List of Senate How-To-Vote Card Preferences

Introduction

This is a resource piece that will be updated as information comes to hand.  It is simply a list of the Senate preference recommendations on party how-to-vote cards by state, with some comments as I feel inclined to add them.  I will not be writing a similar piece for the House of Representatives.  Note that the ABC Senate Guides also show HTV card scans for many parties (indeed a lot more than listed here) though at the time of writing they are missing some that I have.

Senate how-to-votes are of interest because in the new Senate system, voters decide their own preferences, but many will follow how-to-vote cards in so doing.  Typically something like half of major party voters are likely to follow cards (more accurate assessments are probably available elsewhere in the psephosphere) but the card-follow rate among Greens voters is very low.  Under the new Senate system it is possible voters will be more reliant on these cards than normal.  Knowing who these cards preference may be important in projecting the outcome early in the post-count, as will high-quality scrutineering (but I doubt that there will be too much of that.)

Following a how-to-vote card and then stopping after six boxes weakens the power of your vote and I strongly recommend voting beyond six boxes if voting above the line.  See How To Best Use Your Vote In The New Senate System.



The cards could prove quite significant in some states.  Preference snowballing by micro-parties is unlikely to work well because it will be impossible to co-ordinate, but some of the larger micro-parties might be able to outpoll the leftover quota fraction for a major party and thereby gain a boost on their preferences.  So for instance a micro-party polls 3% and a major party has 2% left over after several of its candidates have been elected.  The major party preferences the micro-party, which gains another 1% because half its voters followed the card - this could be a massive help in a tight race.

However in most cases where a major party preferences a micro-party, the micro-party will be out the door in the cut-up before the major party's preferences are thrown, if indeed they are thrown at all.  Or in other cases a major party may cross during the preference cut-up (with their preferences then worth very little) or may be elected to their last seat without making quota.  So we shouldn't assume that these preferences will always flow.  Yes Hinch has a nice setup in Victoria with preferences from both majors ahead of anyone else of much consequence, but whether those preferences actually get passed on remains to be seen.

Here I will be including only those parties whose cards I think may be significant in determining outcomes, except for Tasmania for which I will include any party.  Obscure micro-parties have little success in directing preferences, partly because their ability to staff polling booths is poor and partly because their voters are independently and sometimes even tactically minded.  Therefore I will tend not to include them, but you are very welcome to add them in comments.  (Note as always that comments here are moderated to prevent vandalism by chess trolls and other lunatics, and hence may take some time to clear.)

As of the early hours of 17 June the Liberals, Nationals, Greens and NXT all had Senate preference cards online (generally searchable by postcode), as did many micro-parties, while Labor only had them on some state websites. Labor's tardiness in getting this information online when people are already voting is surprising.

As a general comment there was a fair amount of concern that parties might try to issue just-vote-1 how to vote cards, even though by doing so they surrendered bargaining power.  It hasn't, so far, happened.  On the other hand parties are often not encouraging their supporters to fill more than six ATL boxes, or even letting them know that they can do so.  (A few cards, such as Family First and Australian Christians in Queensland, are radically recommending a seventh preference!)  Also, the design of how-to-vote cards varies and it may be that some lend themselves more to the voter deciding to just vote 1 than others.

What follows is a work in progress and will be expanded as I have the time.  Please help if you can fill in any blank marked (To be added).  Parties may later decide to hand out how-to-votes different from those they are advertising.  If you see one that doesn't match please photograph it and upload it and send me the link, or email it to me (k_bonham@tassie.net.au).

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Australian Capital Territory

Coalition (Liberal): 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Liberal Democrats, 4 Animal Justice, 5 Sustainable Australia, 6 Labor
Labor:  (To be added)
Green: 2 Secular Party, 3 Sex Party, 4 Animal Justice, 5 Labor, 6 Sustainable Australia

New South Wales

Coalition: 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Shooters Fishers and Farmers, 4 Family First, 5 Liberal Democrats, 6 Motoring Enthusiasts
Labor: 2 Greens, 3 Renewable Energy, 4 Animal Justice, 5 Sex Party, 6 Liberal Democrats (!!)
Green: 2 Pirate Party, 3 Science Party, 4 Socialist Alliance, 5 Animal Justice, 6 Labor
Liberal Democrats: 2 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 3 HEMP, 4 Family First, 5 Australian Liberty Alliance, 6 Katters Australian Party
NXT: Open ticket, asks voters to number at least 6 squares

Northern Territory

Note: the small list of parties in the NT Senate race makes for some seemingly odd preference decisions.

Coalition (CLP): 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Labor, 4 HEMP/Sex, 5 Greens, 6 Rise Up Australia
Labor: (To be added)
Green: 2 Labor, 3 HEMP, 4 CLP, 5 Citizens Electoral Council, 6 Christian Democrats

Queensland

Coalition (LNP): 2 Family First, 3 Christian Democrats, 4 Shooters Fishers and Farmers, 5 Katter's Australian Party, 6 Australian Christians
Labor: 2 Greens 3 Sex/HEMP 4 JLN 5 Glenn Lazarus Team, 6 Katters Australian Party (This has been re-ordered and a card with Renewable Energy at 3 has also been reported in comments)
Green: 2 Renewable Energy, 3 Marriage Equality, 4 Arts Party, 5 Labor, 6 Australian Cyclists (GLT were fourth but have been dropped)
One Nation: 2 Australian Liberty Alliance, 3 Rise Up Australia, 4 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 5 Family First, 6 Katters Australian Party
Glenn Lazarus Team: 2 Katters Australian Party 3 Family First 4 Greens 5 Labor 6 Liberal
Katters Australian Party: 2 Lazarus 3 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 4 Australian Liberty Alliance, 5 Family First, 6 One Nation (Aus Christians initially at 3 but dropped)
NXT: Open ticket, asks voters to number at least 6 squares

Note that many parties in Queensland (including the LDP who are not listed above) have changed their preference order during the campaign - see comment by Brisbanelattesipper below this article.

South Australia

Curiously, after Bob Day railed against the potential of the new Senate system to cause votes to exhaust, he has issued a how-to-vote card that preferences only parties that will be excluded before him, so in the event that he loses, his HTV card preferences will exhaust.

Coalition: 2 Family First, 3 Liberal Democrats, 4 Christian Democrats, 5 Motoring Enthusiasts, 6 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers
NXT: Open ticket, asks voters to number at least 6 squares
Labor: 2 Greens, 3 Animal Justice, 4 Marriage Equality, 5 NXT, 6 Motoring Enthusiasts
Green: 2 Animal Justice, 3 Australian Cyclists, 4 Marriage Equality, 5 Arts Party, 6 Labor
Family First: 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Australian Liberty Alliance, 4 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 5 One Nation, 6 Liberal Democrats

Tasmania

NOTE: I suggest that Tasmanian Liberal voters decide their own preferences rather than following the card, since the Family First candidates are very strange anti-gay extremists. For more see my Tasmanian Senate piece.

Coalition (Liberal): 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 4 Liberal Democrats, 5 Family First, 6 Labor (!)
Labor: 2 Greens 3 Jacqui Lambie Network 4 Recreational Fishers 5 Sex/HEMP 6 Renewable Energy
Green: 2 Renewable Energy, 3 Recreational Fishers, 4 Labor, 5 Science Party, 6 Arts Party
Lambie Network:  No HTV card seen but website recommends "2-6 as you please and due to the Liberals' betrayal put them last". (There is no mention that you need to number more than 6 squares to do this.)
Family First: 2 Shooters Fishers and Farmers, 3 Liberal Democrats, 4 Aus Liberty Alliance, 5 Rec Fishers, 6 Liberal
Christian Democrats: 2 Liberal 3 Shooters Fishers and Farmers 4 One Nation 5 Aus Liberty 6 Family First
NXT: 2 Lambie Network, rest open, asks voters to number at least 6 squares
Sex/HEMP: 2 Arts Party 3 Rec Fishers 4 Science 5 Animal Justice 6 Renewable Energy
One Nation: 2 Christian Democrats 3 Shooters Fishers and Farmers 4 Family First 5 Rec Fishers 6 Aus Liberty Alliance
Hinch Justice Party: Open ticket, says "vote 2-6 for your own preferences"
Renewable Energy: 2 Rec Fishers, 3 Greens 4 Sex Party 5 Animal Justice 6 Labor 7 Hinch Justice Party 8 Science Party 9 FLUX
Aust Liberty Alliance: 2 Christian Democrats, 3 Liberal Democrats 4 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers 5 Family First 6 Lambie Network
Shooters Fishers and Farmers: 2 Christian Democrats, 3 One Nation, 4 Family First, 5 Aus Liberty Alliance, 6 Liberal Democrats 7 Rec Fishers
Animal Justice: 2 Renewable Energy, 3 Science Party, 4 Greens, 5 Labor, 6 "Voter to choose"
Science Party: 2 Animal Justice (bad choice), 3 Greens, 4 Sex/HEMP, 5 Arts Party, 6 Labor
Rec Fishers: 2 Renewable Energy 3 Green 4 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers 5 Sex Party 6 Lambie Network
Liberal Democrats: 2 Rec Fishers, 3 Shooters Fishers and Farmers 4 Aus Liberty Alliance "plus a further two parties of your choice"
Arts Party: Open haiku

Victoria

Coalition: 2 Family First, 3 Australian Christians, 4 Democratic Labour, 5 Australian Country Party, 6 Derryn Hinch Justice Party
NXT: Open ticket, asks voters to number at least 6 squares
Labor: 2 Sex Party, 3 Derryn Hinch, 4 Renewable Energy, 5 Greens, 6 Cyclists/Science
Green: 2 Marriage Equality, 3 Science/Cyclists, 4 Animal Justice, 5 Arts Party, 6 Labor
Derryn Hinch Justice Party: Open ticket, says "vote 2-6 for your own preferences"
AMEP: Recommends "in your preferred order": John Madigan, Shooters Fishers and Farmers, Country Party, Liberal Democrats, Renewable Energy, NXT, Lambie, Drug Law Reform, and "number as many other boxes as you can to make your vote last longer.  Major parties are optional but if you do, major parties last".

Western Australia

Liberal: 2 Nationals, 3 Aus Christians, 4 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 5 Liberal Democrats, 6 Family First
Nationals: 2 Liberal, 3 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers, 4 NXT, 5 Labor, 6 Australian Christians
Labor: 2 Greens, 3 HEMP/Sex, 4 Derryn Hinch Justice Party, 5 Shooters, Fishers and Farmers 6 Nationals
Green: 2 Renewable Energy, 3 Aus Cyclists, 4 Animal Justice, 5 HEMP, 6 Labor
NXT:  Open ticket, asks voters to number at least 6 squares
Palmer United: (To be added)