heyyy so I was wondering if you'd mind breaking down how the ballot form works? this year is gonna be my first election and I wanna make sure I do it right
OK. More information on voting can be found at www.aec.gov.au (like what if you’re away from your electorate/state/Australia on election day etc).
So there are two papers: The Senate paper and the House of Representatives paper. Whenever you vote in a federal election you’re likely to have to fill out both with the exception of by-elections when a candidate in your electorate has resigned/died/been run out for crimes against humanity/found ineligible by Section 44 of the constitution.
Senate paper:
This one is real big.
The Senate is comprised of 12 people from each state, and 2 from each territory (sorry NT/ACT). So this makes it easier for parties outside of Liberal/Labor to get in because they don’t need a concentrated population to vote for them.
There’s a line you’ll notice. You fill out either above OR below. If you vote above it’s AT LEAST 6 people you fill out at least 1-6 in order of most to least liked. Above the line is simply stating the parties you like. You can fill out all of them or just some of them as long as it is at least 6. Below the line is the individual candidates (in columns for the parties). This means if you like a particular party but like one of their candidates more (or HATE one of those candidates in particular) you can rank them differently. Voting below the line you number at least 1-12
House of Representatives Paper:
You fill out ALL THE BOXES from 1 to whatever number. These are candidates in your electorate. There should be 1 person per party on this paper. It’s pretty straightforward.
INFORMATION FOR BOTH OF THEM:
They are PREFERENTIAL VOTING! Which means you put who you like first. It doesn’t matter if the person you put 1st doesn’t win. Candidates that get more than 4% first preference votes get election funding and it can aid them in future campaigns. This means voting for a party you know that won’t win still has benefit. Also, if your first preference doesn’t win then your second vote will be counted, and so forth until a winner is elected. People far down the list have no chance of having your preference count towards them, hence why people say things like “put Liberals/One Nation last.” It prevents them from benefiting from your vote.
They are ANONYMOUS votes. DO NOT put any identifying information on them anywhere. No names, no signatures, no iconography that links it to you or it will be cast as invalid and not count. Make sure the numbers and the names remain legible.
If you make a mistake return to the desk where you marked off your name (marking off your name prevents you from getting fined) and simply ask for a new paper. Someone will dispose of your old one and you can return to a booth to write in a new one.
Tada!
Voting above the line in the Senate is not just “saying the parties you like”. It is indicating that you are allocating your preferences as if you numbered top to bottom the candidates on that party’s ticket as they appear on the ballot paper. So if you numbered 1 in the ALP box, 2 in the Greens box and 3 in the Liberal box, it’s exactly the same as numbering:
ALP1: 1 Greens1: 7 Liberal1:13
ALP2: 2 Greens2: 8 Liberal2: 14
ALP3: 3 Greens3: 9 Liberal3: 15
ALP4: 4 Greens4:10 Liberal4: 16
ALP5: 5 Greens5: 11 Liberal5: 17
ALP6: 6 Greens6: 12 Liberal6:18
So there is literally no reason to vote above the line. Also as this year’s election will be a half-Senate election, not a full-Senate election, you will only need to number 6 boxes below the line. However, I would encourage you to do some research once the election is called and all the candidates are announced, and number ALL the boxes (or as many as you can), in order to have the biggest impact on the very fancy vote counting which is used in the Senate.













