tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4052593945054595675.post2541534014512682874..comments2024-03-28T14:16:10.498+11:00Comments on Dr Kevin Bonham: Why I Don't Prefer Abolishing Above The Line Voting Kevin Bonhamhttp://www.blogger.com/profile/06845545257440242894noreply@blogger.comBlogger4125tag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4052593945054595675.post-18425841319337571932019-09-13T13:32:12.282+10:002019-09-13T13:32:12.282+10:00Thank you. I agree with all of this other than the...Thank you. I agree with all of this other than the threshold bit. I think thresholds are so dangerous, even though they would be advantageous to me personally as a Green, I'm not sure I would prefer them to GVTs.<br /><br />BTW, I have a lot of experience with the system you describe at point 1. It was used at the Melbourne University Student Union elections for more than a decade, and for much of that time I was the deputy returning officer and counted many committees under that system.<br /><br />Obviously the voting habits of university students are very different from those of the general public, but my experience there has led me to believe that if implemented it would diminish the power of preference harvesting dramatically. In principle I think it would be much better to adopt the Senate system, but as a compromise I think this would in practice work quite well.Anonymoushttps://www.blogger.com/profile/01856375621044507018noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4052593945054595675.post-84400518874568274372019-09-04T00:25:42.017+10:002019-09-04T00:25:42.017+10:00Yes there was at least one case where separate Lib...Yes there was at least one case where separate Liberal and National tickets delivered an extra Senator, in Queensland 2004.<br /><br />In Group Ticket Voting systems (now only surviving in WA and Vic upper houses and Vic councils) the group submitting a ticket is required to keep its own candidates in the order listed - they're not allowed to use the multiple-ticket option to spread their own vote. But they can juggle the order of candidates on other tickets (both within tickets and between tickets) as much as they want to. Some preference harvester groups would exploit this by chopping back and forth between tickets from different parties in their preference order to make it even harder for anyone to understand which candidate would actually benefit. <br /><br />Thanks for the comment; interesting.Kevin Bonhamhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06845545257440242894noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4052593945054595675.post-29452521323056010512019-09-04T00:16:30.627+10:002019-09-04T00:16:30.627+10:00The "Ginninderra Effect" is often seen i...The "Ginninderra Effect" is often seen in both Northern Ireland and the Republic of Ireland where the Hare-Clark (or STV) experience is very different.<br /><br />Candidates aren't grouped by party on the ballot paper and parties generally only nominate as many candidates as they would reasonably hope to get elected on a good day (and parties that overnominate are often condemned for playing with fire). Candidates will often run high localised campaigns, carving up the constituency with running mates to keep out of each other's way and openly urging specific orders of preferences designed to keep them all in the count for as long as possible. Leakage rates are much higher in both jurisdictions than in Tasmania/ACT and there's also a strong phenomenon of voters transferring between the candidates local to their area rather than along party lines.<br /><br />Not every party is always perfect at nominating and/or keeping campaign discipline - some of the most interesting contests occur when candidates realise their only path to election is to defeat their own running mate, whilst some parties have really struggled to accept they're in a weaker position than they'd like and so put up too many candidates then lose seats on leakages. However many parties work the system well and often "balance" their vote such that it's evenly spread across their candidates, keeping them in the count long enough to receive transfers and thus win a great number of seats than the first preference quota % implies.<br /><br />(Casual vacancies are filled either by a constituency wide by-election or by co-option of either the nominee of the outgoing member's party or someone from a pre-submitted list of replacements, the latter mechanism being relatively Independent friendly.)<br /><br />It has long surprised me that Australian parties have never tried to exploit this effect - are/were the multiple ATL lists locked against this? I suppose some of the separate Liberal and National tickets may have delivered an extra Coalition Senator.Tim Roll-Pickeringhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/12589024696145675963noreply@blogger.comtag:blogger.com,1999:blog-4052593945054595675.post-47819213914948929162019-09-01T18:22:14.644+10:002019-09-01T18:22:14.644+10:00Kevin congratulations for your sensible defence of...Kevin congratulations for your sensible defence of above-the-line PR voting and your repudiation of voting elitists who consider BTL voting is somehow superior. We should respect the right of voters to be party-focused rather than candidate-focused, and their subsequent right to make that choice with convenience and not be bamboozled by such artificial devices as Robson rotation.Jeremy Buxtonhttps://www.blogger.com/profile/06529282562063178020noreply@blogger.com