Electoral district of Finniss

Finniss South Australia—House of Assembly
Electoral district of Finniss (green) in South Australia
State	South Australia
Created	1993
MP	David Basham
Party	Liberal Party of Australia (SA)
Namesake	B. T. Finniss
Electors	23,814 (2018)
Area	1,004 km2 (387.6 sq mi)
Demographic	Rural
Coordinates	35°28′49″S 138°41′34″E
Electorates around Finniss: Mawson Heysen Hammond Mawson Finniss Hammond Southern Ocean Southern Ocean MacKillop
Footnotes
Electoral District map

Finniss is a single-member electoral district for the South Australian House of Assembly. It is named after B. T. Finniss, the first Premier of South Australia. It covers a 1,004 km² (388 sq mi) regional area which includes the localities of Back Valley, Currency Creek, Encounter Bay, Finniss, Goolwa, Goolwa Beach, Goolwa North, Goolwa South, Hayborough, Hindmarsh Island, Hindmarsh Tiers, Hindmarsh Valley, Lower Inman Valley, McCracken, Middleton, Mosquito Hill, Mount Compass, Mount Observation, Mundoo Island, Nangkita, Port Elliot, Tooperang, and Victor Harbor; as well as parts of Inman Valley and Waitpinga.

Finniss has been a very safe seat for the Liberal Party since its creation at the 1991 electoral redistribution as a replacement for the equally safe Alexandra. Dating to its time as part of Alexandra, the area now in Finniss has been held by Liberals or their predecessor, the Liberal and Country League, without interruption since 1941. For most of that time, it has been a comfortably safe LCL/Liberal seat.

It was contested for the first time at the 1993 election by newly elected Liberal leader Dean Brown, who had returned to parliament after a seven-year absence by winning the 1992 Alexandra state by-election. Brown had little difficulty winning Finniss, and subsequently became Premier after the election. Brown was later toppled as Premier by Liberal rival John Olsen in 1996, and was initially expected to retire, but remained in parliament as a senior member of consecutive Liberal ministries and shadow ministries, and served as deputy leader of the Liberal Party from 2001 to 2005—the first six months of that tenure as Deputy Premier. Brown retired at the 2006 election, and was succeeded by Liberal candidate Michael Pengilly, who held off a concerted attempt by the SA Nationals to take the seat.

Pengilly held the seat easily until retiring at the 2018 election. David Basham retained the seat for the Liberals, despite a spirited challenge from SA-BEST. Indeed, SA-BEST's showing in Finniss was strong enough to make the seat marginal for the first time in its current configuration. However, Finniss remains a comfortably safe Liberal seat in a "traditional" two-party matchup with Labor; Basham only suffered a small swing against Labor.

Most of Finniss is located within the Centre Alliance-held federal Division of Mayo.

Members for Finniss

Member		Party	Term
	Dean Brown	Liberal	1993–2006
	Michael Pengilly	Liberal	2006–2018
	David Basham	Liberal	2018–present

Election results

Main article: Electoral results for the district of Finniss

This section is an excerpt from Results of the 2022 South Australian state election (House of Assembly) § Finniss.[edit]

2022 South Australian state election: Finniss

Party		Candidate	Votes	%	±%
	Liberal	David Basham	10,424	43.1	−0.4
	Labor	Amy Hueppauff	5,532	22.9	+6.1
	Independent	Lou Nicholson	4,728	19.6	+19.6
	Greens	Anne Bourne	1,647	6.8	−0.9
	One Nation	Carlos Quaremba	1,146	4.7	+4.7
	Family First	Dominic Carli	614	2.5	+2.5
	National	Joe Ienco	82	0.3	+0.3
Total formal votes			24,173	96.9
Informal votes			778	3.1
Turnout			24,951	92.1
Notional two-party-preferred count
	Liberal	David Basham		56.6	−12.1
	Labor	Amy Hueppauff		43.4	+12.1
Two-candidate-preferred result
	Liberal	David Basham	12,258	50.7	−13.7
	Independent	Lou Nicholson	11,915	49.3	+49.3
	Liberal hold

References

• ECSA profile for Finniss: 2018
• ABC profile for Finniss: 2018
• Poll Bludger profile for Finniss: 2018