Six Queensland divisions breach enrolment tolerance in new electoral figures

The Electoral Commissioner, Jeff Pope, has certified that six Queensland divisions and one Victorian division stand outside the ten per cent enrolment tolerance, in a schedule published on 12 November 2026. The determination, made under section 58 of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, records 18,532,799 electors enrolled across Australia as at 31 October 2026. It appears in the Commonwealth of Australia Gazette as government notice C2026G00728.

Under section 58 the Commissioner must ascertain the number of electors enrolled in each division, determine for each State and the Australian Capital Territory the average divisional enrolment, and set out the extent to which each division departs from that average. The resulting schedule is the statutory snapshot of how evenly the electorate is distributed between seats, and the baseline against which the Australian Electoral Commission assesses whether boundaries need to be redrawn. Nationally the schedule counts 18,532,799 electors, from 5,807,876 in New South Wales down to 156,636 in the Northern Territory.

Six Queensland divisions beyond the mark

Queensland, with 3,845,550 electors and an average divisional enrolment of 128,185, accounts for every seat outside the tolerance bar Gorton:

• Blair: 150,559 electors, +17.45 per cent — the largest deviation in the country
• Wright: 149,914 electors, +16.95 per cent
• Longman: 149,750 electors, +16.82 per cent
• Fisher: 145,267 electors, +13.32 per cent
• Forde: 141,731 electors, +10.56 per cent
• Moreton: 110,298 electors, -13.95 per cent, the only Queensland seat below the band
• Bonner: 115,497 electors, -9.89 per cent — the closest seat to the line without crossing it

The pattern is a fast-growing south-east: three of the four largest surpluses sit in the Brisbane and Gold Coast corridors, while Moreton and Bonner absorb the deficits to the north and south of them.

Gorton alone in Victoria

Victoria records 4,716,836 electors on an average of 124,127, and only Gorton, at 138,468 electors and +11.55 per cent, exceeds the tolerance. The next highest Victorian deviations are well within the band — Bruce at +5.33 per cent, Flinders at +4.77 and Goldstein at +4.49 — while Melbourne at -6.45 and Macnamara at -5.29 sit at the low end.

The rest of the country stays inside

No division in the other six jurisdictions departs by ten per cent or more:

• New South Wales: 5,807,876 electors, average 126,258; widest spread Hunter at +7.87 per cent
• Western Australia: 1,933,628 electors, average 120,851; widest spread Perth at -4.89 per cent
• South Australia: 1,328,958 electors, average 132,895; Makin the highest at +4.08 per cent
• Tasmania: 417,135 electors, average 83,427; Bass the highest at +3.66 per cent
• Australian Capital Territory: 326,180 electors, average 108,726; Bean the highest at +5.57 per cent
• Northern Territory: 156,636 electors, average 78,318; Solomon at +1.98 and Lingiari at -1.98

The seat closest to its state average nationally is Hindmarsh in South Australia, at +0.02 per cent, followed by Moncrieff in Queensland and Fremantle in Western Australia, both at +0.07 per cent.

Why the schedule matters

Enrolment at 31 October 2026 fixes the arithmetic that any future redistribution must work from: seats carrying double-digit surpluses hold far more voters than their state average, while Moreton’s deficit means its boundaries would have to expand to catch up. For sitting members in Blair, Wright, Longman, Fisher, Forde, Moreton and Gorton, the practical consequence is that their electorates are the first candidates for redrawn boundaries, with knock-on effects for neighbouring seats as well. Voters in those divisions will be the ones whose federal electorate, and in some cases whose sitting member, changes shape before they next go to the polls.

Source: Commonwealth of Australia Gazette, No. C2026G00728, 12 November 2026, Government Notices (Section I) (official reference: C2026G00728).