The Australian Electoral Commission has redrawn Tasmania’s electoral map in the biggest shake-up in decades, with more than a quarter of voters set to change seats and Franklin facing a possible new name.
The changes, announced on Wednesday, will shift more than 27% of Tasmanians – around 114,000 people – into a different electorate at the next federal election.
Most of the boundaries proposed in February have been adopted, with the biggest changes concentrated in southern Tasmania.
Clark will expand south to take in the Huon Valley and the remainder of the Kingborough local government area.
Franklin will lose its position as Australia’s southernmost electorate and instead become centred on the state’s south-east coast.
Lyons will gain the Glenorchy local government area, while Bass will expand to include Break O’Day on the north-east coast.
The Bass change was not included in the February proposal. Braddon will remain unchanged.
Federal Electoral Commissioner Jeff Pope said the redraw was the most significant in recent memory.
“It is quite a fulsome re-drawing of the electoral map for Tasmania’s south that meets the numerical requirements of the Electoral Act and aligns communities of interest as much as possible in those southern electorates,” Pope said.
He said the changes addressed a long-standing problem with Franklin, which is currently divided by both the River Derwent and the electorate of Clark.
Pope acknowledged community concerns about Glenorchy being moved into Lyons but said the change would proceed.
“The biggest deciding factor is the overarching requirement to ensure electorates remained numerically balanced,” he said.
The commission has also proposed renaming Franklin as Tongerlongeter to reflect the electorate’s new shape east of the River Derwent.
Tongerlongeter, who lived from about 1790 to 1837, is regarded by historians as one of the most significant Tasmanian Aboriginal leaders of the early colonial period.
Franklin was first named in 1903 after English polar explorer Sir John Franklin, who served as governor of Van Diemen’s Land.
If adopted, it would be the first federal electorate in Tasmania named after an Aboriginal person.
The Liberal and Labor parties have opposed the change. No other electorate names are proposed to change.
The public can now make written submissions on the proposed new name, which was not part of the original redistribution proposal.
