Hundreds of businesses in Adelaide and North Adelaide had their council election votes excluded by Electoral Commission
Nearly 250 CBD businesses had their votes in the Adelaide City Council election excluded because of confusion around who is authorised to vote on their behalf and their voting rights, The Advertiser can reveal.
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Almost 250 CBD businesses had their votes in the Adelaide City Council election excluded because of confusion around voting rights and who is authorised to vote on their behalf, The Advertiser can reveal.
As the makeup of the next Adelaide City Council became clearer, there were calls for major change to the voting process following the significant number of informal votes, and the reasons they were invalid.
Meanwhile, Erin Thompson was elected mayor at the scandal-plagued Onkaparinga Council, and ex-mayor Lorraine Rosenberg faced missing out as a councillor.
In the race for Adelaide City Council, scrutineers from multiple camps have told The Advertiser more than 230 votes were excluded from the business-heavy Central Ward.
This was because companies believed they had been told they could vote more than once if they owned several businesses in the council area.
However, signatures on the ballot papers did not match up with the name the Electoral Commission believed to be the “authorising officer” who had the power to cast the vote.
The Advertiser has been told this included some of the major businesses and landowners in the city, as well as law firms, and companies in North Adelaide.
And it could have been more as it is believed that at one point more than 600 votes were in danger of being excluded because of these reasons. The Electoral Commission was contacted for comment.
Houssam Abiad, who is set to return as a Central Ward councillor, said the State Government needed to make the voting process clearer.
“Businesses are seriously disadvantaged in this process as there is no clear indication for them on how to vote or nominate someone to vote,” he said.
Remo Russo, who is understood to have missed out on significant voting numbers because of the exclusion, also said there needed to be changes.
“The unfortunate part is going into the count of the election you need to be able to play the game to win,” he said.
“And it doesn’t help when the people running the count are making up rules as they go along on the day.”
Meanwhile, the makeup of the council chamber under Lord Mayor-elect Sandy Verschoor continues to be determined.
While sitting councillors Sandy Wilkinson and Priscilla Corbell-Moore lost their seats, Area and South Ward respectively, Anne Moran won another four years on the council, having first entered the chamber in 1995.
She will be joined by former councillor and federal Greens Senator Robert Simms, domestic violence campaigner Arman Abrahimzadeh, and Franz Knoll — the father of Local Government Minister Stephan — as an area councillor for the next term.
Former SA Young Liberals president Alex Hyde and psychologist Dr Helen Donovan have won the race for the South Ward, while Phil Martin is set to be re-elected in the North Ward. Mary Couros leads the race for the second seat.
Simon Hou and Cr Abiad look set to take two of the three Central seats, while Jessy Khera is closing in on the third.
In other election results, Michael Coxon was declared the new mayor at West Torrens.
Following John Trainer’s decision to end his 18-year stint as mayor, Mr Coxon ended up more than 200 votes ahead of now former councillor Arthur Mangos.