Ryan Park to keep Keira - in area that has stuck with Labor for almost a century

Since it was formed in 1988, it has always been held by Labor - Col Markham from 1988-1995, David Campbell through to 2009 and Ryan Park ever since.

Amateur psephologists (Google it, mate) will also note that Keira replaced the old seat of Corrimal - and that was also owned by Labor ever since it was created in 1968.

And held by one guy - Laurie Kelly, who spent 12 years as speaker in parliament.

Kelly thumped all comers across seven elections, getting an impressive 70 per cent of the first preference votes in 1981.

Minor parties and independents didn't get a look-in - especially the Communist Party in 1971 who snared an underwhelming 1.9 per cent of the primary votes.

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Kelly only tasted defeat once, when the seat of Corrimal was scrapped for the 1988 election, and he moved over to the seat of Wollongong and take on independent Frank Arkell.

In the two-candidate preferred race, Arkell beat him with a 10 per cent margin.

Before it was called the seat of Corrimal, there was the seat of Bulli, that existed between 1930 and 1971. Guess which party held that seat for all of that time.

Yep, Labor.

Among those was an attorney-general in Andrew Lysaght, the father of Laurie Kelly (also called Laurie Kelly) and a guy jailed for accepting bribes and who later drove an ice-cream truck (yes, that's Rex Jackson).

So it's very, very safe to say the northern Illawarra has been with Labor for a long, long time.

And it's hard to see that changing in the March election.

Yes, there was the whole "teal wave" in last year's federal election and some are thinking that will flow through to the state poll in March.

But in the north of that seat, while the Greens saw a 6.5 per cent swing in primaries to them in 2019, Labor still had around double the Greens primary vote.

So any such "wave" of change isn't really lapping at the shores of Keira.

It is certainly valuable for democracy to see other parties put up candidates in Keira - and elsewhere - rather than saying "bugger it" and leaving it to Labor.

It raises the possibility of the region one day being home to a marginal electorate; you can't get one of those without rival candidates turning up election after election to chipping away at Labor's lead.

And it's a no-brainer that being a marginal electorate is valuable. That way, no matter who is in government, they throw money at you.

Still, it can be hard to understand just why they do it.

Just have a look at incumbent Ryan Park's margin - it's 18.2 per cent.

Incidentally, that makes Keira the least safest Labor seat in the Illawarra - because the other two have even bigger margins.

So something on an unfathomable level has to happen for Park to lose.

Like a huge, huge scandal, Park waking up on election day and suddenly deciding to quit politics or the seat of Keira being obliterated by a nuclear bomb.

Do you get my point? Basically, Park can't lose the seat of Keira (and, for the record, I know of no "huge, huge scandals" waiting in the wings - that was hyperbole)

He could spend the next week and a half at home in his pyjamas binge-watching Netflix and still emerge victorious on the night of March 25.

There has been a change in the boundaries of the Keira electorate.

Those who live in the suburbs north of Woonona now find themselves in the Heathcote electorate, while Keira itself has been pushed south, taking in the likes of Farmborough Heights, Unanderra, Kembla Grange and Dombarton.

Those first two suburbs used to be in the Wollongong electorate and the last two in Shellharbour - both of which are even safer Labor seats.

So that change in boundaries is unlikely to have any serious impact on Park's margin, given the 18.2 per cent already takes into account those new suburbs (yes, his margin used to be even higher).

Even though Park is a complete shoo-in for Keira, there are still things to watch out for in the seat.

One is whether Greens' Kit Docker manages to increase the party's vote.

As was the case at the federal election, the Greens candidates have been out in force pushing their policies.

In recent elections, the Greens candidate has snared between 12 to 15 per cent of the primary vote (though in 2003 they got almost one-fifth of first preferences).

If the belief that the federal election's move away from major parties will flow through to the NSW poll is to bear fruit, Docker really needs to better that 19.3 per cent from 2003.

The other thing to watch is whether last-minute Liberal Noah Shipp can earn some taxpayer funds for the party.

It's a little-known fact that the electoral commission pays candidates. All they need to do to qualify is get at least 4 per cent of the primary vote - at the 2019 poll, that equated to just over 2000 votes.

How much would Shipp earn for the party if he meets that criteria? Just $4.66 per vote.

It's enough to make one wonder whether the cash is the whole reason the Libs are fielding so many last-minute candidates in the Illawarra.

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