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Proportional representation analysis 2004 POLLS FOR THE 41ST AUSTRALIAN HOUSE OF REPRESENTATIVES Estimated no. of PR-STV (Hare-Clark) seats in possible multi-member divisions Copyright © Proportional Representation Society of Australia Inc. 2025: Tel. +61429176725 www.prsa.org.au info@prsa.org.au Final AEC data, from www.aec.gov.au |
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Details of
the 26 Multi-member PR Districts:
Click
on details
to see the PR districts, the votes in
each, and the seats that would be won
with that arrangement, compared with the
single-member seats actually won. The
single-member system reveals that in 56
of the 150 single-member districts an
absolute majority of voters cast their
first preference vote for a candidate
other than the candidate that was
elected. If the crude and
unrepresentative first-past-the-post
form of voting had applied, the result
would have been even more skewed, as the
ALP's
total number of seats would have been 8
fewer, and the Coalition's
would have been 8 more. Discussion: Unexpected
casual vacancies would not threaten the
Coalition Government's small PR majority
nearly as much as the present system
can. Hare-Clark fills casual vacancies
by
countback of
general election ballot-papers, as for
the Tasmanian and ACT Assemblies, and
the predictable party continuity lets
Governments last full term. In contrast,
by-election polls in single-member seats
are notorious for losing those seats for
Governments in power. That can
effectively focus a determination of a
change of government on a single poll,
in isolation, and out of context with a
general election. Countback,
by contrast, continues to determine who
fills the seat on the basis of the vote
at the preceding general election, so all
MHRs are elected by decisions made in
the various electoral divisions of the
nation concurrently, in the same
election campaign. This election,
as the graph
shows, demonstrates that the diversity
of views of the electorate would have
been more faithfully represented in
accordance with the extent of their
electoral support, and less distorted,
if a Hare-Clark multi-member PR
electoral system had been used instead
of single-member electoral districts. Under Hare-Clark PR in Tasmania,
a party has often won a majority of
votes in one or more of that State's
five multi-member districts, but only
once has a Tasmanian MHA (Douglas Lowe in
1979) received an
absolute majority of first preference
votes, because the diversity of
candidates and their support has nearly
always let voters express their diverse views with
a real chance of their being
represented. There is no restrictive
"winner-take-all" scheme operating for
the Lower House of either |
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