Palegoldenrod

I don’t intend to encourage you to vote for a particular party, or want to know who you vote for, or even want to tell you who I vote for. But I’d like to make two points, and offer you more information.

Voting for Small Parties

Don’t consider a vote for a small party to be a lost vote. Even though that small party may not have a chance to win a seat in government, even though your vote will end up falling back on preferences (either yours or theirs, depending what you provide on the ballot) the initial count can help to indicate the populations opinion on certain high profile matters of policy etc. You may not be able to vote in someone other than Labor or Liberal (well, its unlikely) but you can send a message. Please bear this in mind.

In addition, election funding is available to parties that receive more than 4% of the initial first preference vote. This can be a useful tool for smaller parties to continue to operate and lobby for changes in your community and in government policy.

Specifying Preferences

On the Senate Ballot, you can choose to put a 1 above the line, indicating your preference of party. If that party gets knocked out, then the party decides where your preference will go. You can, however, choose to number every single box below the line. Most Aussies probably conisder that to be too much work. I’d suggest that taking 15 minutes once every 3 or 4 years is probably not too much work at all, and that it may result in a government that you are happier with. The section below provides resources to find out more about the candidates so you can even plan your numbering before you walk in there on the day – you can get out of there much quicker and be able to place all those numbers in boxes more confidently. Its your choice.

Being Informed

I realised that I don’t know all of the parties that are available for me to vote for, and I wondered why they didn’t distribute the ballot paper for review prior to the election. How else do I know who I can research or ask questions of? Well, they sort of do. You can review the entire candidate listing (and gain access to contact information for candidates) from the website of the Australian Electoral Commission.

Resources

• Candidate / ballot listing
• List of political parties
• Where to vote

Note: some parties may not have registered in time to be officially listed e.g. I know some friends who will find candidates for the Secular Party listed on the Senate Ballot, but not mention of the Secular Party specifically. If you are looking for a particular party and can’t find them you are best to check out their website to confirm their candidates.