Australia PM defies critics, confident of winning vote

Embattled Australian Prime Minister Malcolm Turnbull defended his performance after widespread calls for his resignation and said on Tuesday he was confident of retaining office after vote counting resumed in a cliffhanger election.

Electoral officials began counting 1.5 million postal and absentee votes that will be crucial to the result of Saturday’s election, which is still seen as too close to call.

That process is likely to carry on for days, possibly weeks, leaving Australia in a political vacuum after Mr Turnbull’s gamble in calling an early election backfired badly with a much bigger swing than expected against his conservative coalition.

Mr Turnbull’s Liberal-National coalition has so far secured 68 lower house seats and the centre-left Labour Opposition 67, according to projections by the Australian Broadcasting Corporation, both agonisingly short of the 76 seats needed to form a majority government in the House of Representatives. Ten seats remain in doubt.

Mr Turnbull said in his first public comments since Sunday that he took full responsibility for his coalition’s campaign and that he was still confident of winning a majority.