Bad Taste Over Water Crisis Means An Up-hill Battle
Sydney Morning Herald
Friday September 4, 1998
Danna Vale's tools of the trade. Photo by ANDREW TAYLOR
The hunting and fishing crowd have their political bumper stickers, so it may be only a matter of time before "I drink water and I vote" stickers appear on vehicles tooling around the electorate of Hughes.
The ALP candidate for Hughes, Mr David Hill, is carrying the can for the Sydney Water contamination crisis and it could not have come at a worse time for an outsider trying to convince the family-oriented electorate that boiling water for the baby is not his fault.
The battle in Hughes is a personality contest, with the ALP wondering if its man can put the water crisis behind him and achieve the 5 per cent swing needed to unseat the Liberal incumbent, Mrs Danna Vale.
Heathcote bottle shop attendant Mr Aaron Scott, 23, said that although he liked Labor's policies, the "water man" lost his vote when he would not drink water during the first contamination alert.
"I just don't think he should come here. Mrs Vale seems a very nice lady and she's been pushing local issues like the [Woronora] bridge and opposing the [proposed Holsworthy] airport," he said.
Based primarily on Sydney's southern outskirts, Hughes has a lingering provincial feel from the 1950s when it meant cheap housing, the national park and beach shacks. Locals still talk about "the shire" from the days when Sutherland was the community heart.
The electorate is named for W. M. "Billy" Hughes, the waterside worker who became prime minister and broke with the ALP over conscription in 1917.
Hughes has been considered a Labor marginal since being proclaimed in 1955. There was a three-year interruption from 1966 when Don Dobie won for the Liberals, but Labor reigned untroubled until 1996 saw Mrs Vale end Mr Robert Tickner's 12-year run with an 11 per cent swing.
Hughes stretches from Sydney's southern suburbs to the Illawarra, taking in the Labor-voting mining retirement communities of Stanwell Park and Coalcliff. The electorate's northern end used to be synonymous with cheap housing but Menai, Bangor and Alfords Point are sprouting $600,000 houses as young families flood in.
It has a young population, with 67 per cent between the ages of 15 and 64 and only 7 per cent over 65.
Home ownership nears 80 per cent, 57 per cent of households own two or more vehicles, and the median weekly family income of $1,068 is the ninth highest of an Australian electorate.
Mrs Vale is pushing localism - her letterhead declares "One of Us". Mr Hill, meanwhile, is standing on his record as a can-do bureaucrat - his letterhead states "Gets Things Done".
Labor supporter Mr Ron McKenzie, of Stanwell Park, says increasing affluence has changed Hughes into a predominantly middle-class electorate and he fears the Sydney Water crisis may have "tarnished" Mr Hill.
"He's got the job ahead of him now. Mrs Vale is a good and hard-working local," he said.
HUGHES
Sitting member
Danna Vale, Liberal
First elected 1996
1996 Vote
Liberal 48.9%
ALP 38.1%
Democrat 5.8%
Other 7.2%
Informal 2.7%
Electorate make-up (1996 Census)
Age
15-24 15.1%
25-64 52.3%
65+ 7.1%
Median age 32
© 1998 Sydney Morning Herald