NSW

BENNELONG and Wentworth provided most of the political drama among the NSW electorates, but many will see the unfolding domestic dispute in Lindsay as a fitting end to one of the low points of the campaign.

Liberal candidate Karen Chijoff has announced that her husband, Greg — one of the engineers of last week’s fake leaflet scandal — had moved out of the family home. It was also reported she had stopped wearing her wedding ring.

Ms Chijoff, who was seeking to replace retiring MP Jackie Kelly, but suffered a 9.8 per cent swing against her to lose the outer- western Sydney seat to Labor’s David Bradbury, is furious at the antics of her husband, who has also been forced to resign from the Liberal Party.

The fake race-hate election flyers from a bogus Islamic group claimed Labor had forgiven the Bali bombers. They were also distributed by Ms Kelly’s husband, Gary Clark.

Treasurer Peter Costello said today the leaflets scandal was an “isolated, stupid thing in one seat” but added: “The blanket coverage just squeezed the oxygen out of any other message.”

On election night, Ms Kelly said: “I really feel for Karen, just the effort that she’s put in, she must be devastated.”

Asked if the Lindsay scandal was partly responsible for the Liberals’ poor showing in NSW, and across the country, state Opposition Leader Barry O’Farrell said it “might have contributed to the defeat”.

“I was disgusted and appalled at the tactic, it let down the Liberal Party, it let down Liberal supporters.”

Overall, Labor gained at least eight seats in NSW. Twenty-eight seats are now held by the Labor Party, double the 14 now held by the Liberals. The Nationals hold five seats.

While postal votes could give departing prime minister John Howard a much-needed boost, an ecstatic Maxine McKew was ahead in Bennelong last night and is expected to take the seat.

The western Sydney seat of Macarthur, held by Pat Farmer but facing an almost 11 per cent swing, remained in doubt.

As well as Lindsay and Bennelong, the seats that fell to Labor were: Eden-Monaro, Parramatta (notionally Liberal), Robertson, Dobell, Macquarie and Page.

Many Labor members also improved their margins to levels they could only have dreamed of.

Beyond the Prime Minister’s seat of Bennelong, there were other high-profile government losses, including Roads Minister Jim Lloyd, who suffered a swing of 7.3 per cent against him in Robertson, with Labor candidate Belinda Neal declaring victory.

On the NSW central coast, Labor’s Craig Thomson enjoyed a swing of almost 9 per cent to claim Dobell from well-known Liberal member Ken Ticehurst.

Despite a spirited local campaign, Liberal member Kerry Bartlett, one of the “Class of 96”, lost the historic seat of Macquarie to former NSW attorney-general Bob Debus after a redistribution fundamentally altered the nature of the seat.

In the nation’s most famous bellwether seat, Eden-Monaro, in southern NSW, which has gone with the government in power since 1972, former army officer Mike Kelly oversaw a 6.7 per cent swing to Labor. Mr Kelly took the seat from special minister of state Gary Nairn, who had held Eden-Monaro since 1996.

Countering the massacre elsewhere, Environment Minister Malcolm Turnbull increased his majority in Sydney’s eastern suburbs seat of Wentworth.

Despite fevered pre-election speculation that industrial relations minister Joe Hockey would lose his seat, he held on to North Sydney, despite a 4.3 per cent swing to former television weatherman Mike Bailey.