Division of Canning

Canning Australian House of Representatives Division
Division of Canning in Western Australia, as of the 2016 federal election.
Created	1949
MP	Andrew Hastie
Party	Liberal Party
Namesake	Alfred Canning
Electors	99,006 (2016)
Area	6,304 km2 (2,434.0 sq mi)
Demographic	Outer Metropolitan

The Division of Canning is an Australian Electoral Division in Western Australia. The division was created in 1949 and is named for Alfred Canning, the Western Australian government surveyor who surveyed the . It was originally a country seat that traded hands between the two main centre-right parties, the Liberal and Country parties.

Since 1980 it has been located in the southern suburbs of the two largest cities in Western Australia, Perth and Mandurah. For most of its last three decades, it has been a highly marginal seat due to the balanced proportion of the urban north and the rural south, changing hands between the Australian Labor Party and the Liberal Party. Canning had a Liberal margin of 4.3 percent leading into the 2010 election, and was targeted by Labor, who stood high-profile candidate and former state Labor MP Alannah MacTiernan. The Liberals retained the seat; however, Canning was the only Western Australian seat to see a two-party preferred swing toward the Australian Labor Party.

A 2015 Canning by-election, triggered on 21 July following the death of Liberal Don Randall, was held on 19 September. Though the Turnbull Government was just four days old, their candidate Andrew Hastie retained the seat for the Liberals, despite having to rely on preferences after a substantial, though dampened, primary (−4.15%) and two-party (−6.55%) swing away from the Liberals − solidly less than the double-digit swings polls had predicted under an Abbott Government − however, some double-digit swings did eventuate among the northern suburban booths. The Canning Liberal margin was reduced from safe to marginal status. Political analysts agreed the by-election was a "good outcome for both major parties".