In the 2007 Federal Parliament Election, held on 24th November 2007, John Howard lost his Bennelong seat to the ALP’s Maxine McKew.
The primary vote in 2007 was:
| Votes | Name | Party |
| 39,551 | John Howard | LIB |
| 39,408 | Maxine McKew | ALP |
| 4,811 | Lindsay Peters | GRN |
| 1,119 | Robyn Peebles | CDP |
| 610 | Peter Lloyd Goldfinch | DEM |
| 289 | Lorraine Markwell | FFP |
| 269 | Margherita Tracanelli | CCC |
| 261 | Victor Waterson | ONP |
| 239 | Graeme Cordiner | IND |
| 123 | David L Allen | IND |
| 97 | Yusuf Tahir | – |
| 89 | David Leyonhjelm | LDP |
| 70 | Gavin Spencer | CEC |
The 2004 Result for this Bennelong seat was:
| Votes | Name | Party |
| 38,326 | John Howard | LIB |
| 21,819 | Nicole Campbell | ALP |
| 12,573 | Andrew Wilkie | GRN |
| 1,824 | Ray Levick | CDP |
| 967 | Peter Lloyd Goldfinch | DEM |
| 854 | Gary Hannah | IND |
| 451 | Troy Rollo | IND |
Maxine McKew was a very popular broadcast journalist, until just before entering Politics in 2007.
Her popularity, rather than Political experience, gave her the edge to defeat John Howard, but only once the Green vote was directed to the ALP.