The 1996 election produced the third largest majority ever for a government in the House of Representatives.
The new coalition government led by John Howard won 94 seats in the 148-seat lower house. The ALP won 49 seats, a loss of 31. There were 5 independents elected: 3 ex-Liberal members, 1 ex-Labor member and Pauline Hanson. Hanson won Oxley as a disendorsed Liberal candidate.
The overall swing against the ALP was 5.06%, with every part of the country swinging to the coalition. The largest swing was 8.65% in Queensland. The smallest swing was 1.50% in Victoria.
There were swings against the ALP in 140 electorates. The biggest swing was 12.68% in the Queensland electorate of Fadden. The smallest swing to the coalition was 0.10% in the Victorian electorate of La Trobe.
The ALP won a majority of the two-party-preferred vote only in Victoria, Tasmania and the Australian Capital Territory.
The election reduced the ALP to a “south-east triangle” of seats in Victoria, and New South Wales, the party winning 36 of its 49 seats in those two States, and most of those in Sydney and Melbourne.
The ALP won only 2 seats in Queensland and South Australia, 3 in Western Australia, 3 in Tasmania (the only State where it won a majority of seats) and all 3 seats in the ACT.
| Two-Party-Preferred Statistics 1996 House of Representatives – Summary |
|||||
|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| State | ALP Votes | ALP % | L/NP Votes | L/NP % | % Swing To ALP |
| New South Wales | 1,734,777 |
47.44
|
1,922,165 |
52.56
|
-6.95
|
| Victoria | 1,388,142 |
50.30
|
1,371,480 |
49.70
|
-1.50
|
| Queensland | 765,019 |
39.78
|
1,158,122 |
60.22
|
-8.65
|
| Western Australia | 437,694 |
44.00
|
557,055 |
56.00
|
-2.02
|
| South Australia | 391,516 |
42.74
|
524,445 |
57.26
|
-4.59
|
| Tasmania | 159,853 |
51.58
|
150,057 |
48.42
|
-3.07
|
| Australian Capital Territory | 105,323 |
55.46
|
84,592 |
44.54
|
-5.73
|
| Northern Territory | 42,003 |
49.63
|
42,630 |
50.37
|
-5.68
|
| Total | 5,024,327 |
46.37
|
5,810,546 |
53.63
|
-5.06
|
Source: Australian Electoral Commission publications
