swings against the major parties in Western Australia Senate re-election

[Antdawg]

[quote=Article]The Greens and the Palmer United Party (PUP) have emerged as the big winners after Western Australia's Senate election re-run.

On projected results the Greens have picked up a 6.7 per cent swing, which would ensure Scott Ludlam retains his Senate seat.

PUP also looks to have picked up a seat with a popular vote of about 7 per cent.

The projected data from the ABC's election analyst Antony Green showed the Liberals and the ALP had falls of 5.6 and 5 per cent respectively.[/quote]

Full article at [url]http://www.abc.net.au/news/2014-04-06/wa-senate-election3a-swing-away-from-major-parties/5370250[/url]

For those not from Australia, 1370 votes from Western Australia had vanished during the 2013 vote for the Australian Senate, so all Western Australians had to go back to the booths yet again. This has worked in the favour of smaller parties, with massive swings towards the Greens and Palmer's United Party at the expense of the Liberal (conservative) and Labor parties, the big two of Australia.

Of the six Senate seats up for election, the results appear to show:
- 2 for the Liberal party
- 1 for Labor
- 1 for the Greens
- 1 for Palmer's United Party

No one can be sure yet of which candidate will receive the sixth seat, it's definitely going down to the preferences on each ballot and could take months of vote counting to determine who the seat goes to. Unless a micro-party candidate could 'snowball' (there's probably a better word to use) towards a quota, I'm guessing that the last seat will go to either Liberal or Labor.

[Lonestriper]

Shame the Sports party guy isnt slated to get a spot again. He seemed cool.

[Bradyns]

Greens support probably sky-rocketed due to the whole shark cull..

[Download]

I heard those votes disappeared because they fell out of a van carrying them

[Lonestriper]

Speaking of the lost votes, I'm not happy with all the pollies calling for an overhaul of the AEC. Under the circumstances they did a good job (sans losing the votes in the first place)