Federal election 2025: Teal Independent Nicolette Boele retakes lead as Bradfield seat hangs in balance

Teal candidate Nicolette Boele has taken the lead from her Liberal opponent in the Sydney seat of Bradfield as counting goes down to the wire.

Ms Boele leads Gisele Kapterian by just 19 votes after the latest round of postal ballots were counted on Monday.

There were 268 votes left to count as of Monday afternoon, including postal, absent and declaration pre-poll ballots.

Bradfield has emerged as one of the tightest contests of the federal election, with a recount looking likely for the former safe Liberal electorate.

If the result is decided by fewer than 100 votes, the Australian Electoral Commission automatically conducts a recount.

Ms Kapterian was last week declared the winner of the seat by some media outlets and was in the Liberal party room meeting on Tuesday to vote for a leader.

But a large number of postal votes in favour of Ms Boele have renewed doubts about the outcome.

Ms Boele had slowly narrowed the gap on Ms Kapterian during the past week of counting.

The Liberal candidate slightly increased her margin to 50 votes earlier on Monday, but a batch of 181 postal votes counted later put Ms Boele in the lead.

The 2025 federal election was the second time Ms Boele has contested the seat after she narrowly lost to Liberal Paul Fletcher in 2022.

The close count reduced the former safe coalition seat to marginal status.

The Liberals pre-selected Ms Kapterian to contest the seat after Mr Fletcher retired from federal politics.

Ms Boele will be the 10th independent elected to the new parliament if she wins Bradfield.

As of Monday, Labor had 93 seats in the 150-member House of Representatives. The coalition had 43 seats, the Greens had one and other minor parties two seats.

The other seat still in doubt is Calwell, with the electoral commission determining the final two candidates in the Victorian seat because of the complexity of the result.