New details of the missing votes in the West Australian Senate election support the result of the first count, which saw the Palmer United Party and Labor elected ahead of the Australian Sports Party and the Greens, according to elections expert Antony Green.
Subscribe now for unlimited access.
$0/
(min cost $0)
or signup to continue reading
The ABC election analyst said on Friday that the astonishing result greatly increased the chances that the High Court would order a fresh Senate election for WA, as there was such a ''tiny gap'' between the four candidates vying for the final two spots.
Earlier on Friday, the Australian Electoral Commission publicly released the information it has about the voting preferences of the 1370 missing votes from the WA count, noting that five fewer votes were missing from the final tally than previously announced.
Describing it as the closest Senate result in Australian history, Mr Green said his updated analysis - which does not represent an official result - had the Shooters and Fishers Party just one vote ahead of the Australian Christians at a crucial point in the count that determines the flow of preferences.
Mr Green said this would change the result between the two parties, ultimately in favour of PUP's Zhenya ''Dio'' Wang and Labor's Louise Pratt, who took the fifth and sixth spots in the first official count. In the second and final count, declared by the AEC on Monday, the Sports Party's Wayne Dropulich and the Greens' Scott Ludlam took the fifth and sixth spots, due to a swap in the result between Australian Christians and Shooters and Fishers.
Mr Green said even if the missing votes could be included in the official count, the result is so close that it would likely go to the High Court sitting as the Court of Disputed Returns anyway.
The AEC would not comment on the significance of the new vote details on Friday but it is ''considering its position'' about petitioning the High Court about the outcome. Former AFP commissioner Mick Keelty is conducting an independent inquiry into the missing 1370 votes and will be in Perth on Monday to investigate.
