Division of Spence

The Division of Spence is an electoral district for the Australian House of Representatives. It is located in the outer northern suburbs of Adelaide in South Australia.

Spence Australian House of Representatives Division
Location of Spence (dark green) in Greater Adelaide, South Australia
Created	2019
MP	Nick Champion
Party	Labor
Namesake	Catherine Helen Spence
Electors	119,402 (2019)
Area	532 km^2 (205.4 sq mi)
Demographic	Outer Metropolitan
Coordinates	34.7°S 138.7°E
Electorates around Spence: Grey Barker Spence Hindmarsh Makin Mayo

History

Catherine Helen Spence, the division's namesake

It is named in honour of Catherine Helen Spence, an advocate for female suffrage and electoral reform and the first female political candidate in Australia.[1]

Spence was created in the electoral redistribution that concluded in July 2018 as a replacement for the Division of Wakefield. It is essentially the more urbanised southern portion of the formerly hybrid urban-rural Wakefield. The Division of Port Adelaide was abolished after South Australia was reduced from 11 electorates to ten, resulting in quite large movements of the remaining divisions' boundaries to fill in the gap.[2]

The geographic extent of Spence is approximately the Adelaide Plains between the Little Para River in the south and the Gawler River on the north, plus areas around Gawler and Salisbury. It includes all of the City of Playford and Town of Gawler; along with Concordia and Kalbeeba from the Barossa Council, and Gawler Belt and Buchfelde from Light Regional Council on the outskirts of Gawler. Spence also includes six suburbs in the City of Salisbury south of the Little Para River but west and north of Main North Road and Kings Road.[3] Spence overlaps the final configuration of Bonython before it was abolished prior to the 2004 election[4] and much of it was merged with what had been the southern part of Wakefield. Spence extends further east, west and north than Bonython at the time of its abolition, but Wakefield had historically been a rural seat until 2004.[5]

Spence was notionally a comfortably safe Labor seat with a notional Labor margin of 17.9 percent, making it on paper the safest Labor seat in the state. By comparison, the abolished Wakefield finished with a safe Labor margin of 11.0 percent.[5] Champion retained it in 2019 with only a small swing against him. Spence is still the safest Labor seat in the state, with a 14.1 percent swing needed for the Liberals to win it.

Members

	Image	Member	Party	Term	Notes
		Nick Champion (1972–)	Labor	18 May 2019 – present	Previously held the Division of Wakefield. Incumbent

Election results

2019 Australian federal election: Spence[6]

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labor	Nick Champion	51,791	50.96	+5.79
	Liberal	Kathleen Bourne	26,252	25.83	+5.13
	Greens	Daniel Jury	7,330	7.21	+2.65
	United Australia	Ron Fiedler	7,157	7.04	+7.04
	Independent	Nathan Herbert	5,473	5.39	+5.39
	Animal Justice	Rita Kuhlmann	3,626	3.57	+2.96
Total formal votes			101,629	94.02	−0.14
Informal votes			6,467	5.98	+0.14
Turnout			108,096	90.54	+2.63
Two-party-preferred result
	Labor	Nick Champion	65,174	64.13	−3.04
	Liberal	Kathleen Bourne	36,455	35.87	+3.04
	Labor hold		Swing	−3.04

References

1. "Profile of the electoral division of Spence (SA)". Australian Electoral Commission. 20 July 2018. Retrieved 28 July 2018.
2. "Proposed redistribution of South Australia into electoral divisions" (PDF). Report of the Redistribution Committee for South Australia. Australian Electoral Commission. April 2018. Retrieved 28 July 2018.
3. Map of the Federal Electoral Division of Spence (PDF) (Map). Australian Electoral Commission. July 2018. Retrieved 28 July 2018.
4. Bonython boundary map, 2001: AEC
5. "2017-18 Federal Redistribution - South Australia". ABC Elections. 26 June 2018.
6. Spence, SA, Tally Room 2019, Australian Electoral Commission.