Just been glancing at the election results for Bennelong, in Australia:Raw results
PETERS, Lindsay [The Greens 4,811 5.53]
HOWARD, John Winston [Liberal 39,551 45.49]
McKEW, Maxine [Labor 39,408 45.33]
Two party preferred
HOWARD, John Winston [Liberal 42,252 48.60]
McKEW, Maxine [Labor 44,684. 51.40]
Interesting what the results would have been under a few common voting systems:
Single Transferable Proportional Representation
Of course the vote was set up head to head so comparisons cannot really be made but assuming there were maybe seven Liberals and seven Labor on the card, along with a dozen others and assuming Bennelong was to return 9 members, with a quota of 10%, then Liberal and Labour would get their 4 each on the second ballot and the Greens would return one member.
First Past the Post
John Howard would be returned.
Preferential Voting
Maxine McKew has actually been returned.
In this blogger's view, FPTP is the least fair system and STPR the fairest. However, STPR needs a single constituency element in it to make members accountable locally and this complicates the issue.
Single Transferable Proportional Representation
Of course the vote was set up head to head so comparisons cannot really be made but assuming there were maybe seven Liberals and seven Labor on the card, along with a dozen others and assuming Bennelong was to return 9 members, with a quota of 10%, then Liberal and Labour would get their 4 each on the second ballot and the Greens would return one member.
First Past the Post
John Howard would be returned.
Preferential Voting
Maxine McKew has actually been returned.
In this blogger's view, FPTP is the least fair system and STPR the fairest. However, STPR needs a single constituency element in it to make members accountable locally and this complicates the issue.
STPR is voting for parties (or party lists) not people, my main dislike of it. Unfortunately Parties remain the most obvious choices for the non-thinking voter in FTTP.
ReplyDeleteI'd prefer it if politicians were drawn by lottery from the general public, assuming they weren't scoundrels of course.
FPTP is unfair but at least you know where you are with it. Proportional representation creates chaos here!
ReplyDeleteProportional representation is the best system. It means politicians would have to work harder on policy.
ReplyDeleteYou wouldn't get the Labour nightmare under PR. The current system leads to five year dictatorships.
I'd also cut a term to three years. Also force pms to step down after two terms.
I looked at the election for Senate in South Australia. It took 24 distributions to elect the last Sentator, the Greens candidate. She had been quite far behind, but it was only the elimination of the third Labor candidate that lead to her election.
ReplyDeleteMy issue with transferable vote is the stitching up of your vote by different parties. If you want to be sure that your vote is going wherever you want it to, you have to vote below the line, which can be tedious. This is all theoretical, because I have not voted for over 25 years because of my resident status.
I noticed that you were curious about the photohunt at JMBs site. The themes are picked well in advance at tnchick.com. You could take a look if you were interested.
I prefer voting for the person you want to elect ;)
ReplyDeleteThe fairest voting system is any that is frequent. That way you can kick against political duplicity.
ReplyDeleteA lot of referendums might help as well - even if you can't sell free beer on a referendum - does it really matter.
Good God!
ReplyDeleteWe agree on something.
The electoral system, as used to elect Dail Eireain is the fairest system, in my book.
And of course, it was designed by the House of Lords :)