2019 federal election: Labor's Lisa Chesters wins Bendigo for third time

Labor's Lisa Chesters has claimed victory in the seat of Bendigo for a third successive term with a decisive result.

The returning MP and her supporters became confident of her win early on on election night, with the ABC calling the result in Ms Chesters' favour shortly after 7pm.

"The result tonight is just phenomenal," Ms Chesters said on Saturday.

"It felt really good on the booths, it felt really good during the campaign, lots of great well-wishes.

"It's wonderful to know you put a plan out there and the people of Bendigo the electorate get behind you."

By 11pm Saturday, Ms Chesters had attracted 44.54 per cent of the first preferences, up from 38.35 per cent in the 2016 election, while Liberal candidate Sam Gayed had 28.64 per cent, down from 37.9 per cent in 2016.

On a two-candidate preferred basis, Ms Chesters claimed 61.68 per cent of the vote to Mr Gayed's 38.32 per cent.

Meanwhile, the Greens' Dr Robert Holian gained 13.21 per cent of first preferences and One Nation's Vaughan Williams - the best performing of the minor parties - 6.03 per cent.

United Australia Party candidate Adam Veitch had 4.44 per cent of first preferences, Julie Hoskin from Fraser Anning's Conservative National Party had 1.64 per cent, and Rise Up Australia's Sharon Budde 1.37 per cent.

Ms Chesters said she had not expected the minor parties to poll so well on primary votes but Labor had "really come home" on the preferences, despite those minor parties preferencing against her.

Among those celebrating with Ms Chesters at the Trades Hall on Saturday night was David Kennedy, a former Labor MP for Bendigo, who described Ms Chesters as one of the finest MPs the electorate had seen.

He said she was not only "intelligent and principled", but she brought people together.

"I'm absolutely thrilled to bits that we've held Bendigo and done so at this stage with an incredible majority, which is a reflection of the fantastic work Lisa Chesters has done," Mr Kennedy said.

Labor MP for the state seat of Bendigo West, Maree Edwards, said the result reflected Ms Chesters' hard work.

Ms Edwards said Ms Chesters, herself and Bendigo East MP Jacinta Allan formed a strong partnership.

Despite the local result, Liberal candidate for Bendigo Sam Gayed remained optimistic on Saturday night about the Coalition's chances at the federal level.

"I'm very happy for the Coalition, it's looking very good... Maybe in Bendigo it's not looking as good, but if the Coalition wins that's what we want, we can try again in Bendigo next time," Mr Gayed said.

A first-time candidate in this election, Mr Gayed said he had learnt a lot.

He said he was doing well until the last week of the campaign, but some coverage did not go as he had hoped and if he were to do it again, he would make improvements.

"I think I needed to talk more about our policies," Mr Gayed said.

"We tried, but many people didn't receive our message, so maybe we needed to be more aggressive in getting our message across to people.

"Maybe we needed to be more careful with the media, because they only get a few seconds of what you say, so you need to focus on really the message you want to convey to people."

Mr Gayed said he believed the Liberal Party was focused more on other seats than Bendigo, but he had still held hope he would show it was winnable.

The last time a Liberal MP won in Bendigo was in the 1996 election, when Bruce Reid was elected for his third term.

Ms Chesters said the Liberals had walked away from the seat in not putting any funding forward.

Ms Edwards said the Nationals had done the same in not fielding a candidate and it showed the Coalition had lost touch with regional communities.

Looking to the future, Ms Chesters said she would turn her attention back to work on Monday, not only on projects in the pipeline but helping people day-to-day navigate federal departments and agencies.

"What I really believe it says is it's a mandate for me to get on with the plan we outlined to the electorate," she said of the result.

"So making sure we lock in the funding for the airport, making sure we lock in the funding for the Rail Trail project, and all the other projects we've committed to in this election campaign."

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