Page 4678 - Week 15 - Thursday, 21 November 1991
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Woden, Weston Creek and Tuggeranong. So, there is old Canberra, the three southern areas and the two northern areas; that is, six distinct entities. I think no-one here would dispute the fact that we need at least 17 members in this Assembly; that is a reasonable number. It is very difficult to get 17 distinct, logical groupings. We have six, but we do not have 17.
The Hare-Clark system is inherently fair. It is used successfully in Tasmania; funnily enough, it is also used in Ireland. Tasmania is not that much bigger than the ACT; its population is about 450,000. It has five electorates federally, and its State Parliament has 35 members of the lower house, based on the Hare-Clark system and having seven members in each of the Federal electorates. It is a system that works well there; it is certainly inherently fair. It does take into account the more significant minor parties and Independents, who at least can get a reasonable proportion of the vote.
The proposed scheme for Canberra would provide for one large electorate with seven members, which means that you would need about 12.5 per cent of the vote to get in, and two smaller ones with five members each, in which you would need about 16.5 per cent of the vote to get in. Based on first preference votes in the last Assembly election, the two major parties would certainly have got people in, in the large electorate, but only the Labor Party would have done so in the two smaller electorates. With preferences being distributed, I think only three parties would have got people in, in the two smaller electorates, and perhaps four parties would have people in, in the larger electorate of seven members. So, the argument that a lot of ratbag minority groups would be elected does not really apply when one looks at the Hare-Clark system, yet it does properly cater for Independents.
It also gets around the problem which, although the Labor Party says that it will not happen, will, and that is that, on current trends, they would be most likely to be elected in virtually all of the 17 seats. Look at what happens in the Northern Territory. There you have, I think, 25 seats now; but that parliament was established in 1978, and it is only now, some 13 or 14 years later, that the Labor Party is up to about 9 or 10 of those 25 seats. That is not necessarily a terribly satisfactory position for the Labor Party to be in up there.
Similarly, I do not think it would be a terribly satisfactory position for the Liberal Party or other parties in Canberra if the Labor Party were in the position of the Country-Liberal Party in the Northern Territory. One party holding virtually all the seats in a parliament is not desirable. A responsible No. 1 party should realise that it does need an opposition. I know that the Labor Party mouths that in its campaign for single-member electorates, but I wonder whether some of the apparatchiks really believe it. I am fairly hopeful that with this
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