This is the most serious campaign the Greens have ever mounted (one art fundraiser alone raised $35,000). Ms Bhathal seems much more focused. In the lead-up to the last election she said one of her greatest achievements was getting rid of Labor's Martin Ferguson, who had retired. She admits that those comments were the product of being overly enthusiastic. Batman, which stretches from Clifton Hill in the south to Thomastown in the north, is held by Labor frontbencher David Feeney by 10.6 per cent, but the party's primary vote has dropped from 57 per cent in 2007 to 41 per cent three years ago. The seat, once the home of Labor stalwarts Ferguson and Brian Howe, looms as the next lower house seat most likely to fall to the Greens. Despite Mr Feeney's healthy margin, a combination of demographic change, a disastrous week in the news where his undisclosed property was revealed (with a pro-Greens sign on the front lawn), and potential Liberals preference swaps have sent Labor into panic.

"I'm really proud to be a Tampa Green," Ms Bhathal told Fairfax Media this week, after revealing that in her university days she was involved with the ALP including working with Julia Gillard as a volunteer at the Commonwealth students' conference. Over time she became disillusioned with "careerist politics", but when she saw the footage of children on the Tampa and a subsequent interview with then Greens leader Bob Brown she joined the Greens. With Mr Feeney under the blowtorch for failing to live in Batman or disclosing his $2.3 million Northcote property, Ms Bhathal said she did not want the election to be about individuals, but rather wanted a focus on policies. She nominated housing affordability, multiculturalism and immigration and climate action as major strengths. Ms Bhathal has lived in the electorate for three decades with her GP husband and the couple own a home in South Preston. The Greens have mounted their biggest ever grassroots push for Batman with hundreds of volunteers doorknocking homes throughout the electorate, with a major focus on communities north of Bell Street.

Ms Bhathal said the Greens were now getting to have conversations in the northern communities, which in the past were strongly Labor, with housing affordability and negative gearing a major concern for residents. "I've never had phone calls from Italian grandmothers before, now they are ringing me," Ms Bhathal said. A Greens placard has been erected by tenants of Labor MP David Feeney's investment property in Northcote, urging locals in the Melbourne seat of Batman to vote for Greens candidate Alex Bhathal Credit:Paul Jeffers The rise to the Greens leadership of Richard Di Natale, the son of Italian migrants who also grew up in Melbourne's northern suburbs, has helped sway voters in traditional Labor parts of the electorate, the party believes.