Australian Federal Election

[Corvus]

This weekend is the Australian Federal Election. Easy to miss as it is going to be boring. Sorry, no storming of parliament will happen, no claims of election fraud. Just more of the same. While Australians are happy to support rallies for causes, rallies in support of politicians and parties in general don't happen.

There are some points of interest, but they have little to do with the outcome.

First is the Democracy Sausage. As voting is done at place likes schools, community halls, churches etc, a lot of these places do fund-raising on the day, the best known of which is the sausage in bread, also known as the Democracy Sausage. I will only go to a polling booth that has sausages for sale myself.

Australia also has compulsory voting, introduced in the 1920s after voter turnout began to fall. If you don't vote you get a fine, though it is a small one, little more than a slap on the wrist. And it doesn't stop you doing a donkey vote if you really want. The theory is that the parties don't have to try and encourage people to go out to vote and instead allows them to concentrate on policies instead.

Voting is held on a Saturday. That way everyone can make it to vote. No restricting voting by having voting take place on a workday. Each election more and more people are voting early, either by postal voting or pre-polling. Last time it was around 25%. This time it looks like being 30% or more. And besides a few fringe characters, nobody is pushing claims it is open to fraud.

The whole thing is run by the Australian Electoral Commission, which maintains the electoral rules, oversees elections, adjust electoral boundaries as populations change. Yes, an independent group actual runs the election. Voting is uniform across the country as it isn't run by states or parties.

The voting system itself is interesting. When it was being designed, it borrowed elements from the UK and US, but made it better and fairer.

There are two houses in the parliament, the Lower House (or House of Representatives) and the Upper House (or Senate.)

The House of Representatives is based on seats of roughly equal population size. As populations shift and move, the number of seats per state can change and the boundaries can shift as well, but given this isn't done by the states or parties, it doesn't result in gerrymandering. (It was an issue in some places, notably Queensland, in the past, but it has since been abolished.)

Voting is preferential, not first past the post. When voting, you number the candidates in order of preference, from 1 to X, which can be a lot in some seats.
When votes are counted, if no one has 50%+1 of the first round vote, the person with the least number of votes gets eliminated, and their votes are distributed to the remaining candidates based on their second preferences. That continues until someone gets a majority of votes. So someone may get 40% of the votes but still lose if the other 60% prefer someone else over them. Call it least-worst option. It does mean that you get plenty of minor parties, as voting for one of them doesn't mean you waste your vote.

The party who receives the majority of seats in the lower house forms the government. Of note that the voters don't elect the Prime Minister - the ruling party chooses who that is.

For the senate, each state has the same number of seats, 12 each in total, enact to allow each state equal representation, as opposed to the lower house, which is dominated by the most populace states. Sort of like the US system. Half per state are elected each election. The upper house is the house of review. The lower house makes laws and the upper house, in theory, reviews and either approves or rejects them.

Voting for the Senate is done via quota-preferential voting. Its a little bit complex. It has a similar preference system but for the whole state, resulting in huge numbers of candidates. Voters can either vote for just the parties or vote for every single candidate. Given just how large the field can be, a lot of voters just go with the former, which results in preference trading as the parties decide where the flow of votes ends up.

The end result is that a lot more minor parties end up in the senate and end up with the balance of power there. It has been a while since a single party has held the majority of senate seats and horse-trading for votes on bills is fairly common by whoever is in government in an effort to get their legislation passed.

The election itself comes down to the two main parties, Labor and the Coalition. Just to confuse the Americans here, Labor is the Centre-Left party who use the colour red, while the Coalition is made up of the centre-right Liberals, whose colour is blue, and the Nationals, who are the party of the bush. (The Liberals are so named for being economic liberals when they were founded, and not social liberals, though they are probably closer to the Democrats than the Republicans in values. Same-sex marriage was legalised here under a Coalition federal government for example. They do have a few on the fringes who align a little more with the Republicans, though there is a minor party led by a Trump wannabe who tend to capture the voters more in step with Republican voters - they only get a small vote and are a none issue.)

Polling indicates that Labor, led by Anthony 'Albo' Albanese is expected to win over the Coalition, led by Scott "Scomo" Morrison. (Yeah, we even give our prime ministers nicknames - the deferential treatment leaders in other nations expect doesn't apply here.) Last time Labor was also expected to win but an unexpected result saw the Coalition win. While it is still a possibility this time, most think it unlikely.

[cubby]

I really appreciate this post. Give me hope of being an expat sometime either soon or down the road.

[Ripster42]

Last time Labor was also expected to win but an unexpected result saw the Coalition win. While it is still a possibility this time, most think it unlikely.

The only things I know about scomo, are that he likes coal, and flew to hawaii during the unprecedented wildfires. The phrase "Australian ted cruz" comes to mind.

[Flarelaine]

The only things I know about scomo, are that he likes coal, and flew to hawaii during the unprecedented wildfires. The phrase "Australian ted cruz" comes to mind.

Wasn't he photographed trying his hand at welding with the visor up?

[Ripster42]

Wasn't he photographed trying his hand at welding with the visor up?

No idea:

The only things I know about scomo, are that he likes coal, and flew to hawaii during the unprecedented wildfires. The phrase "Australian ted cruz" comes to mind.

I'll take your word for it.

[Ivanstone]

Here's an ad for all the great things Scomo has done for Australia.

[jonnysensible]

natural law party gonna romp it

[Masark]

natural law party gonna romp it

Are they into yogic flying like ours is?

[jonnysensible]

Are they into yogic flying like ours is?

thats them. they arent actually running any candidates

I was listening to something the other day taking the piss out of all the fringe parties.

its the rex patrick team for me

[Flarelaine]

I finally found time to look up the welding moment.



Some background.

[LilSaihah]

Yay Scott Morrison lost. Goodbye national embarrassment who fucked off for a holiday in the middle of one of if not the greatest national tragedy in our history since Federation, which was the 2019/2020 bushfires.

Good on you WA for turning red.

There's only one place I can think of where I'd prefer he be kicked from than national leadership, which is a plane

Anthony Albanese will become the 31st Prime Minister and will likely form majority government, pending a few outstanding seats.

[Kallisto]

I finally found time to look up the welding moment.



Some background.

WTF is he doing???!!

[Edge-]

WTF is he doing???!!

Being a very, very, very smart person (link has all the necessary context).

[LilSaihah]

It kinda makes sense in the most boneheaded way. Scomo is a PR guy and he's realised that if his face isn't visible, it's not a good photo op.

Of course he doesn't think beyond what the best photo op is but that's scomo for you.

[jonnysensible]

It kinda makes sense in the most boneheaded way. Scomo is a PR guy and he's realised that if his face isn't visible, it's not a good photo op.

Of course he doesn't think beyond what the best photo op is but that's scomo for you.

how powerful are the evangelicals? are they going to be big mad with this result?

[LilSaihah]

how powerful are the evangelicals? are they going to be big mad with this result?

Not very. They just don't have the body count. Scott being a member of a weirdo sect is honestly a bit of an oddity.
It's worth keeping in mind that he kind of snuck in the back door in the first place, and though he wasn't particularly impressive his worst feat at that point was shitting himself at the Engadine macca's. Rupert only had to do a little sleight of hand to make him palatable enough to re-elect at that point.
Whether they'll be mad... Hard to say. On the one hand, sure, he's an Evangelical. On the other hand, the smell I get is that a lot of those Evangelicals are rural, and a lot of those rurals got hit hard by bushfires, floods, or both. I don't think they'll be sad to see him go.