Electoral district of Strathfield

From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia

Location within Sydney

Strathfield is an electoral district of the Legislative Assembly in the Australian state of New South Wales. It was first created in 1988, and derives its name from the suburb of the same name. Strathfield is an urban electorate, covering 17.94 km² and taking in the suburbs of Strathfield, Homebush, Burwood, Burwood Heights, Enfield, Croydon, Ashfield and Summer Hill. There were 44,861 people enrolled within the electorate as of April 1999.

Strathfield, while traditionally a marginal electorate, tended to favour the Liberal Party of Australia in its earlier years. It was first won by Paul Zammit, who later went on to have a short-lived and unremarkable career as a Liberal member of the federal House of Representatives. Zammit later contested the federal seat as an independent and was badly defeated on the issue of airports and air traffic over the area. Zammit was succeeded by the low-profile Bruce MacCarthy, who was defeated after only one term. His successor, Paul Whelan, was a prominent sitting minister in the Carr government who had shifted to Strathfield from another seat, and subsequently served as Police Minister while the member for Strathfield. The seat has tended to lean towards the ALP ever since, with Whelan being succeeded by current ALP member Virginia Judge.