QUEENSLAND ELECTION 2009

IPSWICH WEST Labor 12.7%
Region: Western Ipswich Federal divisions: Blair/Dickson
	DI CLARK Greens WAYNE WENDT Labor (top) SEAN CHOAT Liberal National (bottom)

Ipswich West covers the northern and western parts of Ipswich and extends a further 20 kilometres through hinterland to the west. Labor struggles to crack 30 per cent in the latter area, while recording solid majorities in Ipswich. The addition of 660 voters around Brightview from Lockyer in the west has been enough to cut the Labor margin 0.4 per cent. Ipswich West has been won by Labor at each election since its creation in 1960, with two exceptions: 1974, when Albert Hales won for the National Party, and 1998, when One Nation's Jack Paff won narrowly on Nationals preferences. Paff quit the party in February 1999 and went into the 2001 election under the wing of the City-Country Alliance, polling a dismal 5.1 per cent. The defeated Labor member from 1998, Don Livingstone, recovered the seat with a 7.3 per cent two-party margin over One Nation, and was similarly untroubled in 2004 when Liberal candidate and long-standing Esk Shire mayor Jean Bray took second place. Livingstone's retirement announcement a day before the 2006 election was called resulted in a snap Labor preselection won by Wayne Wendt of the Labor Unity faction, a local accountant who had run against Pauline Hanson in Blair at the 2001 federal election.

PREDICTION: Labor retain