Electoral division of Nelson (Northern Territory)

Nelson Northern Territory—Legislative Assembly
Nelson in the Darwin/Palmerston area, Northern Territory
Territory	Northern Territory
Created	1990
MP	Gerard Maley
Party	Country Liberals
Namesake	Harold George Nelson
Electors	5,505 (2020)
Area	1,415 km2 (546.3 sq mi)
Demographic	Rural
Electorates around Nelson: Timor Sea Timor Sea Timor Sea Timor Sea Wanguri Karama Nelson Goyder Spillett Brennan Goyder Goyder Goyder

Nelson is an electoral division of the Legislative Assembly in Australia's Northern Territory. It was first created in 1990 as a replacement for Koolpinyah, and was named after Harold George Nelson, the first member for the federal Northern Territory electorate. Nelson is a largely rural electorate, covering 1,415 km² and taking in the small towns of Howard Springs, McMinn's Lagoon and part of Humpty Doo, and some areas between Darwin and Palmerston. There were 5,505 people enrolled in the electorate as of August 2020.

Harold Nelson, c. 1919.

Nelson is also a rarity among Northern Territory electorates in that it has traditionally been an independent-held seat, as opposed to being held by either of the major parties. Long-serving independent Noel Padgham-Purich held the seat for the last few years of her career, having previously represented Koolpinyah from 1983 to 1990. She only narrowly failed in installing another independent, Dave Tollner, as her replacement. After four years of Country Liberal Party control under Chris Lugg, another independent candidate, Gerry Wood, was successful in winning the seat. Wood was easily re-elected at the 2005 election, polling more than double the vote of his nearest rival, Lugg. He increased his vote by over 20% for the second election in a row in 2008, winning 72.2% of the primary vote with a two-party preferred margin of 28.7% over the CLP, the safest seat in the Territory. His margin dwindled to 9.2 percent when the CLP regained government in 2012, but ballooned to 23.7 percent during Labor's victory in 2016.

Wood retired at the 2020 election. Gerard Maley won the seat for the CLP on his second attempt after losing to Wood in 2016. Maley actually garnered enough primary votes to win the seat on the first count. However, for most of its existence, Nelson has been a comfortably safe CLP seat in "traditional" two-party matchups against Labor, so Maley's victory was not considered an upset.

Members for Nelson

Member		Party	Term
	Noel Padgham-Purich	Independent	1990–1997
	Chris Lugg	Country Liberal	1997–2001
	Gerry Wood	Independent	2001–2020
	Gerard Maley	Country Liberal	2020–present

Election results

See also: Electoral results for the division of Nelson (Northern Territory)

This section is an excerpt from Results of the 2020 Northern Territory general election § Nelson.[edit]

2020 Northern Territory general election: Nelson

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Country Liberal	Gerard Maley	2,302	50.5	+28.3
	Independent	Beverley Ratahi	1,351	29.6	+29.6
	Labor	Steve Asher	488	10.7	−0.3
	Territory Alliance	Andy Harley	420	9.2	+9.2
Total formal votes			4,561	96.9	N/A
Informal votes			146	3.1	N/A
Turnout			4,707	85.5	N/A
Two-party-preferred result
	Country Liberal	Gerard Maley	3,320	72.8	+15.8
	Labor	Steve Asher	1,241	27.2	−15.8
Two-candidate-preferred result
	Country Liberal	Gerard Maley	2,657	58.3	+31.2
	Independent	Beverley Ratahi	1,904	41.7	+41.7
	Country Liberal gain from Independent		Swing	+31.2

See also

• Electoral division of Nelson (disambiguation)

External links

• Division profile from the Northern Territory Electoral Commission