Corflutes, ukeleles and free units: what’s going on in the Australian election? | Australian election 2022

Athe protesters are going to the polls on Saturday, and the Labor party led by Anthony Albanese hopes to overthrow Scott Morrison’s coalition government and end nine years of conservative rule. Australian elections always have their vocabulary and concepts that sometimes confuse outsiders – nowhere else is that word karflut appear so often, including this year in the extremely Australian “stoush” over finishing people in pro corflutes. The 2022 campaign has added several new causes of potential confusion to the traditional recipe. Here’s the main thing you need to know.

Who are the main contenders?

To the disappointment of American political observers, the Liberals in Australia (the main party in the ruling coalition) are in fact conservative, and the lower house is made up of MPs, as in the UK, despite being called the US House of Representatives.

Australia has come a long way since Morrison performed a “miracle” victory in the 2019 election. During the two years of the pandemic, many Australians were banned from flying in or out of the country, and state capitals became major the most closed places on Earth. Mortality remained relatively low, but many believed that Fr. the federal government’s moral efforts to provide vaccines at an early date combined with the archaic quarantine system meant the pain lasted longer than it should have.

The nation has also been affected by natural disasters, including recent ones catastrophic floods and Black Summer 2019-20 when Morrison was despised for vacationing in Hawaii in the midst of forest fires. Both have sparked anger over the fact that Australia is pulling the chain on climate change, the most serious issue in the country’s policy in a decade.

Labor promised a somewhat more ambitious goal to reduce emissions, but the main battle in the campaign was over the cost of living crisis. Inflation reached 5.1% in the last quarter, which added to the economic strain of wage stagnation and one of the most insanely expensive housing markets in the world. The coalition also tried arm China’s assertive steps in the region against labor.

Morrison hopes he has convinced the electorate that this is so it is better to stay with the devil they knoweven so far self-recognition does not win hearts and minds.

Can anyone break the duopoly?

Albanians are not the only ones challenging the government. As evidence of growing frustration of petty liberal voters in traditionally safe large liberal urban seats, independent figures have received much media attention. Most notably, a number renewed, climate-oriented, predominantly female candidates threaten to overthrow high-ranking members of the government, focusing on voting “teal”, which for those who did not study at art school, is the color that is obtained when you mix blue and green. These are traditionally (blue) conservative liberal voters who are increasingly tired of inaction on environmental issues. If they win even a small number of seats, it could disrupt all the dynamics of power, which may force minority government.

The Greens are also hoping to pick up seatswhile the case of the United Australia party, generously funded by billionaire mining magnate Clive Palmer, has plagued the country – and In particular, Queensland – with its bright yellow ads promising voters all the riches of the earth (or at least unattainable interest rate cap). How much this will anger Australians, who feel they have failed the political system, remains to be seen.

Voting is mandatory

In ancient Greece, if you were a voter and missed a ballot, you would be fined and smeared with red paint as a sign of shame for renouncing your democratic responsibilities.

In 1924, the Australians decided that political impartiality was a personality trait rather than a constitutional right, and made voting compulsory for all. The disobedient face a $ 20 fine and figurative red paint if they are told to shut up every time they complain about the state of the nation, even though they did not care to vote. The risk of additional fines and even lawsuits for not filling out the ballot is there to give them an extra little push to get out of bed on Saturday morning.

This has allowed Australia to maintain one of the world’s highest voter turnout: in the last federal election in 2019, 92% of eligible voters voted. This election may be the most serious in recent yearsand even though many voters have found the campaign difficultthis figure is unlikely to change significantly.

Sausages for everyone

For those who need extra incentive to vote, there are carrots as well as sticks. These carrots take the form of sausages that volunteers serve on a piece of bread with onions, often raising funds for schools that typically serve as polling stations. Ordinary election day sausage or democratic sausage has become so synonymous with the process that a website democracysausage.orgexists to make sure your local polling station sells goods.

Benefits: It gets a little trickier

The tendency to clog your arteries with fleshy goodness is not the only factor that distinguishes elections in Australia. Voters are issued ballots to both the lower house (House of Representatives) and the upper house (Senate). In the lower house, they are required to list (at least) six of their most preferred candidates in order. The votes are then counted in the rounds in which the candidate with the lowest number of votes is eliminated and their votes are passed to the second choice of each voter. This is repeated until a winner is found among the last two candidates.

Preferential voting means that candidates who have no chance of getting a seat can still have a significant impact, and more importantly, it is impossible to waste your vote.

Australian Election Commission – Fr. Surprise breakthrough social media star campaign – does not matter when it comes to adhering to the principle that all votes should be counted where preferences have been clearly indicated. He confirmed that votes will be counted even if they are numbered in Roman numerals, or if they are accompanied by less than a restrained display of male genitalia, which is repeated for some Australian voters.

Above the line, below the line

Voting in the Senate is more difficult – if you want. Broadly speaking, voters can vote for parties in order of preference (“above the line”) or can number each individual candidate (“below the line”). In this election there is 75 candidates in New South Wales, an unusual figure. That’s where a a staggering array of minor parties hope to emulate the achievements Car enthusiasts party and others who in the past have found a way to be chosen with sophisticated preference strategies despite low levels of primary support.

For a truly challenging voting experience, voters who fall ill with Covid after the campaign’s last Wednesday (and therefore too late to fill out a mailing list) must fill out their ballots by phone. Good luck to all concerned.

Where does it include “free units” and ukelele?

Morrison later showed his talents on ukelele April Sun performance in Cuba in the “behind the scenes” profile for commercial television at the beginning of the campaign the tool was accepted by opponents as a symbol of his often banal attempts to create the image of an ordinary suburban guy.

Morrison later began calling Albanese a “free unit” to emphasize his gaps in memory and the alleged lack of policy coherence. Morrison may not have taken into account the fact that in a country where “liberation” is considered a patriotic duty, especially among young voters, receiving the label of “free unit” is in fact a sign of honor.