Parliament of Victoria, Legislative Assembly election

* Party did not contest previous election or did not meet criteria for listing, or contested previous election under a different party name.

Notes

Premier in office at election: There had been a change of Premier since the previous Assembly election in October 1988. By mid-1990, the Cain [jnr] government's financial problems with the Victorian Economic Development Commission and the State Bank of Victoria's links with the bankrupt merchant bank Tricontinental had been exacerbated by the collapse of the Pyramid Building Society. Coupled with the state's financial problems, hostility between the government and some sections of the union movement, and divisions within the Australian Labor Party caucus and cabinet, prompted Cain [jnr] to resign as Premier on 10 August 1990 (see notes for the period in office of Cain [jnr]).

Kirner was chosen as leader by the Labor caucus; 'In a contest between Joan Kirner and Steve Crabb, Kirner was elected Premier with the support of her Socialist Left faction plus the Independents and unaligned members', Ardel Shamsullah, 'Victoria', Australian Journal of Politics and History, Political Chronicle, July to December 1990, 37(2) August 1991: 308-313 at 308. Kirner was commissioned as Premier of an Australian Labor Party majority government on 10 August 1990.

A redistribution of Assembly seats was undertaken in 1992 (see Green, pp 3-5 in 'Sources', below) and the government announced in mid-August that a general election would be called on 3 October 1992.

Government in office after election: The Liberal Party increased its share of the first preference vote by 3.6 percent over the previous Assembly election in 1988 and won 19 seats from the Australian Labor Party to give the Liberals an 8 seats majority in the Assembly (see Carr in 'Sources', below). In the period leading up to the election, the Liberal Party and the National Party had campaigned as an anti-Labor coalition and, even though the Liberal Party had won sufficient seats to govern on its own, it chose to maintain a coalition arrangement in government. This gave the new government control of close to 70 percent of the seats in the Assembly. Kennett, the leader of the Liberal Party, was commissioned as Premier of a Liberal Party and National Party coalition government on 6 October 1992.

National Party: The National Party contested 12 seats at this Assembly election in 1992 but there was only a fraction of a percent change in the Party's first preference vote share and it maintained the 9 Assembly seats it had held before the election. The National Party had not been in government since a two month period in 1952 and its fractious relationship with the Liberal Party had kept it out of a coalition with the Liberals in Victoria since 1948. But the period of Australian Labor Party dominance during the 1980s had persuaded both parties of the need to cooperate. The background to the coalition agreement between the two parties before this election in 1992 is surveyed in Brian Costar, 'Coalition Government: An Unequal Partnership', pp 88-94, particularly pp 88-91, in Costar and Economou (editors), in 'References', below.

Independents: The votes assigned to Independents in the table above includes the votes for all those candidates who registered as Independents or left their party affiliation blank (note that there is some variation in the way Independent candidates are counted in some of the commentaries listed in 'Reference', below).

There had been 41 Independent candidates contesting the previous Assembly election in 1988, a large increase over earlier elections. At this Assembly election in 1992, the trend continued with 144 Independent candidates, more than three times the number in 1988. There was a corresponding increase in the first preference vote share for Independents, increasing by 4.6 percent to 7.4 percent (note Shamsullah, p.241, in 'References', below). No Independent candidate was elected.

Natural Law Party: Formed in 1992, this party was committed to using transcendental meditation to '... bring national life in harmony with Natural law so that every Australian will enjoy peace, happiness and prosperity ...', Dean Jaensch and David Mathieson, A Plague on Both Your Houses: Minor Parties in Australia, pp 71-72 (St Leonards, NSW: Allen & Unwin, 1998, ISBN 1864484217). Twenty-nine Natural Law candidates contested this Assembly election, but none was elected.

Geelong Community Alliance: This party ' ... fielded candidates in the four Geelong seats, hoping to profit from the resurgence of parochialism engendered by the economic problems the city was facing.' Shamsullah, p.241, in 'References', below.

Australian Democrats: Three candidates were endorsed by Australian Democrats for this Assembly election.

Greens (Australian Greens from 2002): This was the first Victorian Assembly election contested by the Greens party; only one candidate was nominated for this election in 1992.

Call to Australia: The Call to Australia party was associated with the New South Wales based Reverend Fred Nile, and was formed in 1980 (for more information, see the notes to the 1988 Assembly election). The party fielded two candidates at this Assembly election in 1992.

References: For an analysis of this election, see Ardel Shamsullah, 'Victoria', Political Chronicle, July-December 1992, Australian Journal of Politics and History, 39 (2) August 1993: 250-259, and note Brian Costar and Nicholas Economou, 'Elections and Electoral Change 1982-1992', pp 247-264, in Mark Considine and Brian Costar (editors), Trials in Power: Cain, Kirner and Victoria 1982-1992, (Carlton, Vic.: Melbourne University Press, 1992, ISBN 0522845371); and Nicholas Economou and Brian Costar, 'The Electoral Contest and Coalition Dominance', pp 122-131, in Brian Costar and Nicholas Economou (editors), The Kennett Revolution: Victorian Politics in the 1990s, (Sydney: University of New South Wales Press, 1999, ISBN 0868405450).

Sources

For this Assembly election (1992), there is agreement between the three sources below (Hughes 2002, Green 1992 and Carr) on the totals of first preference votes for the established parties but only Green gives a list of votes for the smaller parties

Colin A Hughes, A Handbook of Australian Government and Politics 1985-1999, (Sydney: Federation Press, 2002, ISBN 1862874344).

Antony Green, 1992 Victoria State Election: Summary of Results, Sydney, ABC-TV Election Unit, [1992], online here [accessed 18 April 2018]

Adam Carr, 'Fifty-second Parliament Elected 3 October 1992', in 'Legislative Assembly Elections', Victorian Elections Since 1843, Psephos: Adam Carr's Election Archive, online here [accessed 17 April 2018].