...] n Senator Julian McGauran’s defection from the Nationals to the Liberals generated a productive discussion in comments, in sad contrast to subsequent efforts fingering the entrails of the WA Labor Pa [...

1. Amend the Commonwealth Electoral Act to increase the number of Senators for each State to either 14 or 16 so the size of the House of Reps can increase.

OR

2. Bite the bullet and attempt Constitutional reform. Demolish the nexus.

The Nexus Referendum was tossed out in 1967 but that was 40 years ago. Just because something failed once doesn’t mean it isn’t worth another try if it is right.

Otherwise within 4-5 years Federal Divisions will be over 100,000 electors in size, all the states except QLD will lose another seat, and the whole notion of representative government will be tarnished. For example how will the good people of SA feel when they are reduced to only 10 seats in a few years. The time for destoying the nexus will become a war cry.

Currently the population quota for a House of Reps seat, based on ABS population figures, is close to 140,000. In 1996 it was 112,000. That is a real worry.

Surely constitutional reform, if supported by proper education, is preferable to jacking up the number of Senators for each state. Tasmania, a State smaller that inner Eastern suburbs of Melbourne, would have 14 or 16 Senators. The same as the bigger states. That in itself makes constitutional reform eminently sellable (no offence to the nice people of Tassie).

Secondly, the reason the number of House seats is not increased is nothing to do with the Nexus. The problem is that voters don’t like politicians (understanably) and think that more of them is a bad thing. They may be wrong in this – there is an arguement that the things they dislike are a result of too large electorates, and more MPs would also mean better ones, but few people agree. Expanding the size of the House is a vote loser, and will only happen if there is a powerful reason.

In fact, the Nexus could be the one thing that does cause an increase in the number of electorates. It may eventually be decided that electing an even number of MPs at each election from each state is too problematic (had the coalition not scored 4 in Queensland this might be on the agenda now). Having 9 or 11 elected at once would require consitutional change, so if this idea does take hold the easiest way is to either go to 5 senators per state per election, or to 7. Knocking off that many MPs would cause any party huge internal pain, so they might just wear the voter backlash of increasing it to 7.

It might need to be done in 2 stages, Senate reduction and comined election first and then the House of Reps side.

How many people would vote to reduce the Upper hous MP’s is the question, prob. quite a few

Years of obseqiousness has stripped the Nats of their reputation and they need to redeem themselves to stay alive. Expect further name calling from Peter Ryan, along with an attack on Liberal policies such as the half baked tollway concessions for Eastlink. In Victoria the state Libs are a joke. The Nats will pick up the odd seat this year by default.

Like William I am fascinated by Newspolls results. If correct they are showing the Nats picking up seats at the expense of the ALP and retiring Liberals. The worry for the Libs is that their vote is dipping sharply. The ALP could cause them real damage in the city on the back of preferences simply because the Liberals primary vote is withering away. Nothing to do with the ALP surging in support. Sometimes staying still can get you home.

The Nats need to surf their wave of support now and assert themselves. We’ll see if Mark Vaile has the guts or political smarts to capitalise.

The long term problem for the Federal Nats is caused by the constitutional requirement of the nexus to limit the number of House of Reps seats for the states to approximatelty twice the size of the Senate. Unless the Senate is increased by a change to the CEA then the number of Federal seats stays approximately the same.

In 2006 the average Federal Division has 90,000 electors, in 1984 it was about 65,000. Consequently traditional country seats are becoming urbanised in order for each electorate to meet their enrolment quota. Add to this the complication that Queensland’s expanding population is fleecing seats from all the other states and you have a major problem for the Federal National Party.

If they want to assert themselves maybe they could convince John Howard to initiate constitutional reform. Propose to remove the harnass of the nexus and ensure each state’s number of seats can increase as its population also increases. Each electorate could have about 75,000 electors, a reasonable size I would have thought. At least all states could be democratically represented without being stripped of their representation by faster growing states. I reckon it would stand a fair chance of passing because it is a reasonable proposition.

It is a practical solution that hasn’t been considered, even though Referendums are notoriously unsuccessful. You really wonder about the ability of our political masters to think laterally.

The only thing that saves the Nationals in the Vic state parliament is the deal they do with the ALP over preferences. If a like deal is not done this time, its unlikely that the VicNats will have that many state seats

eg Swan Hill (was a liberal seat from 73 to 83) in 2002 GRN 1635 ALP 8384, Lib 8438 and Nat 11066. A preference change by the GReens and ALP would deliver the seat to the Libs

Lowan (was liberal 70 to 79) in 2002 GRN 1658, ALP 9683, Lib 9871 and Nat 14568. Again a prefernce change would make this sea a Liberal one

Rodney GRN 1414, ALP 8212, Lib 9723 and Nat 11046. Yet again same result

Murray Valley GRN 1764, ALP 9846, Lib 6565, NAt 13778. While this looks good for the Nats the conservative vote could change if Ken Jasper retire this election. But I would call it a Nat seat

Shep. GRN 1057 ALP 7050, Ind 5000, Nat 9268, Lib 9662. Again an ALP prefernce change would make this a liberal seat

Gippsland South GRN 3905 ALP 9505, Lib 7015, Nat 12891, This seat should stay with the Nats

The Nats willbe lucky to get 2 in the new upprhouse, more likely 1 that could leave them with 3 seats in the next parliament in a worse case scenario