Dale Wakefield

Dale Suzanne Wakefield is an Australian politician. She was a Labor member of the Northern Territory Legislative Assembly from 2016 to 2020, representing the electorate of Braitling, defeating former Chief Minister Adam Giles in a major upset.

Early life and career

Wakefield was born in Melbourne. She obtained a degree in social work from Latrobe and Monash University.
After working in road trauma rehabilitation, Wakefield moved to Alice Springs in 2004. She has been a member of the Alice Springs Health Governing Council and was chairwoman and board member of Central Australian Women's Legal Service. Before entering politics, she ran the Alice Springs Women's Shelter for eight years.
She was a NT finalist for the 2015 Telstra Business Women Awards.

Politics

Wakefield stood against Chief Minister Adam Giles in the 2016 election, in the south Alice Springs seat of Braitling. Going into the election, Braitling was the fourth-safest seat in the Territory; Wakefield needed a 19.6 percent swing to win it. Like Alice Springs as a whole, Braitling had long been considered Country Liberal Party heartland; it had only been out of the party's hands for two terms since its creation in 1984, when CLP-turned-independent Loraine Braham held it 2001 to 2008. Labor had never won an inner Alice Springs seat before, and had never come particularly close to winning Braitling. For example, even during the CLP's near-meltdown in 2005, Labor was pushed into third place behind Braham and the CLP.