Labor's Mike Kelly has claimed victory in the seat of Eden-Monaro, with a win that could upset the seat's bellwether status.

The win has ousted sitting Liberal member Peter Hendy.

The seat has been won by the party that forms government in every election since 1972, a trend that could end if Labor fails to win government.

Mr Kelly previously held the seat from 2007 to 2013, and lost by a slim margin to Dr Hendy in the last federal election.

Dr Hendy's margin was increased to 2.9 per cent earlier in the year, after redistribution.

Loading

In claiming victory, Mr Kelly said the campaign had been hard fought.

"This community and this campaign were about things that were important not only here but nationally," he said.

"I know a lot of people from the Liberal Party voted for us tonight, and I want to say to them we will work just as hard for you."

Mr Kelly also praised Labor Leader Bill Shorten and said he should remain leader regardless of the federal result.

"He is a fine leader in the tradition of Bob Hawke, and we need to hang onto Bill to continue to lead us into the future, he deserves that opportunity."

Hendy suffers significant swing

Mr Kelly is projected to have mounted a swing of 6.5 per cent against Dr Hendy, who issued a statement acknowledging his "apparent" loss.

"For the past three years I've been very honoured to represent the people of Eden-Monaro in our Parliament," he said.

"I'm very proud to have delivered better infrastructure and services across the electorate, including improved mobile phone coverage, record spending on local roads, and rolling out the National Broadband Network.

"I congratulate Mike Kelly on his apparent success tonight, and hope he can provide the representation in Parliament that Eden-Monaro deserves.

"I am very proud of the campaign my team and I waged: we focused on policy and presented a positive plan, but above all, we retained our honesty and integrity."

The ABC's political editor Chris Uhlmann said Dr Hendy may have taken the seat for granted.

"Peter Hendy shows what happens when you have somebody in a marginal seat who does not treat it like a marginal seat," he said.

"I've had complaints from his own people that they were standing in the cold handing out how to vote cards at prepoll, while he was sitting at the Press Club in Canberra.

"His absence was noted through the course of his campaign by the people who were working on his behalf.

"The Labor Party thought they'd bagged this ages ago."