Find out how your neighbours voted in 2022 – and what it means for this election

Victoria is a very different place than it was in 2022. At the last state election, Labor was returned to power in a thumping “Danslide”, as Jess Wilson entered the parliament as a first-term Liberal MP.

In the four years since, Labor has been knocked off course by scandal after scandal, its approval rating has plummeted, and three premiers have led the state. Polls suggest the party will be banished to the opposition benches – and replaced by a government led by Wilson.

For all of this change, however, the results in 2022 hinted at the trends now shaping the upcoming state election campaign: the warning signs for Labor in its heartland, the unexpected rise of One Nation, and the potential weakness of the Liberal Party in traditional blue-ribbon seats.

If you scroll to the bottom of this article, you can search for your own local polling station to see how your neighbours voted last time.

Across schools, community halls and sporting clubs, The Age has analysed the results from every polling booth in 2022 to investigate what they might mean for the results on November 28.

Worries in Labor’s northern heartland

Labor’s red wall in the northern suburbs began crumbling four years ago.

While the Daniel Andrews-led government was convincingly re-elected, the party suffered large two-party preferred swings to the Liberals in Thomastown (11.2 per cent), Mill Park (13.5 per cent), Broadmeadows (14.8 per cent) and Greenvale (13.3 per cent).

At the Bethal Primary School booth in Greenvale, Labor’s Iwan Walters – who ultimately won the seat – suffered a whopping 33.2 per cent swing against him. This benefited the Liberals, but also conservative independent Fatma Erciyas, Family First Victoria and the Victorian Socialists.

Greenvale is a culturally diverse area and large numbers of voters have Turkish, Lebanese, Iraqi and Italian heritage.

In 2026, it is being targeted by Liberal candidate Jim Overend, who has served on Hume City Council for the past six years and ran a small business.

Early signs of the orange wave

One Nation was a barely visible political force in 2022, winning just 0.22 per cent of the statewide primary vote. But in the seat of Morwell, about 150 kilometres east of Melbourne, the party pulled 6.1 per cent of the vote, an early signal of Pauline Hanson’s political potency in regional communities.

At the Traralgon South Community Hall, 8.4 per cent of voters gave their vote to One Nation. The booth is close to the Hazelwood coal-fired power station, a cornerstone of the local economy which closed in 2017 and resulted in hundreds of job losses.

The electorate is one of the most disadvantaged in Victoria – the suburb of Morwell recorded an 11 per cent unemployment rate at the 2021 census, more than double the state average.

One Nation’s vote is currently strongest in regional and rural electorates, and among older, non-university educated voters. The Age’s latest Resolve Political Monitor has the party polling with a primary vote of 23 per cent in Victoria, which could result in a significant presence in both the lower and upper house.

Casey Murphy, the party’s Morwell candidate, previously ran for One Nation in a supplementary election in the Gippsland seat of Narracan in early 2023.

Teals targeting blue-ribbon seats

After the success of the so-called teal independent movement at the federal election in May 2022, a host of Climate 200-backed independents ran in the Victorian state election that November. Although none were elected, several managed to put a dent in the support for major party candidates, and are running again in 2026.

Though Jess Wilson won the blue-ribbon seat of Kew at her first state election of 2022, the Liberal Party’s primary vote dropped by 5 per cent.

At the Canterbury Girls Secondary College booth, Wilson’s 44.6 per cent primary vote was down 7 per cent on her party’s performance in 2018, as teal candidate Sophie Torney pulled in 25 per cent, ahead of Labor and the Greens.

Torney, who has since served as Boroondara mayor, is again challenging Wilson, this time with triple the financial backing compared to the $115,000 she raised in 2022.

Wilson, of course, has seen her public profile grow markedly since she became opposition leader late last year.

Changing tide in the west

In 2022, the Liberal Party gained significant ground in Melbourne’s western suburbs for the first time – a momentum they will be hoping to build on to prise some electorates out of Labor’s hands later this month.

The city’s west is home to many migrants and lower-socioeconomic residents – demographics which have traditionally supported Labor.

But the Liberals, as well as independents, fared better in 2022. The introduction of One Nation and The West Party – a group of locals running on a platform of community issues – further threatens Labor’s grip. Melton, Werribee and Sydenham are all considered in play for conservative parties this time around.

In Sydenham, Labor suffered a massive 17.5-percentage point drop in its 2022 primary vote, almost triple the statewide swing of 5.8 per cent.

At the Sydenham-Hillside Primary School booth, Labor’s primary vote plummeted by 20.9 percentage points compared to 2018, as the Liberal primary vote inched up and voters moved to other options including Family First and the Victorian Socialists.

Veteran MP Natalie Hutchins is not recontesting the seat this year, while concerns over data centres in the electorate are a further headache for Labor.