This page will be an alphabetical index of my posts on the various political parties and Independents running for the Senate in Victoria at the 2013 Federal Election. If you live in a state other than Victoria, you have my apologies, but I’m afraid I won’t be writing up any parties that aren’t running a candidate in Victoria. The reason for this is simple: I work full-time, study part-time, and am involved in several other extracurricular activities, and these write-ups take a considerable amount of time. Frankly, I’m going to be fairly pleased with myself if I manage to get through all 39 groups on the Victorian Ballot paper in time for the election on September 7 – attempting to cover parties and independents in other states is well beyond my current capacity! Hopefully, there will be enough overlap for this to be useful.
Having said all that, if you know of anyone who is writing about any of the other small parties or independents, please feel free to link to them in the comments for the information of others. I’m not going to make a blanket promise to add them to my list, but if I have time to read them and like the look of them, I will do so, with suitable acknowledgment.
Finally, if you are reading these posts with an eye to voting below the line on election day, allow me to draw your attention to a really useful site called Below The Line. If you enter your electorate, you get a list of candidates for your electorate with links to their political parties, and if you click on the ‘ballot editor’ button on the top right, you can go through the complete senate ticket, re-order the candidates to your liking, and print out your own personalised how to vote card to take to the polling booth on the day… so you don’t have to worry about losing track of your numbering. I think this is a fabulous resource, and well worth your time if you are a below-the-liner like me.
Oh, and if you are concerned about really *important* election issues, I recommend this site, which allows you to find out which polling booth near you has the most extensive sausage sizzle, cake sale, and school fair. You can even search for sausage sizzles with vegetarian options. Democracy at work…
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Australian Fishing and Lifestyle Party (AFLP)
Australian Motoring Enthusiast Party (AMEP)
The Australian Republicans (RPA)
Building Australia Party (BAP)
Bullet Train for Australia (BTA)
Citizens Electoral Council (CEC)
Help End Marijuana Prohibition (HEMP)
Katter’s Australian Party (KAP)
Liberal / The Nationals (LIB / NAT)
Nicholls Bob / Nicholls, Kylie / Webb, Peter
No Carbon Tax Climate Sceptics (TCS)
Secular Party of Australia (SPA)
Socialist Equality Party (SEP)
Thanks so much for this Catherine! This is my first ‘below the line’ election and your summaries have been a really great help.
You are most welcome! And enjoy voting! There’s something very satisfying about voting below the line. Whatever side of politics you are on, it’s pleasing to reflect that, well, there really is a worse alternative than whoever got in – after all, there are truly terrifying individuals on all sides of the political spectrum, and the major political parties, while not rising to the most inspiring heights, at least have the virtue of mediocrity rather than heroic awfulness.
Like, this is sooooo good. Somehow this needs to be made compulsory reading for all sane Victorians. I discovered your research when googling ‘Beth Matthews senate.’. I was just to find out who is who on the senate ticket like you have already done. (Now its taking much longer than planned..I hope I get through it all before my postal vote is due)
Wow, that’s quite a compliment, thank you! And yes, I fear that conciseness is not one of my virtues. Good luck getting your vote sorted. I’m figuring mine out this evening.
This is magnificent. And made our lives much easier over here in S.A., as well.
Did you need a magnifying glass too?
Not quite, but there was a lot of sliding the paper up and down the walls of the voting booth…
Its unfortunate I did not come across this blog before Election day. It would have been great to know which polling booth near me had the most extensive sausage sizzle bbq.
I invite you to checkout my blog on how Facebook could have predicted the Election Result.
http://felipeinb346.wordpress.com/2013/09/21/facebook-predicted-the-federal-election
Thanks