Victoria hot seats LIVE results: Tim Wilson’s lead in Goldstein narrows further; Kooyong gave us a full-blown political melodrama; the Victorian seats yet to be called

Tim Wilson is scrambling for more scrutineer volunteers to “knock out” his opponent’s informal votes in Goldstein as the margin between the Liberal candidate and teal incumbent Zoe Daniel continues to narrow.

A text message from Wilson to his supporters on Wednesday says it is an “EXTREME necessity” for scrutineers to be available.

“The sole purpose of scrutineering is to knock out our opponent’s vote. That is what they are doing to us with EXTREME position [sic].”

(Wilson later clarified to The Age that the text message should have read “EXTREME precision”.)

His lead in Goldstein when he sent the text was 528 votes. It has since narrowed to 302 votes at 12.45pm Thursday, with 935 votes remaining to be counted. More votes will be added if they arrive by post by Friday.

Wilson’s text message urging more volunteer support comes as he mobilises supporters via his WhatsApp group chat, named “Goldstein Blue Tsunami”.

In those messages, he writes that more Liberal scrutineers are needed to “knock out informal votes that are being counted for the Teals”. Despite the narrowing margin, Wilson insisted to supporters, “we are calm”.

The Age has also obtained Daniel’s scrutineering guide, which Wilson said is a “leaked how-to guide” on knocking out votes intended for him.

The guide for scrutineers states: “We only challenge Tim Wilson’s vote”. It also notes that Wilson’s volunteers will challenge Daniel’s votes, so there is no need for her scrutineers to do that.

Evan Ekin-Smyth, spokesman for the Australian Electoral Commission, said while scrutineers could flag votes, the final decision was with the AEC.

“It’s always up to the AEC to say whether something is formal or not and it always goes to the Electoral Act,” he said. “It doesn’t really matter what scrutineers do.”

He said Wilson’s references to “knocking out” votes “look a bit loose”.

“You can’t just say you’re knocking out votes,” he said. “You can say you’re challenging votes as to whether they’re formal or not.”

“Scrutineers are a part of the process. Challenging votes for whether they’re formal or informal is an important part of that process, but we’re confident in how we’re doing it.

“So in terms of the communication that they’re putting out there, we’d like people to be very clear that what they’re talking about is scrutineer challenges, but the decisions are always made in accordance with the Act.”

Ekin-Smyth said three “relatively small” counts are expected in Goldstein today, including around 170 absent votes, 260 provisional votes and a small number of declaration pre-polls.

“All small quantities,” he said. “The needle will shift off the back of them, but not sure how much”.

Daniel told The Age on Thursday the AEC process should be respected.

“As always, I thank my volunteers for their participation in an open and honest democratic process,” she said.

The Liberal Party’s Zoe McKenzie has won the seat of Flinders in Melbourne’s south-east.

The result was delayed due to uncertainty over the preference count.

But the AEC’s Tally Room website now shows McKenzie leads independent candidate Ben Smith by more than 6000 votes with about 85 per cent of the two-candidate preferred count completed.

McKenzie was first elected to the seat of Flinders in 2022.

Confirmation of her re-election brings the Coalition’s tally in the House of Representatives to 43. Labor has won 93 seats, while smaller parties and independents will hold 12 seats.

Read more here.

Tim Wilson’s supporters are being mobilised to help as scrutineers as the Liberal candidate’s lead over incumbent teal MP Zoe Daniel narrows further to 368 votes.

Screenshots from Wilson’s WhatsApp group chat – named “Goldstein Blue Tsunami” – leaked to The Age show Wilson claiming that informal votes are being counted for Daniel.

He writes that more Liberal scrutineers are needed to “knock out informal votes that are being counted for the Teals” – something Wilson says he is “extremely good” at but legally prohibited from doing as a candidate in this election. He also warns supporters to prepare for a recount.

Daniel claimed victory in Goldstein on election night with a margin of 1800 votes, but postal votes came in strongly in Wilson’s favour, and he overtook her in the count. He claimed victory on May 7 in a triumphant press conference surrounded by supporters.

However, since then, the margin – which once had Wilson ahead by as much as 1200 votes – has been slowly eroded.

On Wednesday night, only 401 votes separated the candidates. Wilson’s lead narrowed on Thursday morning to 368 votes.

There are 1225 votes still to be counted, plus any more postal votes that arrive (they must be received by Friday).

In the WhatsApp chat, Wilson also warns that “bad batches of votes come in” and that votes cast in Melbourne’s CBD are particularly unfavourable to the Liberals because they include many students.

Despite the narrowing margin, Wilson insists “we are calm”.

“We never wanted a drop in margin like this, but we were prepared for it.”

Wilson says he always wanted a buffer of 1000 votes to ensure he was “insulated” against a drop like this.

He warns that Daniel is likely to ask for a recount.

“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. Let’s hope that does not happen.”

An automatic recount is triggered if the margin is as low as 100 votes, but either candidate can request a recount.

When asked to comment on the WhatsApp group and his claims about informal votes being counted for Daniel, Wilson said: “Around Goldstein, teal campaigners have been boasting that they’ve been good at knocking out informal votes that may have otherwise been counted for me.”

The full text of Wilson’s message to the Goldstein Blue Tsunami group:

There is no point projecting where the vote lands, 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. 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. If you can help scrutineer, please contact Ben.

Bad batches of votes come in. For instance absentee votes cast in Melbourne CBD tend to be unfavourable because it is weighted towards students.

This scenario is why I always said we needed a buffer of about 1000 votes despite media outlets calling the result. It was explicitly to ensure we were insulated against a drop of this nature.

I cannot say this is the end of the drop but it is likely to be the biggest.

The Age has a good breakdown of the types of votes that remain to be counted.

We are calm. We never wanted a drop in the margin like this, but we were prepared for it. Postal votes can come in until Friday.

An automatic recount is trigged [sic] under 100 votes. And it is likely the current MP will call for a recount, though it may not be agreed by the AEC.

A further WhatsApp message from Wilson to the group:

Our margin is now down to 401 votes.

There are now 1380 votes left to count.

In the last count of 400 votes we lost another 107 votes.

The only thing that matters is scrutineering to knock out informal votes being counted for the Teals. They are knocking out votes for us with extreme precision.

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. Let’s hope that does not happen.

Tim Wilson’s lead in Goldstein has narrowed to 401 votes as counting continues in the seat.

Teal independent Zoe Daniel is still hoping she can retain Goldstein when international postal votes come in.

There are 1,380 votes still to be counted, but more postal votes are likely to arrive between now and Friday. Postal votes must be received by Friday.

Daniel has been refusing to concede despite Wilson – who contested the seat for the Liberal Party again after losing to the independent in 2022 – claiming victory last week.

Daniel posted on social media on Wednesday night that she had “every finger crossed”.

“Friends. We have clawed our way back from an almost 1500 vote margin on Friday to 401 tonight,” she posted.

“I have every finger crossed that a batch of international postal votes lands in the next two days and a few other things that need to, go our way.

“No matter what, as always, I’m so buoyed by the love, support, and ferocious determination that has been sent my way over the last week.

To my scrutineers who have been hanging over every, single, vote, no matter what happens, you will always be my people. Thank you.”

An update on the most complicated seat count of this election – Calwell – isn’t expected until next week.

Calwell, in Melbourne’s north, is typically safe for Labor but a result has become impossible to predict because it has become a four-cornered contest with complex preference flows.

Although Labor candidate Basem Abdo – an adviser to now-retired Maria Vamvakinou, who had held the seat since 2001 – had the highest primary vote of 30 per cent, the vote tally has been complicated by preference flows between the Liberals, who attracted 15 per cent of primary votes, and two independents who ended up with 12 and 11 per cent.

All the top three non-Labor candidates have encouraged voters to preference each other above the ALP, making it difficult for the Australian Electoral Commission to accurately predict who will move into second place. These preference flows could mean one of the independent candidates leapfrogs the Liberals, putting them within range of Labor.

AEC staff will have to conduct a full distribution of preferences before they can declare a result. This cannot be done before Friday because that is the last day postal votes can be received and counted, meaning there are unlikely to be any updates until next week.

The AEC has previously foreshadowed a result may not be known until next month, describing it as “one of the most complex distributions of preferences we’ve ever done”.

In a typical count, the AEC picks the two candidates it thinks will perform best in a seat and reports two-party-preferred figures based on this assumption to allow for a quick indication of the result on election night.

When this is wrong, they must either change their choice of candidates or wait for a full preference count of every vote in the seat before declaring a winner.

The four-cornered nature of the Calwell contest has made it impossible to predict the two leading candidates, forcing the AEC to await the full distribution of preferences.

Asked to reflect on the past six weeks covering Kooyong, my first instinct is to say: I feel like Amelia Hamer looks in that now-infamous photo with Peter Dutton (taken by this masthead’s James Brickwood) — exhausted, bewildered and slightly awed.

The battle between Monique Ryan — the 58-year-old former paediatric neurologist who unseated then-treasurer Josh Frydenberg in 2022 — and Amelia Hamer, the 31-year-old Oxford-educated grand-niece of former Victorian premier Sir Rupert Hamer, always promised intrigue.

But I didn’t expect this well-heeled patch of Melbourne’s east to deliver quite this much commotion – right up until Monday, when Hamer conceded and Ryan claimed victory for a second time.

Even before the campaign officially began, Kooyong was making headlines.

Ryan’s husband, Peter Jordan, was filmed taking a Hamer campaign sign from a nature strip in Camberwell. The footage was undeniably funny — and deeply embarrassing for Ryan, whose political brand is built on integrity.

Ryan and Jordan apologised quickly. Defenders noted the sign was technically illegally placed, but the image of “Pinching Pete” as the Liberals dubbed him – teal T-shirt peeking out from under his jacket as he scampered down the street – became meme fuel. One local pub even began selling stubby holders emblazoned with: “Monique, please DO NOT take this beer!”

The Liberals ran with the joke for the rest of the campaign.

But it wasn’t long before Hamer hit turbulence of her own. In the second week of the campaign I revealed she owned two investment properties – one in London and another in Canberra’s wealthiest suburb – despite publicly positioning herself as a renter who really understood the housing crisis.

It was a sloppy and obvious omission. Ryan’s social media whiz-kids, as well as satirical news sites, quickly generated memes about the generationally wealthy candidate cosplaying as a struggling renter.

Hamer never really directly addressed whether she had purposefully omitted her landlord status, instead trying to sidestep questions on it. “You can be renting and also own a property,” she said, citing conversations with locals about “the struggles of being a landlord” in Victoria dealing with land tax from the Allan government.

More of Hamer’s personal wealth was raked over after a Ryan campaign volunteer republished public court documents showing she was among the beneficiaries of a $20 million family trust — proof that dirt units come in all shapes and sizes.

Soon after, the predictable graffiti on corflutes turned nastier: “Capitalists will die”, “I get off on poor suffering”, and “Communism will win” were spray-painted across Hamer’s face.

At times, it felt like Hamer was under strict orders from Liberal party HQ to keep a low profile.

She skipped out on at least three community candidate forums. She often did media appearances flanked by her old boss, Senator Jane Hume, who stepped in to answer curlier questions, which reinforced a perception that she couldn’t speak for herself.

But when I finally managed to interview her on camera, Hamer held her own. She was confident and articulate. The leash should’ve been loosened far earlier. Even forums perceived as hostile would have been worth her fronting up to make her party’s case.

Ryan also had media stumbles. On ABC’s Insiders, she flubbed a question about disclosing influencer payments, later clarifying she misunderstood. She also blanked a Sky News reporter trying to spring a live interview at pre-polling.

Each side tried to paint the other’s campaign as being full of grey-haired volunteers. However, while retirees abounded, both camps had plenty of younger supporters — including millennial campaign managers. That’s a good sign for democracy, especially for the Liberals after their worst ever national defeat.

The campaign did veer into childishness at times. Ryan took aim at the Liberal Party over a satirical social media post that depicted her as a scowling action figure in Barbie-style packaging, under the label: “MONIQUE RYAN – VOTES WITH THE GREENS 77% OF THE TIME.”

But most of the negative campaigning seemed to come from Liberal HQ — and there was a noticeable disconnect between that and Hamer’s own conduct. I never once heard Hamer reference Ryan’s voting record or go below the belt in public. Her pitch was more about neglected local issues and the disadvantages of not having a major party MP. She appeared uncomfortable with the signage wars being waged in her name — a conflict that escalated all the way to the Supreme Court in the final days of the campaign.

A funding vehicle behind the teal independents — Climate 200 — also created headaches, including for Ryan in Kooyong. I revealed that residents had received calls and texts as part of a “push-polling” effort conducted on behalf of the group, just moments after Ryan had appeared on live TV describing push-polling as “not ideal”.

It’s unclear how effective the Liberal Party’s central line of attack on Ryan — that she voted with the Greens in Parliament 77 per cent of the time — really was. Rusted-on Liberal supporters lapped it up, but for those who had already backed Ryan, it was hardly a shock. After all, “teal” was always supposed to be a blend of blue and green.

Still, the claim clearly got under Ryan’s skin. She labelled the line as misinformation and hit back with a five-page pamphlet of her own, accusing the Liberals of spreading “egregious falsehoods”.

She pointed out she’d voted in favour of just 21 of 37 Greens motions — 56 per cent — slicing the same data in a different way.

While Ryan focused on her role pressuring the government on big-ticket items — the 20 per cent cut to HECS debts, advocating for 60-day medicine prescriptions, and improving the National Anti-Corruption Commission — Hamer went hard on hyper-local promises. All up, she pledged $14 million worth.

The Easter long weekend was the catalyst for a truly chaotic week on the trail in Kooyong. It kicked off when footage surfaced of a local surgeon — Professor Greg Malham — inexplicably filming himself tearing down and stomping on Monique Ryan corflutes, all while cracking jokes about disposing of a dead body and leaving his full number plate in view.

The video was widely condemned — not just by Ryan and Hamer, but also by domestic violence campaigners. Malham later self-reported to the medical regulator and was placed under investigation.

Then came a candidates’ forum on refugee and asylum seeker policy, where an anti-lockdown activist attempted to hijack the discussion by ambushing Ryan with questions about her husband’s now-infamous sign theft. He filmed her reaction for social media, but was swiftly shut down by the event organiser, who was not having a bar of it.

But the week reached full chaos mode the following evening at what was meant to be a quiet event about public broadcasting at the Kew Library. Three protesters — whom Ryan later described as “right-wing nutbags” — gatecrashed the forum. I was the only journalist in the room to witness the bizarre scene unfold.

Tensions escalated when a female attendee, who was clearly distressed, tried to punch one of the agitators in the face.

Ryan herself waded in to break up the scuffle, physically intervening to stop things from boiling over before police arrived.

That chaotic week ended with a long-anticipated moment: Ryan and Hamer finally appeared on stage together for the first time in the campaign — at a Jewish community event under the watchful eye of Australian Federal Police. It was icy but civil.

In the final week of the campaign, fresh controversies emerged. The Age broke a story revealing that volunteers wearing Monique Ryan T-shirts had been filmed claiming a community organisation — one with historical links to the Chinese Communist Party’s foreign influence operations — had encouraged people to vote for the teal MP.

At the same time, our reporting revealed that Kooyong — along with other targeted electorates — had been flooded with campaign helpers from the Exclusive Brethren, a secretive Christian sect. These volunteers helped hand out how-to-vote cards and staff pre-poll booths, despite objecting to voting themselves.

Shadowy, right-wing third-party groups – Australians for Prosperity, Repeal the Teal, and Better Australia – flocked to pre-polling booths but mainly disappeared on election day itself. Their presence so rattled Ryan she launched a last-ditch fundraising campaign, trying to raise $20,000 for last-minute advertising to “cut through the noise, reach undecided voters, and tell them the truth”.

Then came the signage furore outside a Kew pre-polling booth: a spat between Boroondara council and the Liberal Party that went on for days, complete with accusations of political interference, given the council’s number of teal councillors. It came to a head when council officers swooped in to confiscate 14 Liberal A-frame signs, which they crammed into the back of the Boroondara-branded hatchback.

Forty-eight hours out from election day, I found myself reporting from the Supreme Court, where eight lawyers — who were likely billing by the hour — argued over constitutional issues that would only apply for a single day. The Supreme Court ultimately sided with the Liberals, granting an injunction in their favour. The Liberals promptly celebrated their ideological win over the council, a fleeting victory.

Neo-Nazis also made an unwelcome appearance when Joel Davis, from the National Socialist Network, showed up wearing a T-shirt mimicking Liberal Party branding while distributing fake and antisemitic pamphlets to voters – horrifying everyone. Davis was accompanied by men in costume beards and fake Orthodox Jewish attire, brandishing pamphlets that had been sent to Jewish communities in neighbouring electorates claiming the Liberals planned to “give the Jews everything they want”.

Hamer wasn’t short of Liberal Party elder help on the campaign trail, receiving support from Liberals of all stripes, including former premier Jeff Kennett, who made a grand appearance at her election night party. Her predecessor, Josh Frydenberg, was also spotted in the dying days of the campaign, handing out pamphlets at pre-polling.

And then there was Opposition Leader Peter Dutton’s fleeting appearance at the Tower Hotel in Hawthorn East — a venue that became notorious for its vocal anti-Monique Ryan campaigning, complete with a massive anti-Ryan sign mounted on the pub (for which it would later be fined by the council).

This marked Dutton’s second visit to Kooyong, and it was fleeting. In a rather telling moment, the man who had hoped to become prime minister was prevented from answering any questions by the media by his staff. It was a brief yet revealing moment into the national campaign strategy.

As in 2022, so much of the Liberal Party’s story is entwined with the story of Kooyong. The machinations of this electorate are emblematic of the existential wrestle the party faces — and what it stands for in a modern Australia.

It felt eerie that Petro Georgiou, a former member for Kooyong under John Howard and known to many as the “conscience of the Liberal Party”, died during the campaign. As our special writer Tony Wright penned at the time, “Georgiou was a voice for diversity and considered a champion of Indigenous Australians, underdogs and outsiders”.

It was Ryan who reminded a local forum that Georgiou’s values now feel worlds apart from the politics of today — in both major parties.

“Our politics has become meaner and smaller in the last two or three decades,” she said. “He was a man who demonstrated great personal integrity in the way that he fought for the rights of refugees.”

Hamer was adored by Liberal voters: I saw this first-hand at pre-polling. Whether it was the “Dutton factor” that ultimately held her back is up for debate. But the fact she came so close suggests green shoots for the party, if it can harness the kind of youth and energy Hamer brought to the campaign.

Even Hamer, though, admits you can’t fatten a pig on market day — “We talked a lot about getting Australia back on track, but the question is: back on track to what?” she said on 3AW last week, talking about her party’s slim policy offering.

There was fun and plenty of smiles to be had in the ’Yong — I want to give a shout-out to the campaign volunteers from all parties who let me spend time with them on the front line, complete with smiles, snacks and campaign intel. Greens candidate Jackie Carter and Labor’s Clive Crosby conducted themselves with humour and grace as enthusiastic participants in the whole spectacle despite it being a two-horse race.

After a false start and an early crow from the media and Ryan herself, Ryan did claim Kooyong for a second term. Not by as much as in 2022, but she got there with what looks like at least 1000 votes – and looks to be the sole teal independent in Victoria.

Her victory reaffirms Kooyong’s transformation from a blue-ribbon certainty to a teal-tinged battleground, where even a redistribution, a $14 million funding blitz and a strong candidate couldn’t wrest the seat back for the Liberals this time. One imagines the fight will only be tougher again in three years.

The experience of covering Kooyong felt like being strapped into a speeding, swerving golf buggy — on a ride where the stakes were local and national, trivial and existential, hilarious and deeply serious, often all at once.

Kooyong didn’t just give us a contest. It gave us a full-blown political melodrama. And I, for one, need a nap.

The voters in the seat of Flinders, south-east of Melbourne, are among hundreds of thousands nationwide still waiting to see who will be their new MP.

Sitting Liberal MP Zoe McKenzie has provided this update on Facebook: “The count in Flinders continues, with fierce jostling in the numbers between second and third. I was asked to join the [Liberal] party room today while results are still pending, and I was proud to do so.”

McKenzie faced strong challenges from Labor’s Sarah Race and Climate 200-funded independent Ben Smith.

Smith provided some extra context on his own Facebook page.

“Through to today, the AEC have been undertaking a complex count on a three-candidate preferred basis (between Labor, Liberal and Independent),” he wrote.

“The AEC have this afternoon declared they are now moving forward with a two-candidate-preferred count between myself and the Liberal Party to determine the outcome – so just a little more waiting to go folks.”

Elsewhere, Calwell in northern Melbourne is also a tight-run race. With 81 per cent of the vote counted, there’s still no two-candidate preferred data available.

Liberal Tim Wilson’s lead over Zoe Daniel has narrowed in Goldstein as counting continues, but he should still hang on to win the seat.

Wilson claimed victory in the seat last week, but Daniel has not yet conceded. On Friday she called those watching on to “respect the process” until a “definitive position” was clear.

The Liberal candidate is only 664 votes ahead of Daniel on the latest count, leading with a 50.3 per cent margin over Daniel’s 49.7 per cent on a two-party-preferred basis.

The Australian Electoral Commission still has 3426 votes to count, the majority of which are declaration pre-poll votes and absentee votes.

However, analyst Ben Raue of The Tally Room said the late surge to Daniel in the count was unlikely to get her over the line.

“I suspect she will probably do a bit better on absentee and pre-polls than she was on the postals, but I suspect it is probably too late,” he said.

“I suspect nothing is going to change in Goldstein. I think it is probably not enough.”

Here are the details of votes still to be counted:

• 571 postal votes are still waiting to be counted with more set to arrive during the week until the deadline on Friday. A total of 24,299 postal votes were issued with 21,053 returned. Some will never be returned.
• 1625 declaration pre-poll votes: These were cast at pre-poll centres outside a voter’s home division and need to be verified before they can be counted. 2068 declaration pre-poll votes have already been counted.
• 1035 absentee votes: Cast on election day by people voting outside their enrolled electorate, these are verified and sent back to the correct division. 3000 absentee votes have already been counted.
• 195 provisional votes: These are from voters whose eligibility wasn’t certain at the time of voting. They’re only counted if the voter is later confirmed to be eligible. About half of these have been counted but the other half remain.

That brings us to a total of 3426 votes still outstanding as of 3.30pm Tuesday.