Dates current 1973–present Area 190.2 km² | ||
 | ||
Party Liberal Party of Australia | ||
Pittwater is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales. Located in Sydney's north-east, it is 175.32 km² in size, and comprises a part of the local government area of Northern Beaches Council. There are approximately 43,000 registered voters.
It is named after Pittwater, a body of water the district roughly surrounds.
It includes the suburbs or localities of Avalon, Bayview, Bilgola, Church Point, Cottage Point, Duffys Forest, Elanora Heights, Ingleside, Ku-ring-gai Chase, Mona Vale, Narrabeen, Newport, North Narrabeen, Palm Beach, Scotland Island, Terrey Hills, and Warriewood.
The current Member of Parliament for Pittwater is Rob Stokes of the Liberal Party of Australia. He was elected at the 2007 state election and re-elected in 2011.
History
The electoral district of Pittwater was created in 1973. Located in the traditional Liberal stronghold of Sydney's Northern Beaches, for most of its existence it has been a comfortably safe Liberal seat. Its first member was Sir Robert William Askin, then Premier of New South Wales. It had been created out of a large chunk of Askin's old seat of Collaroy, and was thus a natural place for Askin to transfer when the seat was abolished.
The seat was famously held by New South Wales Opposition Leader John Brogden until his dramatic resignation in 2005. The Liberal stranglehold on the seat was lost in the resulting by-election when the Mayor of Pittwater Council, Alex McTaggart, standing as an Independent candidate, defeated the Liberal Paul Nicolau in a landslide.
The seat reverted to form at the 2007 general election, with new Liberal candidate Rob Stokes defeating McTaggart to comfortably regain the seat for his party. Stokes won on the primary vote alone, gaining just over 50%. After preferences, his share was 61% to McTaggart's 39%. Stokes won every booth in the district with the exception of Scotland Island, whose few hundred offshore voters traditionally buck the trend.
While Labor frequently runs dead in northern Sydney, Pittwatter is very unfriendly territory for Labor even by northern Sydney standards. In recent years, Labor has been lucky to tally 20 percent of the primary vote, and has even been pushed into third place on some occasions.