Electoral district of Davenport

For the electoral districts in Canada, see Davenport (electoral district) and Davenport (provincial electoral district).

Davenport South Australia—House of Assembly
Map of Adelaide, South Australia with electoral district of Davenport highlighted Electoral district of Davenport (green) in the Greater Adelaide area
State	South Australia
Created	1970
MP	Sam Duluk
Party	Liberal Party of Australia (SA)
Namesake	Sir Samuel Davenport
Electors	24,851 (2014)
Area	49.1 km2 (19.0 sq mi)
Demographic	Metropolitan
Coordinates

Davenport is an electoral district of the House of Assembly in the Australian state of South Australia. It is named after nineteenth-century pioneer and politician Sir Samuel Davenport. Davenport is a 49.1 km² electorate covering part of outer suburban Adelaide and the southern foothills of the Adelaide Hills. It takes in the suburbs of Bedford Park, Bellevue Heights, Blackwood, Craigburn Farm, Coromandel Valley, Eden Hills, Flagstaff Hill, Glenalta and Hawthorndene, as well as parts of Belair, Darlington, O'Halloran Hill and Upper Sturt.

Davenport consists mostly of a series of wealthy suburbs and has been a historically safe seat for successive conservative parties since its creation at the 1969 redistribution. It was initially won by Joyce Steele for the Liberal and Country League, but she was succeeded after one term by Dean Brown. Brown, a prominent moderate in the party, represented Davenport for 12 years before being challenged for preselection at the 1985 election by Stan Evans, a member of the conservative wing of what was now the Liberal Party of Australia, after Evans' old seat of Fisher, which took in much of the new Davenport, was moved in the 1983 redistribution. Brown retained preselection despite the challenge, but Evans contested the election as an independent Liberal and defeated Brown, preventing Brown's then-likely ascension to the Liberal leadership after the election. Evans rejoined the parliamentary Liberal Party not long after the election, and was reelected at the 1989 election. He retired at the 1993 election, handing the seat to his son, Iain. Iain Evans held Davenport from 1993 until 2014 and was a member of the Olsen and Kerin ministries, and was opposition leader for one year following the Liberal loss at the 2006 election.

Evans suffered a 2.8 percent two-party swing against him, reduced to a margin of 8.1 percent in Davenport at the 2014 election, with two-party swings against him of up to 8 percent in some booths, including the historically Liberal-voting booth of Belair which Labor won by three votes. On 6 June 2014 he announced he would stand down from the shadow ministry and parliament within a year and prior to the next election. There was speculation that Evans was asked to delay his resignation and the by-election for a year due to federal Liberal government budget cuts and that there could be a "super Saturday" of by-elections in up to five Liberal-held seats.

Evans resigned from parliament on 30 October 2014. A 2015 Davenport by-election was held on 31 January 2015. Liberal Sam Duluk won the seat despite a five percent two-party swing, turning the historically safe seat of Davenport in to a two-party marginal seat for the first time.

Members for Davenport

Member		Party	Term
	Joyce Steele	Liberal and Country	1970–1973
	Dean Brown	Liberal and Country	1973–1974
		Liberal	1974–1985
	Stan Evans	Independent Liberal	1985–1985
		Liberal	1985–1993
	Iain Evans	Liberal	1993–2014
	Sam Duluk	Liberal	2015–present

Election results

Main article: Electoral results for the district of Davenport

Davenport state by-election, 2015

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	Sam Duluk	9,740	46.9	−4.1
	Labor	Mark Ward	6,927	33.4	+4.8
	Greens	Jody Moate	2,584	12.5	−2.8
	Family First	Natasha Edmonds	816	3.9	−1.2
	Independent Australian Democrats	Jeanie Walker	685	3.3	+3.3
Total formal votes			20,752	97.1	−0.7
Informal votes			613	2.9	+0.7
Turnout			21,365	85.7	−7.7
Two-party-preferred result
	Liberal	Sam Duluk	11,021	53.1	−5.0
	Labor	Mark Ward	9,731	46.9	+5.0
	Liberal hold		Swing	−5.0

See also

• Davenport state by-election, 2015

References

• ABC profile for Davenport: 2014
• ECSA profile for Davenport: 2014
• Poll Bludger profile for Davenport: 2014