A general election was held in the

Northern Territory The Northern Territory (commonly abbreviated as NT; formally the Northern Territory of Australia) is an Australian territory in the central and central northern regions of Australia. The Northern Territory shares its borders with Western Aust ...

on Saturday August 30, 1997, and was won by the incumbent

Country Liberal Party The Country Liberal Party of the Northern Territory (CLP) is a centre-right political party in Australia's Northern Territory. In local politics it operates in a two-party system with the Australian Labor Party (ALP). It also contests federal ...

(CLP).

Shane Stone Shane Leslie Stone (born 25 September 1950) is an Australian political figure. He is currently the Chair of the Council for the Order of Australia. He was also the Coordinator-General of the National Recovery and Resilience Agency and its pre ...

continued as Chief Minister. During the previous term, the CLP had lost the seat of Fannie Bay to Labor in a by-election. The CLP did not win the seat back, but managed to take MacDonnell from Labor and Nelson from Independent

Noel Padgham-Purich Cecilia Noel Padgham-Purich (born 25 December 1927) is a former Australian politician. She was a member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly from 1977 to 1997, representing Tiwi until 1983, Koolpinyah until 1990 and Nelson thereafte ...

Retiring MPs

Labor

* Neil Bell MLA ( MacDonnell)

Country Liberal

Fred Finch Frederick Arthur Finch (16 June 1945 – 12 November 2018) was an Australian politician, a Country Liberal Party member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly from 1983 to 1997, representing Wagaman until 1987 and Leanyer thereafter. ...

MLA ( Leanyer) *

Rick Setter Richard Alfred "Rick" Setter (born 12 November 1937) is a former Australian politician. He was the Country Liberal Party member for Jingili in the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly The Legislative Assembly of the Northern Terri ...

MLA ( Jingili)

Independent

MLA (

Nelson Nelson may refer to: Arts and entertainment * ''Nelson'' (1918 film), a historical film directed by Maurice Elvey * ''Nelson'' (1926 film), a historical film directed by Walter Summers * ''Nelson'' (opera), an opera by Lennox Berkeley to a lib ...

)

Results

Candidates

Sitting members are listed in bold. Successful candidates are highlighted in the relevant colour.

Seats changing hands

Post-election pendulum

The following pendulum is known as the

Mackerras pendulum The Mackerras pendulum was devised by the Australian psephologist Malcolm Mackerras as a way of predicting the outcome of an election contested between two major parties in a Westminster style lower house legislature such as the Australian House ...

, invented by psephologist

Malcolm Mackerras Malcolm Hugh Mackerras AO (born 26 August 1939) is an Australian psephologist and commentator and lecturer on Australian and American politics. Education and works Malcolm Mackerras was born at Turramurra in Sydney in August 1939. He is a brot ...

. The pendulum works by lining up all of the seats held in the Legislative Assembly according to the percentage point margin they are held by on a two-party-preferred basis. This is also known as the swing required for the seat to change hands. Given a uniform swing to the opposition or government parties, the number of seats that change hands can be predicted.

References

Psephos - Adam Carr's Election Archive
{{DEFAULTSORT:Northern Territory General Election, 1997 1997 elections in Australia Elections in the Northern Territory 1990s in the Northern Territory August 1997 events in Australia