With 22,000 votes still to be counted, the Labor Party and Sustainable Australia Party are neck and neck in the race for the 15th and final seat on Campbelltown Council.
As it stands, Labor has six and could go to seven, while Sustainable Australia Party (SAP) have won one seat but could turn that into two if they beat the ALP.
Labor is on 6.52 quotas at present, with SAP slightly ahead on 1.58, but with so many votes still to be counted it’s too early to call.
But we do know who the other 14 councillors will be, and who they represent.
The new council will have three councillors representing the new merged entity, Community First Totally Independent Party: Josh Cotter, Warren Morrison and Seta Berbari.
Macarthur Greens will have two, as will Masud Khalil’s Community Voice of Australia.
Adam Zahra, a member of One Nation who ran as an independent, has also won a seat.
The NSW Electoral Commission, which conducted the 2024 local government elections, reports 22,666 informal votes so far in Campbelltown.
That’s a mammoth 21 percent of the total votes cast.
Over in Camden, the Libertarian Party, formerly Liberal Democrats, have won two spots on the new council.
And while this may give them the balance of power, especially in electing the next mayor, they will not have the massive influence over development that’s been portrayed in the metropolitan media.
In central ward the two former mayors, Therese Fedeli and Ashleigh Cagney have been elected to four more years. The third person elected there is Peter McLean, who ran as an independent.
In North ward independent Abha Suri won one spot, Labor Party one and the Libertarian Party one.
In south ward Labor and the Libertarian party have won each, and it looks like veteran Eva Campbell who has .74 of a quota could scrape in for her umpteenth term on Camden Council. Standing in her way is Cindy Cagney, who ran as an independent this time and is on .63 of a quota, with around 5000 votes still to be counted.
Camden has also seen a massive number of informal votes cast, more than 17,000 so far.
The election will be formally declared next week, and that will also signal the start of the wheeling and dealing for mayors in both Campbelltown and Camden.
