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QUOTA Newsletter
of the Proportional Representation Society of Australia QN1997A March
1997 www.prsa.org.au ·
"Australia Consults" ·
Winston Peters, New Zealand Deputy
PM, to Address a PR Society Meeting ·
General Elections for Both WA
Houses ·
Electoral & Constitutional Polls
to Involve PR ·
Queensland "Affirmative
Action" ·
Port Lincoln Municipal Elections · List of issues of Quota Notes "Australia Consults"Over two hundred public meetings were held around Australia
Day as part of the Australia Consults program developed by the National
Australia Day Council (see www.telstra.com.au/nadc/) and the Australian Local
Government Association, with the support of Telstra as principal sponsor.
Those attending were invited to discuss appropriate Centenary of Federation
celebrations, constitutional reform including possible changes related to the
Head of State, and reconciliation between indigenous and other Australians. ACT
Branch Committee Member, Julie McCarron-Benson attended the Canberra forum on
Saturday 25th January, taking the opportunity to question both monarchists
and republicans about why they were not addressing the more basic issue now
facing an educated mature independent nation, the reform of processes for
proper democratic representation. Ms
McCarron-Benson called on those present to support the PRSA's efforts to
secure the Hare-Clark electoral system for the House of Representatives. In
the light of the ACT's positive experience with effective voting already,
there were no negative comments. Change of the electoral system to
proportional representation was included as an important part of the communique issued at the conclusion of the forum, and
forwarded to the National Australia Day Council. Forum on Electoral
Fraud
The Honourable Henry Samuel Chapman authored
the world's first secret ballot law, for Victoria in 1856, which by combining secrecy with limited
vote-tracing, both protected the elector, and
detected fraud where election results were in dispute. Last November, several members of the PRSA's
NSW Branch attended a Forum on Electoral Fraud, which was the first major
public activity of the newly-formed H S Chapman Society. After a keynote
address by Senator Nick Minchin, Parliamentary Secretary to the Prime
Minister, there were sessions exploring the presence and extent of electoral
fraud: presentations, often by speakers with past or present Liberal Party
affiliations, examined the electoral roll and its integrity or otherwise,
fraud and forgery in postal ballots and especially those involving trade
unions, and the potential for systematic fraud through rogue computer
programming or exploitation of the flurry of unchecked last-minute changes
that occur just before the close of the rolls once an election is called. While commending the speakers on the
thoroughness of their investigations, long-time New South Wales Branch member
Syd Gilchrist raised the unfortunate absence from
their presentations of work on the important fraud of single-member electorates,
where perhaps 70% of the seats might be safe for one party or another,
leaving voters in those areas virtually disfranchised. Party attention always
focuses on the swinging or marginal seats that determine government, and
voters in those seats are clearly seen as more valuable than those in safe
seats. Mr Gilchrist pointed out that the only way in which democracy would be
improved would be through the adoption of quota-preferential methods in
electorates largely returning seven or nine members. The PRSA commends NSW members for their
efforts to have fundamental questions addressed by a wider audience that
professes concern about electoral fairness. PRSA Conference
Presence
This year's National Conference of the Australian Democrats held in Canberra
in January was structured around academic papers examining the party's role
and influence in its first twenty years, to be collated as a book for
publication later this year. PRSA National President Bogey Musidlak
attended much of the proceedings. He placed numerous copies of various
publications on a literature table being picked over by activists, and
ensured that academics present were handed Society submissions and other
materials of use to them and their students. When important electoral matters
were raised personally with sitting MPs and other prominent figures, much was
learnt about strong personal commitments to electoral reform. Following this experience, a stronger
presence by the Proportional Representation Society of Australia can be expected
at future academic or political conferences where promotion of effective
voting may bear fruit. Winston Peters, New
Zealand Deputy PM, to Address a PR Society Meeting
The Hon. Winston Peters MP, Deputy Prime Minister and Treasurer of New
Zealand, has accepted an invitation by the PRSA for him to address members
and other interested people on New Zealand's MMP system, and proportional
representation in general. Mr Peters will speak to us on Friday 25th July
1997, at 6 p.m. in the Council Chamber at the University of Melbourne. Those
proposing to attend, particularly those bringing a prospective member, should
inform the Victorian Branch (Fax number on Page 4: other details in Melbourne
White Pages). General Elections for Both WA Houses
WA Branch President, John Taplin, begins his report
on these general elections by reminding us that WA has a malapportionment,
between metropolitan and country electorates, of about 2 to 1 for its 57
single-member Legislative Assembly electorates, and 4 to 1 for its four
Legislative Council electorates. Two of those Council electorates elect 5
MLCs and the other two elect 7 MLCs.
*To simplify
presentation, adjustments were made for the 2 country Legislative
Council electorates where these parties had a joint ticket. If malapportionment
were a dominant cause of disproportion between seats and votes the largest
departure from a value of 1.00 in the Ration column above, for the major
parties, should appear in the Council table. Instead it appears in the
Assembly table, where the Liberals alone gained an absolute majority of the
seats with less than 40% of the vote. The Council table shows the much more
proportional result that PR gives, despite the much greater malapportionment for that House. Electoral
& Constitutional Polls to Involve PR A most significant referendum should
be held in the United Kingdom if the British Labour Party achieves Government
as a result of the General Election to be held on 1st May 1997. The following
is an extract from the policies of the Labour Party: “Labour
has been keen to ensure wide and informed debate on the future of our
electoral system. We are committed in government to holding a referendum on
voting systems for the House of Commons.” [http://www.labour.org.uk/policy/ch5.html] The promised referendum was Labour’s
response to those party members and Liberal Democrats that are campaigning
for the UK’s deplorable system of single-member electorates with relative
majority (first-past-the-post) counting to be replaced
by a proportional representation system. It is to be hoped that our fellow
society, the Electoral Reform Society
of Great Britain and Ireland, will succeed in having quota-preferential PR as
one of the referendum options, and that, unlike the case in New Zealand, a
preferential ballot will be used in the referendum if there are more than two
options. In Australia the Federal Government
has introduced the Constitutional
Convention (Election) Bill 1997, which details the proposals for the
electoral system for that half of the membership of the Convention that is to
be directly elected by the people. There are to be two elected Convention
members for each internal Territory (33.3% quota). Each State’s
representation is shown below.
The
Government is to be greatly commended for proposing that the votes be counted
by quota-preferential proportional representation with optional marking of
preferences. The next issue of Quota
Notes will cover certain unusual aspects of the electoral arrangements. ACT Assembly Countbacks
Two new
members were sworn into the Australian Capital Territory Legislative Assembly
this year, following the resignations of Ms Rosemary Follett, ALP MLA for Molonglo, who was recently, for nearly seven years,
either Chief Minister or Leader of the Opposition; and Mr Tony de Domenico, Liberal MLA for Brindabella
and Deputy Chief Minister since the change of government in 1995. Ms Follett
stunned party colleagues with her resignation on 13th December 1996 to take
up an appointment as the Territory's Discrimination Commissioner later in the
month. After the placing of newspaper advertisements on 20th December 1996,
six consenting candidates were declared ten days later. Only one of those was
from the Australian Labor Party - Simon Corbell,
who worked for Fraser MHR John Langmore before the
latter's departure to take up a high-level United Nations appointment. In
counting that took just under two days, Mr Corbell
initially received 78% of Ms Follett's quota (next came exhausted with nearly
7%). He was declared elected without need for exclusions or transfers of
ballot-papers. Mr de Domenico resigned on
30th January 1997 to take up a lucrative private sector position.
Applications from defeated candidates were invited the following day, and
again six consented before the expiry of the ten-day period, three of them
endorsed Liberals, namely Sandie Brooke, Louise Littlewood and Brian Lowe. As Ms Brooke had just married
former Leader Trevor Kaine, public speculation was
rife in some quarters about what changes the outcome of the countback might bring. In the event, Ms Littlewood's
election was confirmed within two days, albeit by a rather narrow margin of
177 votes over Ms Brooke. Subsequently, Gary Humphries, who had been
instrumental in having the key Hare-Clark principles entrenched, was
elected unopposed as Deputy Leader of the ACT's parliamentary Liberal Party. In a published
Letter to the Editor of The Canberra Times,
ACT Branch Convenor Bogey Musidlak contrasted the
timely, straightforward and inexpensive replacement of Mr de Domenico through countback with
the costly, and to many, farcical Fraser federal
by-election, which had taken place at about the same time. The table below
indicates progress totals at key stages of the countback
at which the three endorsed Liberals together obtained 89% of Mr de Domenico's quota.
Queensland "Affirmative Action"
Following Ms Fiona Bucknall's
appointment as Equity Officer of the Queensland Branch of the Australian Labor
Party late last year, the Convenor of the PRSA's
Queensland Branch, Chris Tooley, wrote to offer his
congratulations, and to draw attention to the fact that women's parliamentary
presence under proportional representation systems tended to be at levels
double those achieved under single-member electorate systems. Replying,
Assistant General Secretary Peter Shooter explained that the ALP's
"Affirmative Action" rule does not refer to quotas in winnable
seats, but seeks to make the system fairer within its constraints. He said that the
rule indicated the need to establish a plan to ensure an outcome of
35%, and that this would be achieved through merit in
individual preselections. Mr Shooter conceded
that the ALP's holding of only two federal Divisions (both by men) made the
situation more problematic, but he said that the Queensland Branch was
"committed to achieving an outcome at the next federal election where
women are selected to contest the required number of winnable seats to reach
our objective". Tasmanian Developments
When the Tasmanian Parliament resumed in March 1997,
the continuing impasse over Legislative Council boundaries assumed renewed
importance, as Tasmania's Constitution Act 1934 requires periodic Legislative Council elections to
be held in May of each year. While new boundaries with 10% enrolment tolerance
have been drawn, agreement on transitional provisions has not been reached,
and wider questions are being posed about the Legislative Council's current
powers. The Tasmanian
Electoral Office will not begin to produce rolls for the next election until the
Governor issues the writs. Government
sources have stressed that the old boundaries will be used if no agreement is
reached. Labor is seeking an immediate election for the entire Council
(rather than for just three or four Divisions). The Tasmanian Greens want a
future referendum on various of the Council's powers
and Hare-Clark State-wide as recommended
in December 1994 by Mr Justice Morling During early January's media silly season, the
Tasmanian Chamber of Commerce and Industry's chief executive, Tim Abey, called for scrapping of the Hare-Clark system and
even more remarkably, replacing it with first-past-the-post methods in single-member electorates. Labor's John
White, one of Denison's seven MHAs, promptly denounced the simplistic idea, but the Liberals' Bob Mainwaring, one of the
seven MHAs for Lyons, declared himself in favour of
single-member electorates. Later letters in The Mercury strongly supported Hare-Clark. Whenever anyone expresses frustration at minority
government, there needs to be an understanding that, in five of the past
eight Tasmanian elections, any system of single-member electorates would have
left little or no trace of an Opposition. In such unchecked circumstances,
major Government excesses could be expected. In contrast, Hare-Clark, which always offers all
parties fair representation, produces majority governments when voters are
convinced that one party's policies and candidates are superior. When voters
are not persuaded by Labor or Liberal offerings, from time to time the
Assembly itself will act as a brake on the Executive. In the ongoing constitutional debate, Hare-Clark
supporters would do well by pushing for the entrenchment of key principles as
was achieved in the Australian Capital Territory after it had adopted the
Hare-Clark system. That would avert the prospect of surprise deformations
such as the failed attempt, begun in 1993, to revert to six-member
electorates Port Lincoln Municipal Elections
By-elections in all five wards of South Australia's
Port Lincoln Council, each of which has two councillors,
received national publicity last year. Nine of the ten ward councillors (the whole municipality elects the Mayor separately) resigned in protest at the Mayor's alleged racist comments and support for Pauline
Hanson MHR. All nine
anti-Mayor councillors re-contested the vacancies
their resignations had produced, to try to show popular opposition to the
Mayor's statements. There was a poll in each ward, but only Boston Ward had
enough candidates to let both resigning ward councillors
lose - a classic defect of ward systems. Only four of the nine resigning councillors were re-elected. The five newcomers to the
Council were pro-Mayor. The result was blamed on the low turnout of only 30%,
but the total of 1548 votes (57.3%) for pro-Mayor candidates clearly exceeded
the 1155 votes for the anti-Mayor candidates. The electoral
system is commonly called bottoms-up. In Australia, it
is peculiar to South Australia, probably because SA's Electoral Office favours it, when up to three positions are to be filled. It
is one of the two systems that SA's Local Government Act allows for municipal
elections. It is officially called optional preferential, as it allows voters
to vote for as few or as many of the candidates as they wish. That is perhaps
the system's only worthwhile attribute - one that all electoral systems
should include. Once the first preference votes have been counted, the
candidate with the fewest votes is excluded and those votes are distributed
to the other candidates. The process continues till the number of candidates
remaining equals the number of vacancies to be filled, at which point those
candidates are elected Bottoms-up is claimed to discourage tickets. That is considered
important in SA, as political parties do not officially endorse candidates in
municipal elections, but that supposed advantage has worked against bottoms-up, as large majorities of votes can be locked up with
popular candidates, allowing candidates with minimal support to also be
elected. Using at-large PR, four of the original nine councillors
would still have been elected, but voters would have had much more choice.
* Asterisk denotes councillor that had resigned on the issue of his or her opposition to the Mayor, and stood for re-election. Names in bold type are those of the councillors elected. © 1997 Proportional Representation Society of Australia National President: Bogey Musidlak 14 Strzelecki Crescent NARRABUNDAH ACT 2604 National Secretary: Deane Crabb 11 Yapinga Street PLYMPTON SA 5038 Tel: (02) 6295 8137, (06) 295 8137, 04291 76725 quota@prsa.org.au Printed by PANTHER PRINTING 97 Pirie Street ADELAIDE SA 5000 |
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