The Liberal Party has won the seats of Flinders and Monash, providing a much needed boost to the depleted federal Coalition, Sky News has projected.
The victory in the two Victorian seats brings the Coalition up to 42 seats, which at just 28 per cent of the lower house is their worst result in history.
Sky News Chief Election Analyst Tom Connell called both seats on Friday, declaring there was no longer a “realistic” chance the Teal independents could win the seats.
The results in Flinders and Monash have been held up by the complicated three-horse races that exist in both seats, with Labor and the Teals battling it out for second place.
MONASH
In the seat of Monash, Liberal candidate Mary Aldred is currently sitting on 32.29 per cent of the first primary vote, with Labor’s Tully Fletcher on 20.19 per cent, and Teal independent Deb Leonard on 17.35 per cent.
Outgoing MP Russell Broadbent also achieved 10.32 per cent of the vote, having left the Liberal Party after losing his preselection.
Explaining his decision to call the seat, Connell referred to the AEC’s “three candidate preferred” calculation.
The count shows Ms Aldred on 43.72 per cent, while only 760 votes separates the Labor and the Teals candidates, on 28.72 and 27.41 per cent respectively.
The Sky News election analyst said even if Ms Leonard managed to make it into second place, which is unlikely, she would need around 80 per cent of preferences from Labor (and voters who had preferenced Labor after minor parties) in order to defeat the Liberal candidate.
And with postal votes and votes from the Warrigal Monash pre-poll voting centre both swinging more heavily in favour of Ms Aldred – Connell said this would increase the preference flow the Teals require to over 85 per cent.
“The likelihood of getting that high preference flow (is) unrealistic”, Connell said.
“It’s not a realistic chance, given the Trumpet of Patriot vote and also the One Nation vote. So I’m saying Mary Aldred will win that seat.”
FLINDERS
The Sky News Chief Election Analyst explained there is a similar three-horse race in Flinders where Liberal MP Zoe McKenzie achieved a primary vote of 41.59 per cent to the 22.24 per cent for Labor’s Sarah Race and the 21.67 per cent for Teal independent Ben Smith.
According to the AEC’s current “three candidate preferred” calculation, Ms McKenzie is on 49.02 per cent, with the Labor and Teal candidates battling out for second on 26.5 per cent and 24.49 per cent, respectively.
The Sky News election analyst explained there was now just too many hurdles for either Labor or the Teals to pick up the seat.
“Ben Smith has to finish second for the Liberal Party to lose, because the preferences from Labor will go really strongly to Ben Smith. It doesn’t happen vice versa. Those Teal voters won’t preference Labor very high, so he has to get up,” Connell said.
“He’s two per cent behind Labor. That’s difficult in itself. But look how high Zoe Mackenzie is on that current number… she only needs 0.9 per cent.
“The flows that she would need at that point are about 92 per cent for Ben Smith, if he gets second. That just doesn’t happen.
“It’s just outside the realms of any realistic chance of happening.”
