The Coalition suffered a 7% swing against it at the 1969 election, and Labor outpolled it on the two-party-preferred vote. During the close election Gorton promised to waive all future government rent on residential leaseholders in Canberra. After surviving the election Gorton came through on his promise, giving away an estimated $100 million in equity to leaseholders and abandoning future government rent revenue. Still, Gorton saw the sizeable 45-seat majority he had inherited from Holt cut down to only seven. Indeed, the Coalition might have lost government had it not been for the Democratic Labor Party's longstanding practice of preferencing against the ALP. The Coalition was only assured of a ninth term in government when DLP preferences tipped four marginal seats in Melbourne —the DLP's heartland—to the Liberals. Had those preferences gone the other way, Whitlam would have become Prime Minister.