Categories
In the map, category 1 shows the electorates that are most vulnerable to replacement of a duopoly MP with a community independent candidate, and category 5 shows electorates where this is most difficult.
Notes on each electorate, suggesting more specific reasons for the classification, as well as the existence of any community group (as at the 2025 election) will pop up by clicking on the map.
Assignment of categories is based primarily on the seats that are the ‘safest’ (think of these more as ‘independent-ready’ seats), but three other factors are also used.
- Safe seats have a two-candidate preferred (2CP) vote of at least 56%. The 2025 2CP is generally shown but the average 2CP for the last three elections is considered. In all cases where Independents have been elected to the federal House of Representatives since 2001, the 2CP at the relevant preceding election was at least 55.7% (see charts, below). Independents winning in safe seats may be counterintuitive: see the rationale, below.
- The primary vote of the incumbent. It gets harder to win against them the higher their primary vote, but this is not a barrier, indeed most past wins have been against incumbents with primary votes over 50%.
- The difference between the primary votes of the incumbent and the second-highest. The larger this difference, the smaller the primary vote for a challenger needs to be to get into second place and then potentially win on preferences.
- The total primary vote for others (anyone other than Labor, Coalition and Greens) is also considered, as electorates where many voters have already made these choices are likely to support independents.
Categorising a large number of electorates is necessarily superficial and these are no more than opinions that should be augmented with local knowledge. The original data are all of course available at the AEC. Please use the feedback form if you have comments or questions on the categorisation.
Election data
Chart: All independents (or *single-candidate parties) elected to the House since 2001, showing the two-candidate preferred vote (2CP) at the relevant previous election.
In all cases where Independents have been elected to the federal House of Representatives since 2001, the 2CP at the relevant preceding election was at least 55.7%. Safe (or fairly safe) seats are normally considered those with a 2CP above 56%.
Chart: Community Independent Challengers in 2025: Marginal vs Safe seats
In marginal seats (in blue, to the left of the 56% line for the two-party preferred result in the previous election), there is a strong correlation between how safe the seat is and the primary vote achieved by community independent candidates in 2025. For fairly safe and safe seats (in orange, to the right of the 56% line) there is no correlation. This suggests that a seat needs firstly to be safe for independents to have a chance. About 54%, as in Forrest, may be safe enough. In safe seats, many other factors (candidate quality and name recognition, campaign strength, preference flows, etc) combine to determine success.
Rationale
It is counter-intuitive that Community Independents win in safe seats, but there are good reasons. Safe seats are neglected by the major parties – the one who holds it takes it for granted, and the one who stands little chance of winning puts its resources elsewhere. Voters feel the neglect and often feel frustrated that their electorate is not receiving its fair share.
Voters in safe seats are more likely to vote strategically – for instance if you’re in a Liberal or Greens voter in a safe Labor seat, voting for a strong independent candidate might be the best chance of getting a result other than Labor.
Marginal seats are where most of the resources and attention and pork barrelling are directed, so voters in marginal seats feel less neglected, but also continue voting for their major party of choice because they have a real chance of winning.
Community Independents have run in marginal seats. Even though they haven’t been successful yet, could they be? One factor is that successful campaigns have mostly been in seats with a history of previous independent MPs, or previous independent campaigns, so potentially a second attempt at a marginal seat could be stronger than the first, but there is not enough data yet to support this.
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Analysis
