> we have compulsory attendance at voting booths for eligible citizens, you can spoil your paper or walk away but we enforce with a fine, participation in the one obligation of citizenship
Then my refusal to vote should be counted. If enough people refuse to vote then the entire election should be cancelled and new candidates found. Otherwise this is a ridiculous catch 22 of state bullying to no actual purpose. Who would even think to create such a law?
Which country doesn't count spoiled or blank votes? And the whole "cancel the election and find new candidates" is pretty pointless when anyone can start a political party of their own and participate in the election.
> Which country doesn't count spoiled or blank votes?
The USA. We have districts where turnout is as low as 25% of eligible voters.
> anyone can start a political party of their own and participate in the election.
You don't get federal funding and the FCC doesn't force networks to cover your party or include you in debates until you win 5% on a national platform. Have fun actually doing this. Which was the only reason I voted for Nader. I wanted the greens to have a standing in the US. It's never even come close to happening since.
> "cancel the election and find new candidates"
Then your political parties will engage in a race to the bottom with you. You don't sense this already happening?
Spoiling your paper shows that you got off your arse and voted to say "I don't want any of these people". (See the number of spoilt votes in the UK Police and Crime Commissioner elections for a prime example of this; many in the UK disagreed with politicising the police and spoilt their papers in protest)
By simply not voting, the assumption is you are either lazy or simply don't care...... And as a result, the politicians will not care either.
> See the number of spoilt votes in the UK Police and Crime Commissioner elections
The candidate was still elected with a turnout of 15.3%. This is farcical to give this person a mandate where they clearly earned none. Shouldn't the parties get off their arse and pick better people for office? I'm busy and I pay taxes. What are you hassling me for?
> the assumption is
Assume whatever you like.
> the politicians will not care either.
I hate to be flip, but your entire tenor has brought it out of me, and this is the hardest to take. Then why would else would they run for office? They need my approval by engaging in a national cargo cult ritual to function properly? You accept this from your "leadership?"
It'd be a pity to get heated up over a misunderstanding of the Australian election system.
OP said (somewhat confusingly I admit):
>[Australia has] compulsory attendance at voting booths for eligible citizens, you can spoil your paper or walk away but we enforce with a fine,
and I think you understood that to mean:
>Australian citizens must choose: drop a valid ballot in the box or be fined
but I think what OP intended was (and this is consistent with the Australia Electoral Commission website [0]):
>Australian citizens must choose: drop a ballot (spoiled is fine) in the box or be fined
(As an aside - one WILL get fined if one appears the polling place but refuses to drop a ballot in the box - see [1].)
Then, believing (incorrectly) that casting a spoiled ballot incurs the fine, you said "Then my refusal to vote should be counted [for the system to be anywhere near reasonable, given that I went to the polling place and exercised my civic duty to the extent permitted by my moral fiber, fully expecting to be fined for it]" (emphasis and context added).
And Australia does keep track of how many "informal votes" (their term for what we're calling spoiled ballots here) are cast. See [2] for an official results page breaking out informal votes by count and percent. But informal votes have no bearing on the election results; they are thrown out and only the valid votes contribute to the result.
So I think you're fundamentally asking for the "informal votes" to have a first-class mechanism for contributing to the election result (specifics TBD, maybe a threshold to meet, maybe an disqualification of the candidates for a period of time, maybe a re-do, whatever).
And that's a valid ask and an interesting discussion to have!
But given that the reason you asked for that was based on a misunderstanding, do you even still want that? Do you still think the AUS system is unreasonable as-is?
>Under the Electoral Act, the actual duty of the elector is to attend a polling place, have their name marked off the certified list, receive a ballot paper and take it to an individual voting booth, mark it, fold the ballot paper and place it in the ballot box.
>Because of the secrecy of the ballot, it is not possible to determine whether a person has completed their ballot paper prior to placing it in the ballot box. It is therefore not possible to determine whether all electors have met their legislated duty to vote. It is, however, possible to determine that an elector has attended a polling place or mobile polling team (or applied for a postal vote, pre-poll vote or absent vote) and been issued with a ballot paper.
in Krosch v Springell, at the polling place, Mr Springell handed the presiding officer a note saying, paraphrased, "none of these candidates deserve my vote". He was fined, because it could be proven that he didn't uphold the "duty of the elector" as defined in [0].
You can pay the fine or spoil your paper. If significant numbers do this, it will be reported publicly.
As it is though, people tend to vote for one of the parties on offer, of which there are many. And as it's also preference voting, Australia is not stuck in the trap of "better vote for A or B will get in" either. You can vote for C, with a fallback to D, E and F before putting in A as a back-stop.
Who knows? The numbers that choose to take this action are pretty small so there’s no particular driver for any political reaction. Turns out if you make people show up, most of them decide they do want to vote.
We also have a lot of choice of parties here which helps. Shame the same 2 majors keep getting in but the smaller parties and independents do take some seats.
Then my refusal to vote should be counted. If enough people refuse to vote then the entire election should be cancelled and new candidates found. Otherwise this is a ridiculous catch 22 of state bullying to no actual purpose. Who would even think to create such a law?