Well Al, I know several people who fully intend put the Greens at no1 on their ballot paper, so your anti-Green protest has been cancelled out (plus) already.

Same with Family First to a lesser degree. Second last on my ballot. Last was Steven Conroy. A friend of mine who has already filled in her postal vote has put Conroy last followed from the bottom up by Family First and any other religious orientated people she could find. Her many close friends will do likewise, however most of them will, unfortunately, vote for the Coalition.

I don't think I could bring myself to vote informally, though I do wish we still had optional preferential voting so I could omit the candidates I really dislike. Just numbering them seems to validate them, even if it is number eleventy-one on a Senate paper.

For the Reps I'm putting our sitting member last - we are a safe seat and therefore ignored by the major Parties, so I'll be doing my bit to make the electorate a squeak more marginal. For the Senate, I'm thinking Greens, but I'll mull over their Senate preferences before deciding whether to vote above or below the line.

Can't wait for the whole shebang to be over. Gillard reminds me more and more of a Stepford wife - all bland and smiley with no substance - and I don't want a return to the Coalition. Or Labor. Oh dear.

Boazy

If a man has to make an issue out of being courteous:

"the green rep BEGGED for our vote... donchuworry..I was courteous :)"

David Boaz/Polycarp/Algoreisrich

only Runner has created more atheists than you.

And, yeah, will be voting Greens - BOTH houses.

Making MY protest count for something.

Helloooooow CJ. Welcome back.

<< All this clamouring by the disaffected for others to vote informally is really an expression of how ridiculous it is that voting is compulsory in Australia. If it wasn't, it wouldn't be an issue. >>

I disagree on two counts.

Firstly I think that every one of us of voting age (and of sound mind and who is not a major criminal serving a long sentence) should be required to vote, as we should have at least this basic level of responsibility to be involved with our democratic system and governance.

And secondly I don't think that voluntary voting would in itself prevent any of the issues that we now have with the voting system. In fact it could make it worse, because a very large portion of the population would feel even less inclined to be involved in any way.

I think I've asked you this before somewhere along the line, but - as a Greens member, can you suggest why no one in the Greens has really cried foul about compulsory preferential voting whereby most first votes given to the Greens will end up counting for one of the major parties and consequently people who understand CPV would be less inclined to vote for the Greens than they would be with an optional prefential system?

Ludwig, you have some good points there, except this one:

• thinks that neither of the two big parties are really worth voting for and that voting for one or other of them on the basis of whichever is considered to be the slightly less irksome is NOT a good enough reason for giving them their vote

It is important to encourage small parties, so even if not elected, they may know that they have some chance in some future. Voting formally also provides a small financial benefit for your first choice (I think it is around $2/vote). This can help small parties to recover some of their election expenses and stay above water.

Even if you do find one of the major parties lukewarm or not-so-irksome, you can still help a small party or an independent by placing them first.

Tim must get a kick out of pulling people’s leg.

It wasn’t fun for Albert Langer; it was jail, yes jail and lasting potential harassment still at tap for any one wishing him harm.

That jailing is evidence that the Judiciary, of which you Tim are a potential candidate, has no idea of the dictates of Logic.

Any man that has reached adulthood can perceive the contradiction in the statements: ‘Voting is Free’ and ‘Voting is Compulsory’. And if the Australian Supreme Court Judges refuse to recognise this contradiction, it is because they have to obey principles above Logic.

Unless the judiciary, has created a Logic for its own convenience, say a ‘Forensic Logic’, which takes us back to the previous postulate or more pointedly to: ‘Justice at the service of Power’; In Langer’s case Political Power.

So fellow Australians vote informal! It is the only form of protest against the corruption that pervades every level of our administration.