The 2010 South Australian state election elected members to the 52nd Parliament of South Australia on 20 March 2010. All seats in the House of Assembly or lower house, whose current members were elected at the 2006 election, and half the seats in the Legislative Council or upper house, last filled at the 2002 election, became vacant.

The incumbent centre-left Australian Labor Party government led by Premier Mike Rann was elected to a third four-year term over the opposition centre-right Liberal Party of Australia led by Leader of the Opposition Isobel Redmond. Labor's landslide 7.7 percent swing to a two-party-preferred vote of 56.8 percent at the 2006 election was reversed at this election with a swing of 8.4 percent, finishing with a two-party vote of 48.4 percent, however, Labor retained majority government with 26 of 47 seats, a net loss of two. Labor lost the inner metropolitan seats of Adelaide, Morialta and Norwood to the Liberals while Nationals SA member Karlene Maywald lost her rural seat of Chaffey to the Liberals. Independent Kris Hanna lost to the Labor candidate in Mitchell, independents Bob Such in Fisher and Geoff Brock in Frome retained their seats (the latter having won at the 2009 by-election), while independent candidate Don Pegler won Mount Gambier, replacing outgoing independent Rory McEwen. Jay Weatherill took over from Rann as Premier and Labor leader in October 2011.

In the upper house, both major parties won four seats each, with the last three to the SA Greens, Family First, and Dignity for Disability. The composition of the upper house therefore became eight Labor, seven Liberal, two Green, two Family First, two independent No Pokies, and one Dignity for Disability.

Like federal elections, South Australia has compulsory voting, uses full-preference instant-runoff voting in single member seats for the lower house and single transferable vote group voting tickets in the proportionally represented upper house. The election was conducted by the Electoral Commission of South Australia (ECSA), an independent body answerable to Parliament.

Results House of Assembly

Independents: Bob Such, Geoff Brock, Don Pegler

Seats changing hands

Seat Pre-2010 Swing Post-2010 Party Member Margin Margin Member Party Adelaide  Labor Jane Lomax-Smith 10.2 14.5 4.2 Rachel Sanderson Liberal  Chaffey  Nationals SA Karlene Maywald 17.2 20.0 3.8 Tim Whetstone Liberal  Mitchell  Independent Kris Hanna 0.6 N/A 2.1* Alan Sibbons Labor  Morialta  Labor Lindsay Simmons 7.9 11.1 4.1 John Gardner Liberal  Mount Gambier  Independent Rory McEwen 6.2* N/A 0.4* Don Pegler Independent  Norwood  Labor Vini Ciccarello 4.2 8.8 4.9 Steven Marshall Liberal  *Figure is versus the Liberal Party. In the electoral district of Mount Gambier, the incumbent independent Rory McEwen did not re-contest his seat, and was expected to revert to the Liberal Party. However, another independent, Don Pegler, won the seat. In the electoral district of Frome, incumbent independent Geoff Brock retained his seat won at the 2009 Frome by-election, held at the 2006 election by former leader of the Liberal Party and former Premier, Rob Kerin.

Pendulum

The following Mackerras pendulum works by lining up all of the seats according to the percentage point margin post-election on a two-candidate-preferred basis. "Safe" seats require a swing of over 10 per cent to change, "fairly safe" seats require a swing of between 6 and 10 per cent, while "marginal" seats require a swing of less than 6 per cent.Political party name abbreviations & codes, demographic ratings and seat status: AEC

Labor seats (26)MarginalBrightChloë FoxALP0.4%MitchellAlan SibbonsALP2.1%NewlandTom KenyonALP2.2%HartleyGrace PortolesiALP2.3%FloreyFrances BedfordALP3.6%ElderPat ConlonALP3.6%ColtonPaul CaicaALP4.0% MawsonLeon BignellALP4.4%WrightJennifer RankineALP4.6%AshfordSteph KeyALP4.8%LightTony PiccoloALP5.3%Fairly safeLittle ParaLee OdenwalderALP6.7%West TorrensTom KoutsantonisALP6.7%LeeMichael WrightALP7.1%TorrensRobyn GeraghtyALP7.7%KaurnaJohn HillALP8.6%SafeReynellGay ThompsonALP10.4%EnfieldJohn RauALP10.5%TaylorLeesa VlahosALP11.1%GilesLyn BreuerALP11.9%Port AdelaideKevin FoleyALP12.8%CroydonMichael AtkinsonALP14.1%NapierMichael O'BrienALP15.8%CheltenhamJay WeatherillALP16.1%PlayfordJack SnellingALP16.2%RamsayMike RannALP18.0% Liberal seats (18) MarginalChaffeyTim WhetstoneLIB3.8% v NATMorialtaJohn GardnerLIB4.1% AdelaideRachel SandersonLIB4.2% NorwoodSteven MarshallLIB 4.9% Fairly safe StuartDan van Holst PellekaanLIB7.6%SafeMorphettDuncan McFetridgeLIB11.1%FinnissMichael PengillyLIB11.2%DavenportIain EvansLIB11.8%UnleyDavid PisoniLIB12.2%WaiteMartin Hamilton-SmithLIB12.9%KavelMark GoldsworthyLIB15.8%HeysenIsobel RedmondLIB16.5%SchubertIvan VenningLIB17.8%GoyderSteven GriffithsLIB18.3%HammondAdrian PederickLIB19.0%MacKillopMitch WilliamsLIB20.1% v INDBraggVickie ChapmanLIB21.1%FlindersPeter TreloarLIB26.2%Independent seats (3)Mt GambierDon PeglerIND0.4% v LIBFromeGeoff BrockIND7.5% v LIBFisherBob SuchIND16.6% v LIB

Legislative Council

Prior to the election, of 22 seats, Labor and the Liberals held eight seats each, Family First and No Pokies held two seats each, and the Greens and Democrat-turned-independent David Winderlich held one seat each. Up for election were five Liberal, four Labor, one Family First, and Winderlich. Labor and the Liberals won four seats each, with one each to Family First and the Greens, with the last spot to Dignity for Disability candidate Kelly Vincent. This gives an upper house composition of eight Labor, seven Liberal, two Greens, two Family First, two independent No Pokies, and one Dignity for Disability.

Campaign Rann Labor opened the campaign by announcing the duplication (one-way to two-way) of the Southern Expressway, due to be completed by 2014. Additional specialist maths and science teachers for South Australian high schools were announced. Tens of thousands of extra training places and apprenticeships as part of a pledge to create 100,000 extra jobs during the next six years, despite a healthy economy, assisted by mining and defence industries, and the lowest state unemployment figures in the country.

Under Labor, the Royal Adelaide Hospital would be abandoned and a new hospital built on the site of the old rail yards, moving Adelaide's main hospital from the eastern end to the western end of North Terrace in the Central Business District, within the electoral district of Adelaide. The Liberals and minor party Save the RAH were campaigning against this, with the Liberals proposing renovations on the current site.

Australian Football League (AFL) games and other sporting events are expected to be moved away from AAMI Stadium to new grounds. The Liberals proposed a new sports stadium on the old rail yards, while Labor proposed a major overhaul of Adelaide Oval, also in the electoral district of Adelaide.

A large unfunded liability within the workers compensation scheme known as WorkCover had built up under both Labor and Liberal governments, which sparked sweeping payout reductions under the last term of the Rann government, with the legislation passed in Parliament by both major parties, but came under sustained criticism from both the left and the right. The left were critical of monetary cuts to injured or otherwise incapable workers (see 2008 Parnell–Bressington filibuster), while the Liberals attacked WorkCover's operations, claiming there was wasteful duplication and a decrease in accountability, argued that this contributed to its budget problems, and that under a Liberal government WorkCover's insurance and regulatory arms would be split.

Attorney-General Michael Atkinson had been the subject of sustained criticism by the internet generation demographic for refusing to allow classification of and therefore legally allow certain types of explicit media (see Michael Atkinson#Media classification and censorship). Gamers 4 Croydon was created and contested Atkinson's seat of Croydon, as well as Adelaide, Norwood, Light, Mawson, and the upper house. Though the Liberals had not pledged a different stance on the issue, Atkinson suffered a larger than average primary swing of 16 points and two-party-preferred swing of 12 points in his seat. Following the election, Atkinson announced his immediate resignation from the Rann ministry, and that he would not recontest his seat at the next election. It was announced that the new Rann Labor Attorney General would be John Rau, who expressed that he held a different view to his predecessor, and would be talking with his interstate counterparts at the next meeting of Attorneys General.

The election campaign was overshadowed by affair allegations against Rann.

Although it was apparent only a few hours after the polls closed that Rann Labor had retained majority government, it was four days after the election that Rann officially claimed victory, after Redmond eventually conceded that the Liberals had not won enough seats to be capable of forming a government. The Governor of South Australia subsequently re-appointed Mike Rann as Premier of South Australia.

Labor retained government despite the Liberals winning a bare majority of the statewide two-party vote. The "fairness clause" in the state constitution was intended to ensure that the party winning the statewide two-party vote would win a majority of seats. On the boundaries drawn after the 2006 election, which were based on over a quarter-century of voting patterns, a uniform swing of 6.9 percent would have seen the Liberals take seven seats off Labor—on paper, enough to make Redmond South Australia's first female premier. However, despite suffering a swing of 8.4 percent, Labor only lost three seats, and only two of them—Morialta and Adelaide—saw swings of 6.9 percent or more. While 22 seats saw double-digit swings, Labor sat on insurmountably safe margins in 16 of them. Labor actually picked up swings in their favour in their two most marginal seats, Light and Mawson. The ABC's Antony Green observed that Labor lost votes in seats that would have stayed in Labor hands in any event, while holding onto its support in seats the Liberals needed to win government.2010 election preview from Antony Green

Additionally, the Liberals only won nine of the 34 metropolitan seats, though all three seats they took off Labor were in Adelaide. For most of the four decades since the end of the Playmander, South Australian politics have been characterised by an extreme urban-rural split. Under normal conditions, Labor wins the most seats in the capital, while most of the Liberal vote is packed into ultra-safe rural seats. The 2010 election was no different. While six of the Liberals' 13 safe seats were urban, all but one of their four marginal seats were urban. As was the case at the 1989 election, much of the Liberal majority was wasted on landslides in their rural heartland.

Candidates See Candidates of the South Australian state election, 2010

Retiring

Liberal Graham Gunn MHA (Stuart) Liz Penfold MHA (Flinders) Robert Lawson MLC Caroline Schaefer MLC

Labor Lea Stevens MHA (Little Para) Trish White MHA (Taylor)

Other Rory McEwen MHA (Mount Gambier, Independent)

Polling

Newspoll polling is conducted via random telephone number selection in city and country areas. Sampling sizes consist of just under 900 electors, with the 14–18 March 2010 poll consisting of just under 1600 electors. The declared margin of errors are ± 3.5 percent and ± 2.5 percent respectively.