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Katie Woolf spoke with Electoral Commissioner Iain Loganathan · 360 with Katie Woolf

• 0:00
  Speaker 1: And we know that the local government elections indeed took
• 0:02
  Speaker 1: place a couple of weeks ago, but we are still
• 0:04
  Speaker 1: waiting to hear the outcome. With quite a number of
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  Speaker 1: those different different areas and different mayoral races now joining
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  Speaker 1: us in the studio just to give us a bit
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  Speaker 1: of an idea where things are at when it comes
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  Speaker 1: to the counting and when those well, when they're going
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  Speaker 1: to be declared. I guess is the Northern Territories Electoral
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  Speaker 1: Commissioner in Logan, Nathan, good morning to you.
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  Speaker 2: Good morning Katie, and where are.
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  Speaker 1: We ast with the count for the local government elections?
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  Speaker 3: So, Katie, we've counted most of the votes. The only
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  Speaker 3: votes really left account now are the postal votes that
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  Speaker 3: are yet to come in, and they will slowly trickle
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  Speaker 3: in for the rest of this week.
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  Speaker 2: So what will happen is when the votes.
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  Speaker 3: When we get the final postal votes, which will be
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  Speaker 3: by lunchtime on Friday, we will then determine the quota,
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  Speaker 3: and then from the quota we will do a full
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  Speaker 3: distribution of preferences and determine the results.
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  Speaker 1: Because some of these seats are very much going to
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  Speaker 1: be determined by those preferences.
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  Speaker 3: Aren't they look absolutely, Katie. In local government, particularly for
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  Speaker 3: the aldermen and counselor positions, they're always determined by the preferences,
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  Speaker 3: you know, particularly for the last seat or second last seat.
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  Speaker 3: We also have very close contests in Lichfield and in
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  Speaker 3: Catherine and in our Springs.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, it's been quite fascinating to watch. I think that
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  Speaker 1: a lot of the time when an election happens, people
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  Speaker 1: expect to know the outcomes sort of the very next day.
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  Speaker 1: But unless it's a really clear winner, it is always
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  Speaker 1: going to come down to those preferences and always going
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  Speaker 1: to come down to you to where people place.
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  Speaker 3: Those preferences, look absolutely, and that's why it's very important
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  Speaker 3: that when you cast your vote, it's just not the
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  Speaker 3: number one that matters. You have to think that if
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  Speaker 3: your selected candidate is unsuccessful, then who would you prefer next,
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  Speaker 3: And that really requires some thought because, as you say,
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  Speaker 3: preferences really matter.
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  Speaker 1: So Friday midday is when we'll know, well who's going
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  Speaker 1: to be the mayor of the likes of Lichfield and Catherine,
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  Speaker 1: Alice Springs and all of those other aldermen and council positions.
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  Speaker 3: So Friday midday is the deadline. For the postal votes,
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  Speaker 3: so we will then start the distribution of preferences, so
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  Speaker 3: it'll be late afternoon for some of them, and likely
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  Speaker 3: probably a late evening for some of the for some
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  Speaker 3: of the longer counts.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, how did we go in terms of voter turnout
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  Speaker 1: with the local government election? Do you did you feel
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  Speaker 1: us so we got a pretty good voter turnout.
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  Speaker 3: I think the short answer would be no, Katie, we
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  Speaker 3: did slightly better than twenty seventeen. Remember you have to
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  Speaker 3: add Palmerston election, which was a year later in twenty eighteen.
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  Speaker 3: I think we're just over sixty percent. We'll probably with
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  Speaker 3: a few more postal votes, and when you add in
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  Speaker 3: the deck votes, we'll probably be at sixty one sixty
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  Speaker 3: two percent, which is I think we were at fifty
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  Speaker 3: eight percent in twenty seventeen, So a marginal increase, but
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  Speaker 3: certainly for I think for the voting services that we provided,
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  Speaker 3: you know, expanded early voting services, particularly out in the remotemmunities. Honestly,
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  Speaker 3: we were really hoping for a better result than that.
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  Speaker 1: So what do you reckon us maybe caused that situation.
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  Speaker 3: I think there's a lot of reasons why, you know,
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  Speaker 3: turnout you know, is poured particularly out in remote communities.
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  Speaker 3: I think that the lockdown certainly had a factor, particularly
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  Speaker 3: in Catherine where we lost four days, and what our
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  Speaker 3: stuff were telling us that you could just tell that
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  Speaker 3: there was less movement in the community even after the lockdown.
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  Speaker 3: People were just generally staying at home. So that meant
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  Speaker 3: that in terms of usually Catherine takes the highest percentage
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  Speaker 3: of early votes, and that wasn't the case. So that, Look,
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  Speaker 3: there's certainly at the remote communities. It's just awareness. We're
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  Speaker 3: certainly doing a lot more stuff in language, doing a
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  Speaker 3: lot more things in social media, you know, our researcher
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  Speaker 3: telling us that we're getting the message out, but it's
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  Speaker 3: just not translating to people still going to the voting
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  Speaker 3: to our voting centers and casting.
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  Speaker 1: A vote, right, and no doubt once everything's finished counting wise,
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  Speaker 1: there will sort of be full look at this to
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  Speaker 1: try to determine how you can maybe or how we
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  Speaker 1: can all try to help to ensure that we do
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  Speaker 1: get a voter turn a better voter turnout next time round.
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  Speaker 3: Look, I've been trying to do that for a long time, right,
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  Speaker 3: and really we've been coming with the same questions and
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  Speaker 3: really without any concrete answers, what is going to be
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  Speaker 3: interesting is with Daily. So we've had an election just
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  Speaker 3: after the local government election. It's a remote division, which
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  Speaker 3: is a rarity in regard to doing a by election.
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  Speaker 3: Certainly there's a lot of interest in this by election
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  Speaker 3: and the parties are extremely active, so it'll be interesting
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  Speaker 3: to sort of say whether their presence leads to an
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  Speaker 3: increased turnout.
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  Speaker 1: And as you've just said there, obviously the Daily by
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  Speaker 1: election is going to be incredibly important for both or
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  Speaker 1: well for all the political parties, whether they're running as
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  Speaker 1: independence or whether they are running for two of the
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  Speaker 1: major parties. I know that I believe the pre polling
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  Speaker 1: opened in what I yesterday. How did that go in
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  Speaker 1: terms of the number of people turning out to vote?
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  Speaker 3: That was a bumper day. In what I yesterday, we
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  Speaker 3: took four one hundred and thirty one votes. We took
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  Speaker 3: another thirty two declaration votes if you can, if you
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  Speaker 3: can compare that to the local government election where we
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  Speaker 3: just took four hundred and thirty three votes in total.
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  Speaker 3: And remembering that we're at what I all week, we're
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  Speaker 3: pilling from eight to four at the sports and recreational Hall.
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  Speaker 1: So did you say four hundred and thirty one votes
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  Speaker 1: yesterday and thirty two declaration votes?
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  Speaker 2: That's correct.
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  Speaker 1: That seems like a pretty high number for first day
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  Speaker 1: of having that pre polling. Why is that, do you reckon?
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  Speaker 2: Look, certainly, we've been pushing it.
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  Speaker 3: We've been doing a lot of advertising there own language,
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  Speaker 3: and like I said before, there's a lot of campaign
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  Speaker 3: workers out there from both sides. You know, my staff
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  Speaker 3: for telling me there's more campaign workers than car bodies
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  Speaker 3: out at what I at the moment?
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  Speaker 1: Right, So this do you mean like campaign workers I
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  Speaker 1: members of the labor or the COLP.
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  Speaker 3: Look, yes, look, yes, Look, that would certainly be the case.
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  Speaker 3: And certainly they drum up the presence, they create the
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  Speaker 3: interest and pass on the information that people are required
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  Speaker 3: to vote, and that certainly has a huge factor in
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  Speaker 3: regard to turnout at remote communities.
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  Speaker 1: How do those numbers sort of compare to some of
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  Speaker 1: the other early voting centers that you've had in other
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  Speaker 1: areas of.
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  Speaker 3: Daily Look, it's been pretty good so far. You know,
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  Speaker 3: bell Ewan had a good turnout, so did Dundee and
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  Speaker 3: Kybrook Farm. Looking obviously this week we've got other places
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  Speaker 3: to do. We've got Peppy to do and New You
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  Speaker 3: and on Saturday we'll do Bachelor. So look, there's certainly
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  Speaker 3: more votes to be taken there. But if I can
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  Speaker 3: give you like an overall perspective, is that so far
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  Speaker 3: we've taken twelve hundred and forty six votes. In addition,
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  Speaker 3: we've issued another three hundred and eighty three postal votes
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  Speaker 3: and that's in an electorate of five seven hundred and
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  Speaker 3: six in total.
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  Speaker 1: Wow, people obviously want to have their voices heard in
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  Speaker 1: this one.
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  Speaker 3: Look, Like I said, it's certainly a high profile by election.
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  Speaker 3: There's a lot of interest from the parties. It's a
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  Speaker 3: big electorate and very different sort of a client base
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  Speaker 3: or an elector base in terms of rural communities and
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  Speaker 3: Aboriginal communities. So it's going to it's going to be
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  Speaker 3: it's going to be an interesting weekend.
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  Speaker 1: Yeah, sure is. So what's going to be the process
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  Speaker 1: in terms of counting all of those votes over the weekend.
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  Speaker 3: So on Saturday, we will have a voting center aty
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  Speaker 3: at Bery Spring School and so they'll be open there
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  Speaker 3: from eight till six and they'll count those votes there,
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  Speaker 3: all the other votes that includes the Kola linga early
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  Speaker 3: voting center and that's open till this Friday, and then
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  Speaker 3: the vote. Then the early voting center we've had in town,
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  Speaker 3: plus the early voting center currently is at Berry Springs
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  Speaker 3: Shops shopping Center. Will count those in our office here
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  Speaker 3: on Saturday night. In addition, we'll count the early votes, sorry,
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  Speaker 3: the postal votes that have been returned.
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  Speaker 1: And so do you anticipate that you'll have an outcome
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  Speaker 1: on Saturday night or you really don't know it.
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  Speaker 2: It just depends on the numbers, Katie.
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  Speaker 3: I think you know one thing you can see in
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  Speaker 3: the local government if election. If someone's got a good
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  Speaker 3: margin on the Saturday night, then you kind of know
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  Speaker 3: that they're going to get up. But if they don't,
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  Speaker 3: then like the rest of us, they're just going to
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  Speaker 3: have to wait. Similar to LG, there's going to be
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  Speaker 3: a two week period for postal votes. Like I said,
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  Speaker 3: there's three hundred and eighty three postal votes being issued,
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  Speaker 3: and if the margin's small, we're going to have to
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  Speaker 3: wait for those who trickle in before we just we
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  Speaker 3: can determine who is going to win that seat.
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  Speaker 1: Well, Ian Logan, Nathan, always good to catch up with you.
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  Speaker 1: I really appreciate you taking the time to have a
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  Speaker 1: chat with us today. Sounds as so we'll probably talk
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  Speaker 1: again early next week.
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  Speaker 2: No worries, Thank you, Kate, thank you