Additionally, Labor had never come close to winning any seat in Palmerston in the Assembly's history. Robertson Barracks, long a solid base of Army support for the CLP and particularly for Burke, had been redistributed out of the electorate. Even with the loss of the barracks, Burke still held Brennan with a seemingly insurmountable majority of 19 percent, making it the CLP's safest seat. However, James Burke rolled him on a 20-point swing, which came as a shock even to Labor. Burke had promised to resign if he failed to win the election, but his unseating forced the CLP to immediately replace him with Carney. From 2007-11, Burke worked in the United Arab Emirates as a high level Advisor to the Abu Dhabi Government.
