Electoral officials order recount of Bradfield after eight-vote margin

After a tense weeks-long battle, Liberal Gisele Kapterian and Teal Nicolette Boele will have to wait another two weeks to find out which of them has won the seat of Bradfield.

The election results of a prized Sydney seat will be recounted after the two top candidates were split by a margin of just eight votes.

The Australian Electoral Commission announced the seat of Bradfield would undergo a full recount on Friday night, revealing the current vote count had Liberal Gisele Kapterian ahead of Teal challenger Nicolette Boele on an excruciatingly slim margin.

“The recount will proceed in accordance with the AEC’s longstanding policy to conduct a recount for any House of Representatives contests where the final margin is under 100 votes,” the AEC statement read.

Earlier on Friday, Ms Kapterian had trailed Ms Boele by 48 votes before the margin gradually thinned and later flipped.

Ms Boele had earlier been determined the provisional winner but an error was found early on Friday which wiped out most of her lead.

Gisele Kapterian and Nicolette Boele are facing-off in Bradfield.

At one point on Friday the contest was tied with 56,190 votes after preferences for each candidate.

The vote recount will begin on Monday and is expected to take two weeks.

Bradfield was held by former communications minister Paul Fletcher, who announced he was retiring from politics in December last year.

If the final margin between the two candidates is less than 100 votes, the Australian Electoral Commission will automatically conduct a recount.

Then the losing candidate has the option of challenging the result in the Court of Disputed Returns.

Redbridge pollster Kos Samaras said he expected the result to end up in court.

“This will likely end up in the Court of Disputed Returns as there will be disputed ballot papers, ruled informal or formal, that one party or the other is challenging,” he said.

Mr Samaras said the last time an election result went to the court was in 2007 when the result for the Victorian seat of McEwen was disputed.

In another previously close seat, Goldstein in Melbourne, Liberal Tim Wilson extended his lead against Teal Zoe Daniel to more than 400 votes as of 6.30pm.

Ms Daniel announced her win on election night, only for Mr Wilson to overtake her off the back of postal votes.

He had a lead of more than a 1000 votes which was slashed to 128 before bouncing back on Friday.

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Originally published as Electoral officials order recount of Bradfield after eight-vote margin