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New South Wales general election, 1976
From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
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| Legislative Assembly election, 1976 | ||||
| Party[1] | Vote %[2] | Seats[3] | ||
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Labor | 49.6 | ↑6.8 | 50 | ↑6 |
| Liberal | 36.3 | ↑2.4 | 30 | ↓4 |
| Country | 10.0 | ↓0.5 | 18 | 0 |
| Independents | 1 | ↓1 | ||
| Others | 0 | ↓1 | ||
| Labor win | ||||
A general election for the New South Wales Legislative Assembly was held in the state of New South Wales, Australia, on Saturday, May 1, 1976. The result was a narrow win for the Australian Labor Party under Neville Wran—the party's first in the state in more than a decade.
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The incumbent Liberal-Country Party coalition had lost its longtime leader, Sir Robert Askin, at the end of 1974. His successor, Tom Lewis, didn't last a year as premier before his colleagues dumped him in favour of Eric Willis.
Wran successfully emerged from the shadow of the defeated Whitlam Labor government at a federal level. Labor's campaign focussed largely on the leader himself, what Australians call a "Presidential" style campaign. The state party had undergone a long process of renewal, and emerged with strong moderate credentials. Labor also offered an alternative to a long-serving government widely perceived as corrupt.
Wran's campaign slogan, "Let's put the state in better shape," delivered by the leader and key spokesmen Peter Cox and Syd Einfeld, resonated with voters.
The New South Wales Legislative Assembly had 99 members elected using Instant run-off voting, a form of preferential voting. The allocation of preferences was compulsory at the 1976 election.
At the time, the New South Wales Legislative Council was elected indirectly.