Werribee voters face long wait for byelection result in cliffhanger count

The Werribee byelection result won’t be known until Friday, with Labor’s hold on the western suburbs seat to be decided by 4111 postal votes issued by the Victorian Electoral Commission but which have not yet been returned.

The cliffhanger count in a seat the Liberal Party has not held for 46 years has upended the established order of Victorian politics and delivered a potent message to the Allan government, which has promised to do more to ease cost-of-living pressures, provide better roads and address growing concerns about crime.

Premier Jacinta Allan on Sunday after a big swing against Labor at the Werribee byelection.Credit: Luis Enrique Ascui

Strategists from both major parties expect that, if the outstanding postal votes follow the pattern of those already counted, Labor’s John Lister will retain his narrow lead from Liberal candidate Steve Murphy.

Meanwhile, the Liberals declared victory in the Prahran byelection, where former Administrative Appeals Tribunal member Rachel Westaway clinched the seat from the Greens and provided an early boost to her newly elected party leader, Brad Battin.

A VEC spokeswoman confirmed that postal votes for Werribee would keep coming until 6pm on Friday. All votes lodged on Saturday, early votes and postal votes already returned were counted by 12.45am on Sunday. The remaining postal votes will be counted on Friday.

The delay to the result will frustrate both major parties, which have each raised concerns about the VEC’s conduct of the Werribee byelection. A VEC spokesperson defended the slow count. “We always prioritise accuracy over speed when counting votes for an election, to ensure an election result is trusted and stands up to scrutiny.”

Rachel Westaway and Victorian Liberal leader Brad Battin outside the Prahran market on Sunday.Credit: Penny Stephens

Labor’s primary vote in the electorate – vacated by former treasurer Tim Pallas – collapsed by almost 17 per cent, leaving Lister with just 28.7 per cent of the vote. Murphy, a real estate agent who moved out of the electorate five years ago, narrowly out-polled Labor on primary votes.

This is the largest byelection swing recorded against Labor since former premier Daniel Andrews rose to power 10 years ago. At the 2023 Mulgrave byelection, prompted by Andrews’ retirement, Labor suffered a 10.8 per cent primary swing. At the Altona byelection, which preceded the fall of the Brumby government in 2010, the swing was 13 per cent.

At the close of counting on Sunday morning, Lister held a lead of just 441 votes after the distribution of preferences. Postal votes counted so far are running slightly in Murphy’s favour, but neither party believes there are enough votes outstanding to bridge the gap.

Premier Jacinta Allan greeted media the morning after the byelection in her normal Sunday dress – a hard hat, hi-vis vest and work boots. Standing outside one of the newly constructed stations for the Metro Tunnel project, Allan said she never took a seat for granted and acknowledged there was more to do to support “working people and families”.

Victorian Greens leader Ellen Sandell hoped to win back Prahran in 2026.Credit: Luis Enrique Ascui

“And that’s certainly … a message that we have heard from the Werribee community,” Allan said. “The community is sending a message to government and MPs everywhere: ‘You’ve got to do more to listen to us. You’ve got to do more to help us’.”

While the Liberal Party came close to scaling Labor’s red wall in Werribee, its primary vote lifted by only 4 per cent, suggesting voters deserting Labor were unwilling to embrace the Liberals. It is also evidence of a further fracturing of the two-party system.

The notion of Labor’s primary vote falling below 30 per cent in a western-suburbs seat was once unthinkable. In Werribee, no party or candidate reached that mark.

Battin said the result that mattered was the two-party preferred but took responsibility for the Liberals failing to make bigger gains on its primary support.

“There is a message for us as well,” he said. “It is time for us to put forward our policies to be the alternative government. People are ready for that change.

“Nothing is safe.”

The opposition leader also offered a blunt message for his party room, which will expand to 32 members after the win in Prahran.

“Go out and work hard. But I also say, we’ve got to pick the right candidates now. Pick the people that Victorians can trust, put the platform forward, and I actually think then people will come along and understand we are a genuine alternative.”

Battin was exuberant after his party pulled off double-digit swings in two-party preferred terms in both Prahran and Werribee. However, the Coalition still requires an additional 16 seats at the November 2026 election to form government.

The Greens’ Prahran candidate, Angelica Di Camillo, congratulated Westaway on Sunday and conceded defeat in the tense contest.

Victorian Greens leader Ellen Sandell said the minor party was in a strong position to win Prahran back in 2026. It is still trying to win back Northcote from Labor and would have preferred to be turning its attention to seats like Footscray and Albert Park at the next state election.

Both major parties were pushing for a review into the Victorian Electoral Commission’s conduct in the Werribee byelection after confusion over ballots, delayed counting and a collapsed roof contributed to a shambolic tally night.

It came after the VEC ordered one of its own election officials to leave a polling place earlier in the day after the official was reportedly heard telling people to vote Liberal.

The Greens separately flagged concerns about the low voter turnout, particularly in Prahran, which it attributed to the lack of absentee voting in byelections.

The VEC has been monitoring low voter turnouts at Victorian elections, with increasing concern. Votes from only 64.29 registered voters have so far been counted in Prahran, compared with 82.7 per cent at the last state election. In Werribee, the current turnout figure is 75.22 per cent, compared with 85.58 per cent in 2022.

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