It ain't easy being small and anti-Green

A simple example illustrates this. Consider if there were 69 voters then a quota to elect a Senator would be 10. In that situation if the Coalition received 35 votes, the ALP 25 the Greens 6 and the NCTCS 3, the Coalition would have 3 senator quotas, the ALP 2 and there would be a preference race for the last seat with the two major parties each having a surplus of 5. As the NCTCS vote is lowest they would be excluded and their preferences distributed first.

If the NCTCS preferences go to the Coalition their vote goes up to 8 which would still be short of a quota. In that circumstance the ALP would be excluded and their preferences would elect a Green. That is a result contrary to the primary intention of the NCTCS.

However, if NCTCS preferences went to the ALP, this would put them in front of the Greens and they instead would win the last "left" seat.

As it turned out Leon Ashby was eliminated after the next to final counts largely due to the Palmer United Party preferences going to Sarah Hansen-Young.

Palmer spent many millions of dollars and received a great deal of air time at the ABC, presumably because his party looked to take votes away from the Coalition, which it did. NCTCS spent about $40,000, $32000 of which was registration fees for candidates and received no air time at the ABC, apart from a question asked on Q&A by NCTCS President Bill Koutalianos of David Suzuki about flat temperature.

The lesson for the NCTCS and all smaller parties is a big budget and a big personality will always trump evidence and facts and preference deals. That must be why Antony Green accused the NCTCS of rank amateurism.