Has anyone noticed the strong correlation between votes received and dollars spent?
The last election saw JF with some posters and an old mini bus clattering around Launceston as her election winning strategy.
Meanwhile MF had Mercedes cars adorned with his face on constant patrol, a never ending stream of paper choking our letterboxes, giant billboards and colour gloss everywhere.
His advertising assault would make any fast food chain stand up and bow with respect.

My next question is “Who are the Liberals”?

I think Dave Groves has answered his own question: “Who are the Liberals”? with his reference to envious food chains.  It’s a franchise mate and there are five territories with exclusive rights on offer in Tasmania right now. Policies are provided by the company HQ so you don’t even have to think for yourself.  Policies are flavour of the month.  Customers are offered cash back incentives or a buy now pay later plan at grand sale held every three years.  Roll up….

Neither of the ‘major’ parties appears to represent the spread of interests of the voters.

From where I sit the libs and the labs are virtually indistinguishable.

They act like corporate sycophants with no clear vision for the state.

How to choose?

Mike, if neither of the major parties represents the spread of interest of the voters, then why do the voters continually re-elect them?

Disclaimer: all posts I make here represent my own views and not necessarily those of any other entity.

Mike, it sounds like the major parties perhaps don’t represent your interests, but they do represent the interests of greater that 80% of voters. I am not sure I buy the corporate sycophant comments either - there are precious little corporations represented or active here. There is much more political selling out going on along your usual parochial lines than in the interests of corporations or business in general.

I would agree that the current Government is in general not terribly creative, although the concepts underlying development of new policy in education and health represent not a bad response to future challenges that Tasmania faces. They may well yet be undone by small town politics and parochial forces - this is what holds us back from developing visions for the whole state.

#4 Our voting system forces their re-election.
Were it possible to select a number of those candidates standing for election instead of the full spread, then one would be able to eliminate those whose policies one disliked.
A fairer system would be to allot points to those I vote for.  If seven candidates stand, then No 1 would get seven points, No 2 six etc. No matter how few I voted for, my No 1 would still get the seven.

Mike, your claim in #6 is incorrect.  If 50+% of the population preferred the Greens to both current major parties, then the Greens would win an outright majority of seats whether voters were forced to vote all the way down the ballot or not.  Why do the great majority of voters put at least one major party, and frequently both, ahead of the Greens (or any other non-major party you care to name)? 

Furthermore in Tasmania it is possible to select a number of candidates instead of the full spread when voting; one can stop at number five and need not preference a major party candidate at all.  It is also possible in the Senate via a little-known technicality; happy to elaborate on this on request.  It is only in the House of Reps that you are forced to distribute your preferences all the way for your vote to be valid.