Barker: Karen Lock was the state champ with a swing of 10.4% swing. Admittedly that was from a very low base but Karen captured many votes that were supposedly heading from the Liberals to the Nationals. She as clearly the right fit for the electorate.

Grey: Karin Bolton won big in the Iron Triangle for an overall swing of 9.4%. Grey would have returned to Labor with that vote on the old boundaries (before Yorke Peninsula and parts of the Mid North were added). In a vast seat like this, maybe Labor could consider running two candidates – one from the industrial cities and a farmer like Ben Browne to appeal to the outlying areas.

Makin: Tony Zappia was rewarded second time around with a massive 8.6% swing against his moneybags opponent. Justice at last.

Wakefield: Nick Champion regained the Labor heartland with a 7.3% swing. He should be a member for many years.

Adelaide: Kate Ellis gained a 7.2% swing and a ministry after three years of hard work. All those street corner meetings have borne fruit.

Port Adelaide: Mark Butler rode the wave against Work Choices for a very enjoyable 6.8% surge into parliament.

Mayo: Mary Brewerton did really well with a 6.5% swing, but this seat needs a strong independent to challenge the Libs should Lord Downer step down.

Sturt: Mia Handshin achieved Labor’s best result here since Norm Foster’s 1969 win. Big swings in the northern suburbs for an overall result of 5.6% but the blueblood south stayed true to class.

Hindmarsh: Steve Georganas gave up smoking during the hair-raising 1974 election count which he won by 106 votes. No need to take it up again after a reasonably comfortable 5% swing this time.

Kingston: Amanda Rishworth survived a tough multi-candidate contest to regain what is perhaps the state’s most volatile seat with a 4.5% swing. For some reason some of the south-western suburbs in Kingston and Boothby did not swing that much to Labor.

Boothby: Nicole Cornes has sparked more commentary than anyone in memory. Why only a 2.4% swing? She did well in some middle-class booths, poorly in the affluent east and disappointingly in some of the tree-hugging and working class areas. But she still came closer in Boothby any Laborite since Tom Sheehy won it in 1946.

Congratulations also to Labor’s Senate winners, Don Farrell and Penny Wong (though they should have been in reverse order on the ballot paper).

I agree with comments previously that Greens preferences may not be disciplined, but does anyone know where they’re going in O’Connor? The AEC still hasn’t released two-party preferred voting.

As for fluster at the crowd. I’m not sure if you’ve ever relied on ear pieces to hear other people on a television panel, but it becomes impossible when your other ear gets drowned out with background noise. It’s like trying to talk on a mobile phone in noisy bar.

Whether Howard conceeds or not is entirely his business. I have nothing to say on the subject. Concession or claims of victory mean nothing to the counting process, and there are candidate who have conceeded defeat on election night and been elected.

They shouldn’t have had to wait for H*ward to concede the seat. All the networks had called the election for the ALP long before H*ward was wheeled out at the Wentworth Hotel for his national concession speech. Why have this special treatment for Bennelong? I mean they even called McEwen for Fran Bailey, and now she’s lost the seat! That was actually a close seat, rather than Bennelong which was never close.

Anyway Maxine McKew is now the MP for Bennenlong and that will be the definding moment of the 2007 election.

In saying that had Howard conceded on the night but somehow hung on he would have looked very silly.

Exhibit A: Fielding, who practically no-one (aka 1.7%) voted for, randomly generated by hacks foisting a pref list on unsuspecting ALP voters.

As for your views on the Vic Commissioner – huh? I think you’ll find im not too interested in whatever that’s about.

Or is he waiting on the 2 000 odd postals he and Janette personally filled in at Kirribilli to come in?

This is the story that has been overlooked by the media. No-one has applied the egg to the faces of the pundits (even the online ones here) who refused, poll after poll after poll, to entertain the possibility that H*ward could loose his seat, regardless of the national swing.

How many times did we hear the horsesh-t: “Maxine wont win this time, but she’ll win the by-election” ?

Even on election night, the pundits kept banging on about how H*ward *may* have lost his seat. They’d called several other seats which were less close, but there was something magical about Bennelong which made every one overly conservative. Had they been consuming LTEP’s medication perhaps??

H*ward won’t concede of course, he’s hoping we all forget that he’s lost his seat – only the 2nd PM to be honoured in such a way. The media and even many posters here have been so compliant in this, that Maxine’s victory just feels like an anti-climax. Not letting her claim victory for days after the election has made it almost as if she’s won a by-election after the election, with the press relegating her victory to a page 13 post-election side note to the Rudd victory.

Antony and Kerry O’brien’s shameless abuse and fluster at the folks in the tally room who were claiming Maxine’s victory were part of the complicity. They couldn’t fathom that a) Bennelong was lost and b) people were happy about it.

Well just in case you missed: H*ward lost Bennelong!

*rant over*