The seat was first proclaimed in 1901 and was named after the second Governor of New South Wales, John Hunter (1737-1821).
Since 1901 only nine people have been elected to represent the seat of Hunter in the Federal Parliament. The first Member for Hunter was Sir Edmund Barton who served as Prime Minister between 1 January 1901 and 24 September 1903.
The 2016 New South Wales Federal Redistribution resulted in the disappearance of the Charlton electorate and the Hunter electorate gained most of the urban areas of the western shore of Lake Macquarie. It lost Maitland and Kurri Kurri to the re-drawn Paterson, towns north of Aberdeen including Scone to New England, and Kandos and Rylstone to Calare.
At the time of the last Federal Election in 2016, there were 113,469 electors enrolled to vote in an area of approximately 10 640 sq km.
The Hunter electorate includes the Muswellbrook Shire Council, Singleton Council, Cessnock City Council (part) and Lake Macquarie City Council (part). The main towns include Broke, Cessnock, Denman, Muswellbrook, Putty, Singleton, Toronto, Widden and Wyee.
Hunter also includes the New South Wales Legislative Assembly electorate of Cessnock, parts of Maitland, Wallsend and Lake Macquarie.
The main industries and products of the area include; Agriculture, coal-mining, dairy farming, engineering, farming, forestry, fruit and vegetables, horse studs and racing, timber milling, tourism, wine grapes, wineries and wool. Liddell and Bayswater Power Stations are also within the electorate.
For a detailed map of the electorate click here click here
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