The Tally Room

A week after the AEC released the electoral boundaries, I have finally produced my Google Earth map of the boundaries. This took a lot longer than in the case of Queensland, but that's because I made a file that's much smaller and easier to...

So the federal government's Carbon Pollution Reduction Scheme was voted down today, with all non-government senators voting to block it. It appears clear that this bill will return later this year, with two weeks of sitting in late November presenting an opportunity. In order to...

I've been thinking a lot about the future of the Nationals, and I thought I would play through some scenarios regarding their future. When considering the losses of seats through redistribution and election losses in New South Wales, and the creation of the LNP in...

After today's announcement of the draft boundaries for New South Wales' federal redistribution, I thought I would summarise the consequences of the election. It appears that this result has clearly benefited the ALP in its attempts to increase the size of the majority, although, as...

The draft federal redistribution boundaries for NSW will be announced this morning. Unfortunately I'll be in work and won't be able to break the story (although generally it's best to wait until Antony Green crunches the numbers). I will hopefully be able to post...

Just to follow up on today's story, Northern Territory Labor defector Alison Anderson has announced she will become an independent and support a new Country Liberal government. This will be the first mid-term change of government, that I can think of, since John Curtin...

Two separate stories have emerged in the last few days of governments that could lose their majority with the resignations of their own party's parliamentarians. In the Northern Territory, Labor MP Alison Anderson has resigned from the party, and is yet to make clear which...

The issue of political donations and electoral funding has come to the fore again this week, with Queensland Premier Anna Bligh calling for a ban on political donations in the wake of criticisms of her government from anti-corruption figure Tony Fitzgerald. A call was similarly...

This morning, The Australian reported that the Labor Party is considering introducing non-compulsory voting for 16-year-olds as part of its second white paper. I think it's a great idea to allow 16 and 17 year olds to vote. We should, as a society, allow as...

So I'm still working on my UK House of Commons map, and I've reached the Scottish border! As the map below shows, I have now completed 7 of the 9 regions of England, after just finishing North West. I only have yet to do...