RESULT: Yvonne Barlow wins Division 7

Yvonne Barlow has been officially declared winner of the Moreton Bay Regional Council Division 7 by-election.

The announcement was made by the Electoral Commission of Queensland (ECQ) this morning after a recount of votes last week.

Commissioner Pat Vidgen said a recount was completed including postal votes received by the deadline of close of business on December 14, recounted and the distribution of preferences completed again.

Slim margin

Figures on the ECQ website show Yvonne Barlow finished with 5533 to Brett Hayes’ 5475 – a margin of 58 votes.

Of the other candidates Ryan Bakker had 3276, Dean Teasdale 2867, Ben Wood 2279 and Jacqui Findlay 909.

“The recount was requested by candidate Brett Hayes and as the margin was less than 100 votes between first and second place, the request was deemed reasonable," Commissioner Vidgen said.

Successful candidate

“The recount of all votes was carried out by four ECQ teams, and observed by senior election staff and nine nominated scrutineers, on Friday 17 December.

“After finalising the official distribution of preferences, the successful candidate, Yvonne Barlow, received approximately 50.2 per cent of the formal votes and Brett Hayes received 49.7 per cent, a difference of under one per cent.”

The ECQ said there were 16,884 votes counted equating to about 64.6per cent of the 26,130 enrolled electors in Division 7.

All results

Turnout was lower than the 77.4 per cent for the 2020 Local Government elections (LGE).

However, the informality rate when voting for a councillor was just under five per cent, which is a slight improvement on the 2020 LGE rate of 5.4 per cent.

All Moreton Bay Regional Council Division 7 by-election information including the results, is available from the ECQ’s website at ecq.qld.gov.au.