SOUTH AUSTRALIAN ELECTION 2010

RAMSAY Labor 28.5%
Region: Northern Suburbs Federal divisions: Port Adelaide/Wakefield
	DALE RAMSEY Family First MIKE RANN Labor (top) PAUL PETIT Greens ROD STEINERT Australian Democrats DAVID BALAZA Liberal (bottom)
Electoral District Boundaries Commission map

Mike Rann's electorate of Ramsay consists of a block of suburbs in central northern Adelaide dominated by Salisbury, and extending to Parafield Gardens in the south. It has not been affected by the redistribution. Mike Rann is the second successive Labor Premier to have represented the seat, Lynn Arnold having held it from its creation in 1985 until he moved to Taylor in 1993. Rann was born in England and emigrated to New Zealand in 1962, arriving in South Australian politics via a career in journalism and a position as press secretary to John Bannon. He impressed sufficiently in the latter role to win preselection for the northern suburbs seat of Briggs in 1986, despite being factionally non-aligned. Rann served as Employment Minister in John Bannon's government and Business and Tourism Minister in Lynn Arnold's, becoming deputy leader when Frank Blevins stepped aside after the 1993 election. When Lynn Arnold quit politics 10 months later, Rann was clearly the senior figure among Labor's nine remaining lower house members.

Labor's strong recovery at the 1997 election was enough to secure Rann's position in the short term, but there were murmurings in 2001 when polls suggested Labor was failing to capitalise on the government's mounting problems. He nonetheless survived to the 2002 election, at which he initially appeared to have fallen a seat short on election night. Deliverance then arrived in the form of the Liberal-turned-independent member for Hammond, Peter Lewis, who agreed to support a Labor government. By 2005 Rann had the highest opinion poll ratings of any leader in Australia, and the next year he led his party to a landslide election win. He has had a rockier time of it in his second term: his failure to promote ambitious back-benchers in the July 2008 reshuffle brought powerful forces to the brink of mutiny, and he has recently endured the spectacle of a physical attack by the husband of a man whose wife claimed to have had an affair with him.

The Liberal candidate is David Balaza, who represents Central ward on Salisbury council.

PREDICTION: Labor retain