Topics: 2016 election results.
E&OE…
NEIL MITCHELL:
On the line, Liberal Senator for Victoria, who has been advising us through the counting and has been spot on, I must say. Senator Scott Ryan, good morning.
SCOTT RYAN:
Good morning Neil, how are you?
NEIL MITCHELL:
I’m okay, what’s the latest?
SCOTT RYAN:
Okay, so as of last night there has been nothing updated today except in one seat where one vote changed. The Government was ahead in 74 seats, 73 of them by 1,000 votes or more, so the seat of Forde in Queensland is the narrowest of those at 265 votes ahead but there are several, there are about 8,000, 9,000 postal votes to count and they’re breaking more than 55 per cent in the Government’s favour. That will strengthen the lead and then they’ll count about 5,000 absentee ballots, people who voted outside the electorate. They tend to favour Labor, so if it goes as expected, the Government would be expected to hold their seat. That would take the Government to 74 seats.
There are five where Labor is ahead, one in South Australia at 151 votes, one in Flynn at 1,065 votes and the others are in between (inaudible) in Queensland. In my view, the seat of Flynn is possibly the most likely because we’re only 1,000 votes behind and we’ve been getting about 65 per cent of the 3,500 postal votes counted, and there are still 8,000 to come. It would be expected that we would pull ahead by about a 1,000 votes at the end of the postal vote count and then it would come down to the absentee ballots. There might be, that’s probably the smoky, even though it’s the largest Labor lead, that we might have, the Government might have a chance of pulling back.
The other seats are literally all too close to call but the seat of Cowan in Western Australia is looking very difficult and the seat of Hindmarsh in South Australia and Capricornia around Rockhampton, they’re just literally too close to call.
NEIL MITCHELL:
If it goes the way you’re saying, what do you think you’ll finish, would you get to 76 or not?
SCOTT RYAN:
Yeah, I was about to say, I spoke to someone I know you and your listeners know, Ewen Jones, this morning in Townsville. He’s 600 votes behind. He still is confident but he said it could come down to 100 votes. It’s still very possible the Coalition will get to 76. If the ball bounced through the goal square in all those seats we could be ready for it to get to 79. I don’t think that’s likely. I think 76 is very likely, even 75 is very likely.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Well you’ve sort of firmed up a bit. You weren’t all that optimistic about 76 earlier in the week, you were looking at, thinking of you might need a minority government?
SCOTT RYAN:
Yeah, and look, the real smoky here, the one that everyone’s watching is Flynn. It was basically counted as a Labor gain on the night and up until late yesterday. But all through the last three or four days my National Party colleagues have been saying, watch the postal votes. If we get over 60 percent there will be 11 or 12,000 of them, that’s enough to pull back that lead. With a third of the postal votes counted, that is looking accurate. That could take us to 75 and then near win, there are seats, there are a couple hundred votes each way. There could be a recount and in all honesty, it is too close to call.
NEIL MITCHELL:
When will we know?
SCOTT RYAN:
I think we’ll know, very much wouldn’t be surprised if we know a lot more by the end of tomorrow. We’re getting very substantial updates at night, late at night, but I think it’s, the Coalition can be very confident of getting to 75 and reasonably confident we can be, reasonably confident of getting 76.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Okay and if you are 75 you’re going to form government as a minority, aren’t you?
SCOTT RYAN:
Yeah.
NEIL MITCHELL:
So you’re back. You’re really back?
SCOTT RYAN:
We’re back, well because it means that in reality that there’s only 150 seats in the House, so the only real option is to form the government with the Coalition. And look, Canada had these sorts of governments for many years, actually with the Conservative Party in Canada governing and we’ve had it at the state level. I think while it’s not the outcome we would have hoped for, our job is to make it work, that’s what the people voted for.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Yeah. All right, so will we definitely know by the middle of next week?
SCOTT RYAN:
Well look, unless there are four or five seats on 10 or 20 votes, yes, but the Electoral Commission has to consider postal votes that are received up until next Friday.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Okay.
SCOTT RYAN:
Eventually all of them will come in by this weekend.
NEIL MITCHELL:
I’d be interested in your view on this. We just heard Peter Dutton, the Immigration Minister’s take on things, have a listen.
Peter Dutton: In part I think we’re a victim of our own success, the fact that we stopped boats and got children out of detention. We’re cancelling visas of bikies and others to make our community a safer place and essentially the issue had gone off the radar.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Victims of your own success?
SCOTT RYAN:
I think the point Peter’s trying to make is that in politics you don’t get credit for what you’ve done, and quite frankly as a politician I don’t expect people to say thank you. You get credit for what you’ve done to the extent that they’ll believe your next commitment. I think the point Peter was trying to make was that we had been very successful in that area. That’s the view I take into politics, that if I’ve delivered something then that can be my credibility for my next promise.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Thank you so much for your help this week. Thanks for talking to us.
SCOTT RYAN:
Thanks Neil.
NEIL MITCHELL:
Senator Scott Ryan, Liberal senator in Victoria. One of the people advising, one of the people advising the Prime Minister on the numbers and he has certainly become more optimistic of getting 76 than he was a couple of days ago. He’s been pretty accurate in his predictions too, could be 79, could be 76. 74 at the moment. Look, they’re back. They are back because they’ll get the Katter support if they need the minority support, if they are a minority government and they need these votes in the House, they’ll get Katter. I think they’ll get Cathy and McGowan and I think they’ll get the Xenophon candidates, they’ve got three there if they can get their speaker up. There’s still a possibility they’ll be governing in their own right but with a very narrow majority, so they’ll still need that support, theoretically. I don’t think there’s any question now. He says we’ll know more by late tomorrow night and more by next week, but the Government’s back .
(ENDS)