Created 1901 Electors 106,958 (2016) Founded 1901 Member of parliament Trevor Evans Namesake Brisbane | MP Trevor Evans Demographic Inner Metropolitan Area 58 km² Elector 106,958 | |
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Party Liberal National Party of Queensland | ||
The Division of Brisbane is an Australian Electoral Division in Queensland. The division was one of the original 75 divisions contested at the first federal election. It is named after the city of Brisbane.
It was in Labor hands for all but five years from 1931 to 2010, and for most of that time was a marginal Labor seat. However, a redistribution ahead of the 2010 election pushed the seat into more conservative-leaning territory east of Breakfast Creek. This helped Liberal National challenger Teresa Gambaro, previously the member for nearby Petrie from 1996 to 2007, take the seat from longtime Labor incumbent Arch Bevis, marking the first time in over a century that Labor had been in government without holding Brisbane. She was reelected in 2013 with an increased majority.
Gambaro did not re-contest the seat at the 2016 election. The contest was historic in that it was the first Australian federal election where both major party candidates in a lower house seat contest were openly gay – Trevor Evans for the Liberal Nationals and Pat O'Neill for Labor. Evans retained the seat for the LNP.
Boundaries
On its original boundaries, Brisbane covered all of what is now the northern part of the City of Brisbane, but successive boundary changes cut it back to the inner suburban area. However, between 1913 to 1949 the seat instead covered the inner south-west.
It now extends from the city centre into the western suburbs, and includes the Brisbane CBD, Alderley, Ashgrove, Bowen Hills, Clayfield, Enoggera, Ferny Grove, Fortitude Valley, Gaythorne, Grange, Herston, Kelvin Grove, Keperra, Milton, Mitchelton, New Farm, Newmarket, Newstead, Red Hill, Spring Hill, Upper Kedron, Wilston, Windsor, parts of Bardon, Everton Park, Paddington and Stafford.
In the 2009 redistribution announced by the Australian Electoral Commission, the suburbs of Hendra, Ascot and Hamilton were included in the seat of Brisbane.