Voice data blunder: AEC admits Geraldton’s only Yes majority polling booth was actually in No camp

The only polling booth in Geraldton that recorded a majority Yes vote in the Voice to Parliament referendum on Saturday was actually in the landslide No camp, after a data mix-up was revealed. The result at Bluff Point Primary School was an eye-catching anomaly among all the polling booth results across Geraldton. For several days after the referendum, the 1016 formal votes counted at that station were 67.4 per cent for Yes and 32.6 per cent for No. It was the only polling booth in Geraldton and the Mid West to have a majority Yes verdict. Making the situation all the more peculiar was that the outcome at another polling station in the same suburb, at St Lawrence’s Primary School, was firmly entrenched on the No side, with 69.5 per cent of voters rejecting changing the Constitution. It was a result that had volunteers in both camps scratching their heads. However, it turns out data entered by the Australian Electoral Commission for the Bluff Point Primary School station was put in the wrong category, and only corrected online on Wednesday night. The votes submitted at Bluff Point Primary School were in fact the other way around — 67.4 per cent No and 32.6 voted Yes. The AEC has confirmed the figures are correct but there was a transposition error in the second count of votes. An AEC spokesperson said: “The switch inadvertently occurred upon data entry during the secondary, validation count for this polling place.” The spokesperson added transposition errors occurred very infrequently but were always rectified. The change to the outcome of Bluff Point Primary School meant the Mid West did not have a single polling station record a majority Yes vote. Moonyoonooka, 12km east of Geraldton, recorded the highest saturation of No votes, with 92.7 per cent of voters opposing a Voice in Parliament. The change now puts the Geraldton Primary School polling station as the booth with the highest quantity of Yes votes for Greater Geraldton, with 35.5 per cent of voters favouring the Voice. Durack recorded 86,451 total votes and 62,216 were against voting in a Voice to Parliament As a whole, 72.51 per cent of registered voters in Durack voted No, and 27.49 per cent voted Yes. Across polling booths in Greater Geraldton, almost 75 per cent of voters objected to the Voice.