Finally, the votes are in. The result is known. Apart from a few remaining postal votes, which are expected to be counted today, we know Gilmore has been returned to the Liberals albeit by a razor thin margin.
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Labor’s Fiona Phillips has conceded defeat via social media. She is yet to call the victor Ann Sudmalis to officially concede. There is some festering dispute about polling booth behaviour standing in the way of good sportsmanship.
Once the formalities are complete and the childish squabbles put behind us, every voter in Gilmore expects the business of government and representation to resume in earnest.
For the next three years, the electorate will expect to see vigorous actions taken on its behalf. It will want local issues taken up to ministers, not just their assistants. And it will expect to have meaningful federal investment in infrastructure and services. Piecemeal funding grants are unlikely to cut the mustard with voters, who showed their dissatisfaction with what was offered before when they went to the polls on July 2.
In the north of the electorate voters will rightly expect their federal representative to prosecute a compelling case for Canberra to contribute to the cost of the Princes Highway upgrade. That means more than a few million dollars for planning the new bridge over the Shoalhaven River.
The south of the electorate will want its internet speeds brought up to speed. It will expect meaningful progress towards a bypass of Milton and will not brook an argument that this is purely a state issue.
If it sounds demanding, it is. That is the prerogative of marginal electorates, especially ones where votes in their hundreds can tip the scales.
The seat of Gilmore has shown it no longer votes along purely tribal lines. In 2013, it bucked the national swing to the Coalition and substantially reduced the margin enjoyed by the Liberal Party. In 2016 it almost tipped the party out.
If the government is determined to be returned in 2019, Gilmore will have to be front and centre. The seat will require the attention voters felt it had been denied for the past three years.
Eleventh-hour commitments ahead of the next election are unlikely to sway voters who this year appeared cynical towards last-ditch pitches.
It’s a message for the Opposition as well. Gilmore expects a lot more.
