Liberals struggle with accuracy on Greens preferences
Considering the Liberal party team are poised to take government in NSW in 2011, they need to meet standards and accuracy should be at the top of the list.
Liberal MP for Castle Hill Michael Richardson's letter in the SMH on Greens' preference decisions contains comments that are inaccurate.
In the 2007 election Labor won comfortably and Greens preferences were not significant in determining who won government. I did not make the statement Mr Richardson attributed to me. I do not determine Greens preferences. We have a democratic process for our decision-making
In the SMH article I wrote about the dysfunctional state of the NSW Labor government, and that while a recall could be an option to solve the problem, changing the system to proportional representation would be of more long-term benefit to the state.
The outcome of the 2007 state election highlights the need for the change. Labor received 56 per cent of the Lower House seats off only 39 per cent of the primary vote. Mr Richardson's statement that this was the result of “Greens directing preferences to Labor” is not accurate.
In the 2007 NSW election the Greens preferenced Labor in about 20 marginal seats, (depending on your definition of marginal), and did not preference any major party in about 10 marginal seats. Labor won government easily, and of those 20 marginal seats there were perhaps only two or three seats where the Greens party direction of preferences made the difference to the result. An independent won the normally safe Labor seat of Lake Macquarie with the help of Greens preferences.
The discrepancy in Labor's 39 per cent of the vote winning 56 per cent of the seats arises because under the Lower House electoral system the Greens 9 per cent of the vote, or more than 350,000 votes was rewarded with no seats. Collectively other minor parties suffered a similar result.
Our democracy still has plenty of room for improvement. At least the Upper House electoral system results in parties winning no more seats than they deserve, hence no major party has a majority in that house.
In his letter, Mr Richardson also asked why the Greens didn’t give their preferences to the Liberals. He should know that the Coalition's track record on climate change, and other environment and social justice issues makes it virtually impossible for the Greens to preference them.
Thankfully in NSW we have the option of not preferencing any major party.
