Elections were held in the
Australian state
The states and territories are federated administrative divisions in Australia, ruled by regional governments that constitute the second level of governance between the federal government and local governments. States are self-governing ...
of
Queensland
)
, nickname = Sunshine State
, image_map = Queensland in Australia.svg
, map_caption = Location of Queensland in Australia
, subdivision_type = Country
, subdivision_name = Australia
, established_title = Before federation
, establishe ...
on 19 September 1992 to elect the 89 members of the state's
Legislative Assembly.
The
Labor Party led by
Wayne Goss
Wayne Keith Goss (26 February 1951 – 10 November 2014) was Premier of Queensland from 7 December 1989 until 19 February 1996, becoming the first Labor Premier of the state in over thirty two years. Prior to entering politics, Goss was a solic ...
was reelected for a second term with a strong
majority government. The election effectively confirmed the status quo, although the ALP lost a small percentage of votes and four seats. Three of those were new seats which were nominally Labor following the redistribution.
This was the first election in many decades in which a
zonal system of electoral representation did not exist. The previous parliament had legislated for a "
one vote one value
In Australia, one vote, one value is a democratic principle, applied in electoral laws governing redistributions of electoral divisions of the House of Representatives. The principle calls for all electoral divisions to have the same number of e ...
" electoral redistribution, in which almost all the 89 electoral districts were to have similar numbers of electors (within a 10% margin of the mean). The only exceptions were electorates that had areas of at least 100,000 square kilometres. The number of electors in each of those electorates was increased by 2% of the total area of the electorate expressed in square kilometres, to ensure that the number of electors in the affected electorates was within 10% of the mean enrolment. This election also saw the introduction of
optional preferential voting
One of the ways in which ranked voting systems vary is whether an individual vote must express a minimum number of preferences to avoid being considered invalid ("spoiled" or "informal"). Possibilities are:
* Full preferential voting (FPV) requir ...
(replacing compulsory
full-preferential voting
One of the ways in which ranked voting systems vary is whether an individual vote must express a minimum number of preferences to avoid being considered invalid ("spoiled" or "informal"). Possibilities are:
* Full preferential voting (FPV) requir ...
) in Queensland elections, which would remain in place until the 2016 electoral reforms of the
Palaszczuk government.
Although Labor suffered a small swing against it in north Queensland, that was slightly masked by the abolition of the zonal system.
Key dates
Results
Seats changing hands
* Most seats that changed hands were newly created by the extensive electoral redistribution before the election.
* Members listed in italics did not recontest their seats.
* ** The 1991 redistribution combined the fairly safe Labor held electorate of Mourilyan with marginal National held electorate of Hinchinbrook. Based on 1989 results, Hinchinbrook has a notional seat margin of 3.0%.
Post-election pendulum
See also
*
Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1989–1992
*
Members of the Queensland Legislative Assembly, 1992–1995
*
Candidates of the Queensland state election, 1992
*
Goss Ministry
The Goss Ministry was a Ministry of the Government of Queensland, led by Labor Premier Wayne Goss. It commenced on 7 December 1989, five days after the Cooper Ministry, led by Premier Russell Cooper of the National Party, was defeated at the ...
References
{{Queensland elections
Elections in Queensland
1992 elections in Australia
1990s in Queensland