Scott Morrison enters this election hoping the Liberal Party's improving electoral fortunes along the Georges River in south-west Sydney can hold for a few more weeks.

The May poll will concentrate attention on at least five Sydney electorates considered a decent chance of changing hands.

From the Western suburbs to the Northern Beaches, a number of seats in Sydney will hold the key to election victory.

The most marginal of the Liberal seats at risk is Banks, which hugs the north of the Georges Rivers between Kogarah and Bankstown in southern Sydney – an area that has increasingly tended to vote conservative in state and federal elections.

Banks was held by an uninterrupted run of Labor candidates between 1949 and 2013 but has since been won twice by Liberal representative, David Coleman, who was last year promoted into the role of Immigration Minister.

At the same time, the Coalition has returned improving results in state seats that cover similar areas.

At last month’s state election, in which there was a general 3 percentage point swing away from the Liberal Party, Oatley Liberal MP Mark Coure recorded a 3.8 percentage point swing in his favour. There was also 0.1 point swing for Wendy Lindsay in neighbouring East Hills – enough for the Liberals to hang on to that seat.

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"The demographics along the Georges River are changing without a doubt," said Mr Coure.

"When you've got medium property prices increasing, mixed in, I have to say, with some very good campaigning, you are getting results that are bucking the trend."

Mr Coure said the area was increasingly home to young families, from a broadening mix of backgrounds – in particular the sub-continent, and mainland China and Hong Kong. The demographics should help Mr Coleman, Mr Coure predicted.

Mr Coleman’s challenger in Banks, Chris Gambian, agreed the profile of the electorate was changing, but not that it had become more receptive to the Liberal Party.

"Banks has always been an area of a lot of migration, and as the community mix has changed that's brought in new people to talk to and engage with and understand," said Mr Gambian, an official with the Finance Sector Union who at the 2016 election reduced the seat's margin from 2.8 per cent to 1.4 per cent.

"I see that as the job, not as something to struggle against."

Ben Raue, a psephologist who noted the Georges River trend on his blog The Tally Room, puts Banks as one of five Sydney seats of particular interest in May.

Of those, Reid in Sydney’s inner west is another that could fall to Labor, though they would have to overcome the Liberals' margin of 4.7 per cent.

The Liberals have picked child psychologist Fiona Martin to replace departing MP Craig Laundy. But Ms Martin will face an uphill battle against Labor candidate Sam Crosby, who has been campaigning in the area for the past year.

Although it is difficult to translate results from state elections to federal races, Mr Crosby said he was "heartened" by a general 3 per cent swing to state Labor in areas intersecting with Reid.

"I've been working on campaigns here for a long time,” said Mr Crosby of previous elections. "It hasn't felt this good for quite a while ... the feeling is good."

Lindsay in the city’s outer west, held by only 1.1 per cent, is one the Liberals are hopeful of regaining from Labor. Emma Husar, who was elected for Labor in 2016, departed the party in a storm of controversy and the ALP candidate will this time be former state MP Diane Beamer.

In Wentworth in the eastern suburbs, Liberal Dave Sharma will attempt to reclaim Malcolm Turnbull's former seat from independent Kerryn Phelps.

And there is Warringah in the north, where barrister and independent Zali Steggall is taking on former prime minister Tony Abbott.

Outside of Sydney, there are a host of seats where the outcome is uncertain.

These include Gilmore on the south coast, where former NSW Nationals MP Katrina Hodgkinson will run in a three-cornered race against the Liberals' Warren Mundine and Labor's Fiona Phillips; Robertson on the Central Coast, where the Liberals' Lucy Wicks has a margin of only 1.1 per cent; and Cowper on the north coast, where former Nationals and independent MP Robert Oakeshott is contesting a seat in which the incumbent, Nationals MP Luke Hartsuyker, is retiring from politics.