Former Victorian premier Jacinta Allan will leave politics at November’s state election, bringing to an end a 27-year parliamentary career that began when she was elected at just 25.
Allan announced on 14 August that she would not recontest Bendigo East, the seat she has held since 1999, weeks after stepping down as premier following a loss of support within the Labor caucus.
Her departure closes one of the longest careers in contemporary Victorian politics. Allan entered Parliament as the first Labor member for Bendigo East and the first woman to represent Bendigo in an Australian parliament. She went on to serve in numerous ministerial portfolios, became deputy premier and succeeded Daniel Andrews as Victoria’s 49th premier in 2023.
Announcing her decision, Allan returned to the first speech she gave to Parliament almost 27 years ago, when she promised she intended “to make a difference”.
She said Bendigo had remained central to her political life, pointing to the city’s new hospital, upgrades to public schools, new railway stations at Goornong, Huntly and Raywood, investment in Bendigo TAFE and the development of the GovHub, law courts and Ulumbarra Theatre among the changes during her time in office.
“There are no words big enough to describe what this community means to me,” Allan said.
Her statement was also unusually personal, reflecting on entering Parliament as the daughter of working parents and later becoming a wife and mother while building a political career that eventually took her to the state’s highest office.
“There were extraordinary days. There were bloody hard ones too,” she said.
Allan said the political values with which she entered Parliament had remained unchanged, including her support for public education and health, secure work and ensuring regional communities were not treated as secondary to Melbourne.
Her political career ended differently from how she might have expected only months ago. Allan had been preparing to lead Labor to the November election before internal pressure on her leadership culminated in her stepping aside in late July. Ben Carroll subsequently became Premier.
Carroll paid tribute to his predecessor on Friday, saying Allan’s public life had been shaped by the belief that regional Victorians should have access to the same opportunities as people living in the state’s major cities.
“For 27 years, Jacinta Allan has poured her heart into the community she loves,” Carroll said.
He credited Allan with helping reshape Bendigo through investment in health, education, transport, arts and sporting infrastructure, saying she had “helped build it into the proud, thriving regional centre it is today”.
Allan’s departure also creates another challenge for Labor ahead of the election, with the party now needing a new candidate for Bendigo East after almost three decades of Allan representing the seat. The Nationals are contesting the electorate with candidate Andrew Lethlean.
For Victoria’s Indian community, Allan will also be remembered as a premier who developed a visible relationship with India and regularly engaged with the state’s growing Indian population. But her political story is ultimately much larger than any one community.
It began in Bendigo when she was 25 and, as Allan made clear in announcing her departure, that is where she wants it remembered.
“When I leave Parliament, I’ll leave the same way I arrived,” she said. “A daughter of Bendigo. A daughter of workers. A proud Labor woman.”
After 27 years, Allan’s promise to Bendigo that she would try to make a difference has become her final argument for how her political career should be judged.
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