Legislative Council 2026: Rosevears

ROSEVEARS (2020 margin Lib vs IND 0.57%)

This is my second guide to the Legislative Council this year.  My guide for Huon is here and my latest guide to voting patterns in the upper house is up.   

I expect to be doing live coverage of the Legislative Council elections on this site on election night, scheduled for Saturday May 2.  However, updates to this page in the lead-up will probably be less frequent than normal. 

The current numbers in the Council are three Liberal, three Labor, one Green and eight independents, with the independents ranging fairly evenly across the Green to Liberal spectrum.  Labor gives up one vote on the floor and in the committee stages because it holds the Presidency.  As the major parties frequently vote together, the Government has not had an especially difficult time of it in the upper chamber lately, most notably getting the hugely controversial Macquarie Point stadium through 9 votes to 5.  But that is not to say the Liberals get everything their own way, for instance having their legislation to wind up greyhound racing referred to an inquiry.

This year sees just two Legislative Council contests, being the first defence for independent Paul Harriss in Huon and likewise for Liberal Jo Palmer in Rosevears.  

Seat Profile

Rosevears (see map) is situated on the west Tamar in northern Tasmania. It includes much of western and central Launceston and the towns of Beaconsfield, Legana, Exeter and Beauty Point.  Industries outside the urban area include tourism, mining and vineyards.

Rosevears was created as a new division out of parts of various pre-existing divisions in the 1999 redistribution.  Sitting MLC Ray Bailey was allocated to the division when it was formed but retired in 2002.  Prominent former radio announcer Kerry Finch, a left-wing independent, held the seat without serious challenge for three terms.  The seat is mostly an expanded version of the former division of Cornwall, which always returned independents except for electing one Liberal between 1942 and 1951.  One of the independents, Mac Le Fevre (member from 1978-1984) was a former Labor lower house MP.  

The seat got another Liberal MP in 2020 when Jo Palmer won by just 260 votes against then independent Janie Finlay.  So much water has flowed under the bridge since that Finlay has now been elected to the Lower House three times as a Labor candidate and is now Labor's Deputy Leader.  In scenes like a Sydney teal seat, Finlay's campaign was so successful (just not quite successful enough!) that Labor polled a miserable 9.1% in third place - and the Labor candidate Jess Greene has since gone on to join Finlay as state MP for Bass.

At the 2025 state election, with an adjustment of the booths for non-booth votes, I estimate the Liberal Party polled 43.3% in Rosevears, Labor 25.8%, the Greens 17.6%, independent George Razay 3.4% and the Shooters Fishers and Farmers 3.3% and the rest went to the latest Tasmanian Nationals flopfest and to ungrouped independents.  The Greens won the Trevallyn booth, always a strong one for them, with 35.1% and beat Labor in a few others.  Labor won the Beauty Point booth with a similar vote and the Liberals won all the rest, approaching or exceeding 50 in the Legana/Riverside booths which have a high bible belt component.  

Incumbent

Jo Palmer (Facebook, Instagram) is the Liberal incumbent since winning the slightly COVID-delayed August 2020 election by the closest margin in 21 years (or since).  Prior to politics Palmer was best known - to household name standards - as a former Southern Cross (now Seven) Tasmania newsreader and journalist, and also as a charity worker and former Tasmanian of the Year.  The frequency of said station's alumni winning seats has led to many jokes about the "Southern Cross faction" in the party room.  My 2020 guide contained the following dubiously relevant addendum: "In the celebrity trivia department I note that Palmer is a former Miss Tasmania and Miss Australia 1993, that she is Lyons Labor MHA Jen Butler's sister-in-law and that she is the parent of a Dancing With The Stars house dancer. "  Palmer's husband Andrew is a Launceston City Councillor.

Palmer is currently Minister for Education, Minister for Children and Youth and Minister for Disability Services.  She has also held other portfoilios including Primary Industries and Water and also Women.  She was promoted to the front bench in April 2022.  Palmer has not been involved in any personal controversies in her term, but see the Education section under Issues below.  Palmer featured in a nationally viral episode known as the Sportsgirl pants saga after a question from a journalist about her wardrobe choices went to air.  Her handling of the question was praised while the journo's turned out to be an unlucky hot mic moment.  

(Note: candidates may contact me once only to request a change to the link their name goes to, or additional links which will be added, or not, at my discretion and subject to my time. They may absolutely not send me long emails of bio or waffle at the same time.    I will be mostly offline during mid to late April.  No other changes will be made on request except to correct clear factual errors, and I reserve the right not to correct errors caused by a candidate failing to keep their linkedin up to date, and certainly won't remove any link to a outdated linkedin.  Any differences in the length of different candidate sections reflect differences in amount of available/(in my view) interesting material; candidate sections tend to be longer when candidates have past electoral form.)

Challengers (2.5)

To my knowledge all candidates live within Rosevears; if I find out otherwise a note will be added accordingly.

Ben Mckinnon (Facebook, Instagram, candidacy announcement) is the endorsed Labor candidate.  Mckinnon has been a teacher in the Launceston area for nearly 20 years, including at Longford Primary where he currently teaches music and PE, and previously Brooks High.  He has also been a case manager at City Misson and "a Social Inclusion Officer delivering employment programs", and is a musician who has toured nationally playing original indie/folk style music.  I have not found any evidence of any previous political forays.  In an interesting Easter post Mckinnon, who is clearly a Christian, acknowledged "heroes who have shaped my thinking and heart": "MLK, C.S. Lewis, J.R.R. Tolkien, Carl Jung, Iain McGilchrist, and John Smith" and also went on to give a long list of local heroes including Finlay, who is strongly promoting his campaign.  

Charlene McLennan (Facebook, Instagram, candidacy announcement) is the endorsed Greens candidate.  McLennan was the party's candidate for Bass at the 2025 federal election, polling 12.9% (the party's third highest vote in the seat behind the pulp mill days of 2007-10).  She was also the party's #2 candidate for Bass at the state election and polled 871 votes.  McLennan is a family lawyer and mediator with a background according to one firm in "family law, property, and wills and estates" and having also earlier represented children in refuges and displaced women.  While living in Dorrigo NSW she served with the NSW Rural Fire Service in the 2019-20 Black Summer fires and was also affected by the 2013 Dunalley fire.  Her personal Facebook page appeals to my sensibilities by referencing owls and tea.  

Susan Monson is a registered candidate with the TEC since 31/3/2026 and becomes the first prospective candidate to become first known to me by that method, however I have found no online campaign material. I did find a post by someone else that said she was running but no evidence beyond that, so I have not confirmed that she is actively contesting yet.  Monson appears to be co-owner of Monson Construction. I have found some Facebook comments by her (the most informative one of which I can summarise as "my kids should get free stuff from the government") but her profile has been locked.  More later maybe!

Rumours

There has been an on-off unsubstantiated rumour linking Launceston Mayor Matthew Garwood to a run for the seat, which he wouldn't have to quit the mayoralty to pursue.  As of 7 April I hadn't seen this one for a while.

Issues

Issues noted on the campaign trail will be listed here.  This list is not comprehensive or in order and issues may be added over time.  The presence of an item on the list does not necessarily mean it will sway votes, only that it is being talked about.  

1. Education: When it's teacher vs Education Minister as the major party candidates expect to hear a lot about how the government and the Minister are going on Tasmania's education system, which has attracted opprobrium in recent years for dire post Year 10 retention rates.  Palmer's performance as Education Minister has come under sustained attack from education unionists and also questions about the extent to which she is being consulted.  The Australian Education Union recorded a no confidence vote in Palmer's performance and also released comments from principals about proposed Multi=School Organisations while Palmer has challenged claims that the state is doing terribly.

2. Stadium: Rosevears is in Bass and Bass hates the stadium, largely because it is to be built south of Oatlands.  The stadium has been passed with bipartisan support but there remains the issue of how to deal with cost blowouts down the track.  While rage may have faded in the face of futility, the Greens do have the advantage here since both of the majors voted for it.

3. Budget: While I haven't seen much sign of budgetary debate in Rosevears yet, the dire state of Tasmania's debt levels and what exactly should be done about them is bound to surface during the campaign.  

4. Cost of living: Inescapable again with Donald Trump starting a war nobody understands that briefly sent petrol to $2.50 before fuel excise cuts brought it down somewhat.  The government has announced free public transport until mid-year.  

Campaign

Campaign style issues and incidents may be noted here.  During a visit to Rosevears in early March Palmer was certainly first out of the blocks in the corflute wars; her posters were everywhere including even deepest greenest Trevallyn.   

The major party candidates' Facebook pages are pretty positive with few political attacks, with Palmer's mainly focusing on local community and announceables and Mckinnon's profiling "local legends" he encounters on the rounds.  

Prospects

Rosevears is a very Liberal-friendly seat but this didn't stop it electing Finch for three terms, with attempts to blast him out based on his voting record failing dismally.  It was a cracking contest to replace him but either Palmer or Finlay would have beaten anybody but each other easily, and the seat's notional marginal status from 2020 is meaningless now.  

Finlay had the advantage then of being an indie, which is a bigger thing in the north of the state than the south, and she also had a massive profile.  Which raises the question of how there is no significant independent running for this seat this time as of four weeks out.  Despite one commenter's hope that somebody would "clone Ruth Forrest" I suspect potential indies have given running against Jo Palmer a miss because they don't think they can beat her.  (Either that or they're keeping their powder remarkably dry, a risky strategy!) Labor are giving it a go but they're deep underdogs here and, strikingly, haven't won a LegCo seat in the north with an endorsed candidate since 1952.   (Silvia Smith served one term in Windermere as "Independent Labor").

More comments may be added later.