MEMBER for Wannon Dan Tehan has attributed Labor’s “Medicare lie” and the traditional swing against incumbent governments for the swing against him in Saturday’s election.
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At 11pm on Saturday night, Mr Tehan had a swing of 1.3 per cent against him on a two candidate preferred candidate basis and 0.9 per cent on a first preference count.
However he expected the swing against him would decline as postal and other declaration votes were counted during the week.
“On the whole, Wannon has voted with the status quo,” Mr Tehan said.
On the national outcome, he was hopeful the Coalition could still form government despite the threat of a hung parliament.
“It’s going to be very close,” Mr Tehan said.
He took heart the swing against him in Wannon was well below the national two party preferred swing against the Coalition of 3.3 per cent.
The national swing was “a surprise” because he thought “Malcolm Turnbull had a very positive agenda while the Shorten agenda was very negative and would not prevail,” he said.
The national swing is a surprise because I thought Malcolm Turnbull had run a very positive agenda.
- Dan Tehan
On the local outcome, Mr Tehan took little joy the efforts by his opponents to make Wannon a marginal seat were unsuccessful.
He said was “incredibly humbled” to be re-elected as Member for Wannon for a third term.
“Every campaign I have fought, I have fought a robust opposition.
“People throw the kitchen sink at you. That is democracy,” Mr Tehan said.
“I have always represented this electorate like it was a marginal seat,” he said.
He said he had secured $90 million in election commitments for road funding for Wannon, more than had been promised for the adjoining marginal seat of Corangamite.
The $90 million in road funding is contingent on the state government matching the contribution.
He had also promised $14 million to help the ongoing efforts to retain a university campus in Warrnambool.
During his time as federal member, Mr Tehan also secured a $10 million contribution from the federal government towards the South West Regional Cancer Centre that was due to open in the near future.
