South Australian state election, 1979

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15 September 1979 (1979-09-15)

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All 47 seats in the South Australian House of Assembly
24 seats were needed for a majority
11 (of the 22) seats in the South Australian Legislative Council

	First party	Second party

Leader	David Tonkin	Des Corcoran
Party	Liberal	Labor
Leader since	1975	15 February 1979
Leader's seat	Bragg	Hartley
Last election	17 seats	27 seats
Seats won	26 seats	21 seats
Seat change	6	6
Percentage	55.0%	45.0%
Swing	8.4	8.4

Premier before election

Elected Premier

State elections were held in South Australia on 15 September 1979. All 47 seats in the South Australian House of Assembly were up for election. The incumbent Australian Labor Party led by Premier of South Australia Des Corcoran was defeated by the Liberal Party of Australia led by Leader of the Opposition David Tonkin.

A Norwood by-election was held due to the seat's election result being overturned by a court decision, which saw the seat lost from the Liberals to Labor, which meant the Liberals held 24 seats with Labor on 20 seats.

Independent: Norm Peterson

Premier Don Dunstan abruptly resigned on 15 February 1979 due to ill health, and was succeeded by Deputy Premier Des Corcoran.

Spurred by positive opinion polls and seeking to escape the shadow of Dunstan, Corcoran called a snap election (without pre-informing the party apparatus) in order to gain a mandate of his own. The election campaign was plagued by problems, which allowed an opening for the Liberals under Tonkin. It didn't help matters that The Advertiser was biased toward the Liberal campaign.

Labor suffered a large swing, losing eight seats to the Liberals. The Liberals also won 55 percent of the two-party vote to Labor's 45 percent. In most of Australia, this would have been enough for a landslide Liberal victory. However, most of the Liberal margin was wasted on massive landslides in rural areas. The Liberals only won 13 seats in Adelaide, netting them a total of 26 seats, a bare majority of two. Narrow as it was, it was the first time the main non-Labor party in South Australia had won the most seats while also winning a majority of the vote since the Liberal and Country League won 50.3 percent of the two-party vote in 1959.

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