Tasmania and the Swiss example

PR Open Party List system recommended strongly

Proportional representation voting (PR) is the main rival to the single-member district system. Among advanced western democracies it has long been the predominant voting system. For instance, in Europe, 21 of 28 countries use proportional representation, including Austria, Belgium, Cyprus, Denmark, Finland, Germany, Greece, Ireland, Luxembourg, Malta, the Netherlands, Norway, Portugal, Spain, Sweden, and Switzerland.

Where new constitutions were introduced in the last few decades PR was mostly adopted and often enshrined in the constitutions themselves. This was the case in Portugal (1974), almost all of the countries behind the former Iron curtain in Eastern Europe (after 1991), the new South Africa (1996) and also in New Zealand.

Eighty per cent of the PR systems are "Party List". What it means is that the political parties present a list of candidates and the voters place ONE mark next to the party and a particular candidate (at the same time) to indicate the preference for their party AND the candidate (in the German and NZ systems, two votes are used to provide opportunity for a geographical/local candidate). There is a simple quota of votes to be achieved for a candidate to be successful. A party gains candidates in accordance with the number of times it achieves the quota. Preferences for those who are not number 1 on the list are counted first towards such candidates. In this way candidates not highly preferred by the party can be elected as a result of voter preferences. There is no horse-trading here. It is simple, transparent and counted quickly.

High time for electoral change in Australia!

It is obvious that the major parties in Australia don't want to know about proportional representation because it would deprive them of seats and total control over the nation if they win an election. To achieve a break-through Independent candidates who favour proportional representation should group together and form an informal Alliance to promote this reform because Australia is caught in a vicious circle.

There are important national issues, which often cannot be dealt with effectively as a result of the current two-party system. Australia needs a circuit breaker. Perhaps a massive vote for Independents who favour proportional representation?