As it happened Victorian election results 2022: Daniel Andrews secures big win for Labor, count continues in key seats

That’s all we have for you tonight but thanks once more for joining us today and throughout this election weekend in Victoria.

Seven seats remain too close to call and you can see the latest results here.

Before I go, here are a couple of our leading stories:

‘We insult people’s intelligence’: The Liberal Party recriminations begin

‘We are a progressive state’: What is Daniel Andrews planning for his third term in government?

Teal wave falling short of Spring Street, but wealthy backer hails ‘remarkable achievement’

Left-wing parties could hold power in Victoria’s upper house

We appreciate all the comments and feedback this weekend and will have much more state political coverage in the days and weeks to come.

Thanks again and enjoy the rest of your evening.

The Victorian Electoral Commission will correct an error on its website on Monday which showed an incorrect two-party preferred prediction for the seat of Albert Park.

Labor’s Nina Taylor is expected to win the seat and she was put in the two-party preferred alongside Kim Samiotis from the Greens instead of Lauren Sherson from the Liberal Party who clearly has the second most first preference votes.

The VEC put a note on its Albert Park results page saying the page would be updated on Monday.

“Please be aware that our two-candidate preferred prediction for this district was incorrect, and this table does not reflect the 2 candidates considered most likely to be in the lead (after a distribution of preferences),” the note said.

“We will update this table to reflect the 2 leading candidates from Monday 28 November.”

Taylor leads with 61.9 per cent of the vote counted.

It was the moment the Liberals realised they had chosen the wrong Guy.

In August this year, not long after the salary imbroglio surrounding Matthew Guy’s chief of staff first lobbed into the middle of Victoria’s election campaign, Liberal Party state director Sam McQuestin approached the opposition leader with a dire set of numbers.

Matthew Guy with his one-time friend and supporter, Tim Smith.Credit: Paul Jeffers

The survey figures, taken from the Liberal Party’s latest internal tracking at a time when Guy’s popularity had cratered following revelations he knew about Mitch Catlin’s attempt to top up his taxpayer salary with money from a party donor, showed the Coalition was headed for a Western Australia-style wipeout.

Nineteen of the party’s 27 seats were at risk of falling. The Coalition’s primary vote had slipped into the 20s – the death zone for any major party.

Click here to read the story.

Daniel Andrews strolled through the Victorian Parliament’s gardens with his deputy Jacinta Allan on Sunday morning, headed towards the press pack and began as he always does: “Everyone right to go?”

Less than 12 hours after his victory speech at the Village Green Hotel in Mulgrave, Andrews was back in front of the cameras. It was his first day as premier in the 60th parliament, having led Labor to a historic third term, and he wanted us to know he was not wasting a moment.

Premier Daniel Andrews in Parliament’s gardens on Sunday with Deputy Premier Jacinta Allan.Credit: Luis Enrique Ascui

“My politics, our politics, it’s not about us, and it’s not about the win just for its own sake, it’s about winning, so you have the opportunity and the obligation to get on and do the work,” he said.

During the pandemic, press conferences became Andrews’ preferred method of engaging with the media, and Sunday suggested that, along with his use of social media, it would remain that way. These methods come at the expense of long-form inquisitions, particularly on live radio, or regular direct engagement with newspaper interviewers.

The reason, according to one of his senior ministers, was that the game had changed.

Click here to read the story.

The teals have not been the disruptive force in Victorian politics that some had anticipated, with independents trailing in the state election vote count.

Former senior Liberal frontbencher John Pesutto, who dramatically lost his seat on live television in 2018, has a narrow lead in the two-candidate preferred count for Hawthorn ahead of teal independent Melissa Lowe.

Hawthorn independent Melissa Lowe was leading the vote count on election night, but has fallen behind.Credit: Scott McNaughton

Independent Sophie Torney trailed Liberal Jess Wilson in Kew and Liberal David Southwick was expected to retain Caulfield despite challenges from independent Nomi Kaltmann and Labor’s Lior Harel.

Mornington was too close to call, with former federal MP Chris Crewther ahead of independent Kate Lardner – a Frankston Hospital doctor and mother-of-two – by 177 votes as of Sunday evening, with almost 80 per cent of the vote counted.

Click here to read the story.

Hawthorn independent Melissa Lowe has reminded Liberal opponent John Pesutto that community values won’t be changing no matter which of them wins this election.

Pesutto was ahead of Lowe by just under 500 votes today with 70.1 per cent of the vote in Hawthorn counted, and Lowe said she couldn’t be sure how things would play out but that those voters who supported her campaign would still demand action on climate change and other issues.

“Whatever happens next, those community values aren’t changing,” Lowe wrote.

Lowe also said her campaign was both cleaning out its campaign office and scrutineering votes as the count went on.

Federal Liberal MPs say the party must broaden its appeal to voters to have any chance of winning new seats and reclaiming its former heartland after Victorian voters delivered a second stinging rebuke in six months.

Shadow finance spokeswoman Jane Hume and shadow immigration spokesman Dan Tehan, both federal Victorian MPs, said their party had to target new groups of voters to have any chance of reversing the party’s decades-long decline in Victoria.

Shadow finance minister Jane Hume.Credit: Alex Ellinghausen

Hume is currently working with former federal director Brian Loughnane on a review of the Liberals’ crushing defeat in the May federal election.

That review is close to being finalised and will examine the myriad issues facing the Liberal Party including a low number of female MPs, how the campaign was lost and how to win over new supporters.

Click here to read the story.

A bloc of left-wing MPs could hold the balance of power in Victoria’s upper house if the Greens and Legalise Cannabis make projected gains, while early counting indicates that micro parties tied to the so-called “preference whisperer” Glenn Druery went backwards in Saturday’s election.

The Greens could finish with up to four upper house seats if counting continues in their favour, up from a single seat in the upper house.

Greens leader Samantha Ratnam, with colleagues today, says her party is now a force to be reckoned with.Credit: Luis Enrique Ascui

Legalise Cannabis was “cautiously optimistic” about picking up two seats in the Legislative Council, but the Victorian Socialists were an outside chance of snagging one of those. Reason Party leader Fiona Patten was well-placed and could retain her position, while the Animal Justice Party was also likely to hold one seat, but with Georgie Purcell instead of Andy Meddick.

There are 40 seats in the upper house Legislative Council, but the government won’t achieve a majority. Both Labor and the Coalition could end up with 14 or 15 seats each.

Click here to read the story.

The outgoing Member for Hawthorn, John Kennedy of Labor, has bid the seat farewell as counting continues to decide whether Liberal John Pesutto or independent Melissa Lowe will win the election.

Pesutto holds a tight lead at present as he bids to win back the seat which Kennedy won in Labor’s landslide win in 2018.

Kennedy tweeted today that it was clear he would not win and thanked the electorate for its support.

As of 5.30pm AEDT, there are still seven seats yet to be called on our Age election results.

Those “too close to call” seats are Bass, Hastings, Hawthorn, Mornington, Narracan, Northcote and Pakenham.

Click here for our results page.