Going Postal

The Australian Electoral system is broadly similar to that in the UK, but there are a few differences. For instance there are three sets of elections - local, state and federal - instead of the two that the UK have (local and national). This coming weekend is the Queensland state election, and it's a campaign that's coming down to the wire.

Another significant difference is that voting is mandatory over here. If you don't vote you get a fine of around $40 and presumably a sternly worded letter from the Australian Electoral Commission. And you're not excused if you're out of the country - you need to submit a postal vote, find an overseas voting or nominate someone to vote in proxy. I was actually looking forward to my first ever Australian vote (and it's accompanying sausage in bread) but unfortunately I'm flying to Thailand that day, so I'm having to submit a postal vote instead. This isn't so bad as it gives me time to have a look at the ballot paper and figure it all out.

If you look closely you can see another difference - I'm able to either just select one candidate or alternatively rank them all in order. The second option comes into play if there is no clear majority - the candidate with the least votes is discarded and the second choice of all votes for that candidate are added to the main poll numbers. And so on until a clear winner is decided. Cunning, although of course not cunning enough to prevent a hung parliament at the Federal elections a couple of years ago! Federal ballot papers do not give you the option of a single nomination - you are supposed to rank all candidates - although I heard on the radio today that you are legally allowed to select only one candidate and that it still counts as a valid vote , it's just illegal to tell people that that is an option. That makes no sense at all, which almost certainly means that it's true*.

It's interesting voting in a new place. Back in the UK I would never have voted for the Tories, even if they promised free beer and mountain bikes to all, because of the devastation wrought on the country by Thatcher and her evil toadying cronies. Conversely my parents would never vote Labour because their socialist policies take money from the dedicated earners to scatter wastefully amongst the bludgers, and have almost bought the country to it's knees many times. Over here all of the old opinions and prejudices are gone (I sometimes still struggle to figure out who is in which party) so you get to look at it with an unbiased eye. The mandatory vote changes the tone of the campaigns too. There's less of an attempt to inspire the population into getting off their butt and taking positive action, instead they know you will be at the polling station anyway so there's a lot of nasty negative campaigning designed to make you not want to vote for the other side.

Of course it doesn't really make any difference at the end of the day - big business & mining interests are bankrolling all of the major parties to a greater or a lesser degree and will continue to get what they want at the expense of the nation. But that's not going to stop me making my mark!

*Allegedly