Former deputy mayor and make-up artist in tight election race
Two nail-biter seats have been declared in the state election race, with counts continuing today as one seat remains down to the wire.
The rural Yorke Peninsula seat of Narungga is the last seat to be declared in SA Parliament’s lower house, with One Nation candidate Chantelle Thomas hanging onto a 25-vote lead against Liberal Tania Stock as of Monday morning.
Thomas – 30-year-old photographer and makeup artist – came out swinging in the seat, picking up 37.6 per cent of the primary vote, according to the Electoral Commission of SA (ECSA).
But Stock – a former Yorke Peninsula Council deputy mayor – is closing in after picking up 51.6 per cent of postal votes, and being pushed forward by preferences flowing towards her.
One of the women will succeed Fraser Ellis in the regional seat, an independent dis-endorsed by the Liberal party after being charged with misusing parliamentary funds.
Ellis, who did run again in last week’s election, claimed 17.4 per cent of the primary vote according to ECSA, but not enough to be in the top two. ECSA is continuing to distribute preferences in the count today.
The Liberal party has held on to the Hills seat of Heysen, but lost one of its last metropolitan fronts in Morphett over the weekend.
It means the Liberal party can officially claim opposition status with five seats in the lower house: the metropolitan seat of Bragg and regional seats Heysen, Schubert, Flinders and Chaffey.
One Nation has secured three, with a possible gain in Narungga still leaving them with fewer than the Liberals.
Liberal Leader Ashton Hurn said she will convene a meeting later this week after the polls have been officially declared and then announce her shadow cabinet.
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MacKillop
The Liberals’ Rebekah Rosser this morning announced she had conceded to One Nation’s Jason Virgo – a Mount Gambier councillor – who has won the South East seat of MacKillop.
One Nation called the result “seismic”, given the rural seat was previously a Liberal stronghold.
SA party leader Cory Bernardi spent time with Virgo in MacKillop shortly after announcing he had joined the party, meeting with agricultural businesses and community groups in the region.
It is the third seat secured for One Nation, following David Paton – the Adelaide Plains Deputy Mayor – winning the seat of Ngadjuri, and craft distiller Robert Roylance winning Hammond.
“We were told by many that we had no hope of getting one [seat],” the party said. “Despite the electoral system, the mood for change is so strong that we cannot be stopped.”
Virgo picked up 35.5 per cent of the first preference vote in the seat of former Liberal MP Nick McBride, who is currently wearing an ankle bracelet after being charged for the alleged assault of his wife, one he denies.
Rosser was a former adviser in both the Olsen and Howard Liberal governments and won 22.9 per cent of the first preference vote. She said she called Virgo on Monday morning to concede and congratulate him on winning the seat.
“At our core, we all want the same things for MacKillop; better health services, cheaper power and investment beyond the tollgate,” Rosser said.
Morphett
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Labor has claimed the blue-ribbon seat of Morphett, which covers Glenelg and its surrounding coastal suburbs for teacher Toby Priest, who held a 290-vote lead over Liberal Stephen Patterson.
It is the first time the seat has changed hands in 47 years.
Priest said he was “deeply honoured” to be elected in a landslide election result that sees the Labor party now hold 34 out of 47 seats in the House of Assembly.
Patterson – who held the seat for eight years – said in a post to social media that he was looking forward to spending more time with family after the result and will remain active in the community, “starting with a lifesaving patrol at Glenelg beach this weekend”.
“I wish Ashton Hurn and her Liberal team all the best in the future and while I won’t be there in person, I will be there in spirit,” Patterson said.
Heysen
Deputy Liberal Leader Josh Teague has held on to his Adelaide Hills seat of Heysen, with a 266-vote lead, securing it from Labor’s Marissa Bell.
The Greens were optimistic that their candidate Genevieve Dawson-Scott could surpass Bell to finish second, but it did not eventuate.
On election night, the seat was in a three-party race, with the Greens landing 23 per cent of first preference votes, just behind Labor at 24.4 per cent and trailing Teague’s 33.4 per cent.
Dawson-Scott said she was proud of her grassroots campaign’s achievement in Heysen, saying “both major parties took a hit to their primary vote, yet we grew ours”.
Addressing voters on social media after his win, Teague said it was “onwards and upwards” for the area he called “the best place in the whole world”.
Leader Ashton Hurn said she was “stoked” to see Teague returned to parliament.
“We’ve been sent a message by South Australians and we do need to pull our socks up and that’s exactly what we’ll be doing,” Hurn said.
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