This post will not be further updated. Results below are not final. For up-to-date results visit the AEC’s Virtual Tally Room site.
| 2007 | 2004 | ||||
| ALP | LIB | ALP | LIB | Swing | |
| Booths | 20,957 51.05 |
20,097 48.95 |
18,911 47.99 |
20,497 52.01 |
3.06 |
| Pre-Poll | 3,631 47.40 |
4,030 52.60 |
2,333 42.61 |
3,142 57.39 |
4.78 |
| Absent | 411 53.17 |
362 46.83 |
413 51.30 |
392 48.70 |
1.87 |
| Postal | 802 41.38 |
1136 58.62 |
610 38.46 |
976 61.54 |
2.92 |
| Provisional | 52 61.90 |
32 38.10 |
346 53.89 |
296 46.11 |
8.01 |
| Total | 25,853 50.19 |
25,657 49.81 |
22,613 47.19 |
25,303 52.81 |
3.00 |
| ALP (adjusted) | 50.2 | ||||
| LIB (adjusted) | 49.8 | ||||
Saturday evening. This post will be used to follow the final stages of the count in Solomon, where at the close of election night counting the ABC computer has Country Liberal Party incumbent Dave Tollner 0.2 per cent ahead of Labor candidate Damien Hale. On raw figures from the AEC Hale is 1.0 per cent ahead, but the Liberals performed strongly on absent, pre-poll and postal votes in 2004.
Sunday evening. Solomon seems to produce a lot of pre-polls: if the numbers are similar to last time, there’s still only 30 per cent counted. These are have so far produced a slightly bigger swing than the booth votes, adding 0.1 per cent to Damian Hale’s adjusted lead.
Monday evening. It seems only rechecking was done today.
Tuesday 4pm. Still nothing, but comments chat informs us that pre-polls still to come which include those from more conservative Palmerston. Postal votes lean the CLP’s way in Solomon due to overseas Defence Force personnel.
Tuesday 11pm. 485 absent votes have broken 255-230 Damian Hale’s way, though only in marginally greater proportion than they did for Labor in 2004. This puts Damian Hale’s lead at a very handy 718 votes, but the ABC reports that “Australian Electoral Commission says staff will count 1,500 electronically lodged military votes tomorrow (and more pre-poll votes on Thursday)”, suggesting Tollner can expect a boost in tomorrow’s counting.
Wednesday 5pm. As foreshadowed, 1587 new “postal” votes have been added, presumably the military votes referred to in the previous entry, and they have split 939-648 in Tollner’s favour. This is not greatly out of proportion with the result on postals from 2004, although it cuts Hale’s lead to 427 votes.
Thursday 5pm. Another 2572 pre-polls have narrowed the gap by a further 166 votes, to 262. I am informed via comments that there are “an estimated 1500 to 2000 more pre-polls from interstate and overseas”, suggesting there were a lot more of these than at the last election. If they continue to go 53 per cent Tollner’s way, he should claw back a little over 100 more votes. However, 2004 patterns suggest Hale should pick up a little on provisional votes and remaining absent votes.
Monday 3pm. Tollner has made up 79 votes from the counting of 1693 pre-polls from interestate (thanks to ALP Campaign Genius for the info in comments), cutting the Labor lead from 262 to 183.
Monday 8pm. Tollner keeps whittling away that lead, a further 225 postal votes going 133-92 his way and reducing the deficit to 142.
Tuesday 11pm. Hale gains 20 from the counting of 84 provisionals, but loses five from 21 absents. He now leads by 158.
Wednesday 8pm. Here as elsewhere, Labor is slowly dying a death of a thousand cuts. Today saw another 767 pre-polls cut the lead from 158 to 89. There are another 820 to come, which will leave it almost dead even if they go the same way as the last batch. On top of that are 200 absents and even smaller handfuls of provisionals and postals which should break more or less evenly.
Thursday 8pm. A huge reversal of late-count fortune has probably sealed the deal for Hale. A batch of 297 pre-polls, presumably coming from a Labor area, broke 188-109 his way; 267 absent votes favoured him 148 to 119; and further postals went only 59-57 in favour of Tollner. Hale now leads by 194.
Friday 8pm. With only tiny trickles of votes still coming in (three pre-polls for Hale and one for Tollner, plus five postals each), Hale has claimed victory. This post will close for business unless there’s some surprise late development.
99 Comments
and there are heaps of them this time around.
The AEC had polling booths in main traffic centres for the past two weeks.
Its said there are 10,000 pre-poll votes.
and the Empty News (as the Crocodile, Dingo and Road Crash Gazette is descibed by locals) says 8000 votes to count.
Yeah db, but not all pre-poll as such. A mix of pre-poll, postal and absentee will get it up to the 8,000 figure.
apology accepted.
R U OK db. I was indeed pointing out your misunderstanding of terminology i.e. what pre-poll means. Postal and absentee votes are described seperarely and differently.
I think what you actually meant in your initial post was
“There’s about 10,000 votes to count yet”. I accept your retraction in advance.
I think we both agree that it will be some time before the mist lifts.
On 8000 votes Tollner would need 56% of TPP to win.
done some sums….
Assuming 8000 pre-polls and etc… I have Tollner winning by 350 votes based on
6000 prepolls CLP 57.4 / ALP 42.6 TPP (from 2004)
1500 postal CLP 61 / ALP 38 TPP
500 provisional CLP 46 / ALP 54 TPP
thats
Tollner: 20129 + 3444 + 915 + 230 = 24718
Hale: 20941 + 2556 + 585 + 270 = 24352
I would think the postals and provisionals would be about the same in number from last time. Pre-polls have increased due to a bigger effort to service the electorate at large by the AEC (5400 votes that way in 2004).
for Hale to win.. (besides if my numbers are skewiff) he must have limited the pre-poll vote to the CLP in the split 54.5/45.5 – the current 3% swing.. interesting.
If there are more than 6000 pre-polls.. then the margin might be bigger to Tollner.
so… any which way.. it should be the smallest margin electorate in Australia.. again.
any thoughts?
is that one booth in?… 1500 votes… 53/47…
more?
Hale: 21694
Tollner: 20983
Good breakdown. Not sure when u went to the AEC site last but it was updated today @ 3-30 our time and the margin was out to 50.8/49.2 (ALP way) and removed from the too close to call list.
Been doing a bit of research too and I see that there are 3 outstanding booths to be counted. Not sure about the raw numbers here (? 600-700 ) but they are the 2 Mobile Hospitals and the Mobile Prison votes. Given that they all were around the 56% ++ in favour of the ALP in 2004, there is a little buffer maybe, helping DH to absorb some of the prepoll hit.
Will be interesting to see how many Greens pre-polled too. Not sure of their voting pattern in this regard.
I can safely say that I don’t think Maurice F. and his immediate family would have pre-polled though (LOL). Cheers.
BTW, I’ve been getting my booth info from this site too.
http://www.orgburo.com/elections/
Five Solomon pre-polling booths
Darwin x 2
Airport
Casuarina
Palmerston
if this first 1500 is the booth at Palmerston, then Hale has won.
The margin has narrowed to just over 700 votes.
Damien Hale needs to be 300 in front before postals.
My reading of it is that he will be.
I’d be wary of using 2004 as a great guide to pre-polls and postals in this seat.
Expecting an extremely tight finish and obviously hoping that Damian can hang on. He’s one of the best candidates I’ve worked with/for.
13
ALP Campaign Genius Says:
I’d be wary of using 2004 as a great guide to pre-polls and postals in this seat.
Yup.
The support for Hale around town has been phenomenal. Still is; there were cars drivng around yesterday with ALP flags waving from them, my neighbour across the road yelled “KEVIN OH SEVEN!” when she saw me this morning. Tollner has been on the nose, even with some of the rusted on CLP folk. Good luck to Hale!
“Flash Says:
November 26th, 2007 at 9:54 am
On another matter, ABC radio in Melbourne is suggesting Clare Martin will resign as NT Chief Minister today, possibly to play a role in the new federal government.”
Henderson as CM?
and a spot for Damian Hale if he loses Solomon?
Mad Max..
the raw numbers on the three outstanding booths:
Hospital 1 + 2 and Prison would suggest a net gain (compared to 2004) of around 30 to Hale.
there were less than 200 votes cast in 2004 at those three places combined.
Update:
http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HouseDivisionFirstPrefs-13745-307.htm
the narrowing!!!
8 votes off Hale 21685
5 votes off Tollner 20978
Hale 21676
Tollner 20959
umm.. going backwards…
who is driving this bus?
Changes like that after fresh scrutiny of the booths aren’t that surprising.
Just had an update after the second lot of pre-polls were counted. They were 395-327 (2PP) in favour of Tollner.
Hale now leads by 657 (22005-21348).
At the time of writing, the AEC site hasn’t been updated with these pre-poll votes.
how many to go?
all the booths in..
hmm…
Prison: Hale 11
Tolner 0
Hospital 1: Hale 44
Tollner 31
Hospital 2: Hale 26
Tollner 12
net 36 to Hale.
Mr “Tough on Crime” smacked by the jail. LOL
The gaol would be overwhelmingly indigenous.
dartboard predicts….
Damian Hale has lost.
Why?
the pre-polling booths to date reflects Inner Darwin and Northern Suburbs polling. (vis a vis the Greens vote at 9.00%). In 2004 the Greens vote was the same or lower at pre-polls.
Palmerston aggregate Greens vote at the 6 booths was about 5% (2004 vote similar at poll and pre-poll) on aggregate and therefore by taking the incumbent swing shown on the booths from Inner Darwin/Northern Suburbs to date (3.5%) and adding that to the Palmerston results cf 55%.. gives 58/42 TPP.
The Palmerston Booth should return 1400-1500 or more. On the above figures thats +250-300 votes. Add to that the other prepolls booths totalling up to 6000 at 53.5/46.5 (+150), take away for Provisionals 44/56 (-60) and add in the postals 60/40 (+300).
Toller wins.
and the more pre-polls.. the greater the margin.
any comments?
Postals are even according to AEC
Damian may do a little better than 42/58 in the Palmerston pre-polls.
He is a local in Palmerston and the swings to Labor there were better than most of us expected – the surprise for me is that Darwin (i.e. non-Palmerston Darwin) didn’t swing more to Labor.
Hale leading by 675.
A little more concrete today on the number of “other” votes from the AEC:
Provisional: 1236
Pre-Poll: 5760
Postal: 67 – waiting on deliveries?
of this, 2370 of the prepoll have been counted giving a swing back to Tollner of 170 votes.
Theres perhaps 5500 in total to go, with the more conservative majority to be counted (postals, overseas forces and the Palmerston booth).
Postals are approximately 1300 each according to AEC (as provided by each party). The ones provided directly to the AEC could go either way.
The AEC doesn’t list Solomon as one of its close seats, nor is it featured in the article in the Australian today which covers all the still undecided seats (including Sturt). The latest AEC figure is about 50.78 in favour of Hale. Could this be chalked up as a Labor gain?
MGM, I wouldn’t be claiming it yet. I am reasonably confident but we haven’t seen any postals – and they will include more than 300 votes from the Defence Force which I expect to go heavily Tollner’s way.
ALG, I have a nice collect on Hale to win the seat. When would your guess be on a result being known? Would you say it is 50/50 at the moment?
Cheers
Fatcat, the technical answer is Friday of next week (Dec 7) as that’s the last day votes can be admitted/counted.
But the picture might be a little clearer after we’ve seen most of the postals and absentees and that should happen by the end of this week.
Whatever happens, most betting agencies aren’t paying out until polls are declared.
I stuck a massive amount on the Libs winning the seat of Grey (at $1.24 on Centrebet, it was an invitation to print money) and despite the inevitability of the outcome, I’m yet to be paid.
Thanks Genius. Fingers crossed! Had a good win myself on Corangamite. The $1.85 on offer looked a gift.
Damian’s lead now up to 721. He’s just won the first batch of Absentees by 25 (255-230). This batch came from Lingiari (i.e. Alice Springs, Tennant Creek, Katherine, etc).
Postals tomorrow – up to 1400 to be counted. They may make the picture clearer.
@24
Help !!! Are those mobile figures right? Difficult to reconcile only 11 Prison voters and 113 Hospital voters.
Anybody in “the know” able to help out with this one please.
My understanding is that Berrimah has 300 “residents” at least and the RDH has a 300 bed capacity. Even in unusual circumstances one would think that there would be at least 50% of them as registered voters.
Tomorrow is the real test now. I think Damien is in a good position going into this part of the count. It will be very interesting too because I believe there are a number of ADF votes in the mix. Will be watching the AEC site closely.
BTW Genius– good bet on Grey if u have that sort of money to outlay. 28% return is a top result anytime.
here’s the local insight..
from ABC news:
Meanwhile in the Northern Territory seat of Solomon, recounts and postal votes have added complications to the tally.
Iain Loganathan from the Australian Electoral Commission says staff will count 1,500 electronically lodged military votes tomorrow and more pre-poll votes on Thursday.
“Obviously we try to count the votes as quickly as we can but my main priority is to make sure the count is accurate,” he said.
But Mr Loganathan says unless the margin widens with the counting of postal votes, the final outcome could still be unclear.
“Postal votes can still come in until next Friday,” he said.
“There’ll be a large count of early votes on Thursday and depending the way that count goes, what the margin, is, whether that gives a clear indication I really can’t speculate.”
a guess on my part…
2004 turnout was just over 91%
So far in 2007 we have “Enrolment: 57,560 Turnout: 78.55%”
therefore.. there are about 12% of the votes to count.. somewhere around 7000.
anyone taking bets?
How does this work? According to the Virtual Tally Room, 475 postal vote envelopes were issued for Solomon, and yet 496 ballots have been received?
http://vtr.aec.gov.au/Default.htm
Sorry, link should be http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HouseDivisionDecScrutinyProgress-13745-307.htm
so the lead is Hale by 716 votes after stumps on day 3, up 5 votes 3 days ago, some Postal, prepoll and Absentee to count. Hale won Absentee today and should be roughly Equall at Pre Poll.
Tollners run rate is blowing out.
Thanks Max (comment 37). Though Fatcat trumped me getting the Cheese Man of Corangamite at $1.85
Some of those hospital voters you refer to might be permanent postal voters so they wouldn’t vote in mobile booths – I might ask my good friends at the other end of the Stuart Highway if they have more info about that.
I’m really nervous about today. Come on Damian!
Tollner is coming back. The ALP lead is now only 427 votes.
This will go down right ot he wire.
Maybe our esteemed William knows a thing or 2 about these things
Virtually all postals including o/s military now counted.
All that remains is 2000 provisionals which typically favour Labor and absentee votes from interstate and o/s which will be not too bad for them either.
Prediction: Hale to win by between 150 and 200 votes.
“the Cleaner” @ 46 ( you must be a misso), at 2.23 pm AEDT the AEC posting had 81.37% of votes counted, in 2004 there was 91% voter turn out, which when I do the numbers suggest that there’s another 6500 votes to count.
Assuming the 1500 electronic lodgment military votes are already in the mix, I understand they where to be counted this am, Tollner needs to poll better than 53% of the remaining votes ( thats assuming there are still 6500 to count).
Any inside info that can confirm the number of outanding ballot papers ?
Sorry.
Correction – 3500-4300 pre polls from Casuarina (likely to favour Hale) and Palmerston (likely to favour Tollner) also outstanding.
I stand by my prediction – Hale by 150-200 votes
the AEC has 8642 “declaration” votes received on the website (ignoring the 11141 issued).
So far 4437 votes have been counted “after” the fact.
There must be at least 4200 votes to be counted, and potentially another 2500 on top of that going on the 91% voting pattern and the AEC top figure.
let me draw you a graph
Hale…………….X………………Tollner
x marks the winner.. somewhere in between
+150 for Hale and + 150 for Tollner.
its that close.
The Postals actually weren’t quite as bad for Hale as I’d feared with Tollner getting 59% 2PP.
The info that “The Cleaner” has is reasonably similar to what I’ve heard from our people in Darwin.
I understand that there are no more than about 2800 Pre-Polls remaining (yes, from Casuarina and Palmerston) and there will be at least 300 more Absentees (which will come from outside the NT).
Hale might profit from Provisional Votes – ALP candidates usually do. I’m told there are about 1200 but, of course, not all of them will be admitted.
About 800 provisional votes were counted in 04 they went 51% to Labor.
The AEC issued 7926 pre poll votes, 5506 have been recieved and 2370 have been counted so there are 3136 recieved but not counted and 2420 issued but not recieved, so potentially there are 5556 prepolls to count, in 04 they went 57/42 to Tollner.
If the swing to Labor holds up with the prepolls and they pick up a few in the provisionals they might just scrap in
Re: Comment 9, by ‘NOT SO MAD MAX’ :
“I can safely say that I don’t think Maurice F. and his immediate family would have pre-polled though (LOL)”.
You make some interesting comments, Max… I haven’t spent much time on blogs to date… what does LOL mean? Lord, oh Lord?
I hope in my ‘immediate family’ you only include Jaques Chester, the reasonable LDP candidate, to whom I gave my No. 2 – and not the ‘Witchburner’ Trudy Campbell, to whom I gave No. 6…!
Re: Comment 2 by ‘dartboard’:
“… the Empty News (as the Crocodile, Dingo and Road Crash Gazette is described by locals) …”
Beautiful. I’d never heard it before. May I use it? I love it: The MT News… !
Re: All the above comments…
I hope all you commentators spent as much time considering the choices you did have before the election as you are wasting now pretending that there is still some sort of sports contest going on! The election is over. While its amusing to guess which way things will go, it doesn’t actually achieve any deeper understanding of what its all supposed to be about… democracy. May as well talk about last century’s left-right schema, or wonder whether people with red shoes vote Labor…
How did any of you actually vote, BTW…?
I voted this way: Foley, Chester, Hudson, Hale, Tollner, Campbell…
i.e. considering the ‘real’ choice we had, I voted:
21st Century ‘non-modern’ philosophy, 18th Century libertarianism, 20th Century dolphin kissing, 19th Century Aussie Lite, 19th Century Aussie Low, 16th Century ‘Witchburner’ … see http://www.vote1sense.com for more…
[with the single proviso that by 'Aussie Lite' I mean Rudd - not DH, who is clearly no bimbo - and whom I thought would have had it won [damn, back to the racing analogies again!] by 8pm on Sat. night. I thought the 2PP would be min 52.5 – 47.5 to DH.
I have to congratulate DT though… Surely now people will stop calling him stupid. ‘Dopey Dave’ is not – and never was dopey (I’ve known and liked him since ‘86) and, in the circumstances Dave has done unbelievably well… Commentators who think Dave Tollner’s remarkable performance (doing much better than his party – as he did in 2004) is due only to dissatisfaction with Clare do not know Darwin. Dave is genuinely popular… not least [but not only] among those simpletons who think that they too could be Member for Solomon… if only they had more time to read the NT News!
Final comment for now…
First, to Clare and Syd
Vale Clare, Syd and your families. Please do stay on as you promised… you both have enough understanding of how difficult it is to get anything lasting done up here that you will not be destabilising influences on the back-bench or anywhere else you want to work… After having good, long, necessary holidays… anywhere you feel like – to restart your own lives…
The way you were able to hand over – at an excellent time – to people who have been well groomed is an absolute credit to you both…
I attended their last press conference [as TiM, Territory independent Media] and thought they both look energetic enough to be around for a long time to come…
As for the other media present as Clare and Syd handed over so gracefully – generously and obviously genuinely thanking their families and long-term public servants who helped them ‘over the line’ in the critical years when our population actually fell as the non-investment of the CLP ‘bit’, leading to falling receipts while facing a billion dollar deficit :
The bimbo local journos – ABC Lite, MT News et al. -almost spoiled an historic occasion with idiotic questions like “were u pushed? – who told u to go? are u afraid to face Rudd? are u leaving us with no talent?” etc.
Do none of you bimbos remember what things were like during the ‘cowboy’ years…? Or would you actually prefer a return to the cowboy years…?
Or are you – like so many of the electorate – so simplistic [and under-educated] that you think government is easy, and that ‘anyone with half a brain could do as good a job’ as Clare or Syd have actually DONE…?
…And Clare and Syd – and those who supported them – have actually DONE a great thing… they [as Clare did actually say in her short - much too short, actually - 'good-bye'] “brought NT governance into the 21st century …”
NEWSFLASH:
Today’s pre-polls were 1365-1207 in Tollner’s favour (that’s the same percentage split as the first batch).
Hale now leads by 270.
Still to come: about 1200 Provisionals (though not all will be admitted); about 300 Absentees (from outside NT); and an estimated 1500 – 2000 more Pre-Polls from interstate and overseas.
The remaining Pre-Polls won’t be counted until Monday.
I’m going to have trouble sleeping this weekend!
Thank you for that information, ALP Campaign Genius. Very helpful.
Yes, thanks for the detailed info A C G.
While not comforting, it does amswer my anxiety driven concerns about “whats left”.
I remain positive but a little less confidant than 3 days ago. Of the groups remaining to be counted, the overseas group concerns me the most because they may have cast their vote without having advantage of the last week of campaign information which included issues like the racial smear that was attempted in Lindsay or the Today Tonight joint interview (LOL).
BTW , I would still rather have your Grey “super bank interest” wager.
Hey Max, believe me, I’m as nervous as you. I’ll be devastated if Damo doesn’t hang on. Being an ALP campaigner, I’ve worked with/for some forgettable candidates. But Damian is one of the best – a genuine guy who’d be an asset both to Parliament and the good burghers of Darwin and Palmerston.
By the way, the AEC shows the margin is 262, not 270 – I got my info directly from Scrutineers but there has probably been some correction since.
I’m hoping that we don’t do too badly out of votes from OS. Often OS Postal and Pre-Poll votes are better for Labor than those cast in Aus. I’ve Scrutineered at many close counts (Kingston 1998, Adelaide 2001, Kingston and Hindmarsh 2004) and the worst batches of Postals (from an ALP point of view) are usually the first few. That’s probably because most of the first Postals counted are posted locally by older voters (including Registered Postal Voters).
Adelaide 2001 was easily the most depressing count I’ve ever experienced. After leading by more than 1000 votes on election night, we took fatal blows on every single day of counting for the next two weeks. Everything was a disaster: fresh scrutiny of booths, Postals, Pre-Polls and Absentees. We were massacred on the lot. We even lost Provisionals!
In that ghastly fortnight, we only had one tiny consolation – we won the batch of votes cast in London by one vote!
Thanks for the update Genius. I too remain hopeful, though am seeing the dollars slip away.
Quick (stupid?) question…..for the Lib leadership contest yesterday, did Tollner and other undecided members vote?
Cheers,
Fatcat
Sorry, I have know idea whether those in doubtful seats voted in the Lib party room.
I believe, Tollner, Dutton and Laming voted for the Lib leadership.
OK.. so the AEC website now says:
11894 envelopes received
Absent 641
Provisional 1236
Pre-poll 6517
Postal 3500
and the votes counted:
Absent 496
Provisional 0
Pre-poll 5013
Postal 1621
for a diference of 4774
85.96 counted plus 4774/57450 (which is 8.29!) gives: 94.25%
is that in the ballpark?
I think it is.
Have checked the available figures and it supports those posted by DB.
I thought I read somewhere that last time (2004) only 91% of that electoral roll actually voted. Wishful thinking now, “the fewer the better” LOL.
This is excruciating, I can’t imagine what Damien or Dave are going through right now.
So has the number of postals received really more than doubled from 2004 to 2007? Ouch.
If that’s so, Tollner needs something like 54.5 2PP of remaining postals if all other vote types hold at around present levels and assuming provisionals swing by as much as the rest? (That’s what my back of envelope effort makes it anyway).
and so it goes..
http://vtr.aec.gov.au/HouseDivisionDecScrutinyProgress-13745-307.htm
envelopes received: 12818
Absent 641
Provisional 1236
Pre-poll 7437
Postal 3504
63
and 7130 of the 12818 Envelopes Received counted so far.
This confuses the issues a bit for me…………………………….
Postal
Envelopes Issued 2,892
Envelopes Received 3,504
More received than Issued. How does this happen? Any ideas or have I overlooked something really obvious?
Today’s action is as follows (info from the AEC):
- 1500 Interstate Pre-polls (from Vic, Qld, WA, SA and Tas)
- 200 Postal Votes
The AEC in Darwin has not yet received Interstate Pre-polls from NSW and ACT.
I’m actually in Darwin now so I’ll be scrutineering.
P.S. No word from the AEC on Provisionals … hope to get more info on that later today.
UPDATE:
That batch of Pre-polls turned out to be 1739 and 1692 of them were Formal Votes.
Tollner won them by 84 votes (888-804).
Hale’s overall lead is now 178.
The Postals will be counted this afternoon.
Is this worse than expected Genius? How would you rate Hale’s chances?
Cheers,
Fatcat
Actually it was a slightly better percentage for Damian than the Pre-polls that had come in before then. And the numbers have been slightly updated in that batch of Pre-polls to give us a net gain of 5 from what I posted earlier.
This afternoon’s Postals broke 133-92 for Tollner (consistent percentage with Postals received before today).
Hale’s lead is now 142.
I’d make Hale a slight favourite. Maybe $1.50 to win from here
Thanks for all that detail ACG, I’m feeling a little more confident than previously. I hope my friend, the Oz worker is feeling a little better too.
from ABC website:
Labor leads Solomon count by slim margin
The Country Liberal Party’s Dave Tollner has edged closer to Labor rival Damian Hale in the race for the Northern Territory seat of Solomon.
A further 230 postal votes and 1,740 pre-poll votes were counted today, with Mr Tollner now trailing by 142 votes.
Only a small number of votes will be counted tomorrow and a further 1,000 will be counted on Wednesday.
The Australian Electoral Commission says about 90 per cent of the votes cast have been counted.
That “small number” is about 100 votes made up of Provisionals and Absentees. They will be counted after lunch today.
The 1000 on Wednesday are Pre-Polls from NSW, ACT and 4 of the 15 electorates in WA (I don’t know which 4, but I’m guessing that they are WA’s rural/regional seats).
And that’s nearly it. The only other votes possible are Postals that have not yet been received and the AEC will also recheck 700 Pre-Polls that had initially been ruled out. I doubt that will produce much more.
Tollner now needs around 57% of what’s left – given that they’re mostly Pre-Polls (and he’s only been getting 53% of them so far), that’s encouraging for Labor.
Genius, you haven’t factored in that Hale is carrying my money. He isn’t home yet by a long-shot!
Hale back out to a lead of 162 as at 3.13.
That’s the sort of thing I’d say Fatcat
Today’s Provisionals were 52-32 in Hale’s favour; today’s Absentees were 13-8 in Tollner’s favour.
Also, a Postal Vote that was originally called Informal was counted for Hale. His lead should now be 158.
The AEC hopes to count the outstanding 1000 Pre-Polls tomorrow. I’ll post again if I get more information this arvo.
My two biggest outlays were Solomon and Robertson and I’m very nervous about both.
Sounds too close still for my liking here but does anyone how Robertson is doing (it hasn’t got a thread)?
V, as of 12:31 PM today, Labor was ahead in Robertson by 249 votes (43, 168 vs 42, 919 2PP), according to the latest info available on the AEC website.
Looks like the previous AEC site figures for numbers of postals in Solomon were incorrect – now showing just 1956 received with 1851 counted.
It now appears (but correct me if I am wrong) that there are 1738 votes yet to count comprising 1597 pre-polls and 141 postals (are these final figures and if not when do they have to be finalised?). According to my calculations Tollner needs around 55.5% of these remaining votes to win. If they split according to the results thus far he will get 83 to 58 on the postals reducing Hales lead to 133, and with pre polls splitting at approx 53-47 Tollner should get 923 to Hales 815. This leaves Hale in the lead by 25! So still very good cause for nervousness V!
90 votes in it now wow it is getting close
much closer than anyone throught
790 Pre Polls today and 767 were Formal. Tollner won them by 69 votes (418-349).
Damian’s lead is now 89.
There are 260 more votes expected: 200 Pre Polls from overseas and 60 Postals. They will be counted tomorrow morning.
Tollner got 54.50% 2PP in today’s batch – a little better than what he’d been getting in Pre Polls before today.
UPDATE:
The AEC now advises that 410 International (Pre Poll) Votes and 70 Postal Votes remain. There is also likely to be about 20 Pre Polls admitted that were initially rejected.
250 of the International Votes and the 70 Postals will be counted tomorrow. The other 160 will be counted on Friday.
Going on what has been happening lately it looks like Tollner will get up…just. Given that it will be very close will a recount be demanded by the losing party? Under what circumstances is this allowed to take place?
Hale by 80…
Tollner by 80….
well.. Id be guessing that band is now down to 40 votes
Hale by less than 20 or Tollner by less than 20 would be damn near it.
Can someone tell me why the numbers in relation to absentee and postal votes issued keeps changing? Shouldn’t the issued number stay the same? When will it end?
It’s over.
After this morning’s counting of Postals, Absentees and Pre Polls, Hale’s lead grew to 186. There aren’t even that many votes left.
I’m over the moon!
At the moment, the AEC is showing the lead at 115. It’s yet to count a batch of Pre Polls which Hale won by 71.
Great result for NT ALP and for the NT.
Congrats to DH, Cathy, The Oz Worker, Kezz, Super Tim, Manimal and the whole bloody crew. No hubris here, it was a tough contest.
Will DT ask for a recount?
Giddyup!! Thanks for the mail Genius.
With this margin, I doubt they’ll ask for a recount matt and it’s even less likely to be granted.
Max, it’s strongly rumoured that ALP Campaign Genius and Super Tim are in fact the same person.
Liberal guys, take out Tim, he is the “ALP Campaign Genius” We will organise the Stalin hit squard
I know. From soccer tragic to Campaign Genius.
Now I have two reasons to feel like a King. I can Crowe about, the forthcoming 2008 premiership and DH’s victory.
As STC would say, BOOSHKA !!
Well done Mr Hale!!!!!!!!!!!!!11
where is Isobell?
oh well, I think that tollner just missed out on like $1.5mil of super.
Good to win this one for Labor.
Nice one KC … uh I mean Max. I think I was drinking with a Mananimal tonight
Incidentally, there is a bit of a lesson in the Solomon count (and other counts) for you amateur psephos.
Trying to predict the outcome of what happens in the last week or last few days of counting on the basis of early trends in Pre Polls and Postals is a mug’s game.
Usually you don’t know where the votes are going to come from and it’s certainly difficult to know how many will come.
Also, Labor tends to do better in Postals and Pre Polls that are received towards the end of the counting fortnight – I’ve seen it happen so many times.
The reasons should be obvious. The Postals that are counted soon after Election Day are mainly the ones that are cast by permanent postal voters and other older voters – the age group that is most anti-Labor. Later in the fortnight, you get Postals that come from interstate and overseas from people that wouldn’t normally have to cast them but do so because they are away/travelling.
After getting a flogging of about 60/40 on Postal Votes, Damian only lost the last real batch by 3 votes. I was scrutineering so I can tell you that a lot of the envelopes had Air Mail stickers on them.
While I would never have predicted that Damian would win the last batch of Pre Polls by better than 2:1, I did expect that lot to be better than the Pre Polls that had already been counted. They were from overseas (mostly London – a booth Labor can usually count on).
Three years ago, Steve Georganas only led by between 50 and 60 votes going into the final day of counting in Hindmarsh and a similar thing happened. He ended up winning by more than 100.
(This is also why we’ve made small comebacks in other tight seats. See what’s been happening in McEwen?)
Remember all that next time folks…
Good info for the memory bank ACG and not the sort of intricate knowledge that can be read in some sort of dry text book. It is the kind of thing that sorts the “opinion” bloggers on PB from the people who have something of substance to offer others.
On another matter, “D T “’s has not been seen for days. My tip is he’s having the polly version of a “mad Monday”. The CLP are having a crack at Len about his very poor behaviour, but have convieniently forgotten “DT”’s trackrecord. Hypocrasy at it’s best from Jody and her Tarago party.
Until next time we converse STC, Merry Xmas to you and yours, Cheers, KC.