Adelaide Western Suburbs
Marginal Liberal 4.8%
MP
Matt Cowdrey (Liberal) since 2018. Cowdrey is retiring at this election.
Profile
Covers western suburban coastal suburbs from Grange in the north to West Beach in South, including Henley Beach, Henley Beach South, Fulham, Fulham Gardens, Kidman Park and parts of Lockleys and Grange. The electorate also includes Adelaide Airport.
2022 Polling Place Results
The Liberal Party polls most strongly in the southern and beachfront suburbs including Henley Beach, West Beach and Fulham, while Labor's strongest parts of Colton are in and around Grange and Kidman Park.
Background
The electorate is named after Mary Colton (1822-98), who arrived in Adelaide in 1839 and worked for the welfare of women and children. Colton was president of the Women's Suffrage League and lived long enough to see the introduction of equal voting rights for women in 1894, a world first for South Australia.
The name Colton was adopted in 1993 for an electorate previously known as Henley Beach. Henley Beach had been held by the Liberal Party's Bob Randall during the one term of the Tonkin government, but was won by Labor through the 1980s despite several attempts by Randall to regain the seat.
At the 1993 election, the Liberal Party opted for the high profile of former Adelaide Lord Mayor Steve Condous, who was easily elected in the landslide and retained the seat despite a state-wide swing back to Labor in 1997. Condous retired at the 2002 election when Labor's Paul Caica won the seat. Significantly, Labor's two gains from the Liberal Party at the 2002 election, Adelaide and Colton, were both contests where the sitting Liberal MP retired.
Caica was easily re-elected with a 12.7 per cent swing in his favour in 2006, cancelled out by a 12 per cent swing back to the Liberal Party in 2010, returning Colton to its more normal marginal status. Caica retained the seat but lost another 2.2 per cent from his margin in 2014.
Colton was one of the seats transformed into a notional Liberal seat by the 2016 redistribution. Caica did not contest the 2018 election when the seat's notional Liberal majority was confirmed by victory for the Liberal Party's Matt Cowdrey. Cowdrey had a 4 per cent swing in his favour on election, the fourth largest swing to the Liberal Party at the election. He lost 1.4 per cent from his margin in 2022, but with only three candidates running in the seat, still managed to win a majority of the first preference vote. He announced his retirement from parliament in June 2025, declaring a desire to "move on from partisan politics".
Past Winning Parties
| Year | Winning Party |
|---|---|
| 1993 | LIB |
| 1997 | LIB |
| 2002 | ALP |
| 2006 | ALP |
| 2010 | ALP |
| 2014 | ALP |
| 2018 | LIB |
| 2022 | LIB |
(Victories by the party that formed government are underlined)
2026 Candidates in Ballot Paper Order (9 Candidates)
| Candidate Name | Party |
|---|---|
| SUTTON, Bec | Liberal Party |
| PARSONS, Lili | Animal Justice Party |
| DeANGELIS, Rocco | Pauline Hanson's One Nation |
| SCHIRRIPA, Tony | Australian Family Party |
| BOLKUS, Aria | Australian Labor Party |
| SCHULZ, Mathew | Family First |
| HALL-EVANS, Jake | Independent |
| LLOYD, Brad | Stephen Pallaras Real Change SA |
| XERRI, Adelaide | The Greens |
More on Candidates
Bec Sutton
Liberal Party
Sutton holds a Bachelor of Medical Sciences from the University of Adelaide and is currently a PhD candidate in neurobiology and anatomy. She has worked in the banking and insurance sectors, focusing on operations and marketing, and is currently a project officer with SA Health. Sutton says that her work in health inspired her move into politics. She is a mother of two boys.
Lili Parsons
Animal Justice
Rocco DeAngelis
One Nation
DeAngelis is an entrepreneur who runs sourdough pizza restaurants in Findon and Grange. He was born in Adelaide to a large Italian migrant family and trained in Italy. Before moving into pizza, DeAngelis was a chocolatier. He was the One Nation candidate for Hindmarsh in the 2025 federal election.
Tony Schirripa
Aust Family Party
Aria Bolkus
Labor Party
Bolkus has lived in Henley for her entire life and is the daughter of Greek immigrants from Lesvos and Kastellorizo. Before her run for parliament, she worked in the office of federal Labor MP Mark Butler, and prior to that, worked as a lawyer. She holds law and business degrees from the University of South Australia, graduating in 2019. Her father, Nick Bolkus (1950-2025), was a Labor senator for South Australia from 1981 to 2005 and served as a minister in the Hawke and Keating governments.
Matthew Schulz
Family First
Jake Hall-Evans
Independent
Hall-Evans is a small business owner who was born, raised, and educated in the western suburbs and has a background in business management. He ran as an independent in the 2025 federal election and as a Liberal candidate in the 2022 state election and 2019 federal election. He was initially running, at various points, for Colton and the Legislative Conucil with Sarah Game's Fair Go For Australians party. Days before nominations closed he left the party and announced an independent run for Colton.
Brad Lloyd
Real Change SA
Adelaide Xerri
The Greens
Xerri started her career in the arts, working across festivals including the Adelaide Fringe, WOMADelaide, Adelaide Film Festival. She has spent the past decade in climate action and human rights advocacy. She holds a degree in humanitarian aid and development from Charles Darwin University. Xerri grew up in Eden Hills and has lived in Lockleys for the past three years.
Information on candidates and how-to-vote material can be sent to 
2022 Result
| Candidate | Party | Votes | % | Swing |
|---|---|---|---|---|
| Matt Cowdrey | LIB | 13,171 | 52.3 | +6.1 |
| Paul Alexandrides | ALP | 9,277 | 36.8 | +3.7 |
| Deb Cashel | GRN | 2,759 | 10.9 | +5.6 |
| .... | SAB | 0 | 0 | -14.0 |
| .... | OTH | 0 | 0 | -1.4 |
| Two-Candidate Preferred | ||||
| Matt Cowdrey | LIB | 13,816 | 54.8 | -1.4 |
| Paul Alexandrides | ALP | 11,391 | 45.2 | +1.4 |