Editorial: Out with the Old, In with the New

THE final election results for the Upper Hunter Shire are in and the vote for change was resoundingly clear, with newcomers taking 57% of the vote, a loud message to the previous Councillors.

Adding insult to injury, James Burns former Deputy Mayor, did not get enough 1 votes to secure a place on Council and lost any position on Council after preferences were distributed. There were only 15 primary votes separating Allison McPhee in number 10 position and James Burns in Number 9 position. Newcomer Troy Stolz described it as, “two seagulls fitting over the last chip.” Ultimately James Burns lost the chip.

Amazingly three new people made quota, Peter McGill (1192 votes) George Fraser (1003 votes) and Troy Stolz (919 votes), representing 38% of the vote.

What’s quota? The number of votes needed to guarantee a spot on Council. In this Shire quota was 827 votes.

Only one person from the old Council made quota, Maurice Collison (1,200 primary votes). No other previous Councillors made quota.

Since there were only 11 candidates and 9 spots, it means the two people with the lowest votes are out and the remaining candidates all become Councillors by default.

New Compared to Old – Primary Votes

Six candidates ran for the first time this election. Typically previous Councillors get the main share of the votes simply based on name recognition, but it wasn’t the case this time.

Peter McGill, from Murrurundi, only had a voter based 751 people, so meeting quota as a first time candidate was surprising. Troy Stolz in Merriwa had a voter base of 1042, and also had another new candidate Pat Ryan running there, and still made quota. George Fraser in Moobi, could tap into the Scone vote, but considering he also ran a few terms ago and only got a couple of hundred votes, his result was a massive turnaround. The candidates wanting more financial accountability and Council transparency certainly got the lion’s share of the votes, being newcomers and from smaller townships didn’t impact their vote.

Former Mayors can usually rely on at least 1,000 votes and since Lee Watts didn’t run and traditionally held 30% of the votes, Maurice Collison’s vote was expected to climb, just based on more votes coming onto the market. Instead his votes went down by 430 and he ended only 8 votes (0.09%) ahead of Peter McGill.

Tayah Clout was also tipped to benefit from Lee Watts not running, but failed to meet quota and only managed to get ahead of three of the six new comers on 692 votes.

Earle Shields from Aberdeen got a respectable 631 and Pat Ryan from Merriwa 596, both of these first time candidates climbed ahead of three former Councillors. 

In the bottom four were: previous Councillors Adam Williamson (584), James Burns (540), Allison McPhee (525), and last was new candidate Chris Richards on 386.

Final Preferences

While Allison McPhee and Chris Richards got the lowest number of primary votes, there were still preferences from the four candidates who made quota to filter down. Because Collison, McGill, Fraser and Stolz all made above the quota, their extra votes are distributed down the ballot to other candidates.

With only 15 votes separating Allison McPhee in 10th position and James Burns in 9th position, the preferences to them mattered. James Burns lost the last spot, with Allison McPhee limping over the line on preferences back onto Council, making it ahead of Pat Ryan and Adam Williamson. Adam Williamson did not make quota, but managed the claw the last spot on Council.

All candidates have a 24 hour period to review the results and request a recount or explanation. The final order of Councillors will be available after that period.

Not respectable results for any of the old Councillors, let’s see if they really heard the message from the ballot box.