The last election before we expand the parliament?

Expansion of the parliament is something I’ve been arguing since at least 2016. This needs to be taken out of the government’s hands as they make it political.
But this is about the people. Not the Members or Senators and not the AEC. It’s our election, not theirs.
Ultimately, we need to get to 18 Senators per State – the point where Tasmania’s entitlement = 5 members.
Currently that would mean 222 members of the House with an average of around 81,000 electors per Division.
Still, a higher average than after the 1984 Hawke Expansion.

“20 – The Committee recommends that section 184AA of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918, application forms for postal votes, be amended or removed, so that postal vote applications can no longer be included with other material.”

“Noted. The Government notes this recommendation.
Section 184AA of the Electoral Act permits a postal vote application form to be physically attached to, or form part of, other written material. This provides a mechanism for a postal voter to receive their official form with any other material they may expect to receive in an election, such as the campaign material from an entity of which the voter is a member. The voter remains free to return their completed form directly to the AEC, rather than via the entity that provided the material.”

“21 – The Committee recommends that section 184 of the Commonwealth Electoral Act 1918 be amended to
clarify that postal vote applications must be sent directly to the Australian Electoral Commission’s
nominated addresses.”

“Noted. See response… above.”

***
“campaign material from an entity of which the voter is a member”. Huh? That’s not… never mind.

Very disappointing outcome. Why not just say “does not support”.

Jeff, I don’t understand this.
“Ultimately, we need to get to 18 Senators per State – the point where Tasmania’s entitlement = 5 members.”
Can you explain?

Yes such a change is well and truly justified. Maybe start from the current size of the Tasmanian house of reps and build out from there.
The nexus that the senate must be half the size of the reps is a problem. This will lead to greater fragmentation with no one having a majority. But in practice this happens anyway and is caused by the decreased share of the vote by the major parties.

Peter, each original state is guaranteed 5 seats in the House. Tasmania at the moment has enough population for about 3.3-3.4 quotas, but they get 5 because of that constitutional guarantee. So that’s two more than their entitlement. A lot of people are fixated on expanding the parliament to reduce or eliminate that malapportionment. Jeff is saying 18 senators per state would mean that Tasmania’s five seats would actually be their fair share.

@Jeff Waddell;
18 Seantor/State plus 4 in the Territories would add up to 116 Senators, so the House vwould need around 232 Seats to maintain the nexus.
Long overdue, imo, more seats means more representation, though 4 Senators from the NT seems excessive. If they’re going to do that, perhaps increase the Senators from each State to 20 and the House to 256.
**************************
For comparison, America has 435 House members for a population of 340.1 million for an average electorate size of 770,000.

The USA isn’t a great comparison because the country is so vastly bigger. No-one is saying that the ratio should be the same in every jurisdiction – bigger populations should have bigger ratios. That’s why it’s more relevant to compare Australia to similar countries. Canada is about 50% bigger than Australia in population but their House of Commons has 338 seats. For us to be proportionate with them, we’d be roughly in line with what Jeff said.

Also there is an active campaign to significantly increase the size of the US House. So it’s not a great example.

Ben – “A larger parliament… would thus reduce the need to employ extra staff in each office.”
The counter argument it’s likely cheaper just to hire extra staff in the exisiting office given you’d have to hire new / more staff in any expansion; cancelling out any benefit.

Ben – “A larger parliament… would make the chamber more representative and more diverse.”
By more represenative and more diverse, do you mean simply more numbers or better or likely better? You’re somewhat equating quantity with quality. More representatives isn’t the same as more (or better) representation. Assuming voters, vote in a similar fashion as to now, you’re going to end up with a broadly similar elected candidate mix as to now, regardless of how many people sit in the chamber – even in a theoretical scenario of a reduction in members. If you moved to multi-member electorates, you’d get genuine diversity and representation within an electorate of any size. Maybe citizen juries give you better or different policy avenues. If you wanted to go all the way, you’d start of levels of government. Given the structural system we are in, I think an expansion is probably necessary but alone, I would suggest more parliamentarians aren’t necessarily going to change any outcome other than having more parliamentarians.

“Whilst the Government does not propose to increase the membership of the House of Representatives…” tells you everything you need to know, for at least the short-medium term. If you want to get this through, the approach will need to be through current members for a slight reduction to their constituent workloads and to candidates to give more opportunites.

If we’re going to increase the total staffing budget for the parliament, it is far more democratic to do that by adding more MPs rather than having a smaller number of MPs commanding more and more staff. So yeah it doesn’t reduce the costs of staff, I’m not saying that. But it’s a better way to increase resources.

I am sayin gthat a bigger parliament would produce better representation. Perhaps not as well as a new electoral system would, but if you click through to my previous blog post (last link in the post) I explain about the Seat Product Model, which finds that a bigger assembly size, even without a higher district magnitude, leads to more proportionality and an increase in the effective number of parties. It creates potential for different people to sit in parliament, not just more of the same. And there is an immediate short-term benefit in creating a bunch of open seats. A big barrier to increasing diversity in parliament is the fact that existing MPs stick around for a long time, but an expanded parliament would make that less of an issue.

And yes, clearly the government is getting cold feet. Hence why I’m asking people to write to their candidates.

18 × 6 =108;+ 4 …..112
Times 2. ….. 224 house of reps that is another 60 house of reps?

Usa has 2 senators per state irrespective of their size and none for dc.
770000 electorate is too large.

Just done a quick calculation based on salaries of back bench MPs and electorate staff (5 per MP). If you were keep the salary cost neutral with an extra 12 senators and 24 MHRs – the number of staff would reduce from 5 to 4. That doesn’t include extra costs such as real estate, travel and various allowances. The cost of the change would not necessarily be excessive if it is acceptable to reduce staffing numbers.

Apologies if I have missed this elsewhere, but, is there analysis of voter engagement with MP by seat and Senators?

I would imagine areas that have high migration levels might have more enquiries etc

There’s little doubt that parliament should be expanded, although it will be a tough sell to the general public who already believe we are oversaturated with politicians.

I support the idea of making the quota effectively a fifth of Tasmania’s enrolment, with expansion locked in for every 25 years proceeding the last increase in the House of Representatives. So, if expansion happens by 2028, the next time it expands will be 2053. Unless Tasmania experiences a massive population boom, they will always have their five representatives, and the size of the house will rise or (almost certainly not) fall in relation to these representatives.

The nexus is a constitutional issue and won’t be changed. I doubt four states would vote in favour in a referendum of its abolishment, so for the time being we are locked into having half as many senators for the states as we do for the states’ representatives (territory representation is of course a different issue).

Ideally, an expansion of parliament would go hand-in-hand with fixed four year terms, but I think the appetite for further referendums in the short to medium term has been exhausted.

Agree on expanding the house to the magnitude that gives Tasmania a fair 5 lower house seats – last time I ran the numbers that was 9 senators per state per half election.

Should also be odd numbers in each senate race

While I strongly desire a minimal expansion to the Senate and House of Representatives, I don’t anticipate it will occur soon. Labor is aware that any expansion will be quite unpopular, and the Coalition is currently opposed to any increase, as stated in their reply to the ‘Conduct of the 2022 federal election and other matters’ final report.

“The Coalition members of the Committee notes that the Government had no mandate to increase the size of the Parliament and have concerns about increasing the size of the House of Representatives, and the Senate, in the middle of a cost-of-living crisis.”

However, if the Coalition ever determines an expansion would increase their proportion of Senate seats, they may offer support…

I assume Referendums might never become successful again given all but two of the successful referendums are above 70% (which has a non-existent or very weak offical No Campaign) with the two successful referendums is because it positively benefited the majority of Australians in a majority of states. It also doesn’t help that the crossbench is now much stronger so good luck trying to convince both the Greens and One Nation to support the same referendum as only if one party opposes the referendum, it will trigger an offical No campaign which history shows that it can defeat Lib-Lab supported Referendums.

I would have thought the Nationals might be in favour as they would be one of the big benificiaries of an expanded parliament. Otherwise their seats will inexorably slide into unfavourable territory. I imagine Greens wouldn’t mind either as inner city seats would be more concentrated. One reason parties don’t like expansions is that there end up being a lot of seats without sitting MPs and the MPs in marginal seats seek out the safer parts. Labor probably found this out the hard way in both 1949 and 1984. In a volatile political environment, add uncertainty would not be something they would look for.

Well made points I hadn’t considered before. If both major parties are reticent to make these basic changes then I think it highlights it probably should have been done yesterday! Further proves we need a stronger and more independent AEC.

even if they are able to agree on something the change wont be in effect until at least 2031 or 2034 elections as a redistribution takes at least 1 year to complete and given parliament only sits for around 3 theres no way it would be debated legislated and implemented in time for a redistribution of the whole country in time for the 2028 election.

@real talk that would be impossible to implement as the house can only expand when the senate does and therefore youd have to have a constant increase to the senate in order to implement that. the states would never agree to abolish the constitutional clause as the smaller states tas, sa and wa would make sure of that.

In 1984, it was done in about 18 months. It would probably effect only the 5 mainland states as Tasmania and the Territories will not need an increase under an extra 2 senators proposal. Why are the circumstances so different now? More consultation? Fewer resources? On the other hand there is a lot more computer grunt available.

Yes but how long did it take the debate legislation etc

The House of Representatives could get 164 MPs by 2028

The circs are different because the coalition are bloody minded and will not agree.

Royal Assent was given on 22 December 1983 so under a year to the next election and actually a lot less as 1984 was a 7 week campaign.

@Mick and why not? Even if they don’t the govt doesn’t need them to pass the law

That’s a good point John, I hadn’t considered that.

I don’t see the disproportionate level of Tasmania representation as a problem. I see it like the little brother who can make a disproportional amount of noise and so unfairly gets his way, it doesn’t really impact the family dynamic. I live in Bradfield and I know that Bradfield (with 1 representative) contributes about the same amount of income tax as Tasmania (17 representatives). Adding a significant number of politicians just to diminish the Tasmanian influence seems overkill. Cheaper and more productive to upgrade a hospital or airport every 3 years.

What should be avoided is unstable government, I look around the world and see where systems have tried to be representative and resulted in multi party coalitions that are inherently unstable when involving more than two parties.

At last election we saw a surge in independents but I think this will swing back. If you look back at the time when the Democrats were at their peak, the “Independent” electorates had a high level of Democrat vote in the senate. Lets face it, the Teals are Dems reborn.

I am not convinced that multi representative electorates are a good idea, I would prefer to have a single person responsible as THE local representative.

The senate quota system currently gives a place to any candidate that reaches a quota (about 14%). In practice this generally gives 5 places to those with a quota and the last candidate standing which is usually significantly lower than the 14%.

With this in mind, I would say that one house of parliament (the governing house) should be designed to produce stabile government with single member representation and the second house (the approving house) be open to represent as many points of view/parties as possible.

I would increase the senate to 14 being 7 at each election. Having an odd number creates a greater chance of a casting vote like we had when there was 5. This would mean the quota would be about 12% but as we know, the final spots are filled by the last candidate left so would have the effect of giving voice to a group that might have started with 6-8% of the vote but was boosted by left-over preferences from the major parties.

A parliamentary expansion is overdue not just because it’s been over 40 years since the last one. The national population has grown significantly. Also, there are many rural and regional electorates that are growing in size due to population decline as well as disproportionately more growth in capital cities and other urban centres. The electorate of Grey in SA stretches from the WA border to the NSW border.

There are three changes I’d like to see:
1. Expand the House of Reps by a certain number
2. Expand the Senate by a certain number
3. Increase the number of senators for both ACT and NT to four each.

Putting all three into one referendum question would increase the chance of rejection as there’ll be opponents of just one clause and will campaign on that. The third point about increasing ACT and NT senators would definitely be opposed by One Nation and other minor parties as it’s unlikely they’ll fill a quota for a senate seat.

The house and senate can be expanded without a referendum. It’s the nexus that ties the size of the house to twice that of the senate which can only be adjusted by referendum.

An increase in parliament is not just a federal problem – the states should increase as well. NSW is the worst offender – the parliament was reduced to 90 in 1904 – inched up to 94 in 1950 – and 99 in 1973. Then 109 for one election in 1988. Then back to 99 in 1991 and then to 93 during the Carr years. Absolutely ridiculous that there are fewer MPs than 1950.

Idk how many seats the House of Reps. will get in a hypothetical house expansion, but in your opinion, which areas are in need of their own electorate?

I’ve seen a few people online calling for the recreation of Higgins, and I remember someone making a post here speculating that if NSW had an expansion in seats areas like central Liverpool, Blacktown, and former Canterbury area would get their own seats whilst individual seats would be made for major regional cities like Port Macquarie.

Maybe areas like Port Augusta and Eyre Peninsula could be split off from Grey and Cairns be made into it’s own electorate (it can probably keep the Leichhardt name tho)

Also I wonder if AEC would take the approach of QLD when it comes to electorates of major regional cities being small dots surrounded by large rural electorates like Bundaberg, Rockhampton and Mackay.

Yes I advocated for an expansion in the numbers of the NSW parliament at their last JSCEM review, didn’t get much traction.

I’d like to know what the reasoning behind expanding the territories Senate representation is? I can see absolutely no reason for it.

MLV – Agree. Why does the NT need more senators when it can barely support 2 Reps seats now and the ACT has just enough for 3 seats. Even if the parliament was enlarged by the bare minimum neither would gain any Reps seats.

@Lurking Westie – on the ‘NSW federal redistribution – final margins’ post on this site in October 2024, one of the users (I believe Angas?) made their own redistribution in the case of NSW being entitled to 54 electorates. I believe that is who you were referring to.

I make my argument on page 9 of my JSCEM submission if you want to read it.

But basically I think it is wrong to draw a hard line between Tasmania and the territories and say that Tasmania gets 12 senators despite only having about 3.5 seats worth of population but that NT and ACT should be judged on a totally different standard.

To keep it short: if Tasmania is going to get 12 senators, then a territory like the ACT should be treated a bit more like Tasmania.

I would be all for a Senate that did not have severe malapportionment but that was the deal created by federation and I doubt there’s much about our federal constitution that would be harder to change than that. And while we have it, we can’t judge the territories by a one-vote-one-value measure.

The territories now are mostly quasi-states and in most ways function with similar independence to the states, just smaller. That means they have separate interests in the same way that Tasmania does.

The ACT has been growing much faster than Tasmania and is now not that far behind. The ACT’s population is much closer to Tasmania’s than any other state.

I’m not arguing that the territories should have 12 senators but I think if Tasmania has 12 senators than the territories should have a lot more than 2. 4 is a bare minimum.

Some people argue against increased Senate representation by saying that as a proportion of the country they already have their fair share, or that compared to NSW they are doing well. But that is a double standard that is not applied to other small jurisdictions. And this issue wouldn’t be resolved by the territories becoming states, since the constitution only gives the equal senator guarantee to original states. I would argue that a formula that allocated senators to new states or state-like territories in proportion to their share of the smallest original state’s population would be fair (obviously not exceeding the numbers given to the original states).

There are also arguments around electoral competitiveness. We’ve only seen a territory Senate seat change hands once in the entire history of those seats. In the case of the NT, their Senate seats are so uncompetitive that they might as well not be there. Having 4 or 6 senators per state, particularly if they were all elected at once, would give more fluidity, as we have for state senators.

@MLV + redistributed Tasmania has about 100,000 more people than the ACT and gets 12 senators, while the ACT gets 2. That doesn’t seem like a fair way to go about. We’re Australians too

@Ben spot on

The last federal expansion of parliament was in 1984 since then the population has increased from 15.5 million to 27.5 million – a 77% increase.

Suggestions to therefore increase the senators elected per state from the current 12 to 18 and from 2 to 4 for the ACT and NT is reasonable and appropriate, it would be beneficial as well to have an odd number of senators elected per state at a half Senate election, and it would eliminate Tasmania’s malapportionment in the House. It would enable the House of Reps to expand to about 216 members which is 44% more than the current 150.

@redistributed there is also a debat/proposal to expand the territories to 3 sentors each

A reminder-the purpose of the Senate was to represent State interests.There is an argument to be made that territories should not have any senators,as they are not states.There is of course no limit on the number of states and if there were more states,then there would be more House of Representative seats as the operation of the nexus would not be as oppressive.
In the case of the ACT,it is unrealistic to consider it becoming a state as it is the seat of the Federal Government.In the case of the NT it is not viable economically as a state unless there are massive mineral discoveries which can be exploited.
There is another way of looking at the alleged unfairness of non proportional senate representation for the territories as well.It is this-should public servants have the right to vote whilst they are in Commonwealth employment?The fact that they do indirectly influences the number of public servants.If public servants were not able to vote,then the alleged discrimination on the basis of numbers would be very much reduced.
Of course I am being deliberately contrarian in saying this-but it needs to be thought about as part of the process.

@redistributed for starters the left want a way of blocking legislation even if the coalition make it govt.

@raue well tasmania is guaranteed them by constitutional grounds so thats why that is and canberras population only grows because the govt keeps increasing the size of the public service. thats why people move there.

@malcom i doubt they will go for such a big increase thats nearly a 50% increase. in the house and a 50% increase to state senators and a 100% to territory senators i think the more modest proposal of 3 senators per territory and 14 per state is better as it increase the house by 24 members.

I’d like to see the Reps expanded but would love to see the nexus broken so we could avoid expanding the Senate. But that probably isn’t going to happen. I’m not sure I’d be in a rush to go to 18 Senators per state (question – how many independents would Tasmania elect in a DD) but 16 would be a decent step.

But I think the only way it happens is if the major parties both decide it’s in their interest. Being out on your own as the party trying to sell the idea of more politicians is a hit neither side will take, even if they thought it was a good idea. Political capital is a thing, and I can’t see this being something they’d spend it on.

It would be interesting to see how they’d reconfigure the chambers to accommodate more bodies. It wouldn’t be a small job but I think we’re a long way from needing to resort to the no-desk long benches of the UK Commons.

@dean the nexus can only be broken by a referendum. there is no other way to expand the house without expanding the senate.

@Sabena Saying “There is an argument to be made that territories should not have any senators as they are not states” is a logical fallacy. The whole point of giving representation to the territories is to avoid disenfranchisement – taxation without representation.

Nobody is trying to make the argument of making the territories into states as that wouldn’t change their representation anyway, as pointed out, as only the original states are guaranteed representation under the Constitution.

Even more ludicrous is the idea of disenfranchising public servants further by removing their right to vote. Does this only apply in territories or all of Australia? Do state public servants count? Just APS staff or contractors too? Where do you draw the line?

So I would say that no, your points do not need to be thought about as part of the process.

@john Despite your claim that Canberra’s population only grows because government increases the size of the service, the opposite is true. The size of the APS has shrunk as a proportion of the total population over time. As of 2024, only 24% of Canberra’s population works for the APS.

Australians won’t vote to break the 2:1 nexus in a referendum – it failed in 1967 despite the backing of both sides of politics. Expanding the Parliament just because Tasmania is marginally over-represented in the Reps is a futile argument that won’t resonate with political realists. In 1983/84/87 and again in 1998/2001/2016 the Opposition of the day held all five Tasmanian seats – without of course changing the Government.
The Parliament was enlarged in 1948 because the ALP had large majorities in both Houses and could do as they pleased (and also did some very divisive and unpopular things).
The enlargement of 1983-84 resulted from a high degree of consultation and consensus between the major Parties. Neither side of politics should proceed with an enlargement plan without seeking a similar agreement.

@jeremy they wont because SA and WA voters will know this devalues their representation and technically so does it QLD and VIC so likely only NSW will vote or this as they are the only ones to benefit from it.

Is the only reason that the nexus exists because of the contingency of a joint sitting of parliament?

Canada redistributes every 10 years based on the Census and Australia States tends to redistribute every second election based on electors so would it constitutionally be possible to do it every second election?