It's been a six-week election campaign. Fascinating, for some; excruciating, for others.
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It was back on April 10 that Scott Morrison jumped in his chauffeur-driven car and headed to tell the Governor-General - Illawarra boy David Hurley - he was calling the election.
The GG is the first person outside the Liberal party room (and perhaps the PM's wife Jenny) to hear the election date because he has the job of dissolving parliament.
That basically means all the sitting pollies are gone in one mass resignation and then they head to the election to win their seat back.
Because, obviously, you can't land a seat in parliament if someone else is already sitting in it.
What the news of the election means for you is that you now have seven days to enrol to vote - because it's the law, my friend.
These days, it's super easy. Like almost everything else, you can do it online via the aec.gov.au website. The process of enrolling will also tell you which of the three federal electorates in the Illawarra is yours. There's Cunningham, Whitlam and Gilmore - and you don't get to choose which one you're in.
At present all three seats are held by Labor, but the only one with any real potential to change is Gilmore, where the margin is a slim 2.6 per cent.
Fiona Phillips won the seat last time around, helped by Scott Morrison's mistake of parachuting in Liberal candidate Warren Mundine.
This time around Ms Phillips will have much tougher competition in the form of former NSW state minister Andrew Constance.
His profile rose during the Black Summer bushfires, where he was on the ground working to save his own home from the flames. Now he is a very recognisable face in the electorate.
That fact and the tight margin are partly why Gilmore has been tagged a key seat in the forthcoming election.
Cunningham is the only seat of the three where it is guaranteed a new MP will be elected.
That's because sitting MP Sharon Bird, who has held the seat for Labor since 2004, is resigning. Her staffer Alison Byrnes is running as the Labor candidate.
With a 13.4 per cent margin, it's a very safe Labor seat and it's hard to see anyone but Labor winning.
Though for those who like an omen - 2022 is the 20th anniversary of when Michael Organ won the seat for the Greens - a result that surprised a lot of people.
Befitting a seat named after a Labor leader, Whitlam is held by the ALP's Stephen Jones, who has been there since 2010 (when the place was known as Throsby).
Mr Jones is sitting on a 10.9 per cent margin. So he's unlikely to be looking for a new job after May 21.
- Benjamin Britton - United Australia Party
- Alison Byrnes - Labor
- Alexis Garnaut-Miller - Citizens Party
- Michael Glover - Liberal Democrats
- Dylan Green - Greens
- Thomas Grogan - One Nation
- Marcus Uren - Liberals
- Michael Cains - Liberal
- Jamie Dixon - Greens
- Colin Hughes - One Nation
- Stephen Jones - Labor
- Michael Wheeler - Liberal Democrats
- Allan Wode - United Australia Party
GILMORE
- Andrew Constance - Liberal Party
- Nina Digiglio - Independent
- Jerremy Eid - One Nation
- Adrian Fadini - Liberal Democrats
- Jordan Maloney - United Australia Party
- Carmel McCallum - Greens
- Fiona Phillps - Labor
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