16-05-2025
Contest for Bean leaves David Smith confronted with something few of Canberra's federal MPs have to deal with
It was the last thing ACT voters expected before this election.
Few thought the outcome in any of the contests would remain in doubt for more than a week.
But first-time independent Jessie Price brought the result in the electorate of Bean down to the closest ever margin for an ACT House of Representatives seat, currently less than half of one per cent.
The previous record was a one per cent margin in the seat of Canberra in 1977.
Back then, it was Liberal MP John Haslem who held on narrowly, after riding the landslide which endorsed Malcolm Fraser's government in 1975.
The continuing Labor MP in Bean, David Smith, has no such excuse — his party having won a landslide at the very election he came face to face with political mortality.
He is now confronted with something few of Canberra's recent federal MPs have had to deal with — a marginal seat to defend.
She may have fallen short this time, but the clear expectation is that voters have not seen the last of Jessie Price.
Upon conceding defeat, she committed to "keeping an ear out" for the community's thoughts and feelings over the next term, before adding "we'll probably be here again in three years' time".
For someone to get so close, it would take a lot for them not to put their hand up again in 2028.
By then the Labor government will be three years older, and as with all governments, weathered by all that will occur between now and then.
This does not mean she is a shoe-in.
Not until the final days of this campaign did Labor seriously worry that Jessie Price could snatch the seat.
Next time, the party will leave nothing to chance.
Expect a fully-fledged sandbagging campaign to keep a once-safe seat in the fold.
The critical change which put Bean in play had little to do with Labor or Jessie Price.
It was the almost seven per cent drop in the Liberal vote which opened the door.
No doubt many of those defections from the Liberal Party parked their vote with the independent.
The question remains whether the defections were temporary, or whether they could be persuaded to vote independent a second time.
Even though Canberra's south is traditionally the strongest area for the Liberals, their chances of ever winning Bean themselves are limited, absent an emphatic election win which seems unlikely in 2028.
It raises the possibility the Liberals will follow the course Labor has charted in the so-called 'Teal' seats and run dead.
The enemy of my enemy is my friend, after all.
It presents an added complication for a Labor MP who fell into the role almost by accident.
David Smith initially served in the Senate, appointed by the High Court in 2018 after Katy Gallagher was found ineligible due to her lingering British citizenship.
The creation of a third lower house seat for the ACT in 2019 helped keep David Smith in parliament upon his predecessor's return.
In the aftermath of the election, he has been at pains to highlight that Labor's primary vote in Bean remained steady at 41 per cent, and it was preference flows which made the seat so close.
Be that as it may, the task now will be to increase Labor's primary vote, when the best election to do so has arguably just come and gone.
Before this year's campaign began, I observed that major party leaders tend not to spend much time in Canberra on the campaign trail.
Something tells me next time will be different.
