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Canberra Today 13°/15° | Saturday, March 30, 2024 | Digital Edition | Crossword & Sudoku

Seselja likely to make the Senate

LIBERAL Zed Seselja looks likely to win the second seat in the ACT’s Senate contest; nudging ahead of the Greens’ Simon Sheikh after further counting of votes.

Liberal candidate Zed Seselja
Liberal candidate Zed Seselja

Earlier this week, Mr Seselja had reached 33.37 per cent of the primary votes counted; just above the required one-third quota.

But Mr Shiekh remains hopeful, believing yet-to-be-counted below-the-line votes will favour him.

Predictably, Labor’s Kate Lundy retained her position in the first seat, despite Labor’s primary vote falling 6.5 per cent.

Among the minor parties contesting the ACT Senate, the Sex Party received over 6000 votes, the Palmer United Party had over 4,300 votes, the Bullet Train for Australia had over 3,700 and the Voluntary Euthanasia Party had almost 3,000 as of earlier this week.

In the House of Representatives, Tony Abbott is Australia’s 28th Prime Minister as the Coalition claimed a historic victory on Saturday, while Kevin Rudd has stood aside as Labor leader.

The Australian Electoral Commission declared the Liberals won 91 lower house seats in the House of Representatives, Labor has 54 and the Greens have one, while independents Bob Katter and Andrew Wilkie held on to their seats.

The was a nationwide swing of just over 4 per cent against the ALP.

Despite Labor being swept from power nationally, locally the party retained both of the ACT’s House of Representative seats.

As counting draws to a close, sitting Labor member Dr Andrew Leigh retains his seat of Fraser over Liberals candidate Elizabeth Lee, with 62.9 per cent of the vote after preferences, while current Labor member Gai Brodtmann retains her seat of Canberra over Liberal candidate Tom Sefton, with 57.1 per cent of the vote.

 

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