Tasmanian state election, 2002

← 1998

20 July 2002

2006 →

	First party	Second party	Third party

Leader	Jim Bacon	Bob Cheek	Peg Putt
Party	Labor	Liberal	Greens
Leader since	14 April 1997	20 August 2001	29 August 1998
Leader's seat	Denison	Denison (lost seat)	Denison
Last election	14 seats	10 seats	1 seat
Seats won	14 seats	7 seats	4 seats
Seat change	0	3	3
Percentage	51.88%	27.38%	18.13%
Swing	7.09	10.67	7.95

Premier before election

Jim Bacon
Labor

Elected Premier

Jim Bacon
Labor

A general election for the Tasmanian House of Assembly was held on Saturday 20 July 2002. The Labor government led by Premier Jim Bacon was seeking a second term against the Liberal Party of Australia Opposition headed by Opposition Leader Bob Cheek. The election was marked by a strong swing to both the Labor Party and the Tasmanian Greens at the expense of the Liberals, with Cheek losing his own seat.

Bacon and the Labor Party campaigned on a platform of revitalising the state after the 1990s-era economic reforms of successive Liberal governments, while maintaining law and order and a strong economy, and promoting tourism in particular. In response, Cheek and the Liberals claimed that the government had abandoned small business and promised a wide range of spending initiatives - something that was seized upon by Bacon as a means of attacking the Liberals' economic credentials. The Tasmanian Greens, under leader Peg Putt, campaigned as an alternative to both major parties, concentrating on environmental issues, which are often an area of bipartisan agreement among the Tasmanian major parties.

The results of the election were somewhat unexpected. The government retained its 14 seats in the 25-member parliament and recorded a swing in their favour in all five electorates. The Liberal Party had held ten seats before the election, but lost three to the Greens, who subsequently went from one to four seats. The Greens gained 18.1% of the statewide vote, their highest on record. In the Hobart-based seat of Denison, the Greens polled 24.5%, outpolling the main Opposition Liberal Party.

The election had major impacts on both the Liberal Party and Tasmanian Greens, while leaving the governing ALP largely unchanged. The Liberal Party elected a new parliamentary leader, MP Rene Hidding, from the Lyons, following the defeat of its previous leader, Bob Cheek who lost his seat in the Liberal rout.

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