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We’re not in the business of telling our readers how to vote.
But we do share information which may colour that decision.
Canberra voters can usually be taken for granted to deliver one Liberal Senator and two Labor MP’s and one Labor Senator.
But with Tony Abbott so far ahead in this race that he’s putting policy lead in his saddlebag just to carry it over the line you all need to at least consider your Senate vote. (The strange birth and death of the internet filter being an illuminating case in point.)
If the ACT were to reject Zed Seselja in favour of Simon Sheikh it would very likely rob the Coalition of control in the Senate.
This website asks exactly one thing of Candidates for elections. That they take the time to answer ten questions put by our readers.
You can see the answers from candidates of all hues who respect you enough to have done so.
According to Google we had 173,287 unique visitors in the last month, almost all of them from the ACT.
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A candidate that does not take the opportunity to address, in as much length and detail as they choose, this audience is, in my opinion, treating the ACT electorate with contempt.
And remember, voting for a minor party will not waste your vote in Australia.
The Canberra Times has a much more long winded editorial on the subject if you’d like more detail:
The upper-house election gives Canberrans another opportunity to disrupt political norms. Psephologist Malcolm Mackerras said last month that a Senate vote in the ACT might be ”the most valuable vote in the country”; the only ballot that has the potential to prevent Mr Abbott from wielding complete power. At the same time, Canberrans will lose an experienced senator and proud advocate for the ACT, Gary Humphries, who was defeated in a messy and controversial preselection. He was the only Liberal to vote against the Howard government on a party-mandated ballot (on the matter of same-sex civil unions), because he refused to violate the ACT’s rights.
With Senator Humphries’s departure, Canberrans now have the perfect opportunity to break up the ACT’s cosy Labor-Liberal duopoly in the upper house, and in doing so place a cautionary brake on a likely Abbott government. A lack of a Senate majority is no barrier to good government; indeed, Mr Abbott must embrace compromise if he is to lead well.