Senate voting desperately needs a changeARI SHARP* responds to Those preference dealsAs the results continue to be tallied in the Senate race, it seems increasingly clear that Family First will pick up a Senate seat in Victoria. It's a remarkable achievement for such a new party. It's also remarkable because of how few primary votes the party received. To be elected to the Senate requires 14.3% of the vote - Family First received 1.9%, and the rest was the result of preferences. In Family First's case, the preferences were not just from like-minded conservative parties. The crucial preferences will flow from two progressive parties, the Democrats and the ALP, who in an effort to get their own Senators elected did a deal with Family First. It's not the first time that bizarre preference deals have created strange results for the Senate. In 1998, the Christian Democratic Party's preferences in Western Australian delivered the final seat to openly gay Democrat Brian Greig, whilst in 2001 in NSW the Greens' Kerry Nettle received just over 4% of the vote but was elected on the back of preferences from a wide range of parties, including those with links to One Nation. Invariably the beneficiaries of these deals are minor parties that manage to play their hand well during the preference wheeling and dealing, but the big losers are voters. The crucial thing that makes these deals possible is the obscure and byzantine nature of preferences in the Senate election. More than 90% of Australian voters vote above the line, which means that they are giving the party they vote for complete control over where their preferences flow. Sure, voters have access to the information as to where the party will be giving its preferences, but few ever bother to seek it out and naively trust the party they have voted for to preference wisely. The recent examples show this is often not the case. Most voters would like their preferences to flow to like minded parties ahead of dissimilar parties. It is presumed that parties of the left will preference to those on the left, and those on the right would do likewise. This ignores the reality of party politics, where, in the mind of the party, the sole aim is the election of candidates from that party with little interest in the success of like-minded parties ahead of other parties. The complicated nature of the Senate ballot paper discourages most voters from voting below the line and therefore having control over their preferences. This election, voters who voted below the line had to fill in 78 boxes in NSW or 65 boxes in Victoria. It's a complicated task, and most voters prefer the simplicity of a '1' above the line. It's time to alter the Senate voting system to give voters more control of their preferences. Instead of the current option of voters simply lodging a single preference above the line, voters should be able to number all boxes above the line, and their preferences should be counted as if they had voted straight down the list of candidates for each party in the number ordered. The below-the-line option would still remain. With a simple change, voters could have much greater control over how they vote and could easily indicate where they wish their preferences to go. This change would minimise the ability of shady backroom deals to undermine the intentions of voters, since there would be no 'preference ticket' lodged with the Electoral Commission. Most importantly, it would go some way to alleviating the anger and disillusionment that many voters are feeling because of the way their preferences are being used to elect candidates with a very different political affiliation to the one they voted for. Labor and Democrats voters are right to feel upset at how their preferences have just elevated Family First to the federal parliament. Certainly, the political parties that stuck the deals are responsible for the outcome, but ultimately the fault lies with an electoral system that makes gauging a voter's true preference so difficult. If we can change that system, we can minimise the likelihood of it happening again. Now is the time to make that change. Ironically, however, it may well be the coalition-controlled Senate that thwarts it.
Ari Sharp is a political observer and stood as a candidate in the 2001 Federal election.
RAPID RESPONSE EMAIL: What do you think? Tuesday, October 19, 2004 |