No election results yet Vote count to be finished next week

IT could be days before the community gets the official results on the new Townsville City Council.

With a large number of postal and telephone votes this year due to the COVID-19 restrictions, the full number of votes will not be counted until early next week.

But Team Jenny Hill has declared it will win nine out of 10 seats, with Nanette Radeck in Division 2 the only team member not to win.

In a message, Cr Hill said voting “trends” indicated her team was likely to win all other seats.

An Electoral Commission of Queensland spokesman said the counts were progressing but official declarations would not be made until the ECQ could be sure the results would not change. In Division 1, Margie Ryder has almost double the votes of Sandra Chesney, who has 24.25 per cent.

In Division 3, Ann-maree Greaney has received about 57 per cent of the vote, while the next closest has less than 20 per cent. Returning councillor Russ Cook has about 20 per cent more of the vote than Paul Begenal in Division 5.

Suzy Batkovic in Division 6 has secured almost 17 per cent more than Trevor Roberts, who has 30 per cent.

Kurt Rehbein in Division 7 has almost double the votes Harry Patel secured.

In Division 8, Maurie Soars has more than 50 per cent of the vote counted.

In Division 9, Liam Mooney has 51 per cent of the vote.

And in Division 10, former Townsville City Council deputy mayor Les Walker has 63 per cent of the vote. “One of the Townsville City councillors, Mark Molachino in Division 4, was uncontested and his election was officially declared on 30 March 2020,” the ECQ spokesman said.

“For the mayor and other councillor positions, the preliminary count has to be undertaken, which is then followed by the official count during which all votes are recounted – this is the process required to ensure the accuracy of the result. Results will be declared as soon as the outcome is mathematically certain.”

The vote count is expected to take longer than usual because of large postal votes and additional social distancing measures. April 7 is the cut-off date for postal votes to be received.

*Results accurate

5.30pm Tuesday. as of