Thread: Election stuffup

Originally Posted by Chucaro

Interesting article by Antony Green

Hand the power of preferences back to the people

I found this bit interesting:

Tighten the regulation of parties

Federal law requires only 500 members to register a party, where applying the same standards as NSW would require more than 2,000. NSW also requires that parties be registered 12 months before an election, a provision very much driven by the Labor Party's shock at the sudden emergence of the No Aircraft Noise Party ahead of the 1995 election.

A surge of newly registered parties was a feature of the 1999 NSW election and was repeated ahead of the 2013 federal election, helped by micro-parties having some idea of when the election was due to be held. Some delay in party registrations becoming effective will help in weeding out less serious parties.

Stopping over-lapping party membership is also important. David Leyonhjelm, set to be elected as the Liberal Democrat Senator for NSW, is the registered office of both the Liberal Democrats and the Outdoor Recreation Party (Stop the Greens). Members of his party also seem to be closely associated with the Smokers Rights Party.

Political parties should be more heavily regulated as registration brings with it significant advantages. Parties are able to have their names printed on the ballot paper, and have the major advantage of being able to nominate candidates for any contest in the country without the need for local nominators. The Liberal Democrats took advantage of this provision to nominate NSW-based candidates for the Tasmanian Senate election.

September 13, 2013
The Preference Deals behind the Strange Election of Ricky Muir and Wayne Dropulich

If Ricky Muir of the Australian Motoring Enthusiasts Party wins a Senate seat in Victoria, and Wayne Dropulich a Senate seat from Western Australia, they will have achieved the most remarkable victories in Australian, indeed world, electoral history.

Based on the progressive count on Friday 13 September, Muir's party currently lies 13th with 0.50% of the vote. He has turned this vote into the 14.3% required for election by harvesting the preferences from an astonishing 25 parties plus his own first preferences. Nine of these parties polled more votes than the Australian Motoring Enthusists Party.

Dropulich's victory is equally astonishing, the Australian Sports Party finishing 21st on first preferences with just 0.22% of the vote. He has turned this vote into the 14.3% required for election by harvesting preferences from 18 parties plus his own first preferences. Revealing how complex these preferences deals were, an astonishing 14 of these parties polled more votes than the Australian Sports Party.

No electoral system where voters distributed their own preferences would have delivered victory to these two parties. Even the most strictly proportional electoral system in the world would not have delivered election to these two parties ahead of the many parties that polled more votes.

The victories of Muir and Dropulich are entirely due to the unique system of preference deals permitted by the Senate's electoral system.

Below is the list of the parties, as well as the votes and percentage votes achieved by each, that helped to elect Muir and Dropulich.

Both Muir and Drupulich have managed to gain the preferences of both Family First and the Australian Sex Party, a remarkable bringing together of strange bedfellows.

Antony Green's Election Blog: The Preference Deals behind the Strange Election of Ricky Muir and Wayne Dropulich