Does anyone have latest count ?

This morning, Libs were 400 ahead.

Now :
DANIEL, Zoe      Independent      57,195      -305      49.87      51.80      -1.93      Previous Member
WILSON, Tim      Liberal      57,500      305      50.13      48.20      +1.93      

with postal votes still coming in, and expecting to favour zoe, this could get interesting

After sky news were circle jerking about Tim winning nothing would make me happier if he didn't

Tim Wilson urges scrutineers to ‘knock out informal votes’ for Zoe Daniel in leaked WhatsApp messages


The Liberal candidate Tim Wilson has urged his scrutineers in Goldstein to “knock out informal votes being counted” for his independent rival Zoe Daniel, warning that her team has done this “with extreme precision” against him this week as the contest tightened.

Wilson was declared the projected winner of Goldstein last week, a seat he lost at the 2022 election, but the gap in votes narrowed considerably on Thursday, with the former assistant minister now leading by just 294 votes.

Leaked messages from a WhatsApp group called “Goldstein blue tsunami” show Wilson told supporters that the narrowing vote should not be a problem for his campaign but it “highlights the EXTREME necessity for scrutineers to be available”.

“They are knocking out votes for us with extreme precision,” Wilson wrote.

Scrutineers are entitled to challenge votes for another candidate if ballot papers are unclear, have missing numbers, use words or ticks and crosses instead of numbers or are not appropriately signed by an electoral commission officer.

“If a full recount occurs, we will need a massive scrutineering team because every vote will need to be scrutinised and it will be a race to see who can knock out the most votes,” he wrote. “Let’s hope that doesn’t happen.

“If the teals keep knocking out votes and we are not doing the same. The votes will be the votes. The difference is whether we have scrutineers to knock out informal votes that are being counted for the Teals.”

He added: “Sadly, this is something I am extremely good at doing, but I am legally prohibited from doing on this vote because I am a candidate.”

In response to the messages, Daniel said: “As always, I thank my volunteers for their participation in an open honest democratic process.”

On Wednesday night she used a social media post to say she hoped a batch of internal postal votes landing in the next two days would break towards her.

“No matter what, as always I am so buoyed by the love, support and ferocious determination that has been sent my way over the last week and a half,” Daniel said.

When contacted for comment about the WhatsApp messages, Wilson said there were “plenty” of Liberals scrutineering and that there was nothing unusual about this process of casting aside informal votes.

“They are knocking out informal votes for us,” Wilson said. “We are knocking out informal votes for them. None of this is new.”

He also cited training material from Daniel’s campaign, seen by Guardian Australia, that instructs scrutineers to pay careful attention to Wilson’s votes.

“We only challenge Tim Wilson’s votes,” the training manual says. “No need to check that Zoe’s ballots are formal. Tim’s scrutineers will do that.


theguardian

One of the quirks of our system, if there is a weak Returning Officer, they can sometimes be "bludgeoned" into rejecting votes as informal, even though they are technically valid.

For example: Although the instructions state that every box must be numbered (in the House of reps paper) ... if a voter leaves out the final box, it can be argued that the vote is valid because the intention is still clear and the only option left would have been to number that last box with the highest number remaining.

It depends on the way the scrutineers argue the point.

I've personally seen it done in the past.

down to $254 votes between them now

Go Zoe  :)

Labor majority government wrote on May 16^th, 2025 at 5:34pm:

Go Zoe  :)

Yes, she is gone.