EARLY counting for the seat of Bathurst has incumbent Paul Toole holding more than 50 per cent of the votes.
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The polls for the NSW election closed at 6pm on Saturday, with counting then able to get underway at the various voting centres.
LIVE BLOG: Follow our live coverage of the election
Election manager for the Bathurst electorate Stuart Evennett said there were more than a dozen people helping to count in the election manager's office on Saturday night.
"The counting process in the election manager's office will be counting the early votes for the Bathurst election manager's office, for the Lithgow early voting centre, Oberon early voting centre and Rylstone early voting centre," he said.
"The order of the count of that will be Legislative Assembly first preference and then the two candidate preferred.
"Tomorrow they'll be doing the Legislative Council - the large ballot papers - for each of those early voting centres, whereas at the voting centres (polling booths), they're doing the three counts tonight."
Voting centre managers will call in the results to Mr Evennett's staff, who will enter the data so it can be added to the virtual tally room.
The staff are being watched by scrutineers, who are acting on behalf of a candidate or party.
"They're not only allowed to be here, they are encouraged to be here for the absolute transparency of this very important election process," Mr Evennett said.
"What we're conducting here tonight and also in the voting centres is only the early count and then from Monday will be the second count and data entry to finally produce the elected member of Bathurst for the next four years."
Anyone who wants to stay up to date with the counting can monitor the virtual tally room.
As of 7.45pm, there had been just over almost 8000 votes counted.
Mr Toole led with 55.18 per cent of the votes, with a significant gap to Country Labor's Beau Riley, who had 19.80 per cent.
Mr Evennett said scrutineers and voters can trust the accuracy of the results.
"Not all of the candidates or parties may like the final result, but there are absolutely no questions about the integrity of the final result," he said.
He also recognised the contribution of his dedicated staff and thanked all of the electors for their patience in the process.
