Election 2010 August 21

[JohnK]

I like interesting observation.
Having followed some comments to the newspapers it is becoming clear that not many people understand preferences.

I thought I understood it but when you really think about it most of us do not really understand it.

I am stumped how someone with ~20% of the primary vote can be the declared representative of the electorate. Where it their loyalty? The people that voted for them or the people who voted for the opposing parties?

I'm not sure about about Greece but France apparently has a 2 stage election, where the top two people go into a run off election.

This sounds like a much fairer system and ensures that initially if you don't finish in the first 2 you cannot win the seat.

 

[medhead]

I thought I understood it but when you really think about it most of us do not really understand it.

I am stumped how someone with ~20% of the primary vote can be the declared representative of the electorate. Where it their loyalty? The people that voted for them or the people who voted for the opposing parties?

Well this is Serfty's point that really it is a vote against one candidate. But the 20% example is the person who the most people have decided they want to represent them. Making a big assumption that people understand how they have voted. In deciding preference the voter is asked the question: "if you can't have your first choice who would you have instead".

Ideally that should result in the person who is least objectionable to the most voters. (yes I'm talking about theory here not practice)

I guess the only problem with second round voting would be he expense.

 

[JohnK]

I guess the only problem with second round voting would be he expense.

"Expenses be damned sire! We need a fair election and we need it now."

For anyone who does not know I have borrowed a quote from CIV2 and changed it slightly.

 

[serfty]

What can be certain with proportional voting is that any candidate who gets put last in more than ½ the votes will NOT be elected.

 

[medhead]

What can be certain with proportional voting is that any candidate who gets put last in more than ½ the votes will NOT be elected.

Now your making my head hurt. lol
Not help by the cold. Either

 

[Moody]

The preferential system is fair and perfectly simple. It ensures that if no candidate gains an absolute majority (>50%) of the votes, the selection of the winner is based upon them gaining >50% of first plus second (and occasionally third, fourth, etc.) preferences of voters whose first choice was unsuccessful.

It means that the most appropriate choice can get the nod no matter how many candidates are standing, and there is no need to have another run-off election when all the information required can be put on the ballot form.

If Wilkie gets up in Denison it will be because he is preferred by the majority of voters to Jackson. The moral of the story is that it is not good enough that a third of the electorate loves you if the other two-thirds hate you. Actually hate is a strong word - that should read that the other parties stitched up preference deals and most of the voters followed the card like good little donkeys. Particularly interesting that the Liberals would give their preferences to the whistleblower that exposed their Iraq WMD lies. Or is that ironic?

And just to explain why Wilkie may get up from 3rd position ..... after 1st preferences are counted and nobody has >50%, the candidate in last place is eliminated and their 2nd preferences are distributed to the remaining candidates. By this process of elimination Wilkie was elevated to second place in the voting, and the majority of both the Libs and Greens preferences then went to him when they were eliminated. It is a fascinating process to watch how the final votes can see-saw on the order of elimination.


Now if someone could explain the Senate quota system in 1000 words or less then that would be enlightening.

 

[tuapekastar]

So IF we end up going to another election due to neither major party being able to form a minority government, what happens with the Senate vote? Does the August 21 Senate vote stand, with the winning candidates taking their seats after July 1 2011 (yes, I know the new Territory Senators start immediately), making it a rare House of Representatives election only, or is there a requirement for upper and lower house elections to be concurrent? I assume it would be lower house only, but ... ?

Senate stands...i.e. no re-election.

 

[NM]

Senate stands...i.e. no re-election.

Good. It takes quite some time to write numbers 1 to 60 on that large piece of bleached tree.

 

[odysseus]

Or you could get one with 36%, one with 34% and the third with 30%. In this case they are all well under the magic 50% line.

Of course - but it was just said to be impossible the other way.

 

[medhead]

Of course - but it was just said to be impossible the other way.

Ok then, my bad , practically impossible in an australian context where the majority of seats require preferences to get over 50%.

 

[medhead]

Now if someone could explain the Senate quota system in 1000 words or less then that would be enlightening.

Relatively easy. Each state votes for the senate separately and has X number of seats. The number of voters is divided by the X to determine the quota. So if you have 1 million voters and 5 senate seats then a quota is 200000 + 1. Count up all the primary votes for the party. The party with the most votes and also exceeding 200001 they get the first seat, and goes to the first person on their ticket. Then 200001 votes get taken off that party. The next seat then goes to the new party with the most votes and also that exceeds a quota. This goes on until no party has more than a quota. Then they distribute the preferences by eliminating the party with the lowest vote first and so on. As each for the top parties exceeds a quota they get a seat until all 5 are filled.

Hopefully that is less that 1000 words. ABC has worked examples on their website Senate Results - Summary - 2010 Federal Election - ABC News (Australian Broadcasting Corporation) Just remember that this is not the real result as it is based on the preference flows at the last election. The actually preference flows will be different.

For example, I always number below the line and again in the interest of getting value for my voting dollar my preferences are all over the place. Assuming that they lay out the primary vote from left to right based on the order on the ballot paper I often will vote from one side to the other on the paper, just to know that someone has to walk my ballot about 100km back and forward across the room. Hope they're doing the Corporate Challenge.

 

[drron]

What can be certain with proportional voting is that any candidate who gets put last in more than ½ the votes will NOT be elected.

No.In the Tasmanian system where 5 members are elected you need 20%+1 vote to be elected so 79% can put a candidate last but if the rest give him/her their first preference that candidate is elected.So is this fairer than first past the post?
Now when saying the 2 party preferred vote is more important than the primary vote you are assuming that everyone makes an informed preference choice,I can assure you from scrutineering that is not the case.The most obvious example is the donkey vote,but it is by no means the only way preference votes can be unthinkinking.A fairer system may be the optional preference vote-ie you must cast a first preference but only go further if you really want to.

 

[oz_mark]

For example, I always number below the line and again in the interest of getting value for my voting dollar my preferences are all over the place. Assuming that they lay out the primary vote from left to right based on the order on the ballot paper I often will vote from one side to the other on the paper, just to know that someone has to walk my ballot about 100km back and forward across the room. Hope they're doing the Corporate Challenge.

Somewhere back in my past, I used to have to count these things :shock:

 

[Flashback]

Somewhere back in my past, I used to have to count these things :shock:

Been there, done that too! :shock:

 

[serfty]

What can be certain with proportional voting is that any candidate who gets put last in more than ½ the votes will NOT be elected.

No.In the Tasmanian system where 5 members are elected you need 20%+1 vote to be elected so 79% can put a candidate last but if the rest give him/her their first preference that candidate is elected.So is this fairer than first past the post?...

I was not referring to the Tasmanian system - I was referring to the Federal House of representatives system.

 

[serfty]

Relatively easy. Each state votes for the senate separately and has X number of seats. The number of voters is divided by the X to determine the quota. So if you have 1 million voters and 5 senate seats then a quota is 200000. ...

Actually it's divided by the number of 'seats' PLUS 1.

So in that example, a quota is 166,667. once all seats a filled the process completes regardless of how many 'live votes' may remain.

 

[medhead]

Actually it's divided by the number of 'seats' PLUS 1.

So in that example, a quota is 166,667. once all seats a filled the process completes regardless of how many 'live votes' may remain.

Whoops, of course, that'll teach me for thinking of that stuff at 12:30 am.
edit applied

Somewhere back in my past, I used to have to count these things :shock:

Been there, done that too! :shock:

Hope you we're getting paid by the hour. I've only started doing this in the 21st century. But I did used to have to number the boxes in the past in order to put Lady Flo dead last.

 

[simongr]

I still don't agree with presences - although you might argue that this avoids people getting elected with with 40% of the vote and 60% against them i don't think preferences are that much more sophisticated. You don't have a choice about not putting a preference. So I might dislike all of the other parties but I still have to vote for them. So my second least preferred option might be the labour candidate but they might still actually be able to get some preferences from me.

 

[medhead]

I still don't agree with presences - although you might argue that this avoids people getting elected with with 40% of the vote and 60% against them i don't think preferences are that much more sophisticated. You don't have a choice about not putting a preference. So I might dislike all of the other parties but I still have to vote for them. So my second least preferred option might be the labour candidate but they might still actually be able to get some preferences from me.

But still your second last person is still more preferred than the last person.

Hare Clark system FTW

 

[Moody]

Now if someone could explain the Senate quota system in 1000 words or less then that would be enlightening.

Relatively easy ....

Epic fail, Medhead. To the back of the class you go!

What is most interesting about the Senate Quota system is that the "excess" votes (above the quota) for the #1 candidate in a group are passed on in a very convoluted way that ends up being slightly less than full value. So if a group is gunning for 2 senate seats there is some wisdom in putting a 1 against the second candidate as that will be slightly more valuable than inheriting the second preference from the #1 candidate.

Or am I dreaming????