Labor to work ‘guts out’ after seismic shift at poll
South Australia has woken up to the return of a Labor government but it will be days before it becomes clear how many seats it has won in the lower house despite a massive swing in One Nation’s favour.
Prime Minister Peter Malinauskas vowed to “do our best over the next four years” after increasing his party’s majority.
“While this is the best result our party has ever achieved, it is very important that no one confuses tonight’s result with praise,” he said.
Labor had won 30 seats and the Liberals had 4, but the status of the remaining 13 seats in the lower house was in doubt.
In a historic result, One Nation won 19.2 per cent of the vote, while the Liberals’ vote collapsed with a loss of 15.9 per cent, with around 40 per cent of the vote counted.
One Nation candidates were leading in the primaries in the lower house, with Hammond, Mackillop and Ngadjuri to be determined by preferences.
One Nation Leader Pauline Hanson said it was unclear how many seats the party won, but noted state leader Cory Bernardi’s success in winning the upper house seat.
He said the party would push hard for former federal Liberal leader Sussan Ley’s seat of Farrer and the Victorian state election.
He told Sky News: “There’s a movement. There’s an undercurrent and people are saying we’re stuffed. We want our country back. We want our voices to be heard.”
Mr. Bernardi said smiling.
“Because today an earthquake shook the foundations of one-party politics in South Australia,” he said.
Liberal leader Ashton Hurn retained his seat in the Barossa Valley and will maintain his leadership role.
Federal Liberal senator Anne Ruston said a clear message had been sent to the party and that it needed to pivot to the centre-right.
He said the party cannot win by shifting to the right or left.
At Labour’s victory celebration, Mr Malinauskas read Henry Lawson’s poem The Duty of Australians and noted that our patriotism was “less arrogant and boastful, more stubborn and determined”.
“Diversity has always been our greatest strength,” he said.
A record 454,862 (34.5 percent) people voted early and 174,000 (13.2 percent) requested a vote by mail; That means nearly half of the 1.3 million eligible voters potentially cast ballots before election day.
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