THE POLL BLUDGER
South Australian House of Assembly Election 2006

MORIALTA
Liberal 3.6%

Known as Coles from 1970 to 2002, Morialta contains outer suburbs due east of the city from Auldana north to Athelstone, along with a larger area of under-populated hinterland extending 10 kilometres east to Cherryville. A territory swap with Hartley has expanded the northern suburban section and reduced the southern, adding 2000 new voters in Paradise (home to the Assemblies of God church made famous by Guy Sebastian and Family First) and removing 1370 voters in Magill. Paradise actually leans towards Labor and was detached from Hartley to meet torturous electoral fairness requirements, and its addition cuts the Liberal margin by 0.7 per cent.

Coles started life as a Labor seat and was held by future Premier Des Corcoran until 1977, when an unfavourable redistribution prompted him to seek refuge elsewhere. It was subsequently won for the Liberals by Jennifer Cashmore, who held it until her retirement in 1993. Cashmore's successor was Joan Hall (right), television reporter, former staffer to Dean Brown and wife of Steele Hall - Liberal Premier from 1968 to 1970, Senator for the breakaway Liberal Movement from 1974 to 1977, and finally Liberal member for the federal seat of Boothby from 1981 to 1996. Joan Hall's association with Dean Brown came to a sudden end when she defected to the John Olsen camp in November 1996, providing the catalyst for the leadership coup that replaced Brown with Olsen and deputy leader Stephen Baker with Graham Ingerson, Hall's fellow moderate defector. Under Olsen's wing, Hall was promoted to the junior youth and employment portfolios, to which tourism was added in October 1998, but her role in the Olsen takeover soon came back to haunt her. Large volumes of leaked documents calculated to damage the principals behind Brown's downfall found their way into Labor's hands, including revelations about Hall and Ingerson's handling of the Hindmarsh Soccer Stadium redevelopment which was then undergoing a scandalous cost blowout. Damning findings from the Auditor-General compelled both to resign from the ministry in October 2001.

Not surprisingly, Hall has had to fight for preselection at the last two elections. Her endorsement in 2002 relied on the exercise of a party rule designed to deter branch-stacking, prompting Steele Hall to write an article in The Advertiser complaining of a rush of membership applications for the Magill branch immediately before the relevant cut-off date. Those who read between the lines could surmise that he blamed the episode on the federal member for Sturt, Christopher Pyne, a powerful moderate. Last year Hall was one of only two sitting Liberals to be challenged for preselection for the current election, Liberal state politics not being an in-demand career path at the moment. In Hall's case it was two challengers, the more threatening of whom was Louise Houston, an electorate officer to the aforementioned Pyne. This prompted her to again complain of "interference in a pre-selection by federal members". Despite her troubles, Hall recovered her old tourism portfolio in a shadow ministry reshuffle in April 2004, indicating either a successful career rehabilitation or a paucity of options among Liberal ranks. She has also remained an active player in leadership shenanigans, reportedly having enlisted in the Right's push to promote Davenport MP Iain Evans.

Labor's candidate is Lindsay Simmons (left), who won preselection over lawyer Aniello Carbone. Simmons is a policy manager and former chief-of-staff to the Education Minister, currently serving as state manager of the Council for the Ageing. She is linked to the Right faction and has run previously at federal elections in 2001, when she was the Labor candidate for Sturt, and in 1998 when she headed a "Vote No GST" Senate ticket which some suspicious folk may have deemed to have been a Labor front. A poll of 500 voters published in The Advertiser on January 19 had Hall and Simmons tied on 40 per cent of the decided vote, with Labor ahead 51-49 on two-party preferred

ASSESSMENT: LABOR GAIN

Talk emanating from the Labor camp of stronger swings in outer suburban mortgage belt seats than those nearer the city was not borne out. In particular, the result defied rumours of Labor polling showing an uphill struggle to win Morialta. The decisive 11.5 per cent swing here was among their very best, and was achieved on the back of a 12.9 per cent lift on the primary vote. The Democrats were hit hard by the entry of the Greens, who did not contest the seat in 2002 – their vote was down from 10.5 per cent to 3.0 per cent while the Greens scored 6.3 per cent.

OUTCOME: LABOR GAIN (7.9%)