rural towns mostly vote Liberal. Ripon was held from 1976 to 1992 by senior Liberal Tom Austin (who had succeeded Bolte in Hampden in 1972). On his retirement the seat was won by Stephen Elder, who was Bolte's great-nephew, and who had held the abolished seat of Ballarat North since 1988. Elder was expected to go far, but he was unexpectedly defeated in Labor's sweep of the central Victorian seats in 1999.
The winner was Joe Helper, who retained the seat at the next three elections and was a minister in the Bracks and Brumby governments. Helper retired in 2014, when the redistricting turned Ripon into a notionally Liberal seat. It was won by Louise Staley, a company dirtector, farmer and director of the Food and Environment Unit at the Institute of Public Affairs. At the 2018 election, which Labor won comfortably, Staley was re-elected with a margin of 0.0% (15 votes).
The 2021 redistricting made Staley's position even more precarious by removing Charlton and Donald in the Wimmera and adding Labor-voting Ballarat suburbs such as Haddon, Napoleons and Ross Creek. At the 2022 election she was defeated by Martha Haylett, formerly an advisor to Premier Daniel Andrews. Haylett has a slender majority of 3.0%: this is a seat which the Liberals must win in 2026.
2022 results
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Boundaries following
2021 redistricting |
See full-size map
Candidates:
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Jo Armstrong
The Nationals |
Taylah Brennan-Jones
Victorian Socialists |
Tim Drylie
Australian Greens |
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Martha Haylett
Australian Labor Party |
Megan Read
Liberal Party |
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