An independent review will examine South Australia’s troubled election, with upper house results remaining in limbo days before parliament returns.

Former Australian electoral commissioner Tom Rogers will lead the review of the March 21 state poll, which was plagued by mishaps including multiple lost and misplaced ballot boxes.

The review comes as SA Premier Peter Malinauskas revealed upper house election results may not be finalised until Monday – a day before the new parliament’s first sitting week.

Malinauskas said on Tuesday said he had been advised in the past 24 hours that the Legislative Council ballot declaration would not occur “for some days yet”.

“The fact that we’re here, a week out, and it hasn’t yet occurred is deeply worrying,” he said without elaborating further on the declaration delay.

“We’ve got a job to do. We’ve got a state to run … I’ve got legislation that we need to get in the parliament and get debated and hopefully passed.”

Despite a $37 million budget, the SA election was hit by controversy following lengthy queues despite record prepoll voting, short-staffed booths and result delays.

“There hasn’t been a question of the integrity of the Electoral Commission, nor has there been any substantial questions around the integrity of the results,” Malinauskas said.

“But there have been practical failures.”

The $200,000 independent review will report to the parliament rather than the government and is due by year’s end.

It is also tasked with consulting Indigenous voters about their experiences voting in the 2026 Voice election, which was held simultaneously.

Rogers said he had a record of seeing things go wrong in elections and then “fixing them up”, backing his experience following his Australian electoral commissioner stint from 2014-24.

“I know what goes on,” he said.

“I will conduct a careful, methodical review, and I look forward to providing recommendations to ensure future elections are delivered to the standard the public expects.”

Earlier in April, the electoral commission announced the discovery of a stash of uncounted votes for the lower house seats of Enfield and Newland would not have affected the results.

It followed a second count triggered in the Narungga electorate after a different batch of lost ballots was located. One Nation’s Chantelle Thomas was reaffirmed as winning the seat with a slightly increased margin of 74 votes.

State electoral commissioner Nick Sherry remains on leave and Malinauskas said he had no timeframe for his return.

Acting Commissioner Leah McLay said earlier she shared the community’s frustration with “unacceptable system failures” and that issues they had experienced “fall well short of our expectations”.

-AAP