People keep asking me how to Vote, I do not want to tell you
who to vote for, but I will help you understand how it all works, so here goes.
Basics only;
In your local electorate you will recieve 2 ballot papers;
- Will
be for the Lower House, called the House of Assembly, which with in
reason, will result in the choice of political party that will run our
state.
It will have about 4 to 6 boxes on it with the candidates
names adjacent, usually Labor, Liberal, Greens, Family First, an Independent, and
maybe another minor player.
You have to mark a preference for all the Candidates, not my
idea of democracy, but those who benefit from structural biases write the law.
If you like me, are desperate to see change, you would put
the current sitting member last, but you must decide that for your self.
2.The
second Ballot paper is bloody huge, it is for the Upper House called the
Legislative Council, those elected scrutinize legislative change, ie; they
police new laws, I have always believed that the upper house is the true
place for independents, once again my own opinion, if ever the upper house
was to be controlled by the governing party it would loose its ability to
remain our checks and balances. In other words if say Labor had a majority
in the upper house, they could pass any laws they wanted, and no body
could question them, the checks and balances would become a rubber stamp.
The Upper house ballot paper will offer you 2 choices of how
to vote, either you put a 1 in one of the boxes above the line, or you must
number every box below the line, in the same way as the lower house ballot.
If you were voting for me, and put a 1 in the box above the
line next to my name, your primary vote would count for me, if I did not
receive enough votes to be elected, the vote for me would go to whom I decided
was to receive my preferences. I would make the most informed decision I could at this stage that would be the majors last, as I would like to see true independent voices scrutinising legislative change.
You of course can decide your self where the preferences go,
by marking all the boxes consequentially below the line.
I am opposed to the idea that you must in some way have a
preference for all the candidates, considering you will probably not know them
all, or in fact their will be some you oppose.
This happens because of the 2
party counting system, the idea in most cases your vote will end up with one of
the 2 major parties, because as I mentioned earlier, they write the electoral
law, one of the reasons I am running, I want to make it more democratic.
How the counting works is rather complicated, what basically
happens is the candidate with the lowest primary vote is ejected from the game,
and his votes go to the next preferenced candidate, this type of counting is
designed to benefit the biggest player, which will always be the major parties,
Labor and Liberal, something I oppose.
SO NOW YOU KIND OF KNOW HOW IT WORKS,
I wont go on as I feel
the more you learn the angrier you will get about out voting system, my web
site at
www.howtovoteinsa.net will
explain it further if you would like to know.
The site will also explain the changes I would fight for, it
is not very professional, but I cannot afford to have it changed, as I did not
set it up.
Best of luck Mark M Aldridge
If you are still confused, either contact me personally or
the State Electoral Commission.