But the chances of the Liberals winning these seats are smaller than the chances of any voter being struck by an asteroid.

Mike Rann’s Labor Party is on track for a record third term, even though the Liberal Party statewide got more than 50 per cent of the vote.

9.35pm - Labor leader Mike Rann is expected to declare victory later tonight, after his party has retained government by one seat.

This is despite the Liberal Party being well ahead on primary votes. The Liberal’s problem is that the swing towards it was uneven and the Opposition has been unable to secure the seats of Hartley, Light and Mawson.

Had it won even one of these seats, Labor would not have had a majority.

A senior strategist for one of the most high-profile independents told The Independent Weekly tonight that voters had been faced with the choice between continuing arrogance or complete inexperience.

But tonight Labor is refusing to apologise for its last four years, claiming that its collapse in voter support was because of its failure to communicate.

Elder MP and Transport Minister Pat Conlon said a short time ago that the ALP had to get “better at getting its message across”, ignoring the possibility that the electorate had heard the message well enough and didn’t like what it heard.

Liberal leader Isobel Redmond is likely to concede defeat within an hour and a half.

9.26pm -In the Upper House, the Greens look likely to take the seat won by the Australian Democrats in 2002, the seat currently held by Independent MLC David Winderlich.

Greens MLC Mark Parnell said he was confident Greens candidate Tammy Jennings would win a seat.

“As of Monday, I am not the Greens shadow minister for everything, just for half of everything,” he said.

9.11pm - Seventy per cent of the votes have now been counted. Labor has 25 seats, the Liberal’s 18 and independents’ four in the 47-member house. Labor will rule with a majority of one.

9.04pm - Labor still remains on track to win government in its own right in the South Australian election, but the shock news for the ALP is that the largest swings against it were generally in those seats held by Labor ministers.

It appears that voter anger has been greatest against those who they perceive to have been the generals of the Rann Government’s front bench.

Attorney General Michael Atkinson in Croydon, Transport Minister Pat Conlon in Elder, and Ministers like Jay Wheatherhill in Cheltenham and Deputy Premier Kevin Foley in Port Adelaide have all experienced massive swings against them.

In contrast, Labor backbenchers in marginal seats like Mawson saw swings to Liberal far smaller than in those seats held by Ministers.

In Premier Mike Rann’s own seat of Ramsey, the swing is almost 10 per cent against him.

In the seat where Rann lives, Norwood, however, Labor has not been able to withstand the tide and Vini Ciccarello has all but conceded defeat. It is now almost mathematically impossible for her to hang on.

The makeup of the new Labor caucus is therefore expected to change significantly, with Labor sources tonight indicating that the parliamentary party might move to become much more moderate than the previous government.

The Liberal’s failure to win government may mean that the party’s chief electoral asset, Isobel Redmond, cannot be assured that there will be no challenge against her over the next four years, with former deputy Vickie Chapman seen as a stalking horse on the Liberal side.

But for Mike Rann, tonight’s result confirms speculation that he also may not see out the full four years as Premier.

8.32pm - Almost half the vote has now been counted in the SA election and Premier Mike Rann has been given a huge fright but will probably be able to form Government with a vastly reduced majority.

Labor looks on track to win 24 seats and may possibly even get 25 or more and with only one independent certain to get in, Bob Such in Fisher, the Rann Government has survived for a third term.

But the result is sufficient to have cost at least and possibly two Ministers their jobs, with Karlene Maywald struggling in her seat of Chaffey and Jane Lomax-Smith losing in Adelaide.

While Rann looks on track to retain the Premiership the huge swing against him has weakened his authority – and the authority and power of Labor’s factional power brokers like the right-wing’s Don Farrell and Attorney-General Michael Atkinson.

Nevertheless the Liberals can expect to be significantly buoyed even though they are consigned to Opposition benches for another four years.

8.15pm -The Liberal Party has failed tonight to win two seats it needed to guarantee it government. They are the seats of Light – which will be retained by the ALP’s Tony Piccolo – and the seat of Mawson, where Leon Bignall has been re-elected for Labor.

These two marginals were on the Opposition’s wish list and early polling show them both in danger.

The news has tonight heartened the Labor camp. It is still possible that South Australian’s may not know who their next Premier will be with preferences still be in counted in key marginals, but Mike Rann is at this stage likely to be first to cross the line.

8.06pm - The electors of Adelaide have thrown Education Minister Jane Lomax-Smith out of Parliament.

The Education and Tourism Minister has had to carry responsibility for Labor’s so-called “super schools” and she has been criticised for her perceived globe-trotting, while ignoring domestic issues.

This will send Liberal candidate Rachel Sanderson, owner of Rachel’s Model Management in North Adelaide, to North Terrace.

8.00pm - Tom Kenyon looks almost certain to hold his seat of Newland against his Liberal opponent Trish Draper, who was regarded as a bad choice for the Opposition when she won preselection in the seat, which had to be won for the Liberals to form Government.

The Labor party appears now to be able to reach its target of 24 seats and the Liberal party could be looking at 18 seats as their minimum.

The swing against Labor statewide leaves Labor with 37.9 per cent on primary votes with the Liberals on 42 per cent, with counting still underway.

7.40pm - The Labor party has lost two Adelaide metropolitan seats. As the vote continues, it looks impossible for the ALP’s Vini Ciccarello to hang on Norwood, formerly the seat of ALP icon and premier Don Dunstan.

Morialta is also probably lost by the ALP, but Newland and Hartley are still anyone’s guess.

In the south, Labor looks more likely than the Liberal party to win Mawson and Bright.

On current counting, the Liberal party will not pick up all the seats it needs to form government in its own right.

7.29pm - There is a 12 to 15 per cent swing against Michael Atkinson in Croydon but with a 27 per cent buffer, he will hold his seat. Whether he stays as Attorney General depends on whether Labor wins its marginal seats.

7.17pm - There has been a state-wide swing against the ALP in early counting for the South Australian election, but the swing is not even in every seat.

So far in the electorate of Bright, Labor’s Chloe Fox is maintaining her lead over the Liberals and the same is true in other Labor seats on Labor’s outskirts in the north-east.

Tom Kenyon has not suffered the same swings against him in the seat of Newland, a very marginal ALP-held seat, as Labor members in safer seats like Croydon and Cheltenham.

In the West Torrens booth, there was a 9.4 per cent swing to the Liberals.

In Croydon, held by Attorney General Michael Atkinson, Labor is safe with almost 1000 votes counted at the West Hindmarsh Booth.

With seven booths now counted in Morialta, there has been a 10.5 per cent swing against Labor on primary votes.

Labor may hold on to at least some of its most marginal seats and can withstand the huge swings going against it in its safest electorates.

There has been a 10 per cent swing towards sitting Liberal MP David Pisoni at the Parkside booth and a 12 per cent primary swing at Goodwood, two booths in the Unley electorate.

6:37pm - First 100 votes now counted in Kaurna, held by Health Minister John Hill. The ALP is comfortably ahead – 65 per cent to 35.

6:34pm - The second 100 votes have now been counted in the Hallet Cove booth of the Bright electorate. Chloe Fox is now on 56 per cent against the Liberals 36 per cent, with Greens 5, Family First 4, On Your Bike 2.

6:28pm - Figures just in from Elder – a very safe Labor seat – held by Infrastructure and Transport Minister Pat Conlon show a massive 16 per cent swing away from the ALP. Such a swing repeated state-wide would mean a Liberal Government.

In the seat of Finnis there is a swing towards the Liberals of 4 per cent, with 100 votes counted.

In Bright, Chloe Fox is still ahead of the Liberals, 51 to 35 per cent, with Family First on 8 per cent and The Greens on 2 per cent.

In the Hallet Cove booth, this is a 4 per cent swing away from Labor.

6:21pm - The first figures are now in from scrutineers and they show significant swing away from the ALP.

In West Hindmarsh, scrutineers say the swing is going straight to the Liberal Party and not to independents or minor parties.

The same is true in Adelaide’s north-east, where the very first figures available – just 100 – show Labor ahead of the Liberal party 55 to 34.

This compares with the same Salisbury booth last election when the Labor party had 70 per cent of the votes cast.

5:48pm - Here at the unofficial “tally room”, there is an air of expectancy with polling closing in minutes.

The Independent Weekly understands exit polls are showing a swing of around 9 per cent in key marginals.

There is already controversy in Morialta, the marginal north-east seat held by Lindsay Simmons.

Voters today were handed out brochures which suggested they were from Family First, but were in fact from the ALP.

The Independent Weekly also understands there may also have been possible irregularities in Reynell.

We will have the first election figures as they appear and the Electoral Commission says trends will appear within the first 40 minutes.

The result will be very close, with most polls and commentators saying there will be 24 to 25 seats to Labor in the 47-member House of Assembly.

With one or two independents, this would give Labor the ability to form a minority government, but each successive poll this year has shown Labor support drop and Liberal support increase.

A very likely outcome is that this trend has continued right up until tonight and a Liberal victory is still possible.