Robbie Katter has easily retained the seat of Traeger, as did his fellow two Katter party MPs but the KAP's hopes of forming the balance of power look dashed with Labor set to have a working majority in the new parliament.
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At the time of writing Labor has the 47 seats it needs to form government with premier Annastacia Palaszczuk returned for an historic third term.
The ABC tips that they may end up with 51 seats, with the LNP currently on 33 and likely to get to 35, with the KAP on three, the Greens on two, One Nation on one and one independent making up the 93 seat parliament.
In the seat of Traeger Robbie Katter has 59.6% of the vote with 25 of 36 booths counted, down 6.6% on 2017 but still an easy victory,
Labor's James Bambrick has 21.9% of the vote up 5.3%, the LNP's Marnie Smith has 14.1% up 4.0%, the Greens have 2.2% (no change), Independent Craig Scriven has 1.4% (down 0.3%) and UAP 0.8% (did not compete in 2017).
RELATED NEWS: Traeger goes to the polls
Robbie Katter congratulated his staff for his win.
"You can live and die by your staff and I've had really wonderful staff over the last few years so I'd pay a tribute to them," Mr Katter,
Mr Katter was happy that Shane Knuth was re-elected in Hill and fellow KAP member Nick Dametto has extended his winning margin in the seat of Hinchinbrook,
"We have very high results, so when we win seats they are likely to stay our seats," he said.
""People dont realise how enormously difficult it is to fight the advantage of major parties, they are well financed and well resourced, and they keep changing the guidelines against us."
Mr Katter admitted he was disappointed they couldn't add to the three seats they won in 2017.
"We are still in with a fighting chance but it's a little bit disappointing as we put a lot of effort into that," he said.
Elsewhere the biggest shock was the defeat of Jackie Trad to the Greens in South Brisbane while Grace Grace is in a cliffhanger to hold onto McConnell.
But Labor looks like it has held onto its three Townsville seats and won two Sunshine Coast seats off the LNP: Caloundra and Pumicestone.
SEE ALSO: Sell out in Cloncurry for Derby Day
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Derek Barry
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
Editor of the North West Star Mount Isa since January 2016. Prior to that, an editor at several regional southern Queensland newspapers. Passionate about telling local stories. Comes with a strange accent to due an Irish accident of birth.
