Geraldton is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of Western Australia.
Geraldton was one of the original 30 seats contested at the 1890 colonial election. The district is based on the eponymous regional city.
Labor held throughout most of the twentieth century, Geraldton has since become a seat that has changed hands regularly in the last two decades.
Geography The district has always been based on the regional coastal city of Geraldton. Electoral reform ahead of the 2008 state election necessitated an increase in the district's enrolment and thus an expansion of its boundaries, as it did for all non-metropolitan districts. This means the district now includes all outlying suburbs of the city, as well as adjacent rural areas. The district's boundaries were identical with the former City of Geraldton-Greenough from 2008 to the 2021 election.
As of the 2025 state election, the district now contains the City of Greater Geraldton as well as the shires of Northampton and Chapman Valley. In addition to Geraldton city itself the district includes the towns of Kalbarri, Northampton, Nabawa and Mullewa.
History Geraldton changed hands frequently between different members and parties during the early history of the seat in the late 19th and early 20th century. After 1914 however, the seat was held by the Labor Party for all but three of the next 77 years. The seat's longest serving and most famous member was John Willcock, member from 1917 to 1947 and Premier of Western Australia from 1936 to 1945.
A fairly safe to safe Labor seat for much of the 20th century, it became somewhat less safe for Labor in the 1980s. The resignation of Labor member Jeff Carr following his sacking as minister in 1991 triggered a by-election that was won by the Liberal Party's Bob Bloffwitch, the seat's first non-Labor member in more than four decades. Bloffwitch held the seat at the subsequent 1993 state election, when the Liberal Party won government. The seat changed hands with the next change of government at the 2001 state election when Labor candidate Shane Hill was elected. Hill held the seat for two terms before Liberal Ian Blayney won it with a change of government at the 2008 state election. In fact the redistribution prior to that election had turned the seat into a notionally Liberal seat.
In 2013, Blayney seemingly consolidated his hold on the seat with Labor falling to third place behind the National Party. Blayney's margin was enough for him to narrowly overcome one of the biggest swings amid Labor's decisive victory at the subsequent election in 2017, with Labor's Lara Dalton paring back his margin from a seemingly insurmountable 22.8 percent to an extremely marginal 1.3 percent. Blayney's victory marked only the second time since World War I (Bloffwitch's 1991 by-election win being the first) that Labor had been in government without holding Geraldton. Blayney defected to the Nationals in 2019, but was heavily defeated by Dalton in 2021. Dalton actually won enough votes on the first count to take the seat outright.
Members for Geraldton MemberPartyTerm Edward Vivien Harvey Keane Non-aligned 1890–1891 George Simpson Opposition 1891–1899 Richard Robson Independent 1899–1900 Robert Hutchinson Opposition 1900–1904 Henry Carson Ministerial 1904–1906 Thomas Brown Labor 1906–1908 Henry Carson Ministerial 1908–1911 Bronte Dooley Labor 1911–1913 Samuel Elliott Liberal 1913–1914 Edward Heitmann Labor 1914–1917 National Labor 1917 Samuel Elliott Liberal 1917 John Willcock Labor 1917–1947 Edmund Hall Country 1947–1950 Bill Sewell Labor 1950–1974 Jeff Carr Labor 1974–1991 Bob Bloffwitch Liberal 1991–2001 Shane Hill Labor 2001–2008 Ian Blayney Liberal 2008–2019 Independent2019 National2019–2021 Lara DaltonLabor2021–2025 Kirrilee WarrNational2025–present
Election results
References
External links