Page 377 - Week 02 - Tuesday, 19 February 1991
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another, a Labor Party proposal to present a non-preferential system is simply a way to ensure that no view of a minority could possibly be represented in this house. That is a great shame. It is a great credit to the Liberal Party that they have always advocated a system of proportional representation for an electoral system in this house. I will allow them to talk about it, but I believe that the most equitable system of proportional representation that they have advocated has been the Hare-Clark system that is used in Tasmania.
The Buchanan application of the Hare-Clark system with the Robson rotation and the countback is, of course, the fairest possible system that we could provide for the ACT. Thanks to Ian Buchanan, there is a way to provide, in some measure, for the sort of wish that the Labor Party argues is the advantage of single member electorates, and that is that you are aware that somebody near you is representing your point of view and your local interests.
At the same time the Hare-Clark system also allows for somebody in another part of Canberra to recognise that they have a minority viewpoint. For example, if they advocate no casino, they can be sure that that view is represented even though they may not be able to get their own local representative to present the view because they are more concerned about local issues. With the Buchanan amendment, what Ian Buchanan has suggested is that the Territory be divided into either three or four parts and that each one of those areas becomes your local area and that the ballot paper favours the names of the local people, so that you vote for the name of your local person up the top, if you wish.
It is quite clear where your local area is, and where you can vote. However, it does not force you to do that. If you wish to vote for somebody representing the anti-casino stance and nobody above the line does that adequately as far as you are concerned, then you have the option of voting below the line. That application of the Hare-Clark system, of course, manages to resolve the issues that the Labor Party has argued are the most advantageous part of the single member electorates.
Single member electorates, with the notion of a representative in the local area, are fine in a house of representatives when the decisions can be reviewed by an upper house. In this particular instance we do not have that, and I do not advocate it. In fact, we can achieve the same thing with an appropriate, fair electoral system of proportional representation. Most significant, though, is the notion of the Federal interference in the electoral system.
On many occasions, I imagine, most of us have heard Malcolm Mackerras say that the d'Hondt electoral system had one great benefit over any other electoral system, and that was that it could get through both houses of Parliament; and so
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