South Australian Premier Mike Rann is in a strong position to deliver the Labor Party a third term in government despite a voter backlash.

Mr Rann and Liberal leader Isobel Redmond both said the result was too close to call on the night.

But Mr Rann is the frontrunner with the ABC’s election computer predicting Labor is set to hold 25 seats in the 47-seat House of Assembly. The Liberals are forecast to hold 18, with four Independents.

Labor faces a tougher task in Tasmania, with a hung parliament the likely result.

Mr Rann entered the election with a 10-seat majority, but a campaign dogged by the Michelle Chantelois scandal had political pundits predicting a hung parliament.

Early results showed big swings towards the Liberals, but as the evening progressed the swing against Labor decreased.

Mr Rann told supporters in Adelaide that he was cautiously optimistic that Labor would secure a third term.

“If over the next few days I get the opportunity to say that we have won, this election it will be – given all that has happened and all that has been thrown at us – the sweetest victory of all,” he told the party faithful at Labor headquarters.

Opposition Leader Isobel Redmond refused to concede defeat, saying she would wait for more votes to be counted.

She thanked Liberal supporters for delivering the party the scalps of two Labor cabinet members – Nationals MP Karlene Maywald, who held water portfolios for Labor, and Education Minister Jane Lomax-Smith in the seat of Adelaide, where there was a swing of almost 15 per cent to the Liberals.

“I believe that the swings we’ve seen like the swing in Adelaide and across a lot of the very strong Labor-held seats, we have seen swings because Labor has stopped listening,” Ms Redmond said.

“We were listening and we were taking notice of what the people wanted.”

Changing seats

The Liberals achieved a statewide swing of about 7 per cent, but the biggest swings away from the Government were in very safe Labor seats and in some of the safest Liberal electorates.

A 19 per cent swing away from Ms Maywald in the Riverland-based seat of Chaffey has Liberal Tim Whetstone set to take over as the new member.

Ms Maywald had held the seat since 1997, but low water allocations for irrigators and ongoing drought produced a backlash.

Mr Whetstone says irrigators and businesses are hurting and looking for a change.

“Karlene has aligned herself with the Rann Government and I think that is her downfall,” he said.

“The Rann Government has absolutely shown no consideration, given very little support to the seat of Chaffey and along the way we don’t see the Premier come up here and listen to what is going on, to see what’s going on.”

Liberal candidate Steven Marshall tipped Labor’s Vini Ciccarello out of suburban Norwood after she held the seat for more than a decade.

Her 4 per cent margin fell to a 9 per cent Liberal swing.

Mr Marshall said voters in Norwood were disillusioned with Labor’s spin and lack of substance.

He said Labor had been given a hit over issues such as Glenside Hospital’s redevelopment.

Labor’s Lindsay Simmons was dumped from Morialta by Liberal candidate John Gardener.

Crucial seats

Labor incumbent Chloe Fox and Liberal challenger Maria Kourtesis are fighting over a handful of votes to decide the south-west Adelaide seat of Bright.

Postal votes will be crucial and Ms Kourtesis expects they will favour her.

“They do favour us a little bit and we’re looking forward to having them in, but there could be a lot out there so it could be an unknown. We don’t know,” she said.

Ms Redmond said the undecided seats and the big number of postal votes meant the election outcome was far from settled.

“Now we reckon we’re a real possibility in the seat of Bright and we’ve still got to count all of those postals and pre-polls, so we are extremely hopeful about that seat,” she said.

Labor is also in danger of Hartley sliding to Liberal Joe Scalzi, who has held the seat in the past.

In Mitchell, Independent Kris Hanna is hoping he can stay above third place in the count to see preference flows lift him to another narrow win.

Another Independent – Geoff Brock in Frome – achieved a big swing towards him, but says it is still too early to claim victory.

“I’m very privileged to have such a big swing in my favour but there’s still the postal votes and also the pre-polls still to count,” he said.

The ABC election computer predicted Dignity For Disability candidate Kelly Vincent would join the Legislative Council, as would Tammy Jennings for the Greens.

Liberal Jing Lee is also expected to gain a seat in the Upper House.