Do you know your electorate / local MPs?

[Arctic Firefox]

So, just as a little aside to the voting thread: do we all know our electorate/local MP information?

To see how widespread we are across this country, everyone try to list the following:

The name of your Federal electorate:
The name of your Federal MP:
The party to which your Federal MP belongs:

The name of your State/Territory electorate:
The name of your State/Territory MP:
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs:

For those who are unsure, try going to the Australian Electoral Commission website:

www.aec.gov.au/

Okay, to give an example - my example:

Federal Electorate: Goldstein
Federal MP: Andrew Robb (aka [censored])
Party: Liberal

State Electorate: Sandringham
State MP: Murray Thompson
Party: Liberal

*sigh* Why do I live here again? Oh yeah, the beach. Fresh air from sea.

I don't see either of them being unseated at the next election, but I will damn well make sure I do my best to help cause a swing against Andrew Robb, who is a complete jerk. And he can't count either. But that's another story.

[avra]

The name of your Federal electorate: Franklin
The name of your Federal MP: Harry Quick
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: ALP

The name of your State/Territory electorate: Franklin
The name of your State/Territory MP: Paula Wriedt, Paul Lennon, Lara Giddings, Nick McKim, Will Hodgeman
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs: ALP, ALP, ALP, Tas Greens, Liberal

Well, that was fun, wasnt it?

[Deleted]

The name of your Federal electorate: Higgins
The name of your Federal MP: Peter Costello (woo. hoo.)
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Liberal

(I had to look this one up. Shame)
The name of your State/Territory electorate: Burwood
The name of your State/Territory MP: Bob Stensholt
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs: ALP

[Cat-Eyes]

Err... I know the federal one...

The name of your Federal electorate: Deakin (but we're rather close to Casey)
The name of your Federal MP: Phil Barresi
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Liberal

Man, I can't even find who the hell my State MP is. Stupid utterly useless victorian government website... It used to be Honeywood, but no idea if it still is...

[Dameon]

The name of your Federal electorate: Canberra
The name of your Federal MP: Annette Ellis
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Labor

The name of your State/Territory electorate: Brindabella
The name of your State/Territory MLAs: John Hargreaves, Mick Gentleman, Karin MacDonald, Brendan Smythe, Steve Pratt (who is indeed a prat).
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs: ALP, ALP, ALP, Liberal, Liberal
And, for bonus marks, because I only have two, my Senators are: Kate Lundy of Labor and Gary Humphries of Liberal.

The local stuff was hard, because of Hare Clark and the five members. I needed my brother to give me some cryptic clues so I could guess them!

[Cat-Eyes]

...How come people have lots of state government MPs? ie Kayt and Avra...

[Roland]

small areas Cat. Kayt at least is from Canberra where each territory electorate has like six elected members. Given that there are only three electorates in the whole Territory, it's the only way to get a parliament .

The name of your Federal Electorate: Eden-Monaro
The name of your Federal MP: Gary Nairn
The party he belongs to: Liberal

The Name of your State electorate: Monaro
The name of your state MP: Steve Whan
The party he belongs to: Labor

[avra]

Isn't it more just to do with the system that we use? We could always divide up the state in to more electorate if we were using a different system. To elect the members of the House of Assembly we use a form of a proportional representation system, the Hare-Clark system. We use it basically because it was two Tasmanian dudes that came up with it, I assume. Other states, 'cept the ACT I guess, use a full preferential system.

[Dameon]

That's right, Avvy. The ACT and Tassie (and NT?) use Hare-Clark, which is a fairer system, because the people elected to parliament more closely resemble the actual vote than with a simple one-member seat preferential system.

It's better with a small population, so that electorates are of a decent size, but it's also fairer.

[Rushton]

The name of your Federal electorate: Cowan
The name of your Federal MP: Graham Edwards
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Labor

This is a very marginal seat, we used to be safe Labor, but in the last election swung over 7% Liberal (yay!) in fact we had to have a re-count

But I like Graham Edwards; he's a good member.

The name of your State/Territory electorate: Joondalup / North Metropolitan
The name of your State/Territory MLA: Tony O'Gorman (ALP) Legislative Assembly
The name of your State/Territory MLP's: Peter Collier (LIB), Kenneth Travers (ALP), Raymond Halligan (LIB), Giz Watson (GWA), Samuel Cash (LIB), Thomas Giffard (ALP) - Legislative Council

I had to look up a few of those council members

[Arctic Firefox]

I wouldn't have a clue who my council members are - I moved to the area a couple of days after the council election, but from what I saw people weren't advertising their party allegiances, which I found rather odd.

In unrelated news, I've been called up for jury service! I haven't even been in country for a year yet! Still, it will be interesting, if I am eventually selected for a jury. Will keep you informed.

[grunty]

i'm 16 and i live in a tiny town in rural iowa. i dont know who those dudes are!! stop quizzing me!!

[Arctic Firefox]

It's not a matter of age, but of interest. If you're not interested in politics, that's okay. I was very interested by the age of 15, but it's different for each person.

Your Senators in Congress are:

Chuck Grassley (Republican)
Tom Harkin (Democrat)

To find out who your local Washington representative is in the House of Reps, go to the link below and type in your zip code.

www.house.gov/

[grunty]

lol, and i by the age of 16, am not interested.

[Arctic Firefox]

You will be once issues start affecting you directly.

[Fuil Dearg]

What are federal electorates, federal MPs, state/territory electorates and state/territory MPs?

[Arctic Firefox]

*deep breath*

Okay. I forget what the electoral system in Ireland is, but over here we "enjoy" three levels of government: Federal (national, if you like), State, and Local. Our House of Representatives has 150 members; each member represents an electorate, like in the UK. So Federal MPs are like members of the lower house in your Dail.

Australia is divided into six states (New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, Western Australia, South Australia, Tasmania) and two territories (Northern Territory, Australian Capital Territory). I'll leave it to someone else to be more specific if they like, but generally speaking states have more power than territories. At least, when it comes to electing members to our Federal Senate. Our state/territory MPs are the ones we elect at that level. I think the Irish equivalent may be the counties?

So, yeah. If that made sense at all.

[Kaylan-R]

i live in queensland and i just learned something:P

[Fuil Dearg]

AF, i am surprised u know about the irish electorial system. Mostly it's the Dail who have the power. they rae the lower house. the upper house is the seanad. the Dail is elected by the ppl. the seanad is elected by a few ppl in presigious positions. someone amde a joke in the seandad once. it was funny. the guy who tries to keep things in order was like, "we do not appreciate your humour, imagine what would happen if people made jokes here all the time". they make jokes often in the dail. the seanad is stupid. we have a taoiseach (irish word for chieftan). he is pretty much the equivalent to a primeminister. we have a president but her role is mostly ceremonial. she can stop (for a little while) laws being passed if she thinks they are uncontitutional. first she refers them to someone (i forget who), then if they think they are ok she can refer them to the supreme court. if they think they are ok she can resign. do ye use the PR (proportional representation) system of voting in Australia. we use PR in Ireland. i think its a pretty good system. i'll explain the irish government system in more detail sometime if u like. just post that u'd like me to. our current taoiseach is an idiot. thanks for the explanation.

[Timm]

Goldstein sounds so much like it should be a band name or something.

The name of your Federal electorate: Wannon
The name of your Federal MP: David Hawker
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Liberal

The name of your State/Territory electorate: Lowan
The name of your State/Territory MP: Hugh Delahunty
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs: National

That was exciting.

[Dameon]

Further to AF's explanation about States and Territories, I volunteer to be the elaborator he called for!

As AF said, there are 6 States and two Territories here. Our lower house, the House of Representatives (the House) has an electoral system based on population. Although, the constitution stipulated every state has to have at LEAST five members of the house. That's why tiny Tasmania has more electorates than it really warrants. Power to the Tasmanians, say I! (I'm of Tassie descent, and it's my favourite state). Now, where was I... Oh yeah!

In our Upper House, the Senate, each state, regardless of size, gets 12 senators. Each territory gets 2. We elect half our senators ever three years, and they get six year terms. That means, every senate election, the states pick 6 senators and we territories only pick 1.

I'm not so fussed about that. It's ridiculous to give 12 senators to us. Well... kinda ridiculous to give them to Tassie, too, but thems the rules, so whatever.

Anyway, AF was saying that the states have more power to elect senators, and that is true on a state level. But if you look at the individual, people in one state have more power than those in another. Senators are elected by a quota system. You have to get a certain percentage of the vote to be elected.In States, this is 14.7%. The six candidates who get 14.7% (most of them after preferences), will be elected. Look at Tasmania, the smallest state. I don't know how many voters there are in Tasmania, so let's just go by population. That's 484 700. That means you need, in Tasmania about 71 251 people to be elected to the Senate. Now, let's look at New South Wales. It's the biggest state, with a population of 6,764,600. Your 14.7% quota there? 994 397. That's twice as many people as in the WHOLE of Tassie. Your individual vote is worth more for the senate, the smaller your state is. That's why it is much much easier for an independent or third party senator (like Greens leader Bob Brown) to be elected in Tasmania.

The quota in territories, obviously, is much higher, but the populations are also smaller. But, I won't go into that, because it'll just get over-complicated.

Like I said, the Senate system, maybe a little unfair, but not my major grievance.

What DOES annoy me about living in a territory is that we don't get an autonomous state government. There are rules in the constitution about the Federal Government overruling State Laws. States are allowed to legislate in certain areas without federal interference. However, in territories, the federal government has the power to veto our laws. This is always coming up in Canberra, because our government is very liberal and progressive: pro-euthanisa, pro-abortion, pro-gay marriage. The federal government frequently overrules laws passed by our local government. I can recall at least 3 times in teh last few years, very distinctly. If the same laws had been passed in a state, they'd be law, and the federal government would have no power to overule.

Is that fair?

[DragonMornir]

The name of your Federal electorate: North Sydney
The name of your Federal MP:John Hockey
The party to which your Federal MP belongs: Liberal

The name of your State/Territory electorate: Lane Cove
The name of your State/Territory MP: Anthony Roberts
The party to which your State/Territory MP belongs: :Liberal

The name of your local electorate:Hunters Hill - North Ward, Richard Quinn, and no idea what party lol

[Arctic Firefox]

The new Upper House in Victoria is going to be much better for smaller parties. The Greens look like picking up two seats, which would have basically have been impossible under the old system.

Oh, I know a bit about Irish politics. I wrote my History Coursework on the Easter Rising in high school, and I have a penfriend from Dublin, so I keep up with things.

[Fuil Dearg]

how come you u did it on irish politics? we didnt learn anything about australian politics in school.

[Arctic Firefox]

We didn't - I chose to do my History Coursework (a 3,000 word essay which was independent of the rest of the curriculum) on the Easter Rising because it seemed to be an interesting event, especially considering it happened during the First World War. My essay argued what is probably seen as obvious - before the Easter Rising, nationalist politicians were considered radical by most of the country, but after 1916, you wouldn't be elected unless you were nationalist. Hence the rise of Sinn Fein in the post war elections. It was very interesting to research, and gave more perspective on the self-determination issue for European countries at the beginning of the twentieth century.