Electoral Division of Arnhem

Electoral Division Of Arnhem

Arnhem is an electoral division of the Legislative Assembly in Australia's Northern Territory. It was first created in 1974, and takes its name from Arnhem Land, the region encompassing much of the northern part of the Territory.

Arnhem is an almost entirely rural electorate, covering 99,269 km², and taking in the towns of Alyangula, Angurugu, Barunga, Beswick, Ngukurr, Numbulwar and Milingimbi. There were 4,902 people enrolled within the electorate as of August 2012.

Arnhem was one of the initial electorates created along with the introduction of the Legislative Assembly in 1974. Though it consisted of predominantly indigenous towns which voted strongly for the Australian Labor Party at a federal level, it was won by the Country Liberal Party amidst their landslide victory at the election of that year, in which the Labor Party won no seats. Arnhem returned to expectations at the 1977 election, when it was won by Labor candidate Bob Collins, who was elected leader of the party in 1981. Collins contested the new seat of Arafura in 1983, and was succeeded by new Labor candidate Wes Lanhupuy. Lanhupuy was comfortably re-elected three times, but died suddenly in 1995. Labor candidate John Ah Kit won the resulting by-election, and went on to serve as a Cabinet minister in the Martin government from 2001. He retired at the 2005 election, with former ABC TV presenter Barbara McCarthy being comfortably elected as his replacement. The high proportion of indigenous people in the Arnhem population has been reflected in the seat having had three consecutive indigenous MPs, and McCarthy having been an outspoken advocate of indigenous rights in parliament.