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Yeah thats right, I think in Australia your vote basically means nothing.

• sthnblllII 6y ago
  You are certainly correct if you vote for the center-left or center-right parties. But that is true in all western states. Are you familiar with French politics? For all the crap Americans give them about surrendering in the world wars, the french have had the courage to sideline both their center right and center left parties and now the biggest parties are nationalist and socialist.
• zizee 6y ago
  This is not true. Federal senators are elected on a state wide basis with the top N candidates past the post (N depending on size of the state). This can result in Senators being elected with a very small % of the overall votes. For the lower house, we've had many years of the balance of power in the hands of a small number of independents who get an outsized voice. Yes, if you live in an non-swing electorate, that is strongly held by the incumbent, then you could argue that your vote doesn't matter, but only because there are more people voting for something else. Isn't that how things are meant to work?
  • taneq 6y ago
    All of this is true, but it ignores the fact that the two major parties pretty much agree on many important issues (such as government monitoring of internet traffic). Also the fact that (especially with a hung parliament which we've had for years) independents get an outsized voice is a bit of a two-edged sword. It's far more luck than anything else that determines who's in that vote-tipping seat and sometimes they demand all sorts of special-interest stuff in order to let things through.