 | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
 The electoral district of Bragg (highlighted in green) in the greater Adelaide area. | |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
| |||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||||
A by-election for the seat of Bragg in the South Australian House of Assembly was held on 2 July 2022. [1] The by-election was triggered by the parliamentary resignation of Liberal Party MP and former Deputy Premier Vickie Chapman on 31 May 2022. [2] Jack Batty retained the seat for the Liberal Party, despite a modest swing being recorded against the party. [3] [4] [5]
The electorate of Bragg consists of some of the most affluent suburbs in Adelaide's east. [1] As such, it has been a safe seat for the Liberal Party and has always been held by the party or its predecessor, the Liberal and Country League, since its inception in 1970 by at least a 15 percent margin. The 2022 state election saw the closest margin for the Liberals in the seat's history, even though then-incumbent Vickie Chapman still won the seat with 58.2 percent of the two-party-preferred vote, the largest for a Liberal in a metropolitan Adelaide district in the election. Bragg has been represented by three MPs, all of them have been Liberal frontbenchers: David Tonkin, the 38th Premier of South Australia, who held the seat from 1970 to 1983, Graham Ingerson, the 8th Deputy Premier, who held the seat from 1983 to 2002, and Vickie Chapman, the 13th Deputy Premier, who held the seat from 2002 to 2022. [6]
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | Vickie Chapman | 12,751 | 53.8 | −7.6 | |
| Labor | Rick Sarre | 6,793 | 28.6 | +5.7 | |
| Greens | Michael Petrilli | 3,000 | 12.6 | +4.1 | |
| Family First | Daryl McCann | 1,175 | 5.0 | +5.0 | |
| Total formal votes | 23,719 | 98.2 | |||
| Informal votes | 438 | 1.8 | |||
| Turnout | 24,157 | 90.4 | |||
| Two-party-preferred result | |||||
| Liberal | Vickie Chapman | 13,796 | 58.2 | −8.8 | |
| Labor | Rick Sarre | 9,923 | 41.8 | +8.8 | |
| Liberal hold | Swing | −8.8 | |||
| Date | Event [7] |
|---|---|
| Wednesday, 1 June 2022 | Writ of election issued by the Governor |
| Tuesday, 14 June 2022 | Close of electoral rolls (5 pm) |
| Friday, 17 June 2022 | Close of nominations (12 noon) |
| Monday, 20 June 2022 | Start of early voting |
| Thursday, 30 June 2022 | Last day for applications for postal votes |
| Saturday, 2 July 2022 | Polling day |
| Candidates (in ballot paper order) [6] [8] | |||
|---|---|---|---|
| Independent | Neil Aitchison | ||
| Labor | Alice Rolls | Lawyer and farmer | |
| Liberal | Jack Batty | Lawyer and political staffer | |
| Greens | Jim Bastiras | Lecturer and community campaigner [9] | |
| Family First | Daryl McCann | Teacher and political commentator | |
| Liberal Democrats | James Hol | Hospitality worker | |
The Greens selected Jim Bastiras, a University of Adelaide College lecturer and campaigner against the expansion of White Rock Quarry in Horsnell Gully Conservation Park, which is located in the district. [9]
The Liberal Party held its preselection ballot on 5 June. They selected Jack Batty, a lawyer who served as an aide to Christopher Pyne and George Brandis and ran against then-Premier Jay Weatherill in Cheltenham in 2014, with 113 out of 166 votes cast by local party members. [10] Other people seeking preselection for the Liberals included lawyer Melissa Jones who received 33 votes, businesswoman Cara Miller who received 12 votes, and party staffer Sandy Biar who received eight votes. [11] Jones and Miller had also sought preselection in the electoral district of Waite. Chelsey Potter, party staffer who has criticised the party on issues concerning women after alleging sexual assault, also applied for the preselection process but was rejected for not meeting its party membership requirement. [9] [12] After she had considered running in the by-election as an independent, she ultimately declined to do so. [13]
The Labor Party selected Alice Rolls over Rick Sarre, retired academic and Labor's candidate at the 2018 and 2022 state elections. Rolls, who was described by the party secretary as "a lawyer, a Mum and a part-time farmer", was selected at a state party executive meeting on 8 June. [14]
The Family First Party selected Daryl McCann, a teacher and political blogger at publications such as The Australian, The Spectator, and Quadrant. In a post written before the last election, he positioned himself as a "conservative" opponent to then-incumbent Liberal Vickie Chapman and Labor and Greens candidates whom he claimed to be "progressive". [15]
An editor for The Advertiser described the by-election as the first "electoral test" for the Malinauskas government since it took government at the last state election in March. He remarked that campaign posters for Alice Rolls, the Labor candidate, also feature Premier Peter Malinauskas, while Jack Batty, the Liberal candidate campaigned as a “new generation Liberal”. [16]
| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Liberal | Jack Batty | 11,070 | 50.5 | −3.3 | |
| Labor | Alice Rolls | 6,574 | 30.0 | +1.3 | |
| Greens | Jim Bastiras | 3,261 | 14.9 | +2.2 | |
| Family First | Daryl McCann | 505 | 2.3 | −2.7 | |
| Liberal Democrats | James Hol | 347 | 1.6 | +1.6 | |
| Independent Freedom Family Life | Neil Aitchison | 175 | 0.8 | +0.8 | |
| Total formal votes | 20,932 | 98.4 | +0.2 | ||
| Informal votes | 362 | 1.6 | −0.2 | ||
| Turnout | 22,294 | 83.8 | −6.6 | ||
| Two-party-preferred result | |||||
| Liberal | Jack Batty | 12,204 | 55.6 | −2.5 | |
| Labor | Alice Rolls | 9,728 | 44.4 | +2.5 | |
| Liberal hold | Swing | −2.5 | |||
The Division of Boothby is an Australian federal electoral division in South Australia. The division was one of the seven established when the former Division of South Australia was redistributed on 2 October 1903 and is named after William Boothby (1829–1903), the Returning Officer for the first federal election.
Bragg is a single-member electoral district for the South Australian House of Assembly. The seat is named after the eminent physicists Bragg – William Henry and his son, William Lawrence. The electorate is largely suburban and encompasses a significant portion of the City of Burnside, stretching from the east parklands of Adelaide into the Adelaide Hills. After the redistribution following the 2006 election, the boundary moved eastwards to include suburbs that had formerly been in the electorate of Heysen and now borders Kavel. Bragg currently includes the metropolitan suburbs of Beaumont, Burnside, Cleland, Dulwich, Eastwood, Erindale, Frewville, Glenside, Glenunga, Greenhill, Hazelwood Park, Heathpool, Horsnell Gully, Leabrook, Leawood Gardens, Linden Park, Marryatville, Mount Osmond, Rose Park, Rosslyn Park, Skye, St Georges, Stonyfell, Toorak Gardens, Tusmore, Waterfall Gully, Wattle Park and part of Glen Osmond.
Vickie Ann Chapman is a former Australian politician, representing the South Australian House of Assembly seat of Bragg for the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia between the 2002 election and May 2022. Chapman served as the Deputy Premier of South Australia and Attorney-General between 19 March 2018 and 22 November 2021 in the Marshall government. She was the first woman to hold either post.
Adelaide is a single-member electoral district for the South Australian House of Assembly. The 22.8 km² state seat of Adelaide currently consists of the Adelaide city centre including North Adelaide and suburbs to the inner north and inner north east: Collinswood, Fitzroy, Gilberton, Medindie, Medindie Gardens, Ovingham, Thorngate, Walkerville, most of Prospect, and part of Nailsworth. The federal division of Adelaide covers the state seat of Adelaide and additional suburbs in each direction.
Davenport is a single-member electoral district for the South Australian House of Assembly. It is named after nineteenth-century pioneer and politician Sir Samuel Davenport. Davenport is a 57.7 km² electorate covering part of outer suburban Adelaide and the southern foothills of the Adelaide Hills. It takes in the suburbs of Aberfoyle Park, Bedford Park, Bellevue Heights, Chandlers Hill, Cherry Gardens, and Flagstaff Hill; and part of Happy Valley.
Iain Frederick Evans is a former Australian politician. He was leader of the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia from 2006 to 2007.
Robert Bruce Such was a South Australian politician. He was the member for the seat of Fisher in the South Australian House of Assembly from 1989 until his death in 2014. He defeated Labor MP Philip Tyler at the 1989 election and was a member of the Liberals until 2000 when he became an independent. Such was Minister for Employment, Training and Further Education, and Minister for Youth Affairs, in the Brown Liberal government from 1993 to 1996. He served as Speaker of the South Australian House of Assembly for the Rann Labor government from 2005 to 2006. Such was joint Father of the House with Michael Atkinson from 2012.
Martin Leslie James Hamilton-Smith is a former Australian politician who represented the South Australian House of Assembly seat of Waite from the 1997 election until his retirement in 2018. First elected as a candidate for the Liberal Party, Hamilton-Smith was the state parliamentary leader of the Liberal Party and the Leader of the Opposition in South Australia from 2007 to 2009, and a Minister in the Kerin Liberal government from 2001 to 2002.
Isobel Mary Redmond is a former Australian politician who was the member for the electoral district of Heysen in the House of Assembly from 2002 to 2018. She was the parliamentary leader of the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia and the Leader of the Opposition in the Parliament of South Australia between 2009 and 2013, and was the first female leader of a South Australian state major party. Under Redmond, the Liberals won 18 of 47 seats in the South Australian House of Assembly at the 2010 election, a gain of three from the 2006 election. She resigned as leader of the Liberal Party on 31 January 2013.
Geoffrey Graeme Brock is an Australian politician. He is an Independent member in the South Australian House of Assembly, representing the seat of Stuart since the 2022 South Australian state election. Prior to this, he represented the seat of Frome from the 2009 Frome by-election until a redistribution leading up to the 2022 state election.
Steven Spence Marshall is a former Australian politician who served as the 46th premier of South Australia between 2018 and 2022. He was a member of the South Australian Division of the Liberal Party of Australia in the South Australian House of Assembly from 2010 until 2024, representing the electorate of Dunstan.
Peter Bryden Malinauskas is an Australian politician serving as the 47th and current premier of South Australia since 2022. He has been the leader of the South Australian branch of the Australian Labor Party (ALP) and a member of the House of Assembly (MHA) for the division of Croydon since 2018. He was previously the Leader of the Opposition from 2018 until his victory at the 2022 state election.
Susan Elizabeth Close is an Australian politician, who is currently the deputy premier of South Australia since March 2022. She also holds the ministerial portfolios of Minister for Climate, Environment and Water ; Minister for Industry, Innovation and Science; and Minister for Defence and Space Industries.
The 2018 South Australian state election to elect members to the 54th Parliament of South Australia was held on 17 March 2018. All 47 seats in the House of Assembly or lower house, whose members were elected at the 2014 election, and 11 of 22 seats in the Legislative Council or upper house, last filled at the 2010 election, were contested. The record-16-year-incumbent Australian Labor Party (SA) government led by Premier Jay Weatherill was seeking a fifth four-year term, but was defeated by the opposition Liberal Party of Australia (SA), led by Opposition Leader Steven Marshall. Nick Xenophon's new SA Best party unsuccessfully sought to obtain the balance of power.
Annabel Faith Catford Digance is an Australian politician who represented the South Australian House of Assembly seat of Elder for the Labor Party from the 2014 state election until her defeat at the 2018 state election. She was an independent candidate for the South Australian Legislative Council in the 2022 South Australian state election and at the time she and her husband were awaiting trial on charges of alleged blackmail, which were later withdrawn.
The 2018 Victorian state election was held on Saturday, 24 November 2018 to elect the 59th Parliament of Victoria. All 88 seats in the Legislative Assembly and all 40 seats in the Legislative Council were up for election. The first-term incumbent Labor government, led by Premier Daniel Andrews, won a second four-year term, defeating the Liberal/National Coalition opposition, led by Opposition Leader Matthew Guy in a landslide victory. Minor party the Greens led by Samantha Ratnam also contested the election.
The Marshall ministry was the 73rd ministry (cabinet) of the Government of South Australia, led by Steven Marshall of the South Australian Liberal Party. It was formed after the 2018 state election and ended after the 2022 state election. It was preceded by the Weatherill ministry and was succeeded by the Malinauskas ministry.
The 2022 South Australian state election was held on 19 March 2022 to elect members to the 55th Parliament of South Australia. All 47 seats in the House of Assembly, and half the seats in the Legislative Council were up for re-election.
The 2022 South Australian Liberal Party leadership election was held on 19 April 2022 to elect a new leader of the South Australian Liberal Party, following the previous months' state election loss and resignation of then-leader Steven Marshall. The leadership contest was between three candidates: David Speirs, Josh Teague and Nick McBride. Speirs won the ballot contest by an overwhelming majority, succeeding Steven Marshall as leader and becoming the Leader of the Opposition.
The 2026 South Australian state election will be held on 21 March 2026 to elect members to the 56th Parliament of South Australia. All 47 seats in the House of Assembly, and half the seats in the Legislative Council are up for re-election.
