What kind of australian government

The Constitution of Australia establishes the Federal Government by providing for the Parliament, the Executive Government and the Judicature more usually called the Judiciary —sometimes referred to as the 'three arms of government'.

Asked by: Timoteo Wimberger business and finance legal services industry What is a federal system in Australia? Last Updated: 12th April, The federal system. Gyorgy Lerner Professional. What is the difference between federal and state government? Under the Tenth Amendment to the U. Constitution, all powers not granted to the federal government are reserved for the states and the people.

All state governments are modeled after the federal government and consist of three branches: executive, legislative, and judicial. Chaib Barandalla Professional. Who has more power state or federal government?

In this system, the state governments had most of the power. The Constitution made a stronger Federal Government. It gave power to both the Federal Government and the state governments. This system is called federalism. Kizkitza Valhondo Professional. What is federal government responsible for? The Federal Government. Yohanna Schaferjohann Explainer.

Can the prime minister overrule Parliament? A Governor-General can also refuse a Prime Minister's request to dissolve Parliament and hold elections. If a Prime Minister has been defeated by a vote of no confidence, a refusal by the Governor-General to dissolve Parliament would , in effect, force the Prime Minister to resign and make way for a successor.

Cosme Ugoletti Explainer. Why is Australia a democracy? Australia is a representative democracy. In this political system, eligible people vote for candidates to carry out the business of governing on their behalf. Australia's system of government—its institutions and practices—reflect British and North American traditions combined in a way that is uniquely Australian.

Betlem Kassirer Yiddish for Cash Explainer. What is Australia's government called? The Government of Australia is the government of the Commonwealth of Australia , a federal parliamentary constitutional monarchy. It is also commonly referred to as the Australian Government , the Commonwealth Government , or the Federal Government.

Kwame Niraj Pundit. How does a state government work? The states use a bicameral system, meaning each state has two legislative chambers, much like the federal legislative system. This was particularly so during the s and s when Labor was hurt by the impact of DLP preferences. The ALP s response came in two stages. For some time the party s platform called for the reinstatement of the First Past the Post system that had been used for House of Representatives elections from until and in Queensland Legislative Assembly elections as late as However, this was a legislative change that Labor never introduced.

The party later shifted its stance to accept the continuation of full Preferential Voting, but pushed for voters to be allowed to allocate as many or as few preferences as they liked what is generally called Optional Preferential Voting. A limited form of Optional Preferential Voting had been used for Tasmanian Legislative Council elections since , and Labor governments introduced an unlimited model of Optional Preferential Voting for elections for the New South Wales and Queensland Legislative Assemblies the model that is discussed in this paper.

The procedure for the distribution of preferences in either unlimited or limited Optional Preferential Voting elections is identical to that used for full Preferential Voting. However, when a particular ballot paper has no more preferences to distribute that paper is declared exhausted , and is removed from the count. In the electorate of Barron River in the Queensland election, votes eventually were declared exhausted Election Result 5. Unlike full Preferential Voting where the winning candidate will eventually achieve an absolute majority of votes, under Optional Preferential Voting it is possible for a winning candidate to receive fewer than half of the votes left in the count.

This is because some votes are exhausted , with no more preferences to distribute, and are removed from the count. In the example of Barron River given here Election Result 5 , although the winner Clark had gained over half of the votes remaining in the count when counting finished It can be argued that Optional Preferential Voting reduces the importance of the majority that is evident in full Preferential Voting.

In the Queensland elections of and the Labor Party asked its supporters to Just vote 1. In other words, Labor voters were asked to give the party their first preference, with no preferences given to any other candidate. In seeking to take advantage of the optional aspect of preference allocation in this way, Labor sought to minimise the impact of an exchange of preferences that might hurt the Beattie Government.

As well as attempting to persuade its own voters to act in this way, it hoped that many One Nation voters would allocate just a single preference, because their second preferences were far more likely to be given to a Coalition than to a Labor candidate. The Coalition parties claimed that Labor s tactic undermined the principle of voters being able to express preferences, but it seemed that many voters were happy to accept the party s instruction.

Proportional Representation systems were devised to produce proportional election results parties should win parliamentary seats roughly in proportion to the size of their vote. Ideally, 50 per cent of the vote should win about 50 per cent of the seats. Proportional Representation is not a single method of election, for there are a number of variations in use, including the Single Transferable Vote, two variants of which are used in Australia.

The discussion below deals with each, illustrated by the Australian Senate election in Victoria Election Result 6 , and the Tasmanian House of Assembly election in the electorate of Denison Election Result 7. The counting procedure for Proportional Representation is very complex only an outline is given here. For a fuller description, see the paper written by Greg Gardiner of the Victorian Parliamentary Library. Each state and territory acts as a single, multi-member electorate in Senate elections.

In half-Senate elections six senators are elected from each state, and two from each territory. In full Senate elections, which follow a dissolution of both houses of the Parliament, 12 senators are elected from each state and two from each territory.

A heavy horizontal line runs across the ballot paper Ballot Paper 3. Above that line is a single row of boxes, each above the name if given of a party or group, though not for the list of Ungrouped candidates. The position on the ballot paper of each party or group list is determined by lot.

Below the line parties and groups list their candidates in separate vertical lists, headed by the party or group name though here also a name is not required. Independent candidates are placed in an Ungrouped list on the extreme right of the paper. If an elector chooses to vote above the line, the number 1 must be placed in one of the boxes all other boxes above the line must remain blank. Parties may submit a preferred order of voting a Group Voting Ticket to the Australian Electoral Commission which is displayed at all polling places.

An above the line vote is dealt with by polling officials as if the voter had voted in the order of names on a Group Voting Ticket s issued by the party of their choice. The elector can choose to vote below the horizontal line. If that option is taken the voter must fill out every square, with numbers running from 1 to the number equal to the total number of candidates on the ballot paper.

Electors choosing to vote for an ungrouped candidate can vote only below the line. Fifty-seven candidates in a total of 19 groups and eight ungrouped candidates were on the Victorian Senate election ballot paper. A total of 2 votes were cast. The party votes were as follows:. The number of votes needed for a candidate to be elected quota.

Senate candidates must secure a certain number of votes to be elected a quota. To calculate the quota for a particular election, the total number of formal votes cast is divided by the number of candidates to be elected plus 1, and 1 is added to the result. In our Victorian example 2 formal ballot papers were cast, from which six senators were to be elected:. Total formal votes.

One is added to the result. The result is the quota the number of votes each candidate needs to secure to be elected. In this example, where six Senators were to be elected, the quota of votes could be achieved by six candidates only. The percentage of the vote needed to win a Senate seat varies according to the number of senators to be elected Table 2. After the counting of first preference votes, any candidate who has achieved a quota is declared elected. Elected candidates who gain more votes than the quota are said to have a surplus number of votes.

The surplus of each successful candidate s votes is transferred, according to the second preferences shown on the ballot papers, to continuing candidates. In the Victoria example, Ronaldson gained 1 votes. Which of Ronaldson s votes were transferred? Because it is impossible to specify which votes actually elected Ronaldson, and which were surplus to that outcome, some distribution method is needed.

Senate electoral arrangements originally had a random transfer of surplus votes. In the Victoria example, a random sample of of the 1 ballot papers would have been made. However, it was eventually realised that a potential problem was the fact that in a close election different random selections could produce different results. It has been claimed that the election of Neville Bonner Lib as a Queensland senator ahead of Mal Colston ALP in was the result of random sampling, which might have produced a Colston success had a different sample been selected.

The fraction enables those counting the vote to ascertain what is called the transfer value :. The transfer value of Ronaldson s preferences therefore was established by dividing his surplus by the total of his first preferences:. In the Victorian contest, therefore, surplus Ronaldson votes were distributed by a series of such calculations. Because so many voters followed the Coalition Group Voting Ticket the second candidate on the ticket, Julian McGauran, secured surplus votes and the remaining Coalition candidates shared another In addition, 22 surplus votes went to Labor candidates, 40 to the Greens, 43 to the Family First Party and were scattered among the other candidates.

There were also some votes omitted from the count through exhaustion [13] or loss by fraction. Successive counts saw Carr s surplus votes distributed, electing Conroy Election Result 6, Count 3 , and McGauran s surplus distributed, bringing about the election of Troeth Election Result 6, Count 4.

Note that when each successful candidate was elected with surplus votes, a new transfer value was established and used to calculate to which candidates the relevant surplus votes were to be transferred. The process of transferring surplus votes from successful candidates proceeds either until all positions are filled at which point the counting ceases or until there are no more surplus votes to distribute.

In a typical Senate election for state senators the combination of first preference plus surplus votes is very likely to see the election of five senators quite early in the count. When no more surplus votes remain to be distributed, but a seat or seats remains to be filled, the process takes on the appearance of a preferential voting distribution.

Candidates with the fewest votes are gradually excluded from the count, and their preferences are distributed to remaining candidates, either until another candidate is elected with surplus votes then needing to be distributed or the final candidate is elected.

If the latter, the counting is concluded. The preferences of excluded candidates are transferred at full value, unlike surplus transfers. As most of the excluded candidates will have very small total votes, many counts may be necessary before the process ends.

In Victoria it was only on the th count that the final ALP candidate, Jacinta Collins, was excluded, and of her votes went to Steve Fielding Family First who was elected as the sixth Victorian senator.

Of the 59 candidates who failed to gain election, only David Risstrom Green remained in the count. In the Senate election, In our example of Victoria , With As each party s order of candidates names remains fixed, there is therefore no chance of either of these four candidates failing to be elected. To win a Senate seat in a half-Senate election for state senators requires far fewer votes than in Preferential Voting elections This is of great significance to the stronger minor parties.

Since the first use of Proportional Representation in the Senate election, 77 of Senate contests 8. Not surprisingly, this has ensured that a greater range of views has been heard in the upper house than in the lower. In each year the Senate result was far more proportional to voter support than was the House of Representatives result Table 3. This can be seen particularly clearly in , when the Gough Whitlam-led ALP secured more than 40 per cent of the vote, winning Minor parties are advantaged even more in double dissolution Senate elections when the vote needed in a state to win a seat is just 7.

The most obvious consequence of minor party electoral success has been the difficulty for the major parties in gaining control of the Senate. Since , the government of the day has controlled the Senate only during the years 56, 62, 81 and since July When a government does not control the Senate, it soon realises that in such a scenario the Australian Senate joins the US Senate as one of the most powerful of the world s upper houses.

When a government does control the Senate, however, observers are reminded that the Senate power is a matter of potential rather than reality. We have seen that it has been used in Tasmania since the election of , giving it the longest continuous history of any parliamentary electoral system used in Australia.

Tasmania has always had five House of Assembly electorates under the Hare-Clark system. Five MPs are elected from each. The ACT has one seven-member electorate and two five-member electorates.

The Hare-Clark ballot paper does not have the horizontal line seen on the Senate ballot paper Ballot papers 4a, 4b. Party candidates are placed in separate vertical groups, with ungrouped candidates included in a column to the right of the party groups.

A addition to the Tasmanian arrangements provided for the position of the names within each group to be altered by provisions of so-called Robson rotation in which the names in each group are re-ordered from paper to paper, so as to reduce the impact of any advantageous ballot positions. Two examples from the election are shown, illustrating the shift of candidates names on the ballot paper. In Tasmania a voter must mark preferences against at least five candidates, but may vote for more than five.

Tasmanian electoral law forbids anyone from canvassing for votes, soliciting the vote of an elector, or attempting to induce an elector not to vote for a particular candidate or particular candidates within metres of a polling place. The quota is calculated in the same way as for Senate elections. In Denison the calculation was as follows:.

With party tickets not applying, the process of electing MPs under Hare-Clark is far less predictable than in Senate elections. It sometimes happens that the vote is spread so evenly that no candidate is elected on the first count e. Bass, Lyons In Denison , however, Peg Putt Grn was elected on first preferences Election Result 7, Count 1 , though her surplus votes were insufficient to help any other candidate over the line Election Result 7, Count 2.

In fact, it took 23 more counts before the Liberals Michael Hodgman achieved a quota to be the second elected Election Result 7, Count Hodgman s surplus distribution, plus more exclusions, saw the first Labor success with the election of David Bartlett Election Result 7, Count The count soon came to an end due to a combination of candidate exclusion and surplus redistribution, which saw Labor s Lisa Singh Election Result 7, Count 35 and Graeme Sturges Election Result 7, Count 39 being pushed over the line.

Fabian Dixon Lib was the only candidate still in the count. Minority governments are much more common in Tasmania and the ACT than in jurisdictions where Preferential Voting is used.

Seven Tasmanian governments since have lacked control of the House of Assembly, and the first four ACT elections after the achievement of self-government saw the return of minority governments. With Hare-Clark ballot papers lacking the above-the-line provision of Senate elections, combined with an absence of how-to-vote cards and the rotation of party names, Hare-Clark voters are much freer to vote as they choose.

The freedom that voters have can make Hare-Clark elections quite unpredictable at times. The count in the electorate of Bass in , referred to above, was a case in point. There were counts before the first MP gained election, and it took a total of counts to see all five MPs confirmed.

Party candidates are more vulnerable than in Senate elections, where we have seen how the combination of fixed-order party lists and above-the-line voting gives protection to particular candidates.

In Tasmanian and ACT elections, however, parties may not rank their party lists and, hence, voters have much freedom to target a non-performing MP, even though they may continue to vote for that MP s party: the system provides no blue riband [sic] seats for complacent or tired party members. The relative lack of safety for candidates is emphasised by the fact that individual candidates are fighting for votes not only from their party opponents, but also from members of their own party ticket.

In fact some candidates will attempt to become associated with one part of their electorate, while others will work at canvassing the whole electorate, irrespective of whether they are trespassing on the preserve of their colleagues. Some long-standing candidates can make it difficult for colleagues to develop a presence in the electorate.

In the Denison contest given here Election Result 7 , the prominence of Peg Putt Grn and Michael Hodgman Lib made it difficult for their party colleagues to gain a competitive number of votes. The votes of Labor s trio of David Bartlett, Lisa Singh and Graeme Sturges were much more evenly spread than the votes for Liberal or Green candidates, and were sufficiently high for Labor to elect the third, fourth and final members for the seat.

From time to time critics call for the removal of one of the four systems described here. In the Queensland state election Labor s Gladstone candidate was bemused that he lost to the sitting member, despite leading her on first preferences, claiming that use of such a system makes it hard for the electorate to understand why she retains her seat when primary votes clearly show [that] I won.

However, despite such doubts being held, the four systems we have discussed appear to be widely accepted, and are not targets for widespread community frustration. When the Commonwealth Parliament s Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters conducts enquiries after each Commonwealth election, there is generally little interest expressed in removing the actual electoral systems, though refinements of them are often suggested.

The Federal Government is also involved, mainly through funding, in many things largely carried out by the States, such as health, education, environmental issues, industrial relations, etc. State or Territory Government Under the Australian Constitution, the States are responsible for everything not listed as a Federal responsibility.

However, sometimes both levels are involved. Major State responsibilities include schools, hospitals, conservation and environment, roads, railways and public transport, public works, agriculture and fishing, industrial relations, community services, sport and recreation, consumer affairs, police, prisons and emergency services.

Each state has its own constitution setting out its system of government. Local Government Local Government areas vary greatly in size and character. The Sydney area is divided into about 35 cities, municipalities or shires, each with its own local council. The bigger country centres such as Bathurst or Albury have city or municipal councils. Large but less populated country areas, with a number of small towns and large rural areas, are usually shires with a Shire Council based in one of the larger towns.