Final boundary changes confirm merger of NW Central and Moore to create Mid West seat at 2025 State election

Former MP for Geraldton Ian Blayney says regional areas merged into the seat of Geraldton under redrawn boundaries could be neglected if the majority of the population is based in the City of Greater Geraldton. The final boundary changes released last week leave regional WA stripped of a seat to accommodate a new seat in Perth, despite the WA Electoral Commission receiving more than 500 objections to the changes. The mining and pastoral seat of North West Central, represented by Liberal defector Merome Beard, and Opposition Leader Shane Love’s agricultural seat of Moore will be abolished and combined into a single seat representing communities from south of Exmouth, to Chittering in Perth’s north and east into pastoral areas such as Meekatharra. The move will likely see Ms Beard face off against her old Nationals boss at the 2025 State election for the new Mid West electorate after she made the bombshell decision to defect from the Nationals to join the Liberal Party last month. In a sign the campaign has started early, Ms Beard held a meet-and-greet at her Carnarvon pub last week for the first time as a Liberal MP, and she brought with her Liberal leader Libby Mettam. Under the changes, the seat of Geraldton gained the balance of the City of Greater Geraldton, as well as the shires of Chapman Valley and Northampton, growing by less than 5000 voters. Mr Blayney said the last election was on a knife’s edge and the changes could open up the Geraldton seat to the Nationals. “I’d say the seat of Geraldton is in play again. I won’t be surprised to see it change hands,” he said. Mr Blayney said merging the Shire of Northampton and Mullewa in with the Geraldton electorate could impact on how much attention they received. “What I suspect with a lot of these smaller communities is that they won’t get much attention because Geraldton is such a huge proportion of the seat in terms of population,” he said. Member for Geraldton Lara Dalton said she believed it was the right decision and the electorate was the right size for one member to manage. “I believe the WAEC made the right call, they’re impartial and independent and they have correctly identified the communities that naturally gravitate towards Geraldton,” she said. “The boundary changes mean that a small population in the Mid West will come into the Geraldton electorate, and I look forward to working with those communities at the election.” The boundary changes are a double-edged sword, as councils in Northampton and Geraldton will no longer be split between two representatives. Northampton Shire president Liz Sudlow said the reduction in representation for the regions was disappointing but it was positive the shire will no longer be split between electorates. “I’m very pleased to see that the Northampton Shire will now be in the same electorate,” she said. “The travel required by the successful MP will make it very challenging for he or she to adequately represent the people who live in those regions.” Geraldton Mayor Jerry Clune said the changes could make Geraldton a more marginal seat and encouraged the State Government to provide more funding for infrastructure that had been forgotten about. “If you have a swinging seat, then whoever’s in government tends to try and look after you to retain that seat, so maybe we might get a few Christmas wishes under the tree this year,” he said. In their final report, the electoral distribution commissioners wrote the decision to merge North West Central and Moore into a single seat, reducing regional representation, “was not made lightly”. Ms Beard said the announcement was incredibly disappointing for regional communities and was an attack on regional representation. “Despite my disappointment around this decision to gut representation from the regions, I’m not daunted by the task ahead. My number one priority is to represent regional communities and a part of the State I have called home my entire life,” she said. Mr Love said the decision was a slap in the face for regional people during a time when they were already losing. “It be interesting to see what interest the Labor Party shows in the seat because they’ve so far shown very little concern about regional WA,” he said.