There’s been a lot of talk about expanding the size of Australia’s federal parliament in the last few years. Some of us have been talking about this for a lot longer, but it has seemed feasible since Labor took power in 2022.
Expanding the parliament is well overdue, with over four decades passing since the last increase in 1984. An expanded parliament would bring the parliament closer to the people, reducing the number of people represented by each MP, and creating more space for diversity within the parliament. I explained my thoughts more fully in this 2023 blog post. You can also read a number of blog posts gathered at this tag.
There was some reporting yesterday about Don Farrell specifically asking the Joint Standing Committee on Electoral Matters’ inquiry into the recent election to consider the question of expanding the parliament, along with the possibility of fixed four-year terms.
So for today’s post, I wanted to look at what would happen if the Parliament were expanded, and what would need to happen if the Parliament was to make a change to its numbers.
Just as a refresher, the number of seats in the House of Representatives is determined by the numbers of seats in the Senate. A population quota is set by dividing the population of the six states by twice the number of senators representing those states. That quota is then applied to the population of each state and territory to determine their seat entitlement after each election. A referendum was held in 1967 to break this “nexus”, and allow the House to grow without growing the Senate, but it was defeated.
The Parliament can simply change legislation to increase the number of senators per state, and this would cause the number of seats in the House to grow. The Senate entitlement was increased from six to ten prior to the 1949 election, and again from ten to twelve prior to the 1984 election.
Thirty-five years passed between the first and second increase. If the Parliament were to be expanded in 2028, it would have been forty-four years.
As Australia’s population has grown over time, the average number of residents and voters in each electorate has increased. Expansions of parliament won’t completely undo that trend, but they can unwind it somewhat. The 1984 expansion made the average seat population lower than in 1972.
These are the two most modest, but also most likely, options: giving each state fourteen senators (an increase of 12), or sixteen senators (an increase of 24).
If we were to expand the Parliament by 12 Senate seats, this would reduce the average population back to 2016 levels. Expand the parliament by 24 seats, and we’d be reverting the average back to 2007 levels.
So how would these changes apply to each state? It seems likely that no there will be no change to state entitlements prior to the next election, if there is no Senate increase. So the twelve-senator model is the same as the status quo.
The five biggest states all benefit under both scenarios in roughly the same proportions.
Tasmania, as an original state, is entitled to five seats despite only having enough population for three seats. Either of these expansion scenarios would bring Tasmania’s population up to four seats. A 14-senator model would solidify the current House numbers for the two largest territories, but a 16-senator model would see the ACT gain a fourth seat.
So if the government is serious about expanding the Parliament, what would need to happen next?
If there is a change in the number of seats in the House, that will have knock-on effects in changing each state’s entitlement. The entitlement is typically determined one year after the first sitting of the House. Assuming no change in the size of the Parliament, that will be determined for the next election in July 2026. Right now, it seems unlikely that this will trigger any redistributions.
But if the Parliament is expanded, it will trigger redistributions for the five largest states, and possibly the ACT. Tasmania is already undergoing a redistribution anyway, so redistributions would be conducted in every jurisdiction except the NT.
This would be the biggest burden on the AEC’s mapmakers since 1984.
During the last redistribution, I did some research into how long past redistributions have taken, and I found that the last round of redistributions did take quite a long time. For this post, I’ve also looked back at the 1984 redistribution cycle, to see how long things took back then.
The start of the redistribution process in 1984 started roughly around the same time as it does nowadays, but it all happened much quicker. The whole process was finished less than 600 days after the previous election, despite the need to pass fresh legislation rebuilding the redistribution process.
In contrast, it now usually takes around 750 days to finalise redistributions. The last redistribution cycle took close to 900 days to finish.
I there has been an increasing burden on the Commission to conduct the redistribution process.
In 1984, across New South Wales, Victoria and Western Australia, there were 574 submissions across three rounds of public submissions. In those three states in 2023-24, there were 1987 submissions across four rounds of public submissions.
I don’t think the clock can be unwound, and I don’t think it’s possible to redraw electoral boundaries with the speed that was possible back in 1984. So if we are going to expand the parliament, the mapmakers will need time to get the job done.
There is reason to think that the scale of the job in front of the mapmakers during the last parliamentary term led them to being more conservative in redrawing the map – a topic I’ll return to in another post.
Creating another 25-50 seats will be a very significant change in how federal elections work, and the process can’t be rushed, and the public is entitled to have their say properly.
The JSCEM inquiry after the 2022 election recommended a further inquiry to consider whether the Parliament should be expanded. That inquiry didn’t happen in the last parliament, and the issue has been left unresolved.
If the government wants to move on this issue, they need to do it early in the term. The time is right, now.
If the government is interested in both an expansion of parliament and having 4 year fixed terms, then surely the answer is tackle the latter first. That is, put a referendum for 4 year fixed terms starting from the 49th parliament (if they can get bipartisan support then would be simplest to hold the referendum on the ordinary election day). Then pass an expansion of parliament, giving the AEC an extra year to do the redistributions.
Four year fixed terms will run afoul of the consequences for the operation of the Senate – the election of Senators for 8 year terms will be subject to vociferous opposition
I don’t think whether you represent 160k or 180k per electorate is a big deal in parliamentary workload – save, for geographic / demographic reasons you maybe look after a lot of migration or aged care issues. The reality is that the majority don’t know what a Federal Member does and just a few care and even fewer bother to directly correspond.
Where the numbers become a real issue is in elections and the resources associated with winning a seat.
Whilst there are some in the party structure that reflect an individual policy view and others have a personal vote factor, giving some diversity of opinion, the fact that they belong to a party and subscribe to an agreed platform of policy means even constituents that are party members have limited influence over their political representatives.
The punters see a quasi presidential contest and vote accordingly. A few will consider the person, but, generally preselected by state administrators, they just go along for the ride.
The sad reality is that lobbyists set the agenda or manipulate it to their client’s advantage. Putting more members on a partisan basis wouldn’t broaden the ministerial factional talent pool or advance constituency interests.
@Chris, the problem with your logic is that expansion of the parliament is a simple matter of passing legislation whereas 4-year terms probably is an unwinnable referendum. Doug is right, it’s the Senate terms that will kill it. Some people will reject 8-year Senate terms, others will reject making every election a DD.
I wholeheartedly agree with J Knight.
However, if we did go down the route of increasing the number of seats we’d really have to break the Nexus first. Otherwise any gradual increase in electorates would be stymied by the need to increase the size of Senate in large jumps. Each additional Senate increase would trigger at least 24 new Members (thresholds for Tasmania and the Territories might jump over the cut-off point).
There is a minor practical consideration as well – the House of Reps can currently hold up to 172 Members with a maximum capacity of 240. Theoretically the Senate could hold another 14, taking it to 90. Once you get past that you’re doing some fairly major building modifications. The other issue is the amount of office space available in Parliament. There are some workarounds, like shrinking some oversized offices, but there’s not a lot of wiggle room.
Agreeing with Ben – 8 year Senate terms would kill any referendum, even if EVERY Party supported it. And there would probably be significant internal opposition as well from those who think they could do a better job and don’t want to wait that long.
There’s also the risk of Senators jumping ship as soon as they’re elected, confident that they have (probably) eight years of guaranteed employment.
Selling a massive spending proposal on remodeling Parliament House would also be a referendum killer.
parliament expansion is inevitable and they can do that without a referendum. or even expanding the parliament in terms of numbers.
It’s a no brainer the parliament needs to be enlarged. Ideally to 200 HoR members and 100 senators, but, I wasn’t aware the parliament could only house 240 politicians. I wouldn’t be opposed to the senate being fully up at every election, as the Victorian upper house does. I’m not so fussed about fixed terms, and most governments are elected to multiple terms anyway.
I would rather have for all senators just be subjected to one term rather than two terms but of course that would require a referendum.
@john “they can do that without a referendum” – yeah, nahh.
S.7, S.24, S.27 of the Constitution just for starters. Plus S.128 just in case anyone has any bright ideas about loopholes.
im talking about remodelling the parliament
I might have a go at drawing a map for Victoria under a 14 senator model. It would make sense to me for the government to go small to start. It only introduces 12 new senators and 24 new reps which would gauge the general reception from the public and could be passed pretty easily. I can’t imagine the Libs opposing this when they are in desperate need of more members.
@Pencil The HOR can hold up to 240 members, plus another 90 Senators. So that’s 330 pollies. The role of the Senate, as a house of review, was intended to be a brake on radical change in the House of Reps. That’s under S.13 Rotation Of Senators, which was previously amended in 1906 to make it more likely for the election of Senators and members to be held at the same time.
Having thought about there is a way to make the changes. You’d still have to have a referendum to amend the Constitution, but would you could do is amend the nexus provision and not remove it.
If you proposed the change of S.24 from “the number of such members shall be, as nearly as practicable, twice the number of the senators” to “the number of such members shall be, as nearly as practicable, three times the number of the senators” then you could take the number of Members to around 225 without changing the number of Senators.
And of course once the ACT population passes Tasmania’s there’s a good argument for increasing the number of ACT Senators.
I’ve had a favourable view of fixed terms, but thought four years is a little too long. But I had thought that that’s not a dealbreaker. But… with the point about eight-year Senate terms… yeah that certainly is a dealbreaker for me. Is it possible that that could be amended too, in the same referendum?
I have an issue with 8 year senate terms not only too long but unelected senators could serve for a long time – at least two years more than happens now. 4 year terms for the Reps would be an improvement in public policy terms. The fixed term is less important as keeping the houses in synch largely leads to a de facto fixed term anyway. The problem with a 4 year senate term is what happens to DDs and their important role in our constitution – even if they are misused and we are unlikely to see joint sittings any time soon.
Redistributed, I guess DDs would no longer exist in the case where the Senate becomes tied to the House and uses fixed 4-year terms. An equivalent could be where both houses must be dissolved early if the governing party/PM loses confidence and an early election has to be called.
I would like to see a system where seats that become vacant (through death, resignation, etc.) In the first half of a senate term go for election at the next senate election – so any senators elected after the first 6 (or more) serve out a half term. Similar to what happened before 1977. It would act as a deterrent to senators and parties treating their seats as playthings.
The minimum number of seats should be such that Tasmania rounds up to 5 quotas. You could get absurd situations so there need to be brakes on that but it should be the starting point. IIRC that’s 18 senators per state (9 per half election) which is a good number – an odd number with quotas being 10% at normal elections
I mean the other revolution could be like the US Congress with mid terms… so if you do get a Trump Stamermate situation you can get some revenge earlier?
We do need to expand our Parliament now, but I don’t see it happening anytime soon unfortunately. We can dream though. How would we expand Parliament though?
If there is talk of increasing the size of the parliament, then there should be consideration for the vast electorates that are chronically under-represented.
The fact is that two Senators are insufficient to adequately represent the Northern Territory, which is the third largest federal division. And two MPs to cover all the NT plus a bunch of islands like Christmas is too big a job. There are chronic and serious world record level disadvantages in Lingiari and these are not being addressed properly with inadequate representation.
Add to that the fact that the NT has an undemocratic unicameral government which is rampantly increasing ugliness and climate changes which will ensure the population remains low and transient.
Trisha that’s because the NT is sparsely populated. And that’s the way it works in reality you have 4 MPs representing the NT
@np I think it will happen within 10 years at the very most. They can expand parliament merely by increasing the number of senators per state. The problem is it requires political will.
I think we need to keep 4 year terms and Expanding the size of parliment seperate and not conflate the issues. I think a referendum in the current political situation will be very hard and i think bipartisanship may not be enough as i think Greens Or One Nation could sink a referendum
I don’t think any referendum is gonna get up people have had enough for one generation. Any referendum that’s not some sort of urgent matter should be held in conjunction with an election. People would not be too fond of having to go to the polls mid term to extend the length of MPs “jobs”. Id say 4 year terms are at least 10 years off. Nook e wants another referendum quite yet and I don’t think labor are gonna waste it on that they would want a republic referendum first.
@Nimalan, there was a report from DemosAU stating in a poll that only 29% of Australians view the Constitution needed reform to reflect modernization while also 29% of Australians is opposed to any change of the Constitution (all or in most cases) , 23% only supports altering if it is considered ‘broken’ and 19% does not (or knows little) about Constitutional issues.
The Australian voter takes a ‘if it ain’t broke don’t fix it view of the constitution’. From my experience voters take constitutional change seriously. In my extended family we had lots of discussions about the Voice referendum and I always recall my sister only actually voting on her 3rd visit to the polling booth in the Republic referendum as she could not decide. She voted No in the end as the current system is a known quantity. Despite the number of failures we should not be discouraged from seeking constitutional change as the constitution needs to evolve. The argument just needs to be put and argued rationally.
When the houses were out of synch in the 60s after Menzies called an early election on 1963, the Senate election acted like a mid term with the result by 1970 that the majors had a very low vote share for the era. The majors learned the lesson and there have been no separate elections since. The other issue is that it would cost a fortune. Though in the pursuit of democracy we should not penny pinch.
At least in this country we do not see our constitution as some sort of quasi religious document as the Americans see theirs. We respect our constitution but know it is not perfect.
@Redistributed, the thing is that there is very few if any ideas that can even be considered ‘broken’ by
overwhelmingly Australians that would require constitutional change. With Greens and One Nation in the mix now, only one of them needs to oppose which would significantly reduce the success of a Lib-Lab supported Referendum.
I wonder how would had 1967 Referendum for Aboriginal Rights perform (since this was the most successful referendum at 90%) if some rouge politicians opposes it which leads to a No Campaign to exist?
An expanded parliament would address the issue of electorates far too big and inaccessible to electoral services and local representatives. Because most population growth is in capital cities and coastal areas, the largest electorate in each state is inland or remote and is ever expanding e.g. Grey, Parkes, Lyons. This is more pronounced in the outback regions of SA and NSW. Both states are always losing seats and there’s hardly any growth in the outback.
Any referendum to increase parliament size or abandon the MHR to Senator ratio of 2 would be best held in junction with a federal election to minimise disruption and costs. It’ll also need multi-partisan support because it’s a very hard sell. People may see this as an increasing taxpayer burden especially when politicians are one of the least trusted professions.
There’s a difference between giving aboriginal Australians the same righta as everyone else and giving them more rights then everyone else. Redistributed is correct changing the constitution should be taken very seriously. Unless there is a seriously broken part of it people are gonna vote no because it’s up to the politicians to justify needing to change it. I seriously doubt they are gonna be able to make the case that their politicians shpuld be given longer set terms when trust in politicans is at an all tiem low.
@Marh Right now, even with all sides of politics vigorously in favour of a Constitutional change, the chances of making a change are slim.
I believe that we actually do need a Constitutional Commission, a proper one this time. The 1998 Convention only dealt with the issue of the Republic, the first Convention in almost 100 years.
Firstly I’d like to remove the transitional clauses that are no longer relevant. I’d REALLY like to remove S.101-105A covering the Inter-State Commission.
Secondly I would like a discussion on S.51, the Legislative powers of the Parliament. This is the heart of the Constitution and outlines which parts of society falls under the responsibility of the Federal government. This is a product of it’s time and new development have been shoe-horned into antiquated boxes.
And thirdly is everything else – from S.28 (length of HOR terms), to S.44 (disqualification of elected Members and Senators), to S.64 (Ministers of State) and the nebulous position of Assistant Ministers.
@Votante The issue is whether personal contact is necessary for electors to be able to get support from elected Members or Senators. Most times problems are handled by better trained electoral or Ministerial staff. The other issue is that technology provides an opportunity for contact that doesn’t require physical presence.
NSW is going backwards because the relative population advantage it has is being ceded to WA, Vic and Qld. It only had that relative advantage because it had extra years to build population.
Should we decentralise? That’s another issue, but the question is how to do it. Brisbane house prices are getting ridiculous but that’s due to demand – it’s the closest thing we have to a black hole and it’s unbalancing regional Queensland.
I have been calling for an expanded parliament since my first JSCEM submission in 2016. And I will be calling for it again at my next submission, which is already well advanced in preparation.
Lets keep 3 year terms – in fact, part of my submission calls for fixed 3-year terms.
However, I will be arguing that future expansions need to be based on numerical considerations and not the whim of the government of the day.
My argument will be that the parliament must be expanded whenever the numerical entitlement of an original state is less than its constitutional entitlement.
As others have noted above, Tasmania’s numerical entitlement is only 3 members whilst its constitutional entitlement is 5.
To bring both numbers into alignment, the number of Senators from the States cannot be less than 18.
This also means that all Divisions in all states and territories have roughly the same number of electors.
@ Marh
Agree i dont even see a Republic referendum happening until maybe 2030 at the earliest even that i am not sure as there does not seem to be much interest among the average voter.
Jeff
You are basically calling for a referendum on removing the Nexus clause. It is often forgotten that it went to referendum in 1967 on the same as the Aboriginal powers. It went down big time with only NSW voting Yes. If it was held again it would definitely go down in Tasmania and possibly South Australia. Greens and minor parties might also oppose as the Senate gives them a platform that would be diluted with a bigger House. There would presumably be nothing stopping a government reducing the size of the Senate – possibly going back to 60.
If the house size was tied to Tasmania having 5 seats then we would have an ever spiralling size of House as Tasmania is the slowest growing jurisdiction and has been for a long time (possibly forever).
Third point – the House apportionment is based on population not electors. Hence SA has bigger enrolments as it has fewer immigrants and an older population. If based on electors, Tasmania would probably be closer to 5 for the same reason. If apportionment was based on electors – SA and Queensland would each have an extra seat and WA less one (based on July 2025 data).
A lot of great comments are being made in this thread, and I enjoyed reading them.
I support expanding parliament. Voters have always enjoyed a cozy relationship with their MPs, especially at election time, and having compact geography and population divisions will necessitate this. That said, we live in 2025 now, not 1925 or even 1975—communications with social media, the internet, TV, etc., being what they are, the MPs can handle a somewhat larger constituency, especially if the communities of interest rules are adhered to. Most of the increase in division size (population) will come from increased density in urban areas, where the MP will represent more people in the same community.
I agree that any public referenda will likely face an uphill battle, especially if it involves extending the time for elected officials. If anything, I could see a ballot measure passing that rolls back time from Senators simply on the grounds of “holding their feet to the fire.” Three years for a government term seems adequate to me for now. Most successful governments get reelected – Labor will likely be in for another three after this, at least simply as a function of math for the Liberals. They are not in any position to win 33 seats back anytime soon. Only a couple of times — 1993, 2010, and 2019 — did the outcome remain close/unsure during the campaigns, leaving the result truly in doubt.
@Votante, I agree with your point about the rural electorates. Even in today’s digital age, some rural communities are being shortchanged. That said, even though I do not agree with a lot of what Katter and the Nationals put out, I think they do a decent job representing those constituencies. At least in terms of speaking on the issues, it is how those MPs deal with the governments of the day that can be more problematic. I can envision a scenario, contingent on the Liberals’ future reinvention efforts, where rural MPs sit on the crossbench and negotiate with whoever is in The Lodge at the time to secure their desired outcomes.
Despite the wording of the Constitution, I would agree that expanding the Senate would be a harder sell to the public than the House. Mainly for the reasons stated above, voters see a lot more of their MPs by and large, and since they represent distinct geographic constituencies, the bulk of the government’s work is conducted in the House. I, like many, view the Senate as a way to smooth out rough edges on legislation, as well as providing a vehicle for smaller parties to get their foot in the door. It is not really meant to be an obstructionist body. There was a belief by many in the last election (rightly or wrongly) that the Greens in the Senate obstructed unduly and were punished for it. Of course, we also do not want a repeat of 1975.
Retaining full CPV in Federal elections (and I prefer them for State as well) gives the voters a lot of latitude. While many smaller parties do not get elected, they can sometimes play a decisive role in who wins a seat. Someone else might have those figures, but I am sure the number of MPs elected who were not first in primaries is quite high.
@Redistributed – I am not sure the Yanks consider the US Constitution as a religious document, but more so, they are trying to put religion into it. (At least one major party). These days, it seems that the US Constitution is somewhat flexible depending on who is in the White House and what they are trying to do…
I am not sure an expansion really matters until we get to the 2031 election cycle. By then, we will probably have a new Labor leader and 2-3 Liberal leaders. The voter pool will be much different then, and perhaps the mood of the electorate as well.
Clearly, tallyroom readers love a good referendum, me included. Breaking the nexus, enabling more MHRs means fun with redistributions, more seats to run statistics on – what’s not to like? However, I can’t see Labor calling for another referendum, nor the Coalition – Peter Dutton’s musing about a referendum to enable deportation of criminals who were dual-citizens was one of the more idiotic thought bubbles of the Coalition’s election campaign (which is saying something).
Without breaking the nexus, more MHRs requires more senators. Is either major party seriously likely to support an expansion of the Senate which would lower the threshold for minor parties to get elected?
Parliament could, theoretically, divide each State up into regions for Senate election purposes – but with the exception of Queensland and Tasmania, the demography of the States doesn’t lend itself to such an exercise.
An increased senate does reduce the threshold for being elected but it does not necessarily mean that minor parties would be the beneficiaries. From my rough reckoning, if there had been 7 seats per state up for grabs in May – The ALP would have gained an extra in NSW, WA and Tasmania. The Coalition one extra in Victoria and One Nation in SA . I think Gerard Rennick might have got the last seat in Queensland but not very clear as the ALP and LNP sat in a funny place and ON was low. If we still had Group voting in the Senate, it could get very hairy especially in a DD, who knows what would rise to the top. But Group voting is gone – thank goodness.
Is there any reason to oppose Senate terms being the same length as HoR terms so that each election is essentially a DD. Why should they have longer terms? It is very unfortunate that the number of Senators is tied to the House because there are already enough Senators. Why a state the size of Tasmania would need 16 senators is beyond me, and the fact that all states have the same number of senators is just wrong.
Can’t imagine many Tasmanians and Territorians would be all that happy with an expanded house that reduces their influence at elections.
Adam they have the same. Umber because it was a condition of federa4ion. To stop the bigger states from effectively dictating the laws to the smaller ones.
All states having the same number of senators made sense at the time of federation for state rights. Because Tasmania’s population growth has been slow since federation, there’s far more malapportionment in both houses that favour Tasmania.
@Mark Yore, decentralisation can help regional areas grow if their economies are diversified. A lot of the growing regional areas are dependent on one main industry e.g. mining, tourism, retirement villages. The capital cities and neighbouring cities e.g. Geelong, Wollongong, Gold Coast and coastal or near-coastal areas are where most of the growth are.
I agree that having better trained staff and technology to connect with a greater proportion of the election has been helpful. However, having larger electorates would mean more diverse communities of interest. Grey has Yorke Peninsula, the outskirts of Gawler just outside Adelaide, the Iron Triangle and the entire Outback. Because SA’s population growth is slow, removing a seat in metro Adelaide would make Grey a lot bigger.
Perhaps the most useful reason to expand Parliament, as previously identified by Ben, is to increase partisanship in the Senate. An even number of seats up for election often fails to produce partisan results. Despite Labor winning the House of Representatives in a landslide, the third Labor candidates for the Senate only won in Victoria and South Australia. Increasing the number of seats up for election from six to seven would resolve this issue. Such a small increase would also minimise the impact on Parliament itself, as just enough physical seats currently exist in the Senate and House of Representatives to accommodate the extra Senators and Members without modification. (Parliament claims the present capacity of the House of Representatives is 172, but I believe the actual figure is at least 174.) I’m optimistic this expansion will be legislated such that redistribution will commence immediately after the next federal election.
@Evelyn The expansion of the Senate in 1984 changed the maths. Instead of needing a majority of three out the five positions with 50%+1 of the vote, it required four out of the six, or just over 57.14%. In the time since it’s no longer strictly a binary vote, although the outcome seems to end up that way. Instead of 3 ALP (or 2 ALP and 1 Green) and 3 LNP, it’s more like 3 on the left (ALP, GRN, IND) and 3 on the right (LNP, ON, FF, etc). Some of the states (and the Territories) are different, but in general it tends to reflect a normal distribution.
@Votante Yes, a lack of diversity is prevalent in regional communities. The reasons for that are historical inertia – if you’ve been cane farming since the late 1800s then most of the activity in that area is based around that and any new businesses tend to support that; and population movement, where people don’t tend to move into an area if they’re not involved in the principal industry. Once the population gets large enough you end up with service industries that support the service industries and that tends to break the monoculture. The trick is to get over that population hurdle.
To a large extent the capital cities have a unique industry that isn’t available to smaller areas – government. That also tends to be self-reinforcing; suggesting that the Department of Tourism move to Cairns, or Mining to Mount Isa, is almost anathema. One of the reasons for that is that government exists mostly for the benefit of public servants instead of the industries that they regulate. And because the capital cities generally contain the majority of the population and the majority of electorates, that’s where the money gets spent. Which is a long-winded reason why the Department of Transport had major industrial pushback the last time it was suggested that they move from Spring Hill to Ipswich.
I agree with comments that no referendum to expand the life of Parliament to 4 years will succeed. The prospect of 4-year Senate terms, lowering quotas and perpetuating DDs, is frankly anathema and will be fiercely opposed – it was the reason that the Coalition Opposition in 1988 successfully sunk the referendum for 4-year terms. 8-year Senate terms on the other hand would incite populist opposition.
The failure of the 1967 referendum to break the 2:1 Reps/Senate nexus leaves that question “not only dead but damned”.
As for increasing the size of Parliament, the worst argument is the attempt to equalise the Tasmanian situation. Five lower enrolment seats out of 150 is not anti-democratic. And of course an enlarged Parliament means yet more Tasmanian Senators.
@marh, well said re the Demos survey. Australian voters are deeply suspicious of constitutional change, especially any project seen to advantage politicians.
The claim of a lack of office space for elected members in Parliament House, in event of expansion, is a red herring. I have worked in Parliament House for a backbencher. They have very roomy ofices, considering they are only there for 4 days a week for the sitting weeks of the year.
With some remodelling, backbenchers could share offices during sitting weeks. That problem solved easily, but there are a lot of other thorny problems with expansion already mention in the thread.
What are the thoughts for 5 year fixed terms with 5 year senate terms as well?
Yea not happening. The govt is not gonna change 6 year terms. To anything less. Having2 terms guarantees your have your MPs stay on if the tide turns against you. Otherwise if they’re electing 14 senators per state the quota is down to 7% that will only guarantee more minor parties get in over the majors. Constitutional change is hard a
Because people have a”if it ain’t broke don’t fix it attitude” the govt would really have to justify itself and make the case. And people don’t like having long terms because if they get sick of the govt 1 year into a second term they’re stuck with them for 4 more years.
The UK is a perfect example of this at the moment, although there’s an argument it’s good to give the government time to escape a post-honeymoon low.