With over 80 percent of the vote now counted, independent MP Dai Le is set to hold the key Sydney southwest seat of Fowler against a strong challenge from Labor’s Tu Le.
Both Les have achieved swings in their favour at the expense of the Liberal Party and most minor parties, with Dai Le gaining a 1.3 primary swing and Tu Le 6.2 percent.
But that won’t be enough to secure the seat for the Australian Labor Party (ALP), with Dai Le holding a lead of 4,836 votes and predicted to hold the seat—ahead on 52.8 percent against Tu Le’s 47.2 percent.
Labor were keen to re-take what had been a solidly red seat since Fowler was first created in 1984.
It was even named after an ALP luminary, Lilian Fowler, Australia’s first female mayor and later state MP for the seat of Newtown in the New South Wales Legislative Assembly from 1944 to 1950.
Fowler is also one of Sydney’s most ethnically diverse electorates, and the centre of the city’s Vietnamese community. Former ALP MP Chris Hayes had suggested a Vietnamese-Australian member of his staff, Tu Le, as the Labor candidate when he retired in 2022.
Fowler is also comprised of mostly lower socio-economic voters (median weekly household income is $1,403).
Perhaps because they had held Fowler through 13 elections, Labor instead parachuted then-senator and former NSW Premier Kristina Keneally as its candidate.
American-born Keneally had no connection to the electorate or understanding of its voters, having represented the eastern Sydney seat of Heffron in state parliament. When nominated for Fowler, she lived in northern Sydney, on Scotland Island.
In contrast, Tu Le is the daughter of Vietnamese refugees who have long lived in the local community, works at a community legal centre, and lives locally at Mount Pritchard.
Dai Le was a former Liberal candidate and local councillor who won Fowler boosted by preferences from the Liberals, United Australia, and One Nation.
She won and became the first Vietnamese Australian elected to the House of Representatives.
She achieved a 1.1 margin after a first preference swing of 29.5 percent toward her, versus one of 18.5 percent away from Keneally.
Although Labor chose more carefully this time, and took Hayes’ recommendation, it seems that wasn’t enough to sway voters.
Dai Le is a former journalist who has worked for community newspapers in western Sydney and for ABC.
She was named one of the 100 most influential Australian women in 2014. She was suspended from the Liberal Party for 10 years in 2016, in retribution for her bid to become mayor against an endorsed Liberal, despite having twice been the party’s candidate in Cabramatta.
