Electoral district of Gaven
| Gaven Queensland—Legislative Assembly | |||||||||||||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
 Map of the electoral district of Gaven, 2017 | |||||||||||||||
| State | Queensland | ||||||||||||||
| Dates current | 2001–present | ||||||||||||||
| MP | Meaghan Scanlon | ||||||||||||||
| Party | Labor | ||||||||||||||
| Namesake | Gaven Way (a section of the Pacific Motorway) | ||||||||||||||
| Electors | 33,051 (2020) | ||||||||||||||
| Area | 77 km2 (29.7 sq mi) | ||||||||||||||
| Demographic | Outer-metropolitan | ||||||||||||||
| Coordinates | 27°58′S 153°17′E / 27.967°S 153.283°E | ||||||||||||||
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Gaven /ˈɡeɪvən/ is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of Queensland. It was created out of the former district of Nerang and the southern segment of Albert in the 2001 redistribution, and encompasses the northern growth corridor of the Gold Coast. The current Member of Parliament is Meaghan Scanlon of the Labor Party.[1] It is currently the only Labor-held seat on the Gold Coast.
History
[edit]Gaven was created in 1999, named after the Gaven Way (a section of the Pacific Motorway).[2] When it was created, it was a notionally conservative seat, part of the old South Coast electorate held for 14 years by Russ Hinze (commonly known as Sir Joh's "Minister for Everything"), and was contested for the conservative National Party by the incumbent member for Albert, Bill Baumann, at the 2001 election. However, amid a statewide landslide victory for the Labor Party, the seat fell to union organiser Robert Poole with a 14.6% swing. The National Party agreed to let their coalition partner, the more urban Liberal Party contest the seat at the 2004 election, and though they nominated former Gold Coast mayor Ray Stevens, Poole was returned with only a slight swing against him.
Poole became the subject of increasing controversy during his second term, as he spent much of his term out of the state, living with his family in Thailand. This reached its peak in 2006 when Poole revealed that he intended to spend the first half the year in Thailand while he recovered from surgery. A furious Premier Peter Beattie demanded that Poole return or face having his seat formally declared vacant, and Poole subsequently resigned from the seat in late February.
The Liberal-National Coalition made the decision for the National Party, not the Liberals, to contest the seat at the by-election, which was won by around 1,500 votes by Alex Douglas, the National Party candidate, over Labor’s Phil Gray.
The 2006 state election saw Alex Douglas and Phil Gray once again running against each other. Phil Gray won the seat for Labor by a little under 2,000 votes.
The 2009 state election saw Douglas and Gray pitted against each other for a third consecutive time. On this occasion, Douglas, running under the banner of the newly formed Liberal National Party, narrowly emerged as the victor.[3]
Meaghan Scanlon became the first woman to represent the seat, winning the seat for Labor in 2017 and holding it with a swing in her favour at the 2020 Queensland election. Upon victory in the 2024 state election, Scanlon became the longest serving MP for the seat of Gaven.[4]
Despite notionally being considered conservative when it was first established in 2001, as of 2025 the seat of Gaven has been held by the Labor party for 16 of its 24 years of existence.
Members for Gaven
[edit]| Member | Party | Term | |
|---|---|---|---|
| Robert Poole | Labor | 2001–2006 | |
| Alex Douglas | National | 2006–2006 | |
| Phil Gray | Labor | 2006–2009 | |
| Alex Douglas | Liberal National | 2009–2012 | |
| Independent | 2012–2013 | ||
| Palmer United | 2013–2014 | ||
| Independent | 2014–2015 | ||
| Sid Cramp | Liberal National | 2015–2017 | |
| Meaghan Scanlon | Labor | 2017–present | |
Election results
[edit]| Party | Candidate | Votes | % | ±% | |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| Labor | Meaghan Scanlon | 12,057 | 41.34 | −6.06 | |
| Liberal National | Bianca Stone | 11,343 | 38.89 | +5.79 | |
| One Nation | Sandy Roach | 2,440 | 8.37 | +0.07 | |
| Greens | Sally Spain | 1,515 | 5.19 | −0.31 | |
| Legalise Cannabis | Jenelle Porter | 1,240 | 4.25 | +0.35 | |
| Family First | Ian Reid | 567 73 | 1.96 | +1.96 | |
| Total formal votes | 29,168 | 95.45 | +0.40 | ||
| Informal votes | 1,389 | 4.55 | −0.40 | ||
| Turnout | 30,557 | 87.33 | +0.61 | ||
| Two-party-preferred result | |||||
| Labor | Meaghan Scanlon | 14,780 | 50.67 | −7.13 | |
| Liberal National | Bianca Stone | 14,388 | 49.33 | +7.13 | |
| Labor hold | Swing | −7.13 | |||
 | Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. Updates on reimplementing the Graph extension, which will be known as the Chart extension, can be found on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org. |
- Liberal
- National
| Graphs are unavailable due to technical issues. Updates on reimplementing the Graph extension, which will be known as the Chart extension, can be found on Phabricator and on MediaWiki.org. |
See also
[edit]References
[edit]- ^ "Representatives of Queensland State Electorates 1860-2017" (PDF). Queensland Parliamentary Record 2012-2017: The 55th Parliament. Queensland Parliament. Archived from the original (PDF) on 27 April 2020.
- ^ "History of Queensland electorate names" (PDF). Electoral Commission of Queensland. Archived (PDF) from the original on 7 November 2018. Retrieved 8 November 2018.
- ^ "Labor's Gray concedes defeat in Gaven". ABC. 26 March 2009. Archived from the original on 28 March 2009. Retrieved 26 March 2009.
- ^ "Outcome of the State 2024 poll in Gaven". Gold Coast Bulletin. 30 October 2024. Retrieved 18 January 2025.
{{cite web}}: CS1 maint: url-status (link) - ^ "Gaven - QLD Electorate, Candidates, Results". abc.net.au. 27 October 2024. Retrieved 1 November 2024.