2025 Late Postcount: Calwell

CALWELL (ALP 12.4%)
Basem Abdo (ALP) vs Carly Moore (IND) 
Abdo leading on primary votes during preference distribution

ALP retain 

I should have given Calwell its own page from the start but the unique nature of the count was not so obvious from the early primary figures which I covered on the seats where indies may make the final two page.  On the day after the election it was obvious that the very low major party primaries in a huge field in Calwell created an in-theory chance that independent ex-Labor mayor Carly Moore could get into the top two.  However soon after that, another independent, Joseph Youhana, surged, creating a unique situation where even a three-candidate preferred count was of no use as it could not be known for sure which independent (if either though very likely one of them will) would make the final three.  The AEC now has a distribution of preferences page up.   This is a familiar process to Tasmanian audiences as the TEC routinely does this for Legislative Council elections where stuff like this happens (OK that was an extreme case, only four candidates have won from third in LegCo history), but a new thing for federal elections.

The primaries in Calwell are:

Abdo (ALP) 30.51
Ghani (Lib) 15.7
Moore (IND) 11.94
Youhana (IND) 10.73
Garcha (GRN) 8.29

Moslih (IND) 6.86

Toma (ON) 3.76

Del Rosario-Makridis (LCP) 3.16

Hawu (Aus Citizens) 2.92

Bengtsson (FF) 2.57

Issa (TOP) 2.46

Ragupathy (IND) 0.56

Peach (unendorsed - unregistered Socialist Equality Party) 0.54

Victoria 2022: New Lower House Distributions And 2PP Pendulum

Last week saw some late excitement for those of us interested in the entrails of the 2022 Victorian election with the release of 39 previously unavailable preference distributions, albeit officially unofficial and "indicative".   These are the full preference distributions for the seats where previously there was either no distribution (because a candidate was elected on primary votes alone) or an incomplete distribution (because the winner crossed 50% against two or more non-excluded rivals).  36 of these were classic two-party preferred contests (mostly lopsided ones), the remainder being Narracan (a supplementary election that Labor didn't contest), Brunswick (Greens vs ALP) and, entertainingly, Mulgrave.

In the original postcount the VEC kept Mulgrave as a Labor vs Liberal seat although independent Ian Cook (of "Slug Gate" fame) held a narrow primary vote lead for second over the Liberals' Michael Piastrino.  This led to complaints from the Cook camp seeking something they thought was called a "recount" (in fact what they wanted was a realignment).  Cook claimed that "according to my scrutineers, it will bring Daniel Andrews down a few per cent to make the seat marginal".

It didn't (though it might have done the "down a few per cent" bit had Cook's primary lead over Piastrino stayed at 4%).  Cook did in fact hold his eventual primary lead of just under 1% over Piastrino all the way to the final exclusion, but Andrews won the 2CP against Cook by a margin of 60.83% vs 39.17%.  This was, in fact, more than Andrews won the 2PP quick throw vs Piastrino by (60.20-39.80).