As Australians prepare to head to the polls on May 3, the seat of Macquarie is once again shaping up as a critical and closely watched contest.

Currently held by Labor MP Susan Templeman, Macquarie has long been known as a bellwether seat - a barometer for the national mood, frequently flipping between the major parties as power changes in Canberra. Stretching from the escarpments of the Blue Mountains down to the floodplains of the Hawkesbury. The electorate is as politically diverse as its landscape including the Blue Mountains City Council, Hawkesbury City Council,and parts of both Penrith City Council and Wollondilly Shire Council.

Macquarie has a rich political history dating back to 1901, the year of Federation. Named after Governor Lachlan Macquarie, the early colonial leader often credited with shaping modern New South Wales, the seat was once a sprawling rural electorate stretching from Bathurst to Lithgow. It spent much of the 20th century anchored in country towns and Labor strongholds. The seat was once held by Labor legend Ben Chifley, who served as Prime Minister from 1945 to 1949 and famously caught the train home to Bathurst each Friday.

A major redistribution in 1977 pushed Macquarie eastward, adding more of the Blue Mountains and beginning its gradual shift towards Sydney’s outskirts, transforming Macquarie into one of the most marginal electorates in the country. Today, Macquarie is a battleground between the progressive heart of the Blue Mountains and the more conservative edges of the Hawkesbury - a far cry from the vast country seat it once was.

For much of the 20th century, Macquarie leaned Labor, helped along by favorable boundaries. But as demographics shifted - particularly with urban sprawl into the Hawkesbury - the seat became more marginal. From the 1980s onwards, it has changed hands multiple times, often reflecting broader national swings.

In 1996, as John Howard swept to power in a landslide, Liberal candidate Kerry Bartlett took the seat from Labor. He held it until 2007, when the boundaries changed once again to include Lithgow and Bathurst and the Rudd wave saw Bob Debus, a former NSW Attorney General, take it back for Labor.

However, a further redistribution in 2009 kept Macquarie in play with narrow margins. In 2010, Liberal Louise Markus edged out Labor by just over 2,000 votes when she moved from Greenway to Macquarie. She held on in 2013, but in 2016 the pendulum swung again - this time to Labor’s Susan Templeman, who capitalised on anger over funding cuts to local schools and hospitals.

Templeman held the seat by 371 votes in 2019 and in 2022 increased her margin to 7.58%. The most recent electoral redistribution has eased her margin to 6.3% for the current election. That history highlights the volatility of Macquarie - it’s a seat where small local shifts can have national consequences.

In this election, Hawkesbury City Councillor Mike Creed is attempting to win the seat back for the Liberals. A first-time federal candidate, Creed brings a local profile and a campaign focused on cost-of-living pressures, infrastructure, and disaster resilience, particularly in flood-prone Hawkesbury. 

“I can’t promise to fix everything - that would be lying - but I will always do my best to help,” he says. “If I can’t fix something, I’ll be honest about it. People just want someone who listens and tries their hardest.”

Macquarie’s incumbent, Templeman, is running on her track record of local advocacy, disaster recovery work during the bushfires and floods, and securing federal funding for schools, roads, and community infrastructure.

Templeman, a former radio journalist and small business owner, has built her brand around being visible and vocal in a large and geographically complex electorate. During the campaign, Templeman has focused strongly on Medicare, promising a local Urgent Care Clinic, telehealth for urgent care, and cheaper women’s health. She believes that the upcoming election is centered on national concerns rather than individual candidates.

 "These are the big issues, about who do you trust to deliver a good budget, rather than who's nice or who's sweet," Tempelman says. 

She says the economic security of families is a top priority. She points to Labor's commitment to increasing workers' pay, reducing inflation to alleviate interest rate pressures, and maintaining balanced budgets as key components of their strategy.

"I think right now, what people are worried about is the security of their own family economically," she says.

Also contesting the seat are:

• Terry Morgan from The Greens, running on a platform of climate action and affordable housing. He wants an accelerated shift to renewable energy, an end to logging native forests, and increased investment in cheap, efficient public transport powered by renewables.
• Matthew Jacobson from One Nation, promoting immigration controls, cutting unnecessary government spending, and stronger defence policies.
• Joaquim Eduardo De Lima from the Libertarian Party, campaigning for less government and more personal freedoms.
• Roger Gerard Bowen from Family First, focusing on socially conservative values, protecting faith-based schools, opposing "radical" gender ideology, and upholding Judeo-Christian values.

Nationally, the contest between Prime Minister Anthony Albanese’s Labor government and Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s Liberal-National Coalition remains tight. Recent polling has Labor just ahead - 52–48 on a two-party-preferred basis - but both parties are bracing for a potential hung parliament. That makes seats like Macquarie critical to determining who will govern.

With its mix of progressive Blue Mountains voters and more conservative Hawkesbury communities, Macquarie is a microcosm of modern Australia. It reflects the friction between environmental protection and economic development, between climate action and cost-of-living concerns.