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Political party in Australia From Wikipedia, the free encyclopedia
SA-Best (stylised SA-BEST), formerly known as Nick Xenophon's SA-BEST, is a political party in South Australia. It was founded in 2017 by Nick Xenophon as a state-based partner to his Nick Xenophon Team party (renamed to Centre Alliance in early 2018).[1] After an unsuccessful 2022 South Australian state election, the party has one representative in the South Australian Legislative Council, Connie Bonaros, whose term expires in 2026.
SA-BEST | |
|---|---|
.png){kind=logo} | |
| Founded | May 2017 (as Nick Xenophon's SA-BEST) |
| Registered | 4 July 2017 |
| Ideology | Social liberalism |
| Political position | Centre |
| Colours | Orange and black |
| Slogan | Real change you can trust |
| SA Legislative Council | 1 / 22 |
| Website | |
| sabest | |
The party was registered on 4 July 2017.[2] John Darley was the sole Nick Xenophon Team member in the South Australian Parliament until he left the party to become an independent on 17 August 2017.[3]
On 6 October 2017, Xenophon announced that he would be leaving the Federal Senate to contest the state seat of Hartley at the 2018 state election.[4] Xenophon resigned from the Senate on 31 October 2017.
At its 2018 annual general meeting,[when?] the South Australian party officially changed its name from Nick Xenophon's SA-Best to SA-Best.
In late 2017, NSW-BEST, VIC-BEST, WA-BEST, QLD-BEST and NT-BEST were registered as business names, leading to speculation that the party would expand interstate.[5] However, as of 2022, none of these have formed political parties.
In the March 2018 South Australian election, SA-Best contested thirty-six seats in the South Australian House of Assembly and put forward four candidates for the upper house. The party charged candidates $1,000 to be considered for pre-selection, and a further $20,000 for running in the lower house, or a further $40,000 in the upper house, as well as fund their own local campaign.[citation needed][6]
The thirty-six House of Assembly seats contested were: Badcoe, Chaffey, Cheltenham, Colton, Croydon, Davenport, Dunstan, Elder, Elizabeth, Enfield, Finniss, Gibson, Giles, Hammond, Hartley, Heysen, Hurtle Vale, Kavel, King, Lee, Mackillop, Mawson, Morialta, Morphett, Mount Gambier, Narungga, Newland, Playford, Port Adelaide, Ramsay, Reynell, Schubert, Taylor, Unley, Waite, and Wright.[7][8][9][10][11][12]
The party failed to secure any lower house seats,[13] although there was a close contest in the historically safe Liberal seat of Heysen.[14] Xenophon unsuccessfully contested Hartley and although he came second on the primary vote ahead of Labor's Grace Portolesi by 202 votes, the preference distribution of the eliminated fourth-placed Greens candidate turned Xenophon's 99-vote lead over Portolesi into a 357-vote deficit. Third-placed Xenophon was therefore eliminated, with Hartley reverting to the traditional Liberal vs Labor contest.[15][16] The party came second on primary votes in ten seats; the strongest results were in Chaffey, Finniss, and Hartley, where the party received over 25%.[16][17][18]
In the upper house, SA-Best received 19.3% of the voted, securing two seats, with the election of Connie Bonaros and Frank Pangallo.[19][20]
At the 2022 South Australian election, SA-Best had one lower house candidate (in the seat of Giles), and two upper house candidates. The party received approximately 1.1% of the upper house vote, and no candidates were elected.
Upper house members are elected for eight-year terms; as such, Bonaros and Pangallo’s terms will expire in 2026.
In December 2023, Frank Pangallo left the SA-Best party.[21]
| Legislative Council | ||||||
| Election year | # of overall votes |
% of overall vote |
# of overall seats won |
# of overall seats |
+/– | Position |
|---|---|---|---|---|---|---|
| 2018 | 203,364 | 19.35 (#3) | 2 / 11 |
2 / 22 |
 2 |
Crossbench |
| 2022 | 11,392 | 1.05 (#9) | 0 / 11 |
2 / 22 |
 0 |
Crossbench |
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