The Rat Race

Since the announcement of the Federal Election a couple of weeks back, political commercials have been popping up more and more in all the varied media outlets to the lead up of the big day this Saturday. I’m not sure if it’s just that this time I’m taking more notice of the different ads but I have been noticing many more ads for many of the minor parties who are running in the Senate, the house that votes whether to push proposed legislation into law, block it or send it back for further review. Sure, there are many more ads on mediums like Facebook and the like, but there even seems to be ads on the TV for parties like the Greens, which I can never remember from any other election and even radio ads for the religious whack job party, Family First.


This year there also seems to be much more mud slinging in these campaigns rather then stating policy. I know every political campaign does this during every election, but for some reason, this one seems to be much more rife with it. This time around you’re more likely to see a commercial along the lines of “The leader of this major party supported this, which hurt the country. Vote for us” or “The leader for that major party didn’t know about this issue. Vote for us.”. This year there also seems to be many more minor parties up for election to the Senate and this is where I think we run into an issue.


For the House of Reps, the ballot form is simple. There are only a handful of candidates for your electorate, 4 or 5 or 6, and you put a number in each box from 1 to however many candidates there are indicating your preference. Simple and easy.

The Senate is another matter. The ballot for the Upper House lists many more candidates because you’re voting for the whole state as opposed to the electorate. This year there are 60 people alone in VIC that will appear on the ballot. When voting in the Senate, they give you two choices on how to vote. The first one is called “Above the Line”. What this means is that you put a 1 in the box, above the line, for the party you wish to vote for and that’s it. The party then will allocate it’s own preferences with the votes it receives this way, and in some cases, they have allied with minor parties in order to get seats and some of their allotments might go to them. This means that they may pass along to a preference to a party to don’t like or don’t agree with. There are ways to see the way each party will allocate their preferences so you know where they are going.

The second option is to vote “Below the Line”. This is done by putting a number from 1 to however many candidates are up for election, in this case 60, in every box below the line on the ballot form. Choosing this option allows one to allocate their own preferences based on their own whatever’s, it means that YOU get to choose where the vote goes. The problem with this is that it is particularly daunting and time consuming, especially if you decide to investigate each candidate or party’s position on issues. Come election day, many people are in the mindset that, after standing in a line on a Saturday morning to get to a voting booth, they either don’t want to stand around for any more time then necessary filling in all those boxes and just want to get in and out as quickly as possible or they don’t know how the system works and so feel intimidated with this giant sheet of paper that they have to fill in, so go with the easier option.

If you really want to make your vote count as much as possible, you really should take the plunge and vote below the line. That way, at the very least, you know exactly where your vote is going. The reason we wind up with whack job Senators like those from Family First is because the major parties send preferences to them.


Overall though, the one thing I’ve learned about election and politics in general is that there are no “good” guys and “bad” guys. There are just varying degrees of bad guys and your decision to vote for either one being influenced by which of them is the lesser of two evils.