The Tally Room

The NSW Government's proposed laws to allow the Electoral Commission to gather information from other government agencies and use it to update the roll, has caused a stir, with Bernard Keane in Crikey writing critically of it the other day: This is about finding new...

From today's Crikey "Tips and Rumours" section: The Liberals have decided to preference the Christian Democrats. This is a high risk policy as if they don’t get an absolute majority initially all the preferences will keep flowing to the Christian democrat even from the Greens...

The Macarthur Chronicle has reported today that Member for Werriwa Chris Hayes has been offered a deal in which he would move to the neighbouring seat of Fowler in exchange for giving up his seat of Werriwa to a member of the Left. Hayes has...

Candidates were announced today for the forthcoming Bradfield and Higgins by-elections, and an amazing twenty-two candidates have nominated in Bradfield. In Higgins, a more reasonable ten candidates have nominated in Higgins.The field in Bradfield includes nine Christian Democratic Party candidates after the party threatened...

Result: Labour has held on against the SNP with 59.4% of the vote. The SNP polled 20%, while the Conservatives polled 5.2%. The BNP came fourth with 4.9% followed by former socialist MSP Tommy Sheridan and the  Liberal Democrats. Voters are now going to the...

A guest post by regular commenter Nick C. Earlier this week by-elections took place to fill four vacant seats in the Canadian House of Commons. The overall outcome saw a net gain of two seats for Stephen Harper’s governing Conservative Party, one at the expense...

Welcome to the newly redesigned Tally Room blog. I have changed to a new theme which mainly redesigns the front page. The top of the front page will regularly cycle through the three most recent posts. Each post will include an image to identify...

The Greens have today announced that former Democrats leader Andrew Bartlett will run for the party in the federal seat of Brisbane at the next election. Bartlett was a senator for Queensland from 1997 until his defeat in 2007 saw his term finish in...

I have now posted a guide to the federal election in the seat of Macarthur. Macarthur is now Labor's most marginal seat, one where preselection contests are heated in both parties. It's also the seat where I ran in 2007.

US election results today have seen Republicans win Democratic governorships in New Jersey and Virginia, and independent Mike Bloomberg reelected as Mayor of New York by a surprisingly narrow margin. Two races remain close and worth watching. In Maine, "Question 1" is asking voters whether...