Michael Johnsen triumphs

Mr Johnsen, 51, and his wife, Zenda, 48, spoke to the Hunter Valley News this week in the wake of his provisional election win in the state seat.

The NSW Electoral Commission said on Monday afternoon 10,835 pre-poll votes, around 20 per cent of ballots cast in the Upper Hunter electorate, were still to be counted.

First preference results immediately after the election saw Mr Johnsen poll 40 per cent of the vote, with his nearest rivals Country Labor’s Martin Rush on 31 per cent and Independent Lee Watts on 20 per cent.

The minor parties in the Upper Hunter electorate were well behind, with the Greens’ John Kaye polling 5.5 per cent; the Christian Democrats’ Richard Stretton 2 per cent; and the No Land Tax Party’s Louisa Checchin 1.5 per cent.

Booths in Branxton, Clarence Town, Paterson, Muswellbrook and Singleton showed good support for Labor, while Mr Johnsen was strongly backed in the Scone, Murrurundi, Moonan, Gloucester, Stroud and Willow Tree areas.

There was very little between the Labor and National vote in Denman, Elderslie, Caroona, Rylstone, Millbrodale and Ulan areas.

Independent Lee Watts polled well in Scone, Aberdeen, Murrurundi and isolated areas of Muswellbrook.

After the gruelling contest, Mr Johnsen acknowledged the efforts of his fellow candidates, especially Country Labor’s Mr Rush.

“I’m happy to heap praise on Martin Rush [who] has been, without a doubt, the best Labor candidate that we’ve seen here in Upper Hunter in living memory.

“The campaign run by all candidates has been very good, really tough and very focussed on local issues,” he said.

Mr Johnsen said he acknowledges Upper Hunter is now a marginal seat after a swing against the Nationals of more than 19 per cent.

“If you look at the margin that George Souris had at 23 per cent it was unrealistic [because] his long term average margin was around 11 to 13 per cent here in the Upper Hunter.

“I predicted before we went into this campaign I would probably suffer a 15 per cent drop in primaries and it ended up being something like 14.4 per cent,” he said.

When asked what he wants to do first in his new role, Mr Johnsen said he is committed to establishing a roundtable meeting between the coal, wine, tourism and horse breeding industries in the Upper Hunter.

“I’m in the difficult position of being somewhere in the middle, but one of the important things is we need to bring the community together because it’s been a divisive issue,” he said.

“I believe there should be some level of buffer there, whether you draw a line on a map and say its 10km or 5km or 20km or whatever the case may be.

“I want to go straight to the Department of Planning and the Planning Minister [because] these are planning issues and I want to make sure that we sit down as soon as possible and sort these issues out.

“Over the next month or so, I will be contacting individuals and organisations to establish the roundtable because I want people who are participating in all of these industries in the Upper Hunter to cut a way through and stop the division.”

Mr Johnsen’s wife, Zenda, said she hopes she’s ready for the demands of political life following her husband’s provisional win.

“Michael has been working in the community and involved in politics for a long time and I am just extremely proud of him,” she said.

“Fortunately Michael is a very organised person, he’s been juggling different roles for a while now and [he] absorbs and learns things very quickly, so I think he’ll be fine.”

Mr Johnsen said he will relinquish his mayoral post on Upper Hunter Shire Council as soon as the NSW Electoral Commission officially declares the election result, but he said he won’t stand down as a councillor.

“I will stay on Upper Hunter Shire Council until the September 2016 local government elections [because] I don’t want to create a costly by-election,” he said.

“I believe performing my role as a councillor will, in fact, have some synergies with my new role [as a state MP].”