Independent candidate Dr Kerryn Phelps has claimed victory in the Wentworth by-election, but recent updated from the count indicate there is a chance that the seat could end up going to Liberal Dave Sharma.
Sharma is receiving votes in a large proportion of the postal votes that are still being counted.
While Dr Phelps had a clear majority from polling booth, postal votes that may have been filled out earlier in the campaign are going to Sharma and the margin between the two candidates has closed dramatically.
As of 10:30 AEST on Sunday Dr Phelps has 50.61% of the votes on a two candidate preferred basis. While Sharma has 49.39% of those counted.
Dr Phelps remain the favourite to win the seat but it could end up being by as little as 500 votes. Currently Dr Phelps has a lead of 884 votes. If the final difference between the two candidates in less than 100 votes there is an automatic recount.
As postal votes can be received up until 2nd November there is the possibility that it may be weeks before the final result is known. If a significant majority of the postal votes go to Sharma, the Liberals will retain the seat and Prime Minister Scott Morrison will not have to operate as a minority government.
Appearing on the ABC’s Insiders program this morning Dr Phelps said Sharma’s campaign had been plagued by the chaos of the Morrison government.
“There was a sequence of events that happened that people just became utterly exasperated with the Liberal Party,” Dr Phelps said.
“They seemed to be only interested in their own self-interest. They only seem to want to talk about their leadership challenges and their factional battles and it’s like, ‘Hang on a second, we’re out here, we are the Australian people, we want you to focus on our issues.”
Dr Phelps said that as the campaign continued voters could see the succession of government disasters including the refusal to release the Ruddock Review into religious freedom and proposals that it was acceptable for gay schools kids to be expelled.
The government’s initial support of Senator Pauline Hanson’s ‘It’s OK to be white’ motion had also turned off voters in Dr Phelps opinion. Dr Phelps said the government had delivered a poor excuse on why they had igven the proposal support.
“The next excuse was, ‘Oops, we didn’t mean to, we didn’t actually read the motion.’ That’s shambolic government, that is poor governance and people were saying, ‘How can you possibly explain that? How can you call yourself a responsible government and do that sort of thing?’” Dr Phelps said.
OIP Staff
