Above the line voting is also convenient for those who are not necessarily lazy or indiscriminating, but are faithful to a particular party. However, use of group voting tickets does not necessarily result in the most desired outcome for these voters. First, parties sometimes make strategic mistakes with their group voting tickets, disadvantaging the interests they serve. Second, the major parties routinely minimise their representation by encouraging ticket voting, which can lead to early exclusion of their candidates during vote counting.
In Western Australia in 2001 the group voting tickets of One Nation were a key reason why the Greens gained the balance of power in the Upper House. Specifically, the decision of One Nation to place the Greens before the Liberals on its Registered Voting List in both the Agricultural and Mining and the Pastoral Regions resulted in Green candidates being elected instead of Liberals. After the election Labor and the Greens together had 18 of the 34 seats. It is doubtful that most faithful One Nation supporters realised the consequence of the group voting ticket or were happy with the outcome. It seems that group voting tickets allowed a mistake on the part of a small number of party insiders to significantly reduce the effective representation of One Nation voters.
Parties that have a reasonable expectation of having more than one candidate elected minimise their representation by encouraging all their voters to vote in the same way, which is particularly easy with group voting tickets. The candidates high on the ticket are elected at the start of the counting of votes. However, those lower down have very few first preference votes and even after the surpluses of elected candidates are distributed may have a reasonably small total. This can result in the candidates being excluded before candidates from minor parties. The preferences then flow from the major party to a minor party candidate, who is eventually elected. A more even distribution of votes for their different candidates can result in the election of the top candidates being delayed until later in the count, but the lower candidates also remaining in the count for longer because they have more votes. A candidate from a minor party is then excluded because they have fewer votes, and their preferences flow on to the major party candidate, who is eventually elected.
For example, in the 1993 half Senate election, Labor received more first preference votes nation-wide than the Coalition but had fewer senators elected. This was in part due to the close contests in Western Australia and Queensland where a Green and Democrat filled the last vacancy. With a more even distribution of votes for the major parties, as would have been the case without group voting tickets, it is likely that these minor party candidates would have been excluded in the count (due to higher totals for the major party candidates). In both these cases it would have been the Labor party candidate who won.
Members of the major parties have been made aware that a single ticket minimises their representation and maximises the representation of minor parties. It has been known for many years and in 1993 the Proportional Representation Society publicised it our submission to the electoral enquiry and an article in The Canberra Times10. Major parties could have adopted mechanisms such as multiple tickets or ``split tickets'' to spread out the votes for their candidates. This increases their representation and gives discriminating voters more control over which candidates are elected. Instead, they have continued to use group voting tickets in a way that minimises their representation. It seems that the power brokers within parties prefer to risk their party losing a Senate seat or two than loosen their grip on which candidates get elected. It is doubtful that the bulk of the party faithful share this preference.