Dewey Defeats Truman

Background

For the non-Australians present, I need to briefly explain how the system works so we can get to my observations so far.

Like the UK, we have a Westminster-style Parliament, with two houses, and the executive branch is chosen from the legislative branch. Essentially, the party or coalition with the majority in the "lower house" (what in the UK would be called the House of Commons and in the US and Australia would be called the House of Representatives) is the government, and the leader in the House gets to be the Prime Minister. He or she then picks the Cabinet.

Unlike the UK, and like the US, instead of a House of Lords (or, in the case of Canada, a bastardised substitute), we have an elected Senate.

Like the UK, members of the lower house are referred to as "Members of Parliament" or "MPs". Like the US, members of the upper house are referred to as "Senators".

One MP is elected per local electorate, using the IRV voting system . Ten senators are elected per state (and two per territory), using the STV system (though we do allow a simplified Senate vote for those who wish to do it that way). It's all done on paper, so the "ballot" is a physical piece of paper that can be counted, bundled and stored.

Back to me

I've done an election (state) before, so I know basically what's involved. Nonetheless, here are a few thoughts.

When you have preferential voting, the rules for whether a vote is valid (or "formal") are necessarily more complicated than simply "look for the tick or cross". In a "tick the box"-style election, two ticks would make a vote informal. In our system, not numbering every box, or using non-consecutive numbers, or repeating a number, all make the vote invalid. (The story of Albert Langer comes to mind here.)

The rules for this federal election are significantly more complicated and fixed than the previous state election that I worked on. They even tell you how to lay out the room to do vote counting! More rules to follow and enforce, and they pay less than the state election.

Something's not right here.

One other thing that may not occur to people who haven't worked behind the scenes is that because a vote is a physical piece of paper, there is a strict auditing system so that all pieces of paper are accounted for. By the end of the day, we know exactly how many ballot papers were thrown in the rubbish or removed. Last state election, it was two out of 4,000 or so votes cast in our polling centre. That's apparently a pretty good success rate.

Tomorrow

So tomorrow will be a long day for me. I have to show up at the polling centre at 7:30am, and I don't get to leave the premises until counting finishes (which could be any time from 8pm to 11pm), and we bundle up everything and bump out.

If anything interesting happens, you'll be the first to know.

Update: Apparently the electorate that I'll be working in is a "battleground". That doesn't sound safe. I think I'll check with OH&S.