Yesterday the Australia Electoral Commission published group voting tickets (GVT) for this year’s Senate election, indicating where parties have decided their preferences should flow. Pirate Party Australia is proud to announce that it has successfully completed this important stage of the election process.

In keeping with the Pirate Party’s committment to transparency and participatory democracy, this election the Pirate Party pioneered a form of preferencing unprecedented in Australian politics[1].

“Our approach had three phases. First, all parties were invited to provide our members with a message explaining why we should preference them. These were published publicly. Second, all members were asked to rank the parties according to how they should be preferenced. Finally, our members were asked whether any deals offered by other parties were acceptable,” said Simon Frew, President of Pirate Party Australia. “This made our preferences entirely democratic and transparent. Pirate Party Australia stands in a class of its own in this regard.”

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Preferencing Process

Pirate Party Australia has completed its preferencing for its first federal election. All group voting tickets (GVT) have been published on the Australian Electoral Commission’s website.

In keeping with the Pirate Party’s commitment to transparency and participatory democracy, this election the Party pioneered a form of preferencing unprecedented in Australian politics.

All parties were invited to provide members of Pirate Party Australia with a statement explaining why they deserve preferences. These statements can be found on the wiki.

After publishing the statements publicly, the members of Pirate Party Australia ranked all 53 registered parties according to how they should be preferenced.

A rundown of the process is as follows:

  • Party members were given a ballot listing the parties to be preferenced in an order predetermined by the Party’s Election Committee to be a good general order of preferences based on the Committee’s research. They were given three days to respond to the ballot.
  • The Committee used the preferencing order prior to the closing of the ballot in order to determine how to best go about negotiating preferences with other parties in order to get them to reciprocate the preference order determined by our members.
  • As soon as the GVT ballot closed, the deals ballot was put to our members.
  • 24 hours later, the deal results were determined and the other parties were informed.
  • The Election Committee met as soon as possible after receiving the Group Voting Tickets for each state and democratically determined any changes necessary to the GVT that were not possible to determine in advance.
    • The minutes of that meeting can be found here.
  • These results are now being published in this statement.

An example of the digital ballot that the members of the Party used to determine their preference order can be found here!

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The results of Pirate Party Australia’s recent National Congress are in!

Pirate Party Australia held its National Congress on July 13–14 for the purposes of amending the Party Constitution, amending and adopting policies, deciding leadership positions and preselection candidates, and as an opportunity for members of the Party to socialise in person. The results of the now-concluded week-long voting period can be announced. The Party had a 31% member turnout, and all motions passed.

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Pirate Party Australia is pleased to formally announce that the Party has decided on candidates in four states. The Party met last month to hear presentations from members seeking candidacy for the Senate this year. Nominations came from New South Wales, Victoria, Queensland, and Tasmania.

Brendan Molloy and David Campbell, Secretary and President of the Party respectively, will be competing in the election in New South Wales.

“Australia needs strong representatives that actually stand for principles. I intend to be that representative, pushing back on the encroaching surveillance state of data retention and Internet censorship, while offering positive and much needed reform for copyright, digital liberties and civil liberties,” said Brendan Molloy, lead candidate for New South Wales.

“For too long the electorate has been treated poorly by the incumbents, assuming that the voter will only choose between the big two parties. We offer Australians a real option for political change. I look forward to the public discourse, and hope everyone will join us in creating a better future for Australia.”

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Pirate Party Australia congratulates Pirate Party Iceland on its success in the Party’s maiden elections last weekend. Pirate Party Iceland was founded by Birgitta Jónsdóttir, an Icelandic parliamentarian, and other prominent Internet activists in late 2012.

In its first elections, the Party polled well, taking more than 5% of the vote, which in Iceland’s proportional electoral system equates to three Members of Parliament[1]. This marks the first time a Pirate Party has entered a national parliament. Worldwide, however, Pirates have been elected to many state and local positions, as well as the European Parliament.

“We are very proud of the hard work the Icelandic Pirates put into this election campaign,” said David W. Campbell, President of Pirate Party Australia. “Critics who suggest the Pirate movement is a fad should make room for some humble pie. This is an historic day for the Movement and for a new generation of politics. Waves are being made around the world to give a alternative voice on issues that have traditionally been the domain of corporate interests and career politicians.”

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