Does your senate vote really count?

But how would you know?

Try asking the AEC staff at the polling station come Election Day to explain the various ticket voting permutations and you might be surprised at how few know what you are talking about.

They might not even know that your preferred Party gets up to three bites of the voting ticket cherry, so they can engage in a variety of deals (and double-deals) aimed at not only maximising their vote but also maximising their influence on the make up of the entire Senate chamber.

"Preference harvesting" and "preference corralling" are terms I'd never heard of until I started to explore the murky world of "ticket voting" but if even half of what I've read about them is true we have a seriously compromised electoral system when Senators are elected.

Can it be fixed?

Yes, and very simply. Contrary to some of the surprisingly daft feedback I have received from MPs I recently surveyed on the topic, all it would take is a simple amendment to the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918.

But rather than advocate throwing away the "ticket" voting system I am prepared to let the “market” decide. That is, I am happy for the humble voter to prove my point for me.

I suggest we introduce a rule that permits voters to select one or more boxes below the line (i.e. not have to number a box for every candidate named below the line, just the ones they want to support). Keep the current system above the line - but maybe “fess” up to voters about how Byzantine and counter-intuitive some of the ticket "deals" have become.

That will go a long way to providing voters trying to simply express their democratic opinion a more level playing field. So maybe at some future election 96 per cent of voters will not find it too hard to bother with below the line and actually cast a vote that reflects how they are really feeling on the day.

Interestingly it looks as if the ALP, at least one Green and the Independent Peter Andren would support creating optional preferential voting below the line in Senate elections.

Who knows, we may be onto something.