Extract from The Guardian
For a candidate whose fortunes hinge on one of the biggest nailbiters
in Australian election contests, Cathy O’Toole has a useful day job to
fall back into.
As counting in the seat of Herbert moves to the end of its fourth week, O’Toole – at last tally 35 votes in front – is immersed in the running of a north Queensland mental health service.
“Working in mental health, one has to know how to take care of oneself before you can help someone else, so I’m fortunate in that space,” she says.
“I live with the premise: if I can’t control it, don’t waste my energy on it. It’s been topsy turvy, a ride of ups and downs. For me, it’s put a whole new spin on the term ‘down to the wire’. I don’t think anybody expected this sort of result here.
“I won’t say it hasn’t been stressful at times but I’m paid to work, not to look at the [Australian Electoral Commission] website. And I’ve got huge things happening at work, so there’s a lot to be done.”
So O’Toole, as chief executive of Solas (Supported Options in Lifestyle and Access Services), is focused on bedding down new offices and the early launch in her region of the national disability insurance scheme.
Periodically, the updates come in from her electoral scrutineers, who are fixed on what is shaping, in terms of the raw vote margin, as the fourth-closest result in Australian political history.
Only Des Corcoran in the South Australian state seat of Millicent in 1968 (one vote), Nat Cook in South Australia’s Fisher in 2014 (nine votes) and Fran Bailey in the federal seat of McEwen in 2007 (31 votes) won by slimmer margins.
If O’Toole’s 35-vote lead stands, her north Townsville seat will easily be the most marginal in the country, taking over from Clive Palmer’s 53-vote grip in Fairfax in last election.
Her win would be the first for Labor in Herbert in 20 years and the first for a woman in the seat. It would also diminish the Coalition’s parliamentary majority to a single MP.
It’s a tough break for the Coalition incumbent Ewen Jones, who shed tears on national television while advocating for sacked workers at Palmer’s Queensland Nickel factory months before the election.
Jones has said he is “forever hopeful” and that he might yet prevail in a full preference recount that could run into this weekend.
O’Toole stops short of claiming victory – something reports have already attributed to a message on her Facebook page on Tuesday – and says she is “quietly confident”.
“I’m not – nor is my campaign team or the Labor party – claiming anything except [that] we’ve won the first count, we’ve won the recount and probability would say, yes, it would hold,” she says. “But this is about going through due process.
“The full preference count is happening now and there could be some minor changes. We don’t know, of course, but bearing in mind these votes have been counted numerous times now.
“You would imagine if there are changes, they won’t be great changes large in numbers – but anything’s possible.”
The prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, strongly indicated on Thursday the Coalition would contest a loss in court. “There may well be a challenge to it, because there are allegations that people were not able to vote in the election,” he said.
An Australian Electoral Commission spokesman has described as “speculation” Coalition concerns that 628 defence force personnel on exercises in South Australia and voters at a Townsville hospital were unlawfully deprived of the chance to vote.
The University of Queensland professor Graeme Orr, an electoral law expert, says he’d be “very surprised if this didn’t end up in litigation” in the court of disputed returns.
“It’s quite possible the people of Herbert won’t have full certainty about who their member is until early next year,” he says. “But it sounds like Ms O’Toole is going to be representing them and voting for them in the interim.”
A legal dispute was likely because of the closeness of the result and “the status of a seat like Herbert” as a longstanding Coalition possession amid the strong presence of the military and the increasingly socially conservative nature of its Townsville suburbs.
“I call it the first law of electoral law: when you have really tight results, there is certainly a strong incentive for the losing party to look at it and scramble to find those few errors [that may have occurred],” Orr says.
“That doesn’t mean just because it’s a very close result it should be overturned. Elections can’t be perfect. This is a case of a very thorough count leading to a very close result.
“It’s really a question of, were there errors, administrative or breaches of law, that deprived people of a vote? Or the other thing that would be argued – and why [attorney general] George Brandis and others are up there is – were their votes that were, you know, squiggly numbers that went to one side rather than being counted as informal, for instance?”
If the court found decisive problems with the election, it would be much more likely to send Herbert voters back to the polls than declare a new result itself, Orr says.
He says lawyers are already likely to be on the ground, taking statements, because the losing party needs to be armed with a full statement of evidence when it files a challenge. This must come within 40 days of the seat’s declaration, which is likely to be next week.
Meanwhile, if O’Toole is declared the winner, she’ll have her pay as an MP backdated to the day of the election, go to Canberra, and vote for Herbert in parliament “until such time as the court says otherwise”, Orr says.
Jones did not return calls from Guardian Australia on Thursday.
O’Toole says the Coalition will “do whatever they decide to do and that will be entirely their business”.
Asked how Labor managed to win a relatively safe Coalition seat after two decades, battling a 6.2% margin, O’Toole says its policies on education, health and jobs resonated locally.
“Our policies were relevant, they could be contextualised to the local community, they were very easy to talk with people about, they were meaningful,” she says.
The Coalition’s signature pitch – “jobs and growth” – rang hollow, she says. “It was just a slogan. ‘Jobs and growth.’ Well, where? And how? They’re the questions, seriously,” she says.
O’Toole claims this was “the big difference” in a city where unemployment is almost 13.5% and youth joblessness at almost 20%.
Observers might also note the effect of preference flows against the Coalition from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, whose candidate, Geoff Virgo, came in third on the primary vote with 13.5%.
O’Toole notes the final seat to be decided in a close federal election is “important from both [major] parties’ perspective” – from Labor’s to reduce the Coalition’s parliamentary buffer to a wafer.
“But to localise it, a woman has never held this seat and it’s 20 years since Labor has held the seat of Herbert,” she says. “These were also the strong passions that drove us.”
As counting in the seat of Herbert moves to the end of its fourth week, O’Toole – at last tally 35 votes in front – is immersed in the running of a north Queensland mental health service.
“Working in mental health, one has to know how to take care of oneself before you can help someone else, so I’m fortunate in that space,” she says.
“I live with the premise: if I can’t control it, don’t waste my energy on it. It’s been topsy turvy, a ride of ups and downs. For me, it’s put a whole new spin on the term ‘down to the wire’. I don’t think anybody expected this sort of result here.
“I won’t say it hasn’t been stressful at times but I’m paid to work, not to look at the [Australian Electoral Commission] website. And I’ve got huge things happening at work, so there’s a lot to be done.”
So O’Toole, as chief executive of Solas (Supported Options in Lifestyle and Access Services), is focused on bedding down new offices and the early launch in her region of the national disability insurance scheme.
Periodically, the updates come in from her electoral scrutineers, who are fixed on what is shaping, in terms of the raw vote margin, as the fourth-closest result in Australian political history.
Only Des Corcoran in the South Australian state seat of Millicent in 1968 (one vote), Nat Cook in South Australia’s Fisher in 2014 (nine votes) and Fran Bailey in the federal seat of McEwen in 2007 (31 votes) won by slimmer margins.
If O’Toole’s 35-vote lead stands, her north Townsville seat will easily be the most marginal in the country, taking over from Clive Palmer’s 53-vote grip in Fairfax in last election.
Her win would be the first for Labor in Herbert in 20 years and the first for a woman in the seat. It would also diminish the Coalition’s parliamentary majority to a single MP.
It’s a tough break for the Coalition incumbent Ewen Jones, who shed tears on national television while advocating for sacked workers at Palmer’s Queensland Nickel factory months before the election.
Jones has said he is “forever hopeful” and that he might yet prevail in a full preference recount that could run into this weekend.
O’Toole stops short of claiming victory – something reports have already attributed to a message on her Facebook page on Tuesday – and says she is “quietly confident”.
“I’m not – nor is my campaign team or the Labor party – claiming anything except [that] we’ve won the first count, we’ve won the recount and probability would say, yes, it would hold,” she says. “But this is about going through due process.
“The full preference count is happening now and there could be some minor changes. We don’t know, of course, but bearing in mind these votes have been counted numerous times now.
“You would imagine if there are changes, they won’t be great changes large in numbers – but anything’s possible.”
The prime minister, Malcolm Turnbull, strongly indicated on Thursday the Coalition would contest a loss in court. “There may well be a challenge to it, because there are allegations that people were not able to vote in the election,” he said.
An Australian Electoral Commission spokesman has described as “speculation” Coalition concerns that 628 defence force personnel on exercises in South Australia and voters at a Townsville hospital were unlawfully deprived of the chance to vote.
The University of Queensland professor Graeme Orr, an electoral law expert, says he’d be “very surprised if this didn’t end up in litigation” in the court of disputed returns.
“It’s quite possible the people of Herbert won’t have full certainty about who their member is until early next year,” he says. “But it sounds like Ms O’Toole is going to be representing them and voting for them in the interim.”
A legal dispute was likely because of the closeness of the result and “the status of a seat like Herbert” as a longstanding Coalition possession amid the strong presence of the military and the increasingly socially conservative nature of its Townsville suburbs.
“I call it the first law of electoral law: when you have really tight results, there is certainly a strong incentive for the losing party to look at it and scramble to find those few errors [that may have occurred],” Orr says.
“That doesn’t mean just because it’s a very close result it should be overturned. Elections can’t be perfect. This is a case of a very thorough count leading to a very close result.
“It’s really a question of, were there errors, administrative or breaches of law, that deprived people of a vote? Or the other thing that would be argued – and why [attorney general] George Brandis and others are up there is – were their votes that were, you know, squiggly numbers that went to one side rather than being counted as informal, for instance?”
If the court found decisive problems with the election, it would be much more likely to send Herbert voters back to the polls than declare a new result itself, Orr says.
He says lawyers are already likely to be on the ground, taking statements, because the losing party needs to be armed with a full statement of evidence when it files a challenge. This must come within 40 days of the seat’s declaration, which is likely to be next week.
Meanwhile, if O’Toole is declared the winner, she’ll have her pay as an MP backdated to the day of the election, go to Canberra, and vote for Herbert in parliament “until such time as the court says otherwise”, Orr says.
Jones did not return calls from Guardian Australia on Thursday.
O’Toole says the Coalition will “do whatever they decide to do and that will be entirely their business”.
Asked how Labor managed to win a relatively safe Coalition seat after two decades, battling a 6.2% margin, O’Toole says its policies on education, health and jobs resonated locally.
“Our policies were relevant, they could be contextualised to the local community, they were very easy to talk with people about, they were meaningful,” she says.
The Coalition’s signature pitch – “jobs and growth” – rang hollow, she says. “It was just a slogan. ‘Jobs and growth.’ Well, where? And how? They’re the questions, seriously,” she says.
O’Toole claims this was “the big difference” in a city where unemployment is almost 13.5% and youth joblessness at almost 20%.
Observers might also note the effect of preference flows against the Coalition from Pauline Hanson’s One Nation, whose candidate, Geoff Virgo, came in third on the primary vote with 13.5%.
O’Toole notes the final seat to be decided in a close federal election is “important from both [major] parties’ perspective” – from Labor’s to reduce the Coalition’s parliamentary buffer to a wafer.
“But to localise it, a woman has never held this seat and it’s 20 years since Labor has held the seat of Herbert,” she says. “These were also the strong passions that drove us.”
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