Electoral district of Pilbara

The electoral district of Pilbara is a Legislative Assembly electorate in the state of Western Australia. Pilbara is named for the region of Western Australia in which it is located. It is one of the oldest electorates in Western Australia, with its first member having been elected to the Second Parliament of the Legislative Assembly at the 1894 elections.

Pilbara Western Australia—Legislative Assembly
Location of Pilbara (dark green) in Western Australia
State	Western Australia
Dates current	1894–present1
MP	Kevin Michel
Party	Labor
Namesake	Pilbara region
Electors	23,272 (2021)
Area	292,470 km2 (112,923.3 sq mi)
Demographic	Provincial, remote and rural
Electorates around Pilbara: Indian Ocean Kimberley Kimberley Indian Ocean Pilbara Kimberley North West Central North West Central Kimberley
Footnotes
1known as Central Kimberley-Pilbara 2005–2008

History

Pilbara and surrounds in 1898

Pilbara (historically spelled Pilbarra) was created at the 1893 redistribution in the Constitution Act Amendment Act 1893, through which three new electorates were created in mining and pastoral areas. Its first member was elected at the 1894 election, and while normally a Labor-held seat, it has been held by the Liberals and their predecessors for significant terms. In 1898, its major settlements were Marble Bar, Nullagine, and Bamboo, and it included the southern Pilbarra goldfield.

Pilbara's second member, Walter Kingsmill, was a prominent member of Leake's opposition, serving as a Minister in the Leake, James and Rason governments between 1901 and 1906. The seat was first won for Labor at a 1906 by-election, which was won by Henry Underwood against Ministerial opponent John Marquis Hopkins. He became part of the National Labor movement led by John Scaddan in early 1917, and later served in a Nationalist ministry under Henry Lefroy as a minister without portfolio. He was defeated by a Labor rival, Alfred Lamond in the 1924 election, but on Lamond's retirement at the 1933 election, the seat became the only seat to switch from Labor to Nationalist in the State in what proved to be a disastrous election for the Nationalists which relegated them to third place behind the Country Party. Labor recovered the seat in 1939, who held it continuously until the 1974 election, when Charles Court's Liberals defeated Labor premier John Tonkin's one-seat majority. Labor recovered the seat when they won government again in 1983, with the seat's first female member Pam Buchanan, who later became a minister in the Lawrence government. In 1989, she shifted to the new seat of Ashburton, and Larry Graham won Pilbara for the Labor party. He resigned from the Labor party in 2000, and served as an Independent until his retirement at the 2005 election, and Labor's Tom Stephens, who had resigned his Legislative Council seat and unsuccessfully contested Kalgoorlie at the 2004 election, won the seat, which for one term was known as Central Kimberley-Pilbara due to a redistribution. The name reverted to Pilbara at the 2008 redistribution. At the 2013 election the seat was contested by National Party leader Brendon Grylls who gained the seat with 61.5% of the two party preferred vote. After one term as the member for Pilbara, Grylls was defeated at the state election in 2017 by Labor's Kevin Michel.

Geography

As of 2014, the electorate consists of the Shire of East Pilbara, the City of Karratha, as well as the Town of Port Hedland

Before 2007, The Pilbara electorate contained the eastern parts of the Shire of Ashburton, including the mining towns of Tom Price, Paraburdoo and Pannawonica; the Town of Port Hedland including Port Hedland; the Shire of East Pilbara including Newman and Marble Bar and extending to the eastern boundary of the State; and the western and northern sections of the Shire of Ngaanyatjarraku, which is relatively unpopulated (especially as it excludes the town of Warburton) was added in order to balance the land areas of Pilbara and Kalgoorlie. The area's economy is centred on mining, particularly iron ore, and a significant proportion of the voting population are Aboriginal.

The 2007 redistribution, which took effect at the 2008 election, resulted in the seat losing areas it had gained in the previous distribution, including Fitzroy Crossing and Halls Creek in the Kimberley region, but it gained the large town of Newman from the abolished Murchison-Eyre.

The 2011 redistribution, which took effect at the 2013 election, saw Pilbara gain the Shire of Roebourne from the renamed North West Central electorate, in exchange for the remnants of the Shire of Ashburton, and the Shire of Ngaanyatjarraku was ceded to the Kalgoorlie electorate. That theoretically increased Labor's hold on the seat, but the popularity of the WA Nationals' Royalties for Regions policy made it marginal, so much so that, at the election, it was comfortably won by the then Nationals' leader, Brendon Grylls.

Members for Pilbara

Member		Party	Term
	Henry Keep	Non-aligned	1894–1897
	Walter Kingsmill	Oppositionist	1897–1903
	James Isdell	Independent	1903–1904
		Ministerialist	1904–1906
	Henry Underwood	Labor	1906–1917
		Nationalist	1917–1924
	Alfred Lamond	Labor	1924–1933
	Frank Welsh	Nationalist	1933–1939
	Bill Hegney	Labor	1939–1950
	Aloysius Rodoreda	Labor	1950–1958
	Arthur Bickerton	Labor	1958–1974
	Brian Sodeman	Liberal	1974–1983
	Pam Buchanan	Labor	1983–1989
	Larry Graham	Labor	1989–2000
		Independent Labor	2000–2005
	Tom Stephens	Labor	2005–2013
	Brendon Grylls	National	2013–2017
	Kevin Michel	Labor	2017–present

Results

Main article: Electoral results for the district of Pilbara

This section is an excerpt from Results of the 2021 Western Australian state election (Legislative Assembly) § Pilbara.[edit]

2021 Western Australian state election: Pilbara

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Labor	Kevin Michel	9,075	61.0	30.1
	National	Scott Bourne	2,715	18.3	−9.1
	Liberal	Camilo Blanco	1,241	8.3	−6.9
	Greens	Machelle Vaughan-Cartner	504	3.4	−0.7
	Shooters, Fishers, Farmers	David Allison-Forrest	453	3.0	−6.5
	One Nation	Sandi Crouch	432	2.9	−8.5
	No Mandatory Vaccination	Max Elliott	270	1.8	1.8
	Western Australia	Don Hyland	115	0.8	0.8
	WAxit	Navneet Jawanda	68	0.5	0.0
Total formal votes			14,873	95.2	−0.2
Informal votes			748	4.8	0.2
Turnout			15,621	67.1	−0.8
Two-candidate-preferred result
	Labor	Kevin Michel	10,459	70.4	18.1
	National	Scott Bourne	4,408	29.6	−18.1
	Labor hold

External links

• Green, Antony. "Electorate Profile". Australian Broadcasting Corporation.