Voting 101 – You Can’t Vote for the Prime Minister!

THERE are two ballot forms:

• A small green one for the House of Representatives (also called the lower house)
• A big white one for the Senate.

The Green Ballot

To make your vote count you need to number EVERY box on this ballot paper. The green ballot is to elect who you want to represent this electorate, the seat of New England, in Parliament. You are voting for the candidate who will represent your town and this region in the seat of New England.

The White Ballot

To make your vote count you need to number either 6 boxes above the line or 12 boxes below the line. The white ballot paper is to elect who you want to the Senate, in Parliament. The candidates for the Senate are not associated with any particular electorate. The Senate has 76 senators, twelve from each of the six states and two from each of the territories. The role of the Senate is to pass or not pass laws in Australia.

Preferences

On the green ballot you need to number EVERY box, which means you decide the order of candidates you want your vote to flow to, so YOU decide your preferences.

On the white ballot paper you only have to vote for six above the line or 12 below the line. You can choose to number more boxes to keep directing your preferences, however realistically after voting 6 above the line or 12 below the line your vote will probably be exhausted anyway.

Strategy for Voting Preferences

There are a few general approaches people seem to take on how they preference their vote:

• Who you want to win: If you have a favourite candidate or party, then put them first and then put the candidates in order of your preferences;
• Who you don’t want to win: If you have a least favourite candidate or party, simply put them last.

We can’t vote for the Prime Minister!

Australia does NOT have a presidential system, where we simply vote for the leader. We vote for who we want to represent us, in this case, in the seat of New England (the green ballot paper). The major party which wins the most seats across the entire country is then ‘in power’ and their leader becomes our Prime Minister. And as we’ve seen over successive governments, that party can change their leader, our Prime Minister, any old time they like.

It is important to vote for you want to represent you in Parliament – the representative of the seat of New England. The person who is elected may or may not be part of a major party and if they are part of a major party – their party may or may not be in power. If the person is an independent or from a minor party their ‘party’ will not be in power, but the silver lining is often that they can represent the electorate well by having a relationship with whichever major party is in government, because they are not automatically in ‘opposition’ to them.

Conversely, a representative who is part of a major party, but their party is not in power, is in ‘opposition’ to the government and they may not be able to secure much for their own electorate. Or the major party in power may want the seat for their own candidate at the next election and invest in the seat.

If the representative’s party is in power that can also work two ways, first they take the seat for granted and focus on marginal seats, or there may be more funding for that seat.

At the end of the day it is simply best to cast your vote for the candidate with the policies and sentiments you most agree with to represent YOUR electorate.

Related stories:

• Where to Vote – May 17, 2019.
• Some Candidates in Tomorrow’s Election – May 17, 2019.
• Federal Candidates Announced – April 24, 2019.