Welcome

This web site is dedicated to improving the means of electing our representatives to the State Parliament in Western Australia, particularly the creation of equal representation.

Links on the left open recent statistics, a summary and analysis of reforms, the Proportional Representation Society web site and other sites dealing with electoral matters.

ELECTORAL REFORM IN WA IN 2005
TWO STEPS FORWARD, ONE BACK

Electoral reform legislation was signed into law by the State Governor on Monday 23rd May, 2005. This means that when the next State election comes around [due February 2009 but held 6th Sept 2008], most voters in WA will vote in electorates of equal enrolment for the Legislative Assembly (LA), where the Government is formed. This is a great achievement for the people of Western Australia, the Gallop Labor Government, and especially for the Attorney General, Jim McGinty. After many years of struggling with the Upper House and losing legal battles, Jim McGinty gained the vote of an Independent [formerly Liberal], Hon Alan Cadby, and together with the Greens, guided through this significant reform.

Two districts will be added to the LA to make 59 and two seats will be added to the Legislative Council (LC) to make 36. Inequalities in the current system require country LA districts to have around 14,000 electors but city districts to have around 27,500 electors. Removal of most of these inequalities will lead to fewer districts in the country and additional districts in the metro area.

These reforms are by no means comprehensive. In regard to the LA, the Government was constrained by an election promise to preserve five districts in the Mining and Pastoral Region, covering most of the remote areas of the state. In the rules for redistribution of boundaries in some LA districts, square kilometres will be equated with electors, which will produce districts with well below average enrolment, some more than 9,000 electors below [See the tables below]. This means that one vote, one value is not applied in the Mining and Pastoral region. This takes the edge off reform and leaves ground for further reform.

The biggest problems are with the Legislative Council (LC), which remains unreformed and undemocratic. The Government was forced to conform to Greens policy regarding the LC, as the Greens made their model of the LC a condition of their support for reform. Consequently, there are serious compromises to principles of democratic representation in Parliament.

Firstly, the LC will continue to have extremes of vote weighting of more than 4 : 1 between metropolitan and rural voters. Currently there are 17 MLCs representing 74% of electors in metropolitan regions, and 17 MLCs representing 26% of electors in country regions. It seems unconscionable to ignore such large inequalities, but that is what the new law does by the addition of one MLC to either side of the country/metro allocation to make it 18/18 (six regions, each with six members). This is a serious flaw, and does nothing to address the existing imbalance in representation.

The second flaw is no less serious, and has the potential to result in an inaccurate reflection of voters' wishes. In order to win a seat when six are to be elected by proportional representation from a region an MLC must obtain 14.3% of the vote. It will be highly unlikely for a party to win a majority (ie. four out of six members in a region) as they would have to obtain 57.2% of the vote. The problem lies with the even number of seats. Under proportional repsesentation the election of an uneven number of representatives from each region will more accurately reflect the votes cast, a principal which applies under the current system until the next election. Under the system insisted on by the Greens it will be possible for 57% to vote for party A and 43% to vote for party B - a clear decision by voters - and yet each party would win three seats from that region. Thus, winning the vote may not translate into winning the election. [See note at the foot of this page about Senate elections]

New system - 2007

The table below summarises the structure which was finalised by the Electoral Distribution Commissioners on 29th October 2007.
In the table enrolments are based on the average within each region.

New electoral system
	Council			Assembly
Region	MLCs 36	Region enrolment	Enrolment per MLC	MLAs 59	Average enrolment per MLA/district
Mining & Pastoral	6	73,776	12,296	5 #	14,755
Agricultural	6	82,479	13,746	4	20,620
South West	6	167,871	27,978	8	20,984
East Metro	6	311,378	51,896	14 *	22,241
North Metro	6	312,587	52,096	14 *	22,327
South Metro	6	311,583	51,930	14 *	22,256
# If a district exceeds 100,000 square kms in area at the time of a redistribution, a number equal to 1.5% of its area will be added to artificially increase the number of electors so that the total may fall within a tolerance from 20% below to 10% above the State average district enrolment. In the 2007 redistribution the large district allowance has reduced the enrolment in 5 districts in the Mining and Pastoral region by 34,209. [This table quotes only real electors.] Most districts are not affected by this large district allowance and their enrolments are set within a tolerance from 10% below to 10% above the State average district enrolment i.e. 21,350. * The Act requires approximately the same number of districts in each of the 3 metropolitan regions but gives no similar instruction for the 3 country regions. State enrolment on 26th February 2007 used to create the proposed new boundaries. The quota of votes to elect a Member to the Legislative Council is 14.29% when 6 are to be elected.

Greens' electoral model flawed

In a media release on 26th April, 2005, the Greens Party called for support for their Electoral Reform Model for the LC. The Greens may call their model "country-friendly" but it is certainly not "people-friendly". The Greens seem to have forgotten that in a democracy, Parliament is about representing people, not acres, trees, or anything else. Those concepts belong to the 19th century, when only men with property could vote.

The Greens' model, now entrenched in legislation, sets up 6 regions each electing 6 members by proportional representation (PR). Three regions cover the metropolitan area which contains 935,539 electors, and the other three regions containing 324,126 electors cover the SW, Agricultural, and Mining and Pastoral areas. There is an imbalance of 2.88 : 1 between the average number of people represented by a metropolitan and a rural Member of the LC. In the worst case this imbalance is more than 4 : 1. This is significantly worse than the weighting in the compromise model for the LC proposed by the Government. The Government model proposed 3 regions of 7 members each for the metro area, and 3 regions of 5 for the rural areas. Adoption of this model would have reduced vote weighting and preserved the momentum for electoral reform in State Parliament.

Democracy begins by giving everyone a vote, but it is measured by how fairly those votes are counted. The Greens' model fails to reform the WA Parliament, and must be a huge disappointment to Greens supporters.

These are the difficulties and objections to their model:

1. By weighting votes in the LC, the Greens are ignoring a fundamental principle of democracy, and presumably their own policy, that all votes should have equal value. This is a basic human right, and all voting systems are judged by this criterion.
2. The basic premise for the Greens' model is a flawed policy they describe as "bio-regionalism". The Greens believe that extra representation for the rural regions will lead to better land care. This belief is naive and misguided. It springs from a romantic view that most ancient indigenous cultures cared for their land better. Studies have now shown that it was only low populations, lack of technology, and lack of markets that prevented over-exploitation in the past. Most people in rural WA are not indigenous, and have ready access to suitable technology and markets. Growth and exploitation of natural resources are the economic drivers in rural WA.
3. The policy of embedding "bio-regionalism" in the electoral system displaces good land care policy. It was city based voters who forced a change to the SW forest policy - the local timber industry fiercely opposed any reduction in timber harvesting. At Ningaloo it is the locals who oppose fish sanctuaries. These are just a few examples. Land care is a State wide issue and must be debated as such. Weighted representation for country people usually leads to pressure for more development at the expense of the natural environment.
4. The Greens' model gives vote weighting to people in rural areas, so that on every issue before Parliament, not just land care issues, these electors have more say. Thus issues like law reform, health, education, planning, community safety which affect the whole State are controlled by these weighted votes. This is patently unfair and distorts the democratic process.
5. The current LC regions do not match any biological/botanical boundaries in WA and will not in the future. The Mining and Pastoral Region, for example, covers a huge range of habitats and disparate environments from monsoonal rain forest to absolute desert. The LA districts, however, better reflect the individual bio-regions of WA, and thus give better representation to them.
6. The case for better natural resource management should be debated on its own merits, and not rely on electoral manipulation to win. Good policy comes out of open and inclusive debate. Everyone should feel they were part of the decision, taken on a fair vote. They will then be much more inclined to support the result.
7. The Greens' model views the LC as a house of review. In the WA Parliamentary system, the LC is much more than this. The LC can block a budget, bring down a Government, initiate legislation, and its members can be Ministers. It is the second stage of the legislative process with most of the powers of the LA, albeit with a more sedate approach.
8. The Greens' model is loosely based on the Australian Senate. This is another backward and misguided idea. The Senate was constructed more than 100 years ago to entice the States into Federation. Senators were supposed to represent States, but that idea quickly disappeared and political considerations now rule the Senate. The same has happened in the LC - land care issues will be decided along political lines. [See note below for why we elect 6 at each half Senate election]
9. One of the basic rules of a democratic electoral system is no distortion to over represent any particular group of voters. This is likely to generate outcomes unacceptable to the whole electorate. It opens up the potential for excessive weighting, and leaves out other groups that may also deserve special treatment by the Government. The Greens' model over represents non-metro voters; what about people on low incomes, or disabled people, or people with language difficulties, etc?
10. The Greens' model proposes 6 regions each with 6 members. In a PR system, the election of 6 members can lead to skewed results. One political group could achieve up to 57% of the vote in a region, but still only have 3 members elected. Using an uneven number of electors in a PR region is more likely to produce a fair result. Minor parties will need more than 14% of the vote to elect a member in their model - a difficult task.
11. The continued support for malapportionment by the Greens leaves it open for other parties to manipulate the boundaries for political advantage. The Greens cannot complain if, in the future, another party constructs another model for the LC which gives weighted votes to their supporters. In a regional PR system, the region boundaries should set by Electoral Commissioners, not by Parliament, and the regions should have an equal number of electors.
12. The Greens' weighted vote model contains a metro/rural boundary where electors can lose voting power if they shift to another house. This is both ludicrous and unfair.

The opportunity to reform the WA Parliament does not come very often - the last significant reform was in 1987 by a Labor Government and it lead to representation in the LC for the Democrats and the Greens. And we still have a long way to go. It is critical that each step forward be guided by democratic principles, and that all steps lead to a better Parliament. The Greens' weighted vote model for the LC is a step backward for electoral reform in WA.

Why we elect 6 Senators
The Greens have said the idea for six MLCs per region is modelled on the Australian Senate. But they may not be aware that the election of six Senators each time is not an ideal number but a consequence of Section 24 in the Australian Constitution which requires a ratio of two is to one between the numbers in the House of Representative and the Senate. When an increase in the House of Representatives was desired in 1983, Senate numbers set the parameter. Because only half of Senators come up for election each time, to increase from five to six per election meant two extra per State, 12 Senators overall and therefore 24 additional Members in the House of Representatives. To preserve the proportionally correct uneven number of Senators per election, i.e. seven, would have meant 48 additional Members in the House of Representatives, something beyond anyone's wish or tolerance.